Deepa's Jottings

Entry to Lalbagh Botanical Gardens is free up to 8.30am, and cameras are not charged. The entry ticket business has been outsourced to some private organization. Yesterday (13 September 2015), we noticed people from this organization chasing visitors at about 9.30am and asking them to pay for their cameras. Some groups, visiting for special purposes, have special permission; eg, the Bird Watchers Field Club, which has a bird walk in Lalbagh on the 2nd Sunday of every month, has permission for the group until 10.30am. I cannot understand why officials should chase visitors after 9am and start charging for cameras,…

They wait, in their toxic colours in swathed in plastic, these un-green Ganeshas...a miniscule mimority tries to make green idols, much older people remember a time when a little pinch of mud or turmeric was enough to represent the elephant-faced god. I wonder how many of them remain, mercifully, unsold, and are recycled the next year.

It seems to be men who transport these colourful bangles all over the cities and villages...rainbow fragility on women's wrists that are given in fours at religious festivals,and adorn, in dozens, a pregnant woman's arms. Women pride themselves on wrists that can acommodate smaller bangles, while the bangles are often used as a major insult in our men-are-dominant culture. Made of plastic, metal, and sometimes the finest glass..these circlets are an integral part of our culture and heritage. Valley School, 05 Sept 2015.

Most Hindus celebrate the birth of the dark baby God, Krishna, by installing an image of the god and worshipping it in the traditional manner, with flowers,fruit, and other offerings. However, Priya Mukund, of J P Nagar 3rd Phase, celebrates the festival a little differently.  She has, over the years, made a large collection of figurines of Krishna: as a baby, holding ball of butter; sleeping in a cradle.holding a flute while he herds the cattle; in unison with Radha; or in the form of preceptor, revealing the Bhagavad Gita to Arjuna. The figurines start from very old pieces in…

I arrived by the Air France flight which lands at  Bangalore International Airport (BIAL) at 23.50 hrs. It most definitely meant that by the time I navigated Customs and Immigration and came out of the Arrivals area, it was about 01.30 hrs.  I am an avid user of public transport, and there is a Vayu Vajra service (KIAS 12) that drops me at my front gate. I would have felt much more safe in using that, rather than taking a cab. But the service is suspended between 00.30hrs and 0700 hrs. Therefore, I had no alternative but to take a…

It is a sad reality that nowadays, by the time it's 26th Jan or 15 Aug, the flower displays are wilting and well past their prime at Lalbagh. Why do the displays have to open so much before the actual dates? Or if more days are needed for the general public to attend, surely the display could start fresh on Republic or Independence Day, and go on for a few days thereafter?

Almost before one knows it, the face of the city changes, and many things belong to the past, and then to history. Here are a few facts that I remember from the late 80s and early 90s; it was still pre-IT Bangalore, a sleepy town, rather than a city (in fact, two towns, the "English" Cantonment and the "Kannada" areas like Basavanagudi, Malleswaram and Jayanagar)... the quality of life was excellent. In Langford Town, there used to be an auction house, it was run by a Mr Pacheco. It closed down by 1988 or 1989... probably because the owner emigrated…

Purnimaa Ranganath writes: "Thanks to BESCOM and its erratic power shut downs already this month my fridge's compressor packed up and had to get it replaced ....and yesterday the power supply went on and off every 5mins...nearly 6 times in an hour...God I hope something else doesn't blow too.." The sad thing is that there is no accountability. Direct switch-offs would not be as bad as the "brownouts" of low voltage, or surge of high voltage, which are deadly to expensive electrical and electronic gadgets, often bought with savings over months. How do we make BESCOM accountable?

Krishna Murthy, whose email id is flutekick@gmail.com writes: This incident happened today at Hebbal lake. We went birding today to Hebbal lake in the morning at 7 30 am. I had parked my car just outside on the road (service road) near the lake entrance, (as the parking lot opens only by 9 30 am). I had taken my camera with me and I had left the bag in the car back seat. We returned by 9 30 am and found that the car glass was broken and the bag taken. The bag had lot of camera accessories.   Fellow birders and…

Bengali plays are not very common at Ranga Shankara, so I was quite keen to watch this Badal Sircar play, produced by Centre for Film and Drama (CFD), and directed by Nilanjan  P Choudhry.   For this play, a neat brochure had been prepared by CFD  and the write up described it as a "fast-paced comedy".   Bogota(sic) Charit Manas depicts the journey of a young orphan, whose naivety and lack of self-esteem leads him to be bullied at every turn. Driven to the brink of suicide at the prospect  of having to become a "ghar jamai" at his maternal…