Category: Delhi

Designing, fabricating and executing an exhibition display is an accomplishment unlike print or digital projects. It is physically sapping and mentally exhausting since one gets very limited time to complete it. Some venues have their own inherent problems and restrictions adding to the pressure of timely completion. Despite all that, it is very satisfying when the display takes shape and the client appreciates the outcome. This one was one of the cold winter nights last month. The project was for a global institution engaged in Public Health advocacy and communication. In the Imperial Hotel Ballroom that is Queen Victoria (looking rather glum and not agreeable to a dance with me), and thats sleepy me trying hard not to look glum after being told that the bar and the restaurants are shut. Why can’t a coffee shop serve rum & coffee? 

The hail was unrelentingly brutal for over two hours in Gurgaon yesterday. Unprotected plants and trees bore the brunt and fury of hard hitting marble sized hail which destroyed even hardy shrubs. Long winding Bougainville which was heavy and loaded with flowers was disrobed and now hangs broken and humiliated. The rubber fig and the kadamb trees were pelted with bullet-like ferocity punching holes through their leaves. All our spring beauties have suffered. While the hail chose cozy corners to accumulate and show-off the storm left a trail of destruction in the lawn. 

Excited and grateful. After the Punjabi and Urdu language editions, finally the Hindi edition of ‘Yaar Mera Haj Kara De’ has been released (Setu Prakashan – link in comments). Besides these three, a Shahmukhi language edition was published in Lahore by Kitab Trinjan. Four language editions in three years… couldn’t have asked for more.

https://www.setuprakashan.com/book.php?id=9789393758170

Recent additions to our ashtray collection. When smoking was not a taboo and warnings were not splashed on every leaf in the town, even PSUs distributed an ashtray as a new year gift. I have one from Air India and now this one from Shipping Corporation. Article Nos. 142 and 143. Progress has been rather slow in the last three years. BTW does anyone have the Indian Railway ashtray of the good old days when you could smoke in the compartment. Remember, it was a bowl-shaped thing (fixed in a ring) that one could turn upside down to empty it. If anyone knows where to get one, please DM me. Smoking is injurious to health but collecting ashtrays or matchboxes is not. 

 These three flat-top, black granite table-rocks stand guard on south-western edge of the sparsely populated flatland called Trimbak. It is more of a wilderness dotted with small settlements called villages. Popularly referred to as Brahmagiri range, in whose lap about two kilometers uphill, originates a stream believed to be the source of Godavari river. Trimbakeshwar temple, lying at its foothill, replicates these three lingas in its sanctum sanctorum, representing Shiva, Vishnu, and Brahma. However, inside the temple the lingas are not visible on or over the surface but are sunken in the hollow under the Yoni formation—constantly fed by frothy white mix of milk, butter, curd, honey and water— the abhishekam is performed by local brahmins only or sometime by a special devotees chosen by them. The white ‘holy liquid’ passes through the nimble fingers of a pandit reciting mantras while constantly rubbing and caressing the ‘living rocks’. This liquid, taken as ‘amrit prasad’, represents life force, virility, and the fluid from the conjugation of Shiva and Shakti. In the temple bazaar almost all the shops sell Pedas, Milkcake, and Khoa/Mawa as local ‘prasadam’. Wonder how much of the temple liquid goes through the fire to make those sweets. Trimbakeshwar temple’s gopuram and vimana are made from black rock mined from this hill.