Petals!

I picked up Viv Smith's book, 'I can help recycle rubbish' and felt secretly pleased with myself. I like to recycle a lot of materials to create birthday cards, wrapping paper and make little gifts out of them. I also like to use these materials for my five year old son's school projects .  Here's an interesting paragraph from the book: "The paper you write on was once a tree that stood in a forest. Trees are cut down, taken to a paper mill. The wood is cut up and turned to pulp to make paper. We need to use the earth's resources sensibly so that there is enough left for the people who come after us." Meaning of Recycling "To recycle to make something new out of something that has been used before." What can be Recycled? Here are somethings I like to recycle: Price tags of clothes are used as bookmarks. Glossy supplements, glossy ads and leaflets are saved either to make b'day cards or to create something that is t...

Dear Friends, Hope you had a wonderful Christmas with family members and loved ones. For me, it was one of the best Christmas days I've had in quite some time because it was mostly about yummy food. I know that it is not what Christmas is about but this time, I let go and became a total foodie thanks to hunger pangs, so to speak:) Lunch was just divine, so I stuffed myself. There was lovely red wine that sparkled and tasted like bliss with every sip. The plum cake had the distinct taste of rum and it was yummylicious!  Fish cutlets topped my favorite dish of the day. They seemed to melt and yet be crisp when you bit into the texture of it. Then, there was fluffy, hot appams, vegetable pulav, mutter paneer, chicken do pyaz, mutton curry, mixed vegetables in dark oyster sauce, crisp pappadams that crackled with every bite and of course, the pristine raita. Piping hot paalada is what I had at the end of this awesome Christmas feast. Obviously, I was stuffed like a turkey by the...

If a keyboard is left on my desk long after I’m gone, it will be no more than four years old. It will have no patina, no aura, nothing more than my fingerprints on it. All the more reason to get to work and leave behind a stout body of writing. – Latha Anantharaman (The Hindu, 21 st Dec 2011) When my dad noticed that I (five years old at the time) wrote poetry, essays and short stories, he changed the plan of Sai Prema, our house that was being constructed in Palluruthy in Kochi . He added a big room and called it ‘the writer’s room and library.’ He said, “Writers need to be in their own private world, where the intrusions of the external world do not penetrate their process of creation.” Dad spared no effort in getting the best for that room. He installed a beautiful wall-to-wall rosewood library that crowned the spacious, library room. All my collection of books, hundreds of them right from the time I was a child, are showcased there in that library. And for me, Dad got ready ...

At the start of the day , I thought about cities and wondered. Do cities and places have souls like we do? Or so, I’ve always felt when I think of my love for Kochi though people say it is fast becoming a place that is flawed and devoid of what it once represented to its residents. When I read Orhan Pamuk’s words, it struck me that I was not nutty at all. In fact, he thinks the same too. “There are two ways of looking at cities. The first is that of the tourist, the newly arrived foreigner who looks at the buildings, monuments, avenues and skylines from outside. There is also the inside view, the city of rooms in which we have slept of corridors and cinemas and old classrooms, the city made up of the smells and lights and colors of our most cherished memories. To those viewing them from outside, one city can seem much like the next, but a city’s collective memory is its soul and its ruins are its most eloquent testimony.” How do you view/experience your city? 

Start of the Day, I couldn't imagine that it is almost the end of a year. It's hard to believe that it is already December 2011. Seems like yesterday or maybe a few months ago that the year 2011 had been welcomed. How time 'flies - that was my first thought when the realization struck me. And you know what, I can't wait for this year to end. Yes, like many of you, I too love December for a variety of reasons. The festive spirit of Christmas, the scent of home made wine, raisin and plum cakes, the decorating of Christmas tree, the choir singing, the joy of waiting for a new year to unfold - its a heady season indeed. It's also the best time to contemplate on the year that was. For me, personally, 2011 has been a most difficult year to sail through, the tests and tribulations were unexpected, painful and difficult. But I think its made me a stronger person spiritually.  I've read somewhere in Sri Paramahansa Yogananda's writings as follows, "You...