Friends

See this



The only thing I can cavil at is the reference to a "little lady"...but other than that..

premkudva, can you insert that oversize smiley of yours here?...

You know you've spent too long abroad, when....you sit in Chennai and find yourself trying to calculate what time it is in Bangalore!




I tried out

tree-climbing


...and a couple of days ago, I snapped this:





It struck me forcibly that what was just a pastime for me, and a sport for others, was a livelihood for some people. (You can see that the man in the photograph above is using a sealant on the windows.)

This morning, when I opened

The Hindu

I found

this article by Liffy Thomas

Talk about high living....these people, like Microsoft, make their money from...Windows!

and we have a new proverb...people who live in glass houses, need their windows cleaned.

My solitude is less than two days away from finished. It's been nice to have some time alone, but I must admit (without getting touchy-feely) that I miss Anders a lot. I don't think we've been away from each other for this long before - 8-9 days have been the maximum (and then it was I who left - which is less pity on myself since I am in a new place anyway), and extensive single-travelling will probably not be the norm for the near future either :-)

Today I did some shopping and cleaning, and relaxed a bit. Quite nice :) My parents came over in the afternoon, they had visited my little brother in his cottage together with grandma. Apparently a good day for everyone. I made pizza for dinner, and got some help from dad afterwards. Productive :) Now I am spending the Saturday in front of the TV with a pile of magazines mum brought and a bowl of chocolate. The weather hasn't been too pleasant today, so reading in front of the fireplace seemed like a good idea.

The Marina Beach in Chennai

is one of the public open-air spots in the city that gets a lovely sea breeze in the afternoons, and is a popular spot to visit.


It has a line of statues, that the wiki link above lists; and here's the sunrise on the statue of


Kamarajar (kAmarAjar)






The beach faces east, and sunrises are beautiful...when there's a sunrise, can thoughts of asakiyume be far behind? :)

Here's the "Gandhi silai" (statue of Gandhi) that stands at the junciton of the Beach road and Radhakrishnan Road:









True to his reputation for simplicity, Gandhi walks, while all around him, the rich park their cars to come and walk, too...!

I will be documenting that morning walk of mine...yes, I did take along MLC2 yesterday.

But some things are even more eye-catching than others...


As I turn from Santhome High Road on the Marina, into Radhakrishnan sAlai (erstwhile Edward Elliotts Road), I find that I am suddenly in New York!

( see New York in Chennai )


Well, I was not in a militant mood, I was...affable...!




In Tamizh, the sign says "appapuL" (in Tamizh, "f" sound is written,somewhat awkwardly, with a "therefore" sign written before the "p" consonant...but that wasn't the case here). So, I was appapul instead of affable.



I do enjoy taking my MLC along!


It's beginning to pour with rain again...I'm going to enjoy going to get some vegetables now...

A friend of mine asked for mango-ginger recipes after my mango-ginger rice last week was a hit. Mango-ginger is available everywhere now and my friend Mythreyi had given me some, so I made some more.

If you want to make a nice batch of chutney:

peel and grate mango-ginger. (about 250 gms of it.) Add 5 tbsp oil, sputter mustard seeds, and switch off the gas and add chili powder to taste (I usually add about 4 tbsp to that much of ginger.) Add a pinch of asafoetida powder, and half a tsp of dry-roasted and powdered methi seeds. Switch the gas back to low, add grated ginger, and also add a little "gud" if you like (I do) close the vessel, and cook till slightly soft. It should not need blending...but do that if you like. Refrigerated, lasts a month...unrefrigerated...3 days.

It can be eaten with phulkas or parathas...or mixed with cooked rice.

Instant, crunchy pickle to go with thayir shaatham: Chop the ginger small, and put in a vessel. Make a kind of depression on top and put chilli powder and asafoetida powder. Heat 2 tbsp oil, sputter mustard seeds, and add the hot oil on top of the chilli powder and asafoetida. Add salt, and mix well. It's YUMMMMMMY.

Some people (like me) are instantly allergic to raw mango-ginger. However...I still LOVE this pickle. :)

You can add finely chopped mango-ginger to thayir shaatham itself, too.

....what about onions, ask the Jains....