Showing posts with label Collage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Collage. Show all posts

Diary of the Chennai Traveller - Day 6

Well... I'll say that it was a day well spent... since I am on a holiday.. it only makes sense to chill up and enjoy, isn't it?

Anyways after a late breakfast...Arushi and I went to a church here. This church is one of the oldest churches in India...and it enjoys a great deal of importance in the Christain community... coz apart from St. Peter's in Vatican and St. John's in Rome... this is the only Church that has been built on the Apostle of Jesus Christ. This church is called St. Thomas Basicila. Its a huge church and they have an underground shrine of St. Thomas. The foundation of the church have been laid on this shrine. This is also an Museum that you can visit... there is a lot of stuff that makes all the conspiracy theorists think...

Well... when you think about South India... you are often mislead about the food... there is a huge variety of south indian food... and Kerelian food...has no dosas and sambhars... its so different and amazingly yum... and for authentic kerala food... you must check out Ente Keralam. Its situated at Arington Road... another small lil restaurant... but great food.

Chennai... doesnt have malls...it doesnt need any... coz most of the single shops are spread over three floors... and the poor mall is very small indeed. Its called the City Center... and has an Inox in it. I went and saw a strictly ok movie - Race... watch it at your own risk. The good part was that the theatre was built very beautifully!

Lets see... if I am able to surf tomo at Marina Beach... Ciao... cheers....

Diary of the Chennai traveller- Day 5

After a very active weekend... I had a very slow start to my week... I got up late and literally had nothing much to do...

Though... I must add that down here in south it is very difficult to find good punjabi food... and the choices limit themselves when it comes to ordering vegetarian food... coz here its just the dosas and idli. A restaurant that defies this all is - Creamy Center. This place is bustling with crowd even on a Monday afternoon... and the food is amazing... the Menu is completely vegetarian and its not south indian. I must add that they have amazing chole bhature... and you must try their special biryani.
The evening was spent in some working out... and yeah... the pics so far are great... I'll post em as soon as am back... 
So now I am gonna snuggle and watch a movie with family... wow what a Day...!!! cheers...

Diary of the Chennai Traveller- Day 3 & Day 4

I have just had dinner... after a long drive back home...

My weekend was spent in a town that was developed by the French when they settled in this part of the world...

Yes, Pondicherry... now known as Puducherry... ( I hate this name changing thingy... ). This li'l town is situated about 3.5 hours away from Chennai.. it's around the East Coast Road.

In between Pondicherry and Chennai - stands another lil settlement called Mahabalipuram. This place is preserved by the Archaeological Survey of India... and trust me - the architecture that you get to see here is unbelievable. Krishna's butter-ball... is a huge stone shaped in a ball... and is balanced on a slope w/o any external help... wondrous, isn't it? And then there is a Shivalinga inside a cave with beautiful figureens carved.

If carvings and temples are not your taste then you can check out the beach that is very well maintained... and if you can shell out a few bucks extra then you can have your own part on the beach by way of the premier resort that is situated at the starting of Mahabalipuram.

Divine is Humanity... more Divine is to serve this humanity... this is the motto that was given by Shri. Aurobindo. One of the disciples of Aurobindo was a french woman who is now known as The Mother. Long after Shri. Aurobindo was dead... she set up a place called Auroville. Auroville is situated 10kms before Pondicherry. This Ashram houses about 2000 people out of which 60% are foreigners... and the rest, Indians. I have never seen so many foreigners working in a remote village and running cottage industries to earn themselves a living. The Ashram is surrounded by a lot of greenery. One of the biggest attraction in Auroville is Maitrimandir. This temple is in the shape of a sphere that is covered by discs made in gold mosiac tiles... over 2 million tiles have been used in making this temple of friendship and all the tiles were made in Auroville. The sphere is surrounded by 12 slopes which has 12 rooms all of different colors named differently- like,light, youth... etc... all the rooms are for meditation purposes. The Mother believed that a person should look within himself to find answers and that can be achieved thru meditation...

The actual temple- inside seems to be a direct pick up from a sci fi flick... its all dimly lit has a spiral stairway leading to a huge spherical room, which has a crystal ball set in the centre that has sunlight from top channeled over it... there are 12 pillars in the room..signifying the teachings of Shri.Aurobindo and The Mother. The whole of inside is made of marble and white carpet... the 15 minutes that I spent inside the meditating room.. were awesome... It was so quite that I could hear the silence. A must visit for everyone.

If this was all about spirituality... then Pondicherry... is for all the people who just love the thought of love. This town is very small... and divided into two towns.. one side is pretty south indian while the other is all white and has streets and avenues like in France and the streets are also named as Rue...!!! Little cafe's on the promenade... and the police band playing in the evening... I was staying in the french part of the town... in an Heritage hotel called Du Parc. Very nice rooms... and lovely decor. And the best hotel in town is called The Promanade... its on the promenade and is sea facing. One of the better restaurants is called the Rendezvous. There is a Museum and the church... not much to shop though... but you'll find a lot of stuff which is organic and natural there...mostly produced by Auroville residents.

Its a beautiful town... and you'll find a lot of french ppl there... so a lot of great faces to look at too... what say?

Diary of the Chennai traveller- Day 1

So, finally I managed to get myself a welcome holiday.... I am in Chennai...as I write this blog.


I know that I was in Mumbai for a month last year but that was for work... but this trip is complete leisure... Since I am out... I would continue with the Investment Articles once I am back... that is 10 days later.

Till then- here is Chennai for you to visualize...from my point of view. The pics will only come at the end... 'coz I forgot to carry my cable.

Anyways - Day 1 - for all those who like to travel for the fun of it...never take a flight before sunrise...especially if you are traveling domestic... you tend to spoil the whole day 'coz of the fatigue... and if you do plan to take the early flight... then sleep well, the night before.

Jokes apart - I landed in Chennai after taking the 5.35 am Spice Jet flight no. SG 301. The flight was on time and as the doors of the aircraft opened we were greeted by warm sultry air in which you could smell the sea. Unlike Mumbai, where you are greeted by a huge slum on the side of the airport... the view from top is breath taking. It's all green around and for a moment you a taken aback 'coz you hardly get to see so much of greenery staying in Delhi.

The roads here are narrow... the town, a li'l backward... but it does have the largest university of the country which, along with its affiliates, provide education in various fields to 250,000 students all over the country.

The weather here is great and I saw a handicraft boutique here whose place of manufacture will be shown to me on the way to Pondicherry...which I'm gonna visit this weekend.

Right now - we are getting ready for dinner... this day was spent resting... tomorrow, the fun starts...

cheers...

2K3 Mini ReUnion

Remember the last time I posted about the awesome week I had with Karma, Raj, Dino & Rathz on our mini reunion? Well, the pics are finally here and Dino has got them up on our blog TWM :: Online. Do check them out. Some of them have come out real beautiful.

Love India

It's a video made by one of my best chums, Indrashish, who also happens to be a budding musician in Mumbai. I'd strongly urge you to visit his page on YouTube to rate the video and also put in your comments. Do let me know what you feel about the video.

iPhone


Here's a video showcasing the features of the latest tech phenomenon, the iPhone!

Just For Mah Sweetheart!!

A Li'l Bit of Mumbai Darshan...

Okay, before you start checking out the pictures, let me warn you. The camera (in my phone) that I've used to snap the following pics is just another simple VGA camera and I realised it only now that although it gives me decent pics in the daylight, the pics are horrible when clicked at night. I guess I should've switched the night mode on, but I didn't realise that it'd be necessary. Hope i get similar quality of pics in the night time too, in future.

Well, I've been catching up with friends for the past 3 days and had been going to a few places too. It just so happened that I'd been to Vashi Railway station, yesterday, and it's supposed to be one of the best looking local railway station in Mumbai. And then I'd been to the legendary Marine Drive, today, and got wet in he rains. You won't realise how much fun it was, unless you experience it yourself! While being a part of all that, I did felt like clicking a few pics on occassions when I found the seeting pretty beautiful. Hope you like the journey.


That's Marine Drive for you, when it was raining cats & dogs!


And that's Marine Drive again, to my Left.


The old Taj, of Mumbai (Yeah, Mumbai has 2 Taj :-p)


Taj again, just in a different angle.


Gateway of India, from the place where we were standing.



A closer view of the same.


My companions of the day, Vijay & Pallavi, great buddies!


It's called Flora Fountain, a very famous landmark in Fort.

The rest of the pics are all of Vashi Railway Station. After actually checking out the pics on the comp, I was so upset. I wish Inew this was how the pics are gonna come. I'm sure I'd have gotten the night mode switched on, then. Could't do absolutely no justice to this beautiful station. Anyways, still put up a few, hoping you could find the essence of the station.

CGL Laboratory

Refering to one of my older posts, I'd already mentioned that I've been interning in Crompton Greaves for the past 1 and a half months. Courtesy my new mobile, clicked a few snaps of the laboratory today. I thought I'd share them with you.

Here is the lab. The instruments are pretty much okay in size. They say, the whole lab of instruments are worth 15 crores, in all!


This is the other side of the lab.


That's my personal space. That's the lappy I work on. The instrument beside it is used to test hardnedd of copper strips used in the manufacture of Transformers.


The oven that you can see here, is used to find out the amount of gaseous components dissolved in Copper.


This one is used to measure the viscosity of Transformer Oil using a test called Vicker's Test. Sorry, forgot the name of the instrument :-P.

Just A Few Memories To Live With...

My Visual DNA



Hello! Namaskaar!! Vanakkam!!!

Hmm...I see my absence from the blogging world has created quite a stir, eh? Well, being a regular reader of this page, I'm sure you'd understand how much I need to struggle to even be online from college. First n foremost, the incessant power cuts. And then to top it, there's slow connection speed. It becomes quite a herculean task to keep my page updated. Ask my girlfriend, the co-contributor of this page, and she'll tell you how much she needs to nag me to write her a single mail, even if it is once in every 3 months!! I know it's shameful...but then, that's how life's been with me, I guess!!

Anyways, enough of preamble. I guess it's high time I get you all filled up on how the past month has been, in my life. Seriously, I still sometimes wonder that why would someone ever wish to know about my life. But then I feel, what the heck, I've always been writing about myself out here. This very page is all about me. And yet, I do receive a few comments. I'm sure someone out there would always wish to know a li'l about me. This very thought always keeps me writing. :-P

February 23rd - 28th, 2007 had been exam time for me. It was my mid-semesters for the 6th sem. I ain't sure how I'm gonna fare, but just hope that it won't be too bad a news when the results get declared :-P.

And now, comes the best part of it! March 4th, 2007 was Holi, this year. It was just by sheer chance that I had the opportunity to have a li'l telephonic conversation with Priyam, Sakshi's best friend. It was her who got me all worked up to visit Delhi on Holi, so that I could spend a li'l time with Sakshi. It'd, anyways, been months since I'd last met her. Within a day, things got all finalised and I was all raring to go. I left Jamshedpur on March 2nd, 2007, by Purushottam Express and I was in New Delhi by next morning, about 7 a.m. We met up, had a good time & then I was back to Jamshedpur by the 5th. Here is where I am posting a few pics from my journey. By the way, sorry for eating into your bandwidth. I did wanted to put up a Flickr Badge onto my page, but somehow, after I shifted to the new Blogger, it simply refuses to work, dunno why. I did try to check out the forums, but all in vain. Hope you do bear with me.

That's Anshuman (left) & 2 juniors, before boarding Pushottam, around 6 a.m.


That's the couple for you, Sakshi & Shayon.


That was the hotel room where I spent my night.


Just a top view of New Delhi Station


That's mah buddy, Mehul, applying transparent nail polish,
while getting ready to play Holi ;-)


That's Me n Mehul, after we played Holi at Priyam's place.


Me n Sakshi. So, how do we look together?? ;-)


This one's cute....me with Arushi, Sakshi's sis.


Me, Sakshi, Arushi & Priyam, the host of the party on Holi


These were the number of sticks I fagged while I was in my hotel room :-P


Now this was my prize pic - T.T. collecting money for
alloting a berth to the guy in red shirt ;-)


I found this one too daring....sleeping quite peacefully on the connectors
of two coaches! What do you think?
Do they give a concession for this kinda berth?


Uhh...just two of my co-passengers!! ;-)


I wish Mr. Laloo Prasad Yadav read my blogs. Then I could've asked
him how he thinks one might use the flush!!


Now this is the ultimate example of an Indian woman.
What a dedicated wife she is, doncha think so? ;-)


Well, that is all from the whole journey from Jamshedpur to Delhi & back. Even after I was back at college, life's been pretty much on a roll! ;-) Had been playing DotA all day long with Arun & Suman (buddies in college), even went out to play other clans, watched loads of movies & clicked quite a few pics. Here come some more of them!!

This one's my fav, though it's quite a familiar scene, isn't it?


That's me having food in one of the bastis within our college campus. Actually, it'd been too late when I realised I won't get any more food in the mess but was too hungry :-P


Arun Dhar & Me, sleeping in the same bed, on one of several nights ;-)


Suman Samanta, Abhishek Karmakar & Chiranjit Ghosh (l - r)
in Regent, one of only two 3 star hotels in Jamshedpur!!


That's Dhar, trying to drive an auto ;-)


Tired me & Suman, the philosopher


This was taken by Dhar, all unwarranted, while I was having a good, relaxed smoke in Dipayan's room, during one of innumerable power cuts!!

That is it for now. Anyways, I think this post has become quite a collage now. I hope I'm forgiven, now, for not being able to write anything for over a month now. Oh, by the way, we have our college Cultural Fest (Utkarsh) & Technical Fest (Pravaah) coming up in a week. It's gonna be a huge affair, trust me. If you think you can make it to Jamshedpur, Do lemme know. I'll get all the arrangements done. As for the websites, I'll get them posted as soon as I can manage.

So long for now! It's become a huge post, now. I'd like to sign off. It's past 4:30 in the morning, now & I'm certainly pretty sleepy. Hope to write again, soon. Till then, Sayonara!!!

Durge Durgatinashini...!!

So...Durga Puja's finally here & what more...Ashtami just got over today. Well, true...the festival basically belongs to the eastern sector of the country...and although it's celebrated with much ado & ethos, I won't say Durga Pujas in Mumbai rock as much as they do in good ol' Kolkata. Consequently, there was no surprise at all when I found out, till late Saptami, that life isn't really happening out here! If you've ever been to West Bengal or Orissa in this season, I can bet my tongue on it, you won't find a single alley where u won't be reminded of the festival. Moreover, the way the fest's celebrated in the monetary capital of the country is a li'l too sophisticated for me, what with the greatest of the filmstars bagging the prestigious tag of organisors themselves!

Anyways, I did happen to visit a few pandals yesterday & today morning. They were good enough experiences for me. Seriously, couldn't expect much better out here. Yet, happened to find some lighter moments even outta those. Here comes a li'l collage of the pix I'd taken when I was out & about, searching for and shooting interesting subjects...basically anything that interested me. Truthfully, I'd taken at least 10 times the number of pics I've posted out here, but then I decided no point eating up your internet bandwidth with all of my idiosyncrasies.

That's the entrance of the Durga Puja pandal organised by Rani Mukherjee & Kajol's family.

This is from Bangur Nagar, Goregaon (W). One of the few old ones which are not sponsored by movie stars.

This idol was in Santacruz, the one sponsored by the Mukherjees.

A more close-up version of Maa Durga.

One of the perks of staying in the city of stars. But seriously, this is the first time I've ever seen Nana Patekar this close! Simply adore this guy!!

Hmm...now wot do I say about this star? I just wish he had a li'l less of both weight & lockets. *LoL*

She is one of my most fav singers of the current generation....Lemme introduce Shreya Ghoshal, folks!!

That's Ila Arun & members of Li'l Champs...the finalists of TVS Sa Re Ga Ma.

Seriously, that's the kinda turnout u can find in almost every pandal, at any given time of day & night!

That's Mumbai traffic at 3 A.M. (Bloody hell!!)

Who said Bong babes aren't sexy..?? ;-)

During Puja days, even the "oldies" like to have adda all thru the night!

Be it the shaadi, puja or award ceremony, sponsors are always mandatory!!

All you need to offer, to get such a huge turn out, is free food!

Here are the servers...Hehe..!!

Empty chairs....people haven't gotten their bhog, you know!

The very same chairs...!

I think some dude just proposed to her...wot do u think?

Any wacky ideas on what the kid might be trying to do?? ;-)

Could you believe it that this kid was actually lost when I'd snapped the pic?

There's Mr Abhijeet Bhattacharya, one of the most prominent Durga Puja organisors!!

Now, wot do u perceive of this man, from this pic?

But then again, I forgave him when I saw this avataar of his! :-P

Well...that is all, as of now, from the lens of my camera. Shall surely post some more soon. Till then...Adios...Sayonara!!