Colours!

It is Holi! 

Trying to take a picture of people playing holi, splashing and spraying colours on each other was quite a challenge today. I saw a few people outside The Park, wearing once-white t-shirts in different shades of pink, green and yellow. There was no way I was going to go near them, not in my white shirt. 

I thought I'd have to give up the idea of posting today's colours, but the better half came to my rescue. She had a few pictures of the kids (and some adults too!) in our apartment complex playing holi in the evening. They seem to have had some great fun!

 

Festival returns

The Sundaram Finance Mylapore Festival got back after a 2-year break and yesterday was the last day of this edition. 

Having been away from Chennai over the weekend, I do not have any photos of this year's festival to offer. You should be able to find quite a few of those here, eventually. 

What I have for you is a picture from the festival a few years ago; this year's kolam competition was (as usual, I guess) restricted to 75 participants. The whole of North Mada Street would have been given over to these traditional designs - only pulli kolams are allowed!

Chariot at rest

We have read of the Parthasarathy Temple earlier, with its tower in the distance, or about its chariot festival. And we also got to see the chariot's wheels up close. 

So here is the chariot itself, decked out with the thombais and the thoranams, the final touches being put in place by the priests.

I've always felt that, much more than for any chariot festival of other temples, the one at the Triplicane must be special. After all, the deity is Himself a chairoteer, right?

Book wall

The Hindu's "LitForLife 2017" kicked off today at the Sir Mutha Venkata Subba Rao Concert Hall. It was quite a full house today, with Dr. Shashi Tharoor on stage; after his session, a large chunk of the crowd followed him outside, to the author pavilion where he was signing copies of his latest book. 

On the way back after getting the autograph, spotted this book wall. Couldn't help thinking it would have been better with people - kids, especially - standing up close and reading these. And then, we saw that there were spaces at the Hall where you could sit down and read, and in fact, swap books for the day. 

That's nice - look forward to being back there tomorrow!

Peacock dance

Dusk falls at the Kapaleeswarar Temple. The temple gopuram is outlined with lights, which is not unusual. But what is unusual is the stage in front, and the dancers. 

We are back at the Mylapore Festival and on the last day of the festival, we caught a version of the mayilattam; the dance of the peacocks, the birds the place is named after!

Merry Christmas

The Wesley Church on Whites Road survived Cyclone Vardah with little damage to the main building. But outside, almost all the trees along its walls have been uprooted; the wall along Westcott Road has given away completely. 

The walls will be built again. The trees will be re-planted, and will grow big and strong again. But right now, these are minor inconveniences that worshippers will have had to suffer today. And there will be many of them coming here today. Faith will not be buffeted by a cyclone or two, not when it has survived for 2016 years - merry Christmas, everybody!

Fest-eve

The last weekend of the Mylapore Festival for this year. The square in front of the Kapaleeshwarar Temple was quite packed with people waiting to listen to the nadaswaram performance. This was only a small part of the over 50 thousand people who passed through the Mylapore Festival. 

Are you planning to be there next year?

Artists and subject

One of the attractions at the Mylapore Festival was the chance to get your portrait sketched. That's normal. There were a few artists who would also make a caricature. All of them had enough patrons; there was a queue waiting to have their portraits - or caricatures - drawn. And then, in the midst of all those artists, was a circle of artists who were doing something that seemed quite odd. All of them were focussed on sketching just one person - what is it that they were doing? Or, who was he?

Music everywhere

It is the music season in Chennai. If you thought it meant only concerts in halls, think again. Performances can be seen outside the hall as well. Here is a group gathered outside the Kapaleeshwarar temple, singing paasurams. 

You may be able to see such a group at other times of the year, but that would be a lone swallow. It is during that month of Margazhi that several such groups go around the temple, singing devotional songs - and that's what makes the music season here!

Merry Christmas

That's the spire of the Egmore Wesley Church - in 2015, it will celebrate its 110th anniversary. The stylized six-pointed star on its steeple could refer to any of several symbols associated with such stars. For today, however, we shall think of it as the Star of Bethlehem, shall we?

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Screen festival

In 2003, a bunch of cinema lovers in Chennai formed the Indo Cine Appreciation Forum (ICAF) and staged the first Chennai International Film Festival (CIFF). After the first few years, the state government also lent its support to this festival and since 2008, the CIFF has been hosted with 'official' approval. The 12th CIFF started off on December 18 and will close on Christmas Day. 

This year, the CIFF is being played across four screens in the city: at Casino, at the two screens at Woodlands and at one of the INOX's screens and also at the Russian Cultural Centre. A quick look at the screening schedule tells us there are about 30 countries from where films are being screened - they include familiar names like the USA, UK, Russia and also a couple of surprising ones like Ethiopia, Finland and Kazakhstan. All told, over 80 films are packed into the week. 

The photo shows the Woodlands / Symphony cinema. Decked up with flags and buntings, it is evident that it is hosting a festival. Unlike the typical blockbuster release festivals, there are no 80-ft cutouts of stars or big banners announcing a film. The posters are small and you will need to look closely to identify the movies themselves. Woodlands is also hosting an exhibition - a series of photographs of stand-alone cinema halls by a couple of German photographers. Those photos were lovely, reminding us of a time when not only the movies, but the venues screening them were also works of art!

Lingaa

Contrived, yes. 

But I don't have any other picture to mark the birthday of Chennai's Superstar. His latest movie releases in India today and my Facebook timeline is flooded with pictures of the man, and several friends, young and old, either gushing about how they managed to get "FDFS" (First Day First Show) tickets or growling about those who did.

Happy birthday, Rajinikanth! Or maybe the other way around? 

Door lamp

No, this is not how we usually light up the doorway or the foyers in Chennai. Just that it is the second day of Karthigai, the festival of lights, in this part of the world. 

May the lights shine bright for everyone through the year! 

Men at rest

The theme for today - for City Daily Photobloggers around the world - is "Worker". (Somehow, thinking about it reminds me of that song, "Land down under", but that is a different story.) Anyway, turns out I don't have too many pictures of people, let alone people at work. 

And so this one: the dancers and the musicians had been at work, obviously, entertaining visitors to the crafts bazaar at Kalakshetra. Just around the time I got near them, all of them had taken a break - and so gave me a just-past-the-theme picture for today!

Playful pundits

These kids are all dressed up to be a part of the procession reciting the nalayira divya prabandham at the chariot festival of Sri Narasimha Swamy at Triplicane. Once the procession started, it was difficult to spot these kids - they were lost in the fringes as the older men took over the vanguard of the procession.

While they were waiting, the boys were doing what every Indian boy would do. Discuss cricket. Demonstrating the art of bowling. And maybe reciting the vedas while doing so; that is not unusual, at least not for Triplicane's cricketers!

Elephant in the room

In the middle of the mall, actually. The elephant made of papier mache and plaster of paris stands in the middle of the Express Avenue mall. All decked up in anticipation of the festival season. 

The ambari on the elephant's back carries an image of the Goddess Lakshmi. With the shopping season in full swing, guess both images are needed for the visitor - Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth to provide the moolah and an elephant to cart away all the stuff that would be bought during the season!

Wheels

Jagannath and Parthasarathy are but two manifestations of Krishna, an avatar of Vishnu. One of them has given a word to the English lexicon. A word that was used by Charlotte Brontë in Jane Eyre, and by Robert Louis Stevenson to describe Mr. Hyde trampling over a child. 

There. Even without the clue, you would have guessed by now that I am talking about 'Juggernaut', which came from a description of the chariot of Puri Jagannath, at the wheels of which, it was claimed, Hindus sacrificed themselves. 

These wheels, though, are from the chariot of the Parthasarathy temple at Triplicane. They may not be as big as that of Jagannath; yet, you had better be careful to not get in their way, upon pain of creating a synonym of juggernaut!

Pujo!

Umapathy Street in West Mambalam is so narrow that two cars have to slow down to a crawl to get past each other without scraping paint. And if a vehicle comes in from a side street - say, J.P. Street - in a little bit of a hurry, it would cause a gridlock that would make Kolkata proud. And it should, too, for this is where a teeny-weeny bit of Kolkata pops its head up in Chennai. 

The Madras Kali Bari Temple was inaugurated on February 3, 1981. It does not have the gopurams typical of Tamil Nadu temples, but is a nine-spired tower, in the Navaratna style of Bengali temple architecture. All nine spires are on a single tower, spread over two levels - or three, if you consider the tallest, single spire as a separate level. The other two levels are kind of concentric squares, with a spire at each corner. In that design, the Madras Kali Bari takes inspiration from the Dakshineswar Kali Temple near Kolkata. A magnet for Bengalis of Chennai, the temple is especially crowded during the Durga Puja season, giving the area an additional layer of traffic, and an enhanced Kolkata touch.

Inside, the meditation hall in front of the sanctum has been converted into a puja pandal. On ashtami day today, the pandal was full. There were enough locals in the crowd - but there was very little to be heard of any language other than Bengali. And though there was a separate area housing the Golu, the focus was on Ma Durga!

Happy Onam!

Can't call it the Onam day celebrations, because, for one, Onam is a multi-day festival and for another, this happened yesterday, the Uthradam day. Ente Keralam had put together an Onam sadya along with a performance of Ottamthullal. 

Even though it was supposed to be for the patrons of the restaurant, the performance was staged just outside it. Passing by, the traffic was thick enough for me to get more than a glimpse of the dance, even if I wasn't able to make out the lyrics. 

Happy Onam, everyone!

Gokulashtami

The ninth avataram of Vishnu was the one who knew of his Godliness right from his birth, unlike the earlier avatarams who were completely ignorant of their divine spark. Krishna knew that he was a God and was not exactly shy of showing off. Stories about his childhood are legion and these stories are recalled today, as much of the country celebrates his birth with much festivity today.

Most of the celebrations in Chennai are of the "at home" variety. The common theme is the outline of the boy Krishna's footsteps as he trails them after knocking down the pots of butter - and then there are all the eats to be had, the music to be listened to, all of which celebrate Krishna's carefree boyhood rather than his life as an adult. 

For this day, here is a painting of Krishna with Yashoda, his foster-mother. There are several representations of this duo, but this is not one of the more common ones. But it is by Raja Ravi Varma, the man who single-handedly gave a face and form to most Gods and Goddesses of the Hindu pantheon. This oil-on-canvas can be found in the Chennai museum, along with a few others of Ravi Varma's canvases. Go on, enjoy the day!