[HerStory Recommends] Rock on with Bohemian Rhapsody and travel the world with this 23-year-old girl – our top picks of the week

This week, in HerStory Recommends, Trevor Noah taught us more ways to laugh and a 23-year-old gave us lessons on how far someone can go to achieve our dreams.

Laughter and life lessons

The host of The Daily Show and stand-up comic, Trevor Noah comes up with another brilliant presentation, Son of Patricia. But if you haven’t watched Afraid of the Dark, please watch that first and whatever else you can find on YouTube on Trevor Noah, and then savour this one. A laugh riot from the word go, Son of Patricia takes you through many facets of Noah’s life – funny anecdotes, on-the-spot impersonations, and “seriously” funny takes on life in South Africa. Before we give away any further, the show’s name comes from a special lesson his mum taught him as a child. Growing up in apartheid South Africa to an African mum and a Swiss father, she taught him to face racist slurs by redirecting his anger. Noah has carried this lesson throughout his life and we believe this is what makes him an incredible human being. Go watch Son of Patricia now. It makes you laugh and makes you think.

(Son of Patricia, now streaming on Netflix)

Around the world with a backpack

This week’s short book review is a lesson in understanding your dreams, desires, and how far you are willing to go to achieve them. At just the age of 23, Shivya Nath quit her corporate job to travel the world. But let me warn you that this is no ordinary travel memoir. The Shooting Star – A Girl, Her Backpack and the World is a story that begins from the foothills of Dehradun, a corporate life in Singapore, an uncertain freelancer’s life in Delhi and then travelling all over the world with a backpack. While the journey is not just about the places Shivya has been to but what the experiences she received in return – from hiking in alone in the Ecuadorian Andes, rolling tortillas with her Mayan hostess, being mugged in Costa Rica and many more. It celebrates the human spirit, in all its forms, idiosyncrasies and wonders.

(The Shooting Star – A Girl, Her Backpack and the World by Shivya Nath, Penguin India.)

We will, we will rock you

I was discussing music with our 18-year-old intern a couple of months ago, and she brought up Queen and said Bohemian Rhapsody is one of her favourites. I was not surprised… The song was released a few years after I was born and introduced to me by an ex-colleague 10 years older than I. So, it goes without saying, that this blockbuster has transcended different generations to become a universal favourite. So the recently-released Bohemian Rhapsody is a must-watch not just because you are a Queen fan, but for also for Rami Malek’s brilliant portrayal of the band’s icon Freddie Mercury, his charisma, his insecurities, his frailties, et al. Though not much of Mercury’s early life is touched upon, watch it for how a band still moves generations to tears, and that in itself is the biggest achievement, isn’t it?

(Bohemian Rhapsody running in theatres.)