Culturama August 2014 by Rohini Manian

culturama your cultural gateway to india

August 2014 Volume 5, Issue 6

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In A Nutshell

How much can you say with a single word? Culturama counts the ways

Finding Madras in Chennai

On the 375th birthday of this â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;kaapiâ&#x20AC;˛-loving city, we look at the string of events that led to its founding and development

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Dear Readers, I am writing this note from Kodaikanal – a hill station in South India that refutes the need to travel to Europe for scenic views or cool weather. The British did well to discover and set up our hill stations! They offer much respite and recreation from the tropical 10 biggest cities that house 70 million of our population. Thinking about the British prompts me to ponder on the fact that India will be completing 67 years of Independence – we have come a long way indeed since we began our journey

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by making a Tryst with Destiny. We look back at this momentous event in our ‘The Album of Time’. And, since food is always part of our celebrations, ‘In Your Kitchen’ features a collection of assorted treats based on the tri-colour theme. There is another historic event associated with August – the city of Chennai, or Madras as it was known, was founded this month 375 years back. This quiet southern capital, known prominently for its filter coffee, annual music concerts in December and its preference for the staple foods of idli and dosa, was actually India’s first modern city. A place where the first blueprints for major institutions to ensure smooth governance – such as the army and judiciary, education, engineering and medicine – was chalked out by the British. And yet, Chennai has remained a humble city, one that never trumpets its lineage. We trace the history of this city from its founding days in our ‘Feature’. However, be it in Chennai or Kodaikanal, I notice that most of us are glued to our cell phones. When we look up between text messages, it is to capture yet another photo of the beauty around us so we can transmit it electronically. Once posted as FB status, we must now respond to and keep track of all the ‘likes’ we receive, isn’t it? What if we tried to find some time away from the tech devices and connected with each other on a purely personal level. For example, the ‘Picture Story’ this month is centred on single words that carry a multitude of meanings – and we don’t need Facebook to share this! For those of you looking to do a bit of tech-detox, head to the lesser known Buddhist trails of Odisha, or to the shores of Kozhikode – ‘Seeing India’ showcases both places in splendid detail – and turn off your cell phone and iPad while you are there! Ranjini Manian Editor-in-Chief globalindian@globaladjustments.com

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Letters to the editor Credits A sadhu at Varanasi holds up a board with the first word that came to his mind when the word chai was mentioned. Flip over to Picture Story (page 44) for details.

Cover picture by Zach Marks and Resham Gellatly

Dear Editor,

“I enjoyed reading about Dr. Reddy in your July 2014 issue. We have been using Apollo hospitals all along, but had no idea that it was one man’s dream that became such a big influence on our moving to India.” - Caterine Mignot, UK

Dear Editor,

Business Head Sheeba Radhamohan

“What a pleasure to read about Dr. P.C. Reddy and Apollo Hospitals in your July 2014 issue! He has truly done wonders for India’s health systems.”

Sub Editor Shefali Ganesh

- Meena Chittaranjan, India

Editor-in-Chief Ranjini Manian Associate Editor Yamini Vasudevan

Senior Designer Prem Kumar Finance Controller V Ramkumar Circulation S Raghu Advertising Bengaluru Meera Roy Chennai Amritha Suresh Delhi/NCR Neha Verma Mumbai/Pune Deepa Navani To subscribe to this magazine, write to circulation@globaladjustments.com or access it online at www.culturama.in Chennai (Headquarters) 5, 3rd Main Road, R A Puram, Chennai – 600028 Telefax +91-44-24617902 Email culturama@globaladjustments.com Bengaluru 17/16, Ali Asker Road, Off. Cunningham Road, Bengaluru – 560 052 Mobile +91 99869 60316 Email culturamablr@globaladjustments.com Delhi-NCR 1414, DLF Galleria Tower, DLF Phase IV, Gurgaon, Haryana – 122009 Mobile +91 98712 89488 Email del@globaladjustments.com Mumbai Rustom Court, 2nd Floor, Dr. Annie Besant Road, Worli, Mumbai – 400030 Tel +91-22-66104191/92 Email mum@globaladjustments.com Published and owned by Ranjini Manian at #5, 3rd Main Road, Raja Annamalai Puram, Chennai – 600028, and printed by K Srinivasan of Srikals Graphics Pvt Ltd at #5, Balaji Nagar, 1st Street, Ekkattuthangal, Chennai – 600032 Editor-in-Chief Ranjini Manian Disclaimer Views and opinions expressed by writers do not necessarily reflect the publisher’s or the magazine’s.

Dear Editor,

“The street side remedies that Culturama featured in the July issue were unique and almost unbelievable – though I have actually seen this ‘wannabe dentist’ when I was in India!” - Mark Leslie, Australia

Dear Editor,

“Your wonderful magazine is always on time and always interesting. I found the article on Dr. P.C. Reddy most interesting. Keep up the good work.” - Charles M. Savage, Germany

Dear Editor,

“I was able to plan my holiday to Kodaikanal after reading about this hill station in the July issue of Culturama. Thanks for recommending the great little hotel too.” - Susan Rask, India

Look out for icons On our website and in our magazine we are now using the five icons below to help guide you through the contents. They are based on the five areas where Culturama can really help — giving you an insight into India, its life and culture; finding you great places to shop and fun things to do to enrich your Indian experience; helping you find a home; and connecting you to new friends.

1 Read 4 Locate

2 Shop 5 Connect

3 Do

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Culturama’s contributors 03 Chengalath Charulekha is a part-time consultant at DakshinaChitra in Chennai. She loves to write, learns Baul music, explores avenues of spirituality and rescues stray pups. 04 Anita Krishnaswamy is President of Global Adjustments and a relocation expert. She has several years of experience working with expat clients across the country.

01 Susan Philip is a freelance writer based in Chennai, and the editorial coordinator of Culturama’s various coffee table books. 02 Harini Sankaranarayanan is an ardent foodie and a professional chocolatier. She has a degree in Hotel Management, English Literature and Theatre.

05 Devdutt Pattanaik is the Chief Belief Officer of the Future Group, and a writer and illustrator of several books on Indian mythology. Visit www.devdutt.com 06 Devanshi Mody studied Physics, French and Philosophy at Oxford, then fortuitously stumbled into travel writing. Vagabond urges notwithstanding, she’s ever lured back to Chennai for masala dosas! 05

07 Resham Gellatly and Zach Marks are journalists whose work has appeared in The New York Times and Time Out Magazine among others. Zach is a journalist and contributor to The New York Times. They are currently working on a book that captures their experiences.

Advisory Board members 08 N. Ram is an award-winning journalist and former Editorin-Chief of The Hindu. He is Director of Kasturi & Sons Limited, publishers of The Hindu. 09 Suzanne McNeill lived in India for seven years, first in Chennai and then in Delhi. She has now returned to Scotland, where she works as a freelance writer and graphic designer.

10 Babette Verbeek is a correspondent for BNR Nieuwsradio who previously worked in Amsterdam and Milan. Now she joyfully explores the beauty of South Indian culture. 11 Marina Marangos is a lawyer by profession but enjoys travel and writing. She lived in India for four years before moving to Australia. She blogs at www.mezzemoments.blogspot.com

12 G. Venket Ram is an acclaimed photographer and the creative mind behind many a Culturama issue. To know more about his work, log on to www.gvenketram.com 13 Beth Chapman is an American business management consultant living in Bengaluru. Former President of the city’s Overseas Women’s Club, Beth is an Indian culture aficionado.

14 Marcel Van Mourik is a Dutch photographer living in New Delhi for the past three years. Together with his cameras, he is passionate about discovering Indian culture. 15 Kathelijne van Eldik, from Holland, has been in Mumbai since 2004. Her employment with an airline is not a surprise, considering she has been raised in different countries and has it in her DNA to travel.

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Contents 24

India Writes

A space for discussing the best from India’s world of literature.

Ten for the Road

Trivia about an Indian state – featuring Goa this month.

Cultural Lens

Learn about CCQ – Cross-Cultural Quotient.

30 Feature In August, 375 years ago, a coastal town in South India would become the first modern city of India – with the founding of Madras.

India’s Culture 10

Short Message Service

Short, engaging snippets of Indian culture.

In your Kitchen

Celebrate India’s Independence Day with tri-coloured treats.

Festival of the Month

Look Who’s In Town

Expats in India share their stories on a practical theme for everyday survival in this country.

Picture Story

Can you say a story with just one word? People from across their country pitch in to show you how it’s done.

Calendar of Events

See what’s going on in the main metros and suburbs.

At Global Adjustments

The essentials of adapting to new cultures – in a succint programme.

Say ‘Happy Birthday’ to Lord Ganesh.

Myth & Mythology

Stories from India’s mythology, reinterpreted for practical living.

Journeys Into India

Give to India

Featuring worthy causes across the country.

Seeing India

Walk through Odisha’s lesser known Buddhist trails, or watch a dolphin frolic in the waters of Calicut Beach.

Regulars 14

Thought Leaders

Dr. Santrupt Misra of the Aditya Birla Group talks about his learning over a 19-year journey with the multi-million dollar Group.

India Now

A recap of events, people and places that made news in the past month.

Relocations and Property 70

Realty Bytes

Practical advice from Global Adjustments’ relocation expert.

Space and the City

Property listings across the metros.

The Album of time

As India celebrates its 67th year of Independence, Culturama takes a look at some milestones on the path to freedom.

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SMS 10

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by Suzanne McNeill Short cultural snippets for an easily digestible India

Art, Textile and Craft

Tharu Appliqué – Lucknow Patterns are usually created in appliqué needlework by attaching small shapes of fabric to the surface of a larger piece, often in a contrasting colour or texture. The appliqué of the Tharu women of Uttar Pradesh, however, reveals the pattern in the reverse. They make cuts or slashes into a top fabric that has been hemmed onto a base fabric, revealing the colour or texture below the surface. Always brightly coloured, the patterns are often geometric, creating the fine lines, triangles and colourful borders that decorate traditional garments.

Words

Food and Drink

The Hindi word baraf means ‘falling’, as in snowing – by association, baraf also means ‘ice’. Small dishes of crushed ice soaked in colourful syrups and sprinkled with lemon and salt called baraf ka gola are a treat during the summer. Barfi is a popular diamond-shaped sweet made of condensed milk and sugar, flavoured with fruit, groundnuts or cardamom and sometimes coated with a thin layer of edible silver leaf. The name is derived from the Persian word barf, which means ‘snow’ – a plate of barfi is said to resemble freshly fallen snow.

Many kinds of Indian breads, pancakes and fritters use ground pulses rather than flour for the batter. Pesarettu, which is unique to Telugu cooking, is made from moong dal (green gram) that is soaked and then ground with ginger, chillies, coriander leaves, cumin seeds and water. A ladleful is poured on a heated frying plan or griddle, spread out like a thin pancake, and fried until golden brown with crispy edges. Chopped onion may be sprinkled over the pancake before it is removed from the pan.

Baraf vs Barfi

Pesarettu (Andhra Pradesh)

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Urban Adventure

He/She Lives On

The first Jews arrived on the Malabar Coast to trade in spices over 2,500 years ago, and, to this day, the Jew Town area of Kochi is still an important centre of the spice trade. Five-hundred-year-old warehouses specialising in cloves, cardamom, turmeric and pepper line the streets of the district, and glimpsed within are great piles of ginger or sacks of chillies. The area bustles with trucks, pushcarts and workers drying, sorting and packing the spices. Breathe in the powerful, heady aromas as you shop for spices that will be fresher and richer in flavour than any you can buy at home.

Satyajit Ray was a highly influential filmmaker and is still the most well-known Indian director on the world stage. Ray was born in Calcutta in 1921 into a literary Bengali family. He worked in advertising as a visual designer, but became captivated by cinema and, in 1947, founded the Calcutta Film Society, which fuelled his desire to enter filmmaking. Ray’s stories were intimate, preoccupied with the commonplace. Beginning with his first film, Pather Panchali, in 1955, part of the Apu trilogy that documented the coming of age of a boy from a poor, rural Bengali family, Ray moved from one critical success to another. His films include The Music Room (1958), Devi (1960), The Big City (1963), Charulata (1964) and Days and Nights in the Forest (1970). He was awarded the Oscar for Lifetime Achievement in 1992, just before he died.

Spice Market – Kochi Jew Town

Satyajit Ray

Interpretations

Photo: Jessica Stewart, USA

The Soothsayer Cow The cow that goes from house to house telling peoples’ fortunes is known as the gauri gai in northern India, and in southern India as the boom boom maadu. The cow, or bull, is trained to nod its head in response to a drum or cymbal beat played by its owner (hence the name ‘boom boom’). The owner asks questions such as ‘Will this girl marry a rich man?’ and when he beats the drum, the cow nods with a vigorous ‘Yes! Yes!’ The cow is often gaily decorated with painted horns and bells on its legs. People donate used clothes to the owner with which he decorates the cow, but what he earnestly hopes to receive is a sum of money as a reward for his skill in training a cow as a soothsayer!

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Thought Leaders by Deepa Navani

Corporate Success with a

Human Touch

1 Dr. Santrupt B. Misra, CEO of Carbon Black Business and Director of Group Human Resources of the multi-billion dollar Aditya Birla Group, is known as the “guru of HR” in India. In this exclusive interview with Culturama, he touches on the essentials of leadership, his learning over a 19-year journey with the Group, and what it takes to thrive in today’s global economy

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When asked about the secret behind his successful handling of two important wings of the multi-billion dollar Aditya Birla Group – the Carbon Black Business and Group Human Resources – Dr. Santrupt Misra points to two things: his own ability to multi-task and juggle things, and the fact that he is supported by excellent teams on both ends. It is clear that it is all about people for him – little surprise, then, that he started out in the field of human resources. “I was an HR person, am an HR person, and will be an HR person. I am proud to be one,” he says. His commitment to his people is exemplified by the fact that his team members have remained with him for over a decade – a big achievement in a corporate world where rewards seek out talent at twice the speed. Prior to joining the Aditya Birla Group in 1996, Dr. Misra, armed with two Post-graduate degrees and two PhDs, worked with the J.K. Group, the Tata Institute of Social Sciences and Hindustan Lever Ltd, and was also a trainer and consultant to about 40 organisations in India. He joined the Aditya Birla Group as Vice President of Human Resources at the age of 30, and rose to become its youngest director at the age of 35. When he took over the Carbon Black Business as CEO, it stood at number four in the world. In 18 months, Dr. Misra brought it to the number one position – an achievement that speaks volumes about his leadership capabilities. Speaking about his own long-standing career with the Aditya Birla Group (19 years and counting), Dr. Misra touches on the “soul” of the organisation – the core of social responsibility – be it scholarships or welfare schemes. This, he says, is something not many organisations can lay claim to. In a global world, where competition and advancement are becoming the order of the day, such commitment to deeper values is heartening, even inspiring.

What would you say are your key learning points from this 19-year journey at the Aditya Birla Group? There are many points of learning – it’s very hard to capture all of those, but here are my top five: Nothing risked, nothing gained. I have taken a lot of risks, maybe some have paid off, and some haven’t paid. But then, looking back, I would have always taken the same risks… because, unless you take risks, you don’t know what works and what doesn’t. You can’t do it alone – reach out to people. You shouldn’t try to do it alone, and you should never believe that you did it alone. So, you have got to reach out to people and you never know who can help you in what way. You have to keep on

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trying to sell your ideas to people, try to enlist them about what you want to do – and you will always find people who think alike, or who are doing what you want to do. Don’t let surprises stop you – recalculate. No matter how meticulously you have thought through an issue and planned for it, there will always be surprises. And don’t get stopped by those – learn to take them in your stride and reroute yourself like the GPS devices do in the United States. So re-position yourself and find a new route. Be responsible for the ‘multiplier effect’. Joy lies not in making things happen, but in sharing your learning and insights with other people and thereby inspiring them to find their own way…to make things happen, because at the end of day, the only way you can create a multiplier effect is by having more and more people think independently and differently and find new ways of doing things. Otherwise, you can’t change a large organisation. Be nimble; believe in transient advantages. Perhaps there is nothing called a sustainable competitive advantage. You will keep finding transient advantages – and that will keep you ahead of others; by the time others copy and reach you, you would have found something else to move onto. This means you have to keep your organisation very nimble, agile, learning-friendly…and keep people comfortable with change so they can adapt to and adopt new things, and continuously find the new edge that keeps you ahead of the curve. And since Culturama serves a global readership, let me add: Be comfortable with both who you are and who you are with to make the most of what the world has to offer. If you are worrying about being like other people, I think your mindspace is getting occupied and you are not able to learn and enjoy the diversity, the beauty of it. And if you are not comfortable being with other people, then also you miss out, so watch out for how others communicate, pick up their signals. You need to be able to achieve both of those to really enjoy the global experience.

You wear two hats – one of Group Human Resources and the other of the Carbon Black Business. You have grown the business from fourth largest to the largest in the world. How do you balance the two very different sets of resources and the results you are hoping to achieve? I have been asked that question many times in the last five years, and I am hoping that, someday, someone will be willing to give me a million dollars to give a truthful answer! Having said that, there is no magic formula to it. I think, one,

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I have been fortunate to have two very capable teams on both sides – and that makes my life easy. Second, the fact that I am not a micro-manager makes my life easy. I am able to trust people, I have confidence in them. I don’t worry and lose sleep about every little thing that goes wrong, and don’t try to tell everybody how to do their job. So I think my sense of security helps me not to over-supervise – that’s something if you do, you cannot do a large job or multiple jobs because you get drawn into too many details. The third thing that helps me is to be able to prioritise, to say: What is important? Where am I uniquely positioned to add value that others cannot? And make sure that I give my time and attention to that. If you can do that, then you can handle multiple responsibilities. Lastly, one of my strengths is being a juggler. I can do many things and change channels in my mind, and yet remain focused on each one of them. I think I am personally highly productive. So, some of these personal characteristics and my personality type have helped me to cope with two jobs.

The visionary Aditya Birla Group Scholarship, which you are part of, aims to foster academic talent and encourage humane leadership values. What are the key principles that students should follow to become leaders of tomorrow? The eternal truths of leadership remain few, always. One is courage – a deep sense of personal courage to do things, take on things, speak your mind, go perhaps where no one has gone before. So, courage is very important. You’ve got to display a sense of personal courage that is thought through, which is not impulsive. Second is taking initiatives. Once you have the courage, it has to translate into action, which is taking the initiative. Third is hard work – there is no substitute for hard work. Every leader, I think, is a leader because he or she works very hard. People think leadership is about being smart, but I believe leadership is all about doing hard work… it is working hard – 16 or 18 hours – with a sense of passion… When you do something you are passionate about, you don’t feel tired. You can give your best. Initiative, courage, hard work, passion – these are all internal to you, so you have got to draw on that eternal internal fountain of inspiration to be able to do that. The last and most important thing is to be able to connect with people, and harness the collective power and inspire them. I think that is what leadership is all about. As a student, there are many opportunities – how you relate to your classmates, professor, your course, exam,

Photo: Saran De Zutter, Belgium

1 “You have got to reach out to people. You have to keep on trying to sell your ideas to people – and you will always find people who think alike, or who are doing what you want to do too.” internship, community work, role in youth organisations – to bring that differential passion, courage and hard work. And if one is consistently able to do it over and over again, one not only gets a lot of motivation, inspiration and energy out of it, one also learns what works well for one’s self and others. Leadership is the end product of a lot of small things, not big things. If you get the small things right, the big things will happen.

What are some Aditya Birla Group best practices to follow? There are so many admirable qualities in this organisation – that is what has kept me here for 19 years. I was the youngest director in the organisation; I was elevated to the Board of Directors by the age of 35. That was the beauty of it – diversity in age or gender does not matter. Meritocracy is what matters. The culture of the organisation is one of respect… care. I have a colleague who unfortunately had a heart attack, and has been in coma for over two years; we continue to pay his family his full salary and look after his medical requirements. There are very few organisations in the world that do that. The soul of this organisation is in the right place. We have an employee value proposition called ‘a world of opportunity’. We tell our potential employees that here is a world of opportunity.

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You are a Human Resources professional who later became a CEO. What are the essential qualities you had to imbibe to become a CEO? I did not try to be a CEO. All I said is, ‘Let me leverage all the strengths I have built as a human resource professional to be a CEO – which was connecting with people, managing people and teams, inspiring them, creating a big vision, rallying people around that. When I took over this job, we were world number four in Carbon Black; within 18 months, we became world number one. One of the things that human resources function teaches you is to keep your ego in control, because you have to deal with people and address their issues. I think that helped me learn faster, helped me reach out to people and ask them stupid questions without bothering about what they would think of me. As I said earlier, you need to be comfortable about who you are – so, the fact that you do not know is a fact that you need to be comfortable with. The moment you are uncomfortable about it, you try to play games and hide it – and you don’t learn.

1 “I don’t lose people in this team not because I am a great guy, but because this organisation’s soul is in the right place. After a point, people connect to it, and they stay.” We said, ‘Let’s not keep this only as employee value proposition’, so we took it forward to create a World of Opportunity Foundation, to which we as managers contribute money, out of which we give money to our workmen’s and supervisors’ children who are bright, who get admission into universities but do not have the money to fund it. This year, we collected over Rs. 4 crore in contributions – not many organisations can boast of that. We do so much of community work – we have 45,000 students studying in 42 schools of ours; over 20,000 out of that get free education. I don’t lose people in this team not because I am a great guy, but because this organisation’s soul is in the right place. After a point, people connect to it, and they stay. At the senior manager level, the attrition rate would be 0.001%.

One of your areas of specialisation is training and development. How important is it for an organisation to invest in training its employees, especially in a global context? It is extremely important – the kind of explosion of knowledge and information that is happening around [us], the rate at which skills are getting obsolete, it is important that people need to be trained all the time. It is good for you [the organisation], it is good for them [the employees]. They remain employable and you remain productive as an organisation. Those who do believe in investing in learning and training, I think, are making the biggest mistake – they are fast-forwarding their own death. In 2009, when the world collapsed and the economies were falling, our Chairman wrote to us asking us to be cost conscious, to tighten our belts, but the one budget you do not cut is for training. That was a fantastic message for a Chairman to deliver to the organisation during an economic downturn, because training is often seen as a discretionary expense by most people. To have a global mindset and capabilities, you should expose yourself to cross-cultural training, language training, training to communicate in different settings, being comfortable with different kinds of decision making. 1

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A glance at India's historic struggle for independence

ope, 1931

Gandhi on his trip to Eur

Sarojini Naidu - The Nightingale of India

l Army Troops

India Nationa

Swami Vivekananda, an Indian reformer and spiritual leader, at the World's Congress of Religions, 1893

the album of time

- 1945

Independent India's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, in conversation with Mahatma Gandhi

The historical Salt Ma

rch - 1930

The saffron colour denotes renunciation. Our leaders must be indifferent to material gains and dedicate themselves to their work. The white in the centre is light, the path of truth to guide our conduct. The green shows our relation to (the) soil...on which all other life depends. – Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, Independent India’s first Vice President

Sixty-seven years ago, a nation stood on the brink of freedom from colonial rule. To date, when the Indian tricolour is raised on August 15, a collective sense of pride courses through the nation’s veins. On this occasion, Culturama takes a page from the annals of history, and retraces some milestones on the path to freedom.

I believe that in the history of the world, there has not been a more genuinely democratic struggle for freedom than ours. – Mahatma Gandhi, Father of the Nation

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India now by Susan Philip

The month that was 1 A quick recap of events, people and places that made news in the past month

Awards and Accolades A problem solved! A young Indian mathematician, Nikhil Srivastava, is the joint winner of the prestigious George Polya Prize, a biannual award given by the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), Chicago. Srivastava of Microsoft Research India solved the over 50-year-old Kadison-Singer problem, along with Adam W. Marcus and Daniel A. Spielman from Yale University. “Not only have Marcus, Spielman, and Srivastava proved an important conjecture, which has consequences in various areas of mathematics, but their elegant methods promise to be applicable to a broad range of other problems, as well,” the SIAM citation read. The solution put forward by the trio is particularly relevant to fields such as quantum physics, complex analysis, graph theory and signal processing,

3 After Aryabhatta, India’s most famous mathematician is arguably Srinivasa Ramanujan – Watch the recently released biographical film on him (in English), titled Ramanujan.

Scientifically Speaking Up, Up and Away! On June 30, the little island of Sriharikota in the Bay of Bengal was the focus of attention, when the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV C23) lifted off in textbook fashion from the Satish Dhavan Space Centre. It put five satellites from four countries – Germany, France, Canada and Singapore – into orbit. This was the twenty-sixth consecutive successful flight (out of a total of 27 flights) of PSLV and it strengthened the country’s standing in the global commercial satellite launch market. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who witnessed the launch, described it as a “global endorsement of India’s space capability”.

3 India’s fascination with space goes back a long way. The fifth century astronomer-mathematician Aryabhata was way ahead of his time in this branch of science. The country’s first satellite is named after him. But the ‘Aryabhata’ wasn’t launched from India. Do you know which country put it into orbit? It was launched by the Soviet Union from Kapustin Yar using a Cosmos-3M launch vehicle.

Gandhi Prize for Green Movement Pioneer The 2013 Gandhi Peace Prize goes to Chandi Prasad Bhatt, pioneer of the Chipko Movement, which seeks to prevent deforestation through the Gandhian ideal of non-violent resistance. This annual award is given to individuals and institutions for their contributions towards social, economic and political transformation through Gandhian methods. Bhatt is also the recipient of the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership and the Padma Bhushan, one of India’s high civilian honours.

3 Among the earlier recipients of the Gandhi Peace Prize are two eminent statesmen from other countries. Can you name them? The former presidents of Tanzania and South Africa, Julius K. Nyerere and Nelson Mandela, respectively.

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This and That

End of an Era

Innovative Indian

A star is snuffed out

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Once a humble rickshaw puller, he is now a guest of the President of India in the magnificent Rashtrapati Bhavan. Fifty-one-year-old Dharamveer Kamboj won the honour via an innovation of his – a multi-purpose machine to quickly extract juices and essences from various herbs. Kamboj ran away from home and managed to eke out a living for a while, ferrying traders, many dealing in herbs, up and down Old Delhi’s teeming streets. That’s where his idea was born. After he returned home, he started farming and his innovative brain came up with several DIY tools. The extractor was the one which made him eligible for the recently-launched Innovation scholars in-residence scheme. It aims to give an impetus to grassroots innovation activities and provide innovators with the necessary environment and links to strengthen their abilities.

5 Even if you are not an innovator, you can visit those areas of the Rashtrapathi Bhavan that are open to the public. Make an online booking using the link provided on the website: www. presidentofindia.nic.in

Blazing the educational trail

Veteran actress and dancer Zohra Sehgal has bowed out from the world’s stage. She passed away at a Delhi hospital, aged 102. Sehgal started her career as a dancer in the famous Uday Shankar Ballet Company, and later joined noted thespian Prithviraj Kapoor’s theatre group. Her first foray into films was Dharti Ke Lal in 1946. Her more recent films include Dil Se (1998) and Bend it like Beckham (2002). She was the recipient of the Padma Shri, Padma Bhushan and Padma Vibhushan – India’s coveted civilian awards.

3 Watch Cheeni Kum – a critically acclaimed movie in which July 2013—2014 marks a milestone for several educational institutions in Chennai. The St. George’s School is celebrating its tri-centenary. It traces its origins to an institution that can be considered the oldest English-teaching school in Asia. While the Queen Mary’s College for Women has completed a hundred years of existence, the Women’s Christian College (pictured above) entered its centenary year with much fanfare (the Doveton House building on the college campus is around two centuries old). The Golden Jubilee of the graduation of the first batch of IIT-Madras was also celebrated in July.

3 Can you name the oldest engineering and technical institution in India? The College of Engineering, Guindy, also in Chennai, started in 1794. It is among the oldest modern establishments of this kind in the world.

Zohra acts as Amitabh Bachchan’s mother.

Power to the people! New Delhi is the world’s second most populous city, second only to Tokyo. The Indian capital is expected to retain the slot till 2030, according to the 2014 revision of the World Urbanization Prospects. Mumbai comes sixth on the UN rank list, and is expected to move up to the fourth spot by 2030. Kolkata, Bangaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad are set to be among the world’s top 30 cities 15 years from now. India, China and Nigeria are projected to witness the largest urban growth.

3 Which country has the largest rural population? India, with 857 million people. China, with 635 million, comes second.

August 2014

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India writes

iREAD

Wise and Otherwise – A Salute to Life by Sudha Murty

Reviewed by Babette Verbeek In 51 non-fictional stories, Sudha Murty presents us humanity. Its most honorific and beautiful side, its more ugly face and all that falls in between those two extremes. The décor is India and all the personages are Indian – this makes the stories familiar for Indian readers, and will evoke a strong feeling of recognition for expats who once lived, and are living, in India. It is impossible to separate the author from her stories. Sudha Murty is very well known in India – in 1981, she provided Rs. 10,000, all her rainy day savings, to her husband Murty and his six partners. They used the money to start an IT company, INFOSYS, which is now one of India’s leading IT services companies and known throughout the world. Originally a computer engineer and teacher, Sudha now puts her fame and fortune to use as Chairperson of Infosys Foundation, through which she supports numerous philanthropic causes. Wise and Otherwise depicts the encounters Sudha has in her private and professional life. The stories in which many people appeal humbly or shamelessly for help – and a share of Sudha’s fortune – are very diverse, at times recognisable and endearing but also frustrating or almost hilarious. From her stories emerges a picture of a woman with very strong values who seems able to uphold them herself. She tries to support those who are truly in need and tirelessly battles inequality. Some stories are dedicated to the difficulties a large part of the Indian women face today. Lack of education resulting in a lack of resources and independence is one of the biggest problems Indian society faces. Clearly, Sudha appreciates the honest and hard working above the frivolous and easy life-seeking people. At times the stories seem quite moralistic and judgemental; however, if anyone is allowed to do so, she probably is. Who is it by? Sudha Murty (1950) is a teacher, writer and philanthropist. She lives in Bengaluru and writes in English and Kannada. Visit http://tinyurl.com/ml5pyzm to know about her. 1

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August 2014

culturama

Ten for the Road by Susan Philip

Goa

1 Explore the 29 states of this fascinating sub-continent. This segment will set out a collection of interesting, bite-size facts from each state – this month, we look at Goa 1.

How the Land Lies:

Personality Plus:

Perched on the western coast of peninsular India, bordering the Arabian Sea, this is the country’s smallest state (in area) and among the richest (in GDP). The Western Ghats, clothed in dense rainforests, make it rich in biodiversity as well. Panaji is the capital city.

Political Pressures:

Be it through his amazingly detailed drawings of crowds of people engaged in daily life, or his specific creations like ‘Miss. Nimboopani’, cartoonist Mario Miranda brought Goa to people all over India. A recipient of the Padma Vibhushan award, among many honours, Miranda, who died in 2011, aged 85, still has a strong fan following.

The Portuguese, who came seeking trade ties, defeated the royal family in 1510 and created a permanent settlement. By the mid-18th century, it was known as the overseas State of Portuguese India. And it remained a part of Portugal on the subcontinent till it was annexed by India in 1961. It became a State in 1987.

Sights to See:

Goa is almost synonymous with beaches, so it’s superfluous to talk about them. But there’s more to the state than sun, sea and sand. Do visit the Salim Ali Bird Sanctuary. On a different end of the scale, the Casino Royale provides heady excitement!

Past Glories:

The Greek geographer Ptolemy called this region ‘Aparantha’; that this area was the scene of very early human settlement is seen from rock art and carvings dating back 30,000 to 20,000 years.

4. Ethnic Fingerprint:

Tasty Treats:

The influence of Portugal is predominant in Goan cuisine. Xacuti, a spicy lamb or chicken curry, is a favourite. Vindaloo, usually made with pork, is justly famed too. Vegetarians can relish khatkhate, a type of stew, and, for the sweet-toothed, there’s bebinca, heavy with coconut. And of course there’s feni, a type of country liquor made exclusively in the State.

Crafted with Care:

Bamboo, coconut and shells are the chief raw materials for the handicraft industry in Goa. A wide variety of items, utilitarian and ornamental, are crafted from them, and much loved as souvenirs.

The advent of the Portuguese had a great impact, and the transition to being a part of India wasn’t smooth. Interestingly, as per Portuguese law, those born in Goa before 1961 and their immediate descendants can ‘recover’ their Portuguese nationality.

Culture Quotient:

10. Worshipfully Yours:

The Fugdi, Dhalo and Kunbi are some traditional dance forms. Also, several of India’s famous musicians and music makers come from Goa, of whom Bollywood singer Lata Mangeshkar is perhaps the best known. The annual Carnival is an extravaganza of colour, music, revelry, tableaux and theatrical performances, mainly held in the towns of Panaji, Vasco, Mapusa and Margaon.

The Bom Jesus Basilica, a World Heritage site, houses the relics of St. Francis Xavier, who is considered by many to be Goa’s patron saint. Every once in a while, the Catholic church authorises the placing of the relics for public viewing and worship, drawing massive crowds of devotees. 1

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August 2014

3 Cheers! 1 Food is an important part of Indian celebrations – so Culturama put together a collection of recipes on the theme of the tricolour Indian flag to mark the momentous occasion of India’s Independence Day

This month will see the Indian tricolour or tiranga flying high – saffron, white and green with the blue chakra (wheel) in the centre – to mark the celebration and remembrance of the Indian Independence Day on August 15. What better way to celebrate the momentous occasion than with food that echoes the flavours of the subcontinent? The rava idli, a favourite tiffin in the South, takes on a new avatar and is an instant hit on any table. Make them in miniature and serve them as a starter. For the main course, no dish screams ‘Indian’ more than one made with rice and flavoured with spices and coconut. Of course, no meal is complete without the dessert. Do try this very simple version of the Indian milk sweet, the peda, made specially for this season. Call over your friends and family and make this a memorable occassion in more ways than one!

Photo: Courtesy The Savera, Chennai

In your Kitchen by Harini Sankaranarayanan

culturama

Tricoloured Rice Ingredients For the saffron/orange coloured rice: 1 cup basmati rice 1-1/2 tsp oil (and 1/2 tsp oil to fry the rice) 3 big carrots, steam cooked 2 tomatoes, chopped 1/4 tsp turmeric powder 2 tsp garam masala Salt to taste For the white coloured rice: 1 cup basmati rice 1/2 tsp oil (to fry the rice) 1 cup thick coconut milk 1-1/2 tsp cumin seeds, lightly roasted/ toasted Salt (to taste) For the green coloured rice: 1 cup basmati rice (and 1/2 tsp oil to fry the rice) 2 onions, chopped 1 tsp garlic paste 1 tsp ginger paste 2 tbsp freshly scraped coconut 8 to 10 mint leaves 1/2 cup chopped coriander leaves

1 or 2 green chillies 1-1/2 tsp white poppy seeds (khus khus) 1-1/2 tsp oil 1 tsp garam masala Salt (to taste) Method Cook the rice according to your method of preference. It is better to keep the 3 cups of rice separate while cooking, as it will ensure equal quantities of the different coloured rice varieties. In a pan, put the 1/2 tsp oil and stir-fry 1 cup of rice on medium heat for about a minute just till the rice starts turning whiter. Take it off the heat and put it into the container in which it is to be cooked. Repeat this with the other two cups of rice. To the first container, add 2 cups of water and salt to taste and stir well. Do the same to the next container of rice. To the third container, add the salt, cumin seeds, 1 cup of water and the coconut milk and mix well. This will be the white coloured rice. Using your preferred method cook the rice ensuring that the grains are separate. When done, take the rice out and spread each container of rice on a separate plate. Use a fork to fluff up the rice a bit, to ensure that the grains separate without breaking. Allow the rice to cool a bit. If the rice cools completely, it will be difficult to layer, mould it and have it keep its shape. While the rice is cooking, make the spice pastes to colour and flavour the rice. The

Tricoloured Pedas

Tricoloured Rava Idli

Ingredients

1/2 tin condensed milk

1 cup rava (semolina/cream of wheat)

1 cup milk powder

6 tbsp plain sour yogurt

1/2 stick butter

2 tbsp spinach puree

1/2 tsp cardamom powder

2 tbsp tomato puree

Orange and green food colours – a few drops

1 tbsp finely chopped coriander leaves

Method

Crushed chilli flakes (to taste)

Melt the butter in a microwave-safe dish. Add in the rest of the ingredients and mix well. Cook in the microwave for 3 minutes, stirring very well after every minute. After the 3 minutes are up, mix well again and leave aside for the mixture to cool down enough to handle.

1-1/2 tsp baking powder

Split the mixture into 3 containers and add the colours (just a few drops) – orange to one bowl and green to the other. Leave the third bowl plain. Mix well with a spoon. Once the mixture has cooled, grease your hands and make little balls of each of the three colours.Gently press the three balls together and flatten them to form a flat circle so that the three colours lie side by side, with the white flanked by the orange (saffron) and green. Decorate them with coloured sugar, almonds, cashews, pistachios or raisins.

Salt (to taste) Method Beat the yogurt with a little water for 2–3 minutes, such that there are no lumps. Mix the yogurt with semolina and make a batter by adding more water if required. The batter of yogurt and semolina should resemble a cake batter. Add salt and baking powder and mix. Divide this semolina batter into three equal portions in three separate containers. In the first container, add tomato puree and crushed chilli flakes. Mix well. In the second container, add a little more yogurt and mix well. In the

August 2014

white coloured coconut milk rice is done and needs no further cooking.To make the saffron/orange coloured rice, start by puréeing the cooked carrot and tomatoes till smooth. Heat the 1-1/2 tsp oil in a pan and add the turmeric powder and garam masala and stir a couple of times. Add the carrot-tomato purée and cook for a couple of minutes till done. Pour this cooked paste on one plate of still warm rice and using the fork, mix till the rice is uniformly orange in colour. Take care to see the rice doesn’t get broken and mushy. To make the green coloured rice, put the chopped onions, garlic paste, ginger paste, coconut, mint leaves, chopped coriander leaves, green chillies and the poppy seeds in a blender and purée till smooth. Heat the oil in a pan, add the garam masala and stir a couple of times and then add the green paste. Cook over medium heat for 2 to 3 minutes till the raw smell disappears. Pour this cooked paste on one plate of still warm rice and using the fork, mix till the rice is uniformly orange in colour. Take care to see the rice doesn’t get broken and mushy. To layer the rice, grease a dish lightly with butter and start with the orange coloured rice at the bottom, followed by the white and lastly the green. Press each layer down well before adding the next. Cover the dish with your serving plate, and slowly invert the dish onto it. Tap the dish gently and the rice should turn out onto the plate, orange layer on top. Serve hot accompanied by a raitha or some cold yogurt.

third container, add spinach paste and chopped coriander leaves and mix well. All the three batters should be of the same consistency – do not keep the consistency of all the three batters too thick, else the idlis will turn out very hard and not spongy. Meanwhile mix finely chopped onions, green chillies, red chilli powder and salt. Grease the idli trays with spray cooking oil or extra virgin olive oil. Fill your steamer with water and bring to a boil. Pour half a teaspoon from each batter side by side carefully into the idli mould. As soon as you finish filling all the moulds, put the idli stand into the steamer. Place a tight lid on the steamer and steam the idlis for 15 minutes on medium heat. Remove idlis from the trays by scooping them out with a spoon. Brush with melted ghee before serving.

August 2014

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on: Maniam

illustrati

Feature by Suzanne McNeill

Finding Madras in Chennai

Selven

culturama

August 2014

Photo: Nana Oya, Japan

1 August 22, 2014, will mark the 375th founding year of the southern capital city of Chennai – or Madras, as it was formerly known. Culturama celebrates this occasion with a special feature on the journey of this coastal capital, which holds the honour of being India’s first modern city

When compared to the vast metros of Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai, the southern city of Chennai – or Madras as it was known – is often regarded as a lesser sibling. Yet Chennai can claim to be India’s first modern city. Its founding by the East India Company in 1639 predated that of Calcutta by 50 years. Bombay at that time was a cluster of islands owned by the Portuguese but of little importance to them, whilst Shah Jahan, the fifth Mughal Emperor of India, had only just transferred the capital of his empire back from Agra to Delhi. The practice of alliance and annexation that began in the fishing village of Madraspatnam and spread across the subcontinent enriched India’s colonial masters; however, the systems of administration also provided a blueprint for the founding of institutions – the army and judiciary, education, engineering and medicine – that, repeated across the country, propelled modern India into being. Several of these present-day institutions have their roots in Madras. The older settlements that existed long before the Europeans set sail for the East have stories to tell, too, and modern Chennai is a city that embraces both the old and the new with ease.

The Colonial City Madras is a colonial city, and its origins are to be found in the * The image on the facing page was locality’s importance as a trading centre and potential harbour. India’s first created by talented Chennai artist Coromandel Coast – the south-eastern shores of the subcontinent running Maniam Selven for our coffee table book Stopover Chennai. We rededicate from Kanyakumari at the southern tip of India to the mangrove swamps his work to the city's 375th birthday. that mark the mouth of the Krishna River in modern-day Andhra Pradesh

August 2014

culturama

Photo: Ashok Arsh

– was a pivotal staging post of the Asian trade routes from antiquity. The region’s textiles had long been an important commodity (there existed a highly organised textile industry encompassing skilled weavers, dyers and merchants), and the region’s other main exports were rice, and diamonds from the Golconda mines of the Deccan plateau. The trade routes were navigated by Arab geographers, who used the seasonal winds to journey between the Red Sea, East Africa and India. Portuguese traders arrived on the Coromandel in 1522. They settled near the village of Mylapore, building a port named São Tomé or San Thomé after the Christian apostle St Thomas, who is believed to have lived in the region, and erected a cathedral over his supposed tomb. The Dutch arrived at the beginning of the 17th century, and captured the Portuguese fort at Pulicat, a trading centre 60 km north of San Thomé, whilst the French established trading centres at three more sites along the shore. Finally, the English East India Company arrived in search of a permanent trading settlement where they could build

warehouses to hold the goods they collected prior to shipping to Europe, and from which they could invest in textiles, particularly calico and muslin. Francis Day, an administrator with the East India Company, arrived near San Thomé in 1639 from the Company’s base at Armagon, now in present-day Andhra Pradesh. His purpose was to find a better location for a port (though it is rumoured he was drawn to the region less for its potential harbour facilities and more to visit his San Thomébased mistress). He struck a deal with the local chief or nayak, who governed that part of the coast and its hinterland on behalf of the Rajah of Chandragiri-Vellore, to lease a threemile strip of land at the fishing village of Madraspatnam between the Adyar and Coovum Rivers, empowering the Company to build a fort in return for trade benefits and army protection. The construction of Fort St George began on St George’s Day, 23 April 1640, and the settlement quickly expanded to include the local Portuguese and Dutch traders, and the many Indians – weavers, dyers, bleachers and washers – who arrived in great numbers.

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August 2014

The New and the Old As the city expanded southwards from the Fort and beyond the communities of the European ‘White Town’ and the indigenous ‘Black Town’, it acquired and encircled the neighbouring villages, some long-established, others more recent settlements. White Town and Black Town were razed by the French in the 1740s, during one of their many skirmishes with the Company at this time. When the British recovered the land, army engineers planned a new settlement on a gridded layout, which was to become Madras’s commercial heart during the 19th century, home to the city’s wholesale trade, big agency houses and banks. It was rechristened ‘George Town’ during the early 20th century, and to this day the religious diversity of the area is apparent in the numerous shrines of all faiths that still line the streets: Hindu and Jain temples, the Masjid Mamoor Mosque, and the Armenian Church, the only evidence of the small Armenian trading community that thrived here in the 18th century. The street name ‘Coral Merchant Street’ is all that remains of the Jewish coral merchants, whose synagogue was here. Home to a substantial Muslim population, the village of Triplicane was the Company’s first major territorial acquisition in 1672 and that heritage can be traced in the presence of the Wallajah Mosque, built in 1795, one of South India’s most beautiful mosques. The mosque, however, is pre-dated by the splendid Parthasarathy Temple, which dates to 808 CE, the Pallava period. The cluster of settlements that was Ezhumbur, or Egmore, was granted to the Fort in 1720, followed by Mylapore, the great port of the early Cholas, in 1749. Mylapore was known to Ptolemy the Greek geographer in the 2nd century CE, and the Portuguese noted that Mylapore was ‘rich, vast and grand’. The 16th-century Kapaleeshwarar Temple, devoted to Lord Shiva and built on the site of an earlier 7th-century temple, has a magnificent,

Photo: Ashok Arsh

Photo: Tineke Sysmans, Belgium

ornate gopuram and is one of Madras’s most emblematic buildings, standing tall against the modern city skyline. The French and Danish, also established in southern India, repeatedly attacked Madras, and these military skirmishes led to greater fortification and the establishment of civilian militia groups to aid the defence of the city. By the latter half of the 18th century, however, the British were in complete control of the region and the natural but shallow harbour at Madras was an important base for shipping. However, ships still had to be anchored offshore, and cargo – and people – were transported through the swell to the beach in small open vessels unique to Madras called masula

Chennai that is Madras

Some of Chennai′s historic landmarks. illustrationS: Maniam Selven

Different suggestions exist for the naming of Madras, or ‘Madraspatnam’ as the area around the Fort came to be known. One is that it came from madhu-ras – a Sanskrit word for honey; another that it was named after a local fisherman, Madarasan; or madrasas, a Muslim religious school. The most likely explanation, however, is that the name of the city comes from a corruption of the Portuguese family name ‘Madeiros’. The Madeiros family was prominent amongst the Portuguese settlers who arrived on the Coromandel a century before the East India Company. They owned land around Mylapore that they had named San Thomé in honour of the Doubting Apostle and there are many variations on the family name such as ‘Madra’ and ‘Madera’. Madras State was officially renamed Tamil Nadu in 1969, as part of a post-Independence movement to create new states based on linguistics, and reclaim the names of cities in the vernacular. Since 1996 Madras has been officially known as Chennai, derived from the name ‘Chennapattinam’, which was the area ruled by Chennappa Naicker, the Rajah of Chandragiri-Vellor who granted the East India Company trading rights on the Coromandel Coast.

August 2014

culturama

Photo: Carlo Sem, Italy

boats. The development of the harbour in the 19th century contributed to the city’s importance as a centre for trade. This was the period that saw the founding of Madras’s famous mercantile companies: the sugar producer Parry’s, Binny & Co who manufactured textiles, Spencer’s department stores, the engineering company Best & Crompton, Higginbotham’s – India’s oldest surviving bookshop, and the watchmaker P. Orr & Sons. With land going spare, the city’s merchants built large houses surrounded by greenery and trees, particularly on the banks of the Adyar River, once the hunting grounds for the Fort’s officials. Few remain now, and those that do are lost amongst their urban surroundings.

Madras Precedents The raising of civilian militias to aid the Company’s defence laid the foundations of what was to become the Indian Army. The initiative came from Major Stringer Lawrence, hired by the East India Company in 1748 to take charge of the defence of Cuddalore, another British settlement on the Coromandel. Lawrence made his protégé, Robert Clive, an officer, and trained the local mercenaries enlisted in the defence of Cuddalore to become a militia.

Over the next two years, the Madras militia were formed into companies, and won Clive fame at the Siege of Arcot in 1751. By 1758 Lawrence had reorganised these disciplined forces into the Madras Regiment, today the oldest regiment in the Indian Army. It was the men of the Madras Army who were responsible for the opening up of India and discovering its wealth. Colonel Colin Mackenzie surveyed southern India, studying religion, oral history and inscriptions and produced the first maps of the region and notes on archaeological landmarks. Lieutenant-Colonel William Lambton was the superintendent of the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India, which he began at a baseline near Madras in 1802. His work was extended to the Himalayan mountain range by his assistant, George Everest. Francis Buchanan was a geographer, zoologist and botanist who made comprehensive studies of the immense wealth of flora and fauna offered by the land. From their work came into being the Survey of India, the country’s central engineering agency in charge of mapping and surveying; the Archaeological Survey of India, responsible for protecting the nation’s ancient monuments and archaeological sites; and the Zoological and the Botanical Surveys of India preserving the country’s bio-diversity.

culturama

August 2014

culturama

Photo: Deborah Miller, USA

A City Reinvented Post Independence, the city of Madras has reinvented itself as a modern and cosmopolitan metropolis. It is India’s leading automotive hub, home to companies making bicycles, cars, trucks, earth-moving equipment, rail coaches, and even battle tanks. Software development, business process outsourcing and electronics manufacturing are major drivers of economic growth. The city’s healthcare institutions are amongst Asia’s largest, and attract nearly half of India’s medical tourists, whilst the presence of long-established educational and research institutions have encouraged international engineering and energy companies to the city. Francis Day would no doubt be delighted to know that textiles are still manufactured in the city and exported around the world. The city maintains its traditional Tamil roots, too, as reflected in its performing arts. Many of India’s most famous Bharatnatyam dancers have passed through the halls of the city’s Kalakshetra Foundation, founded in the early 20th century. Every year in December the city hosts its Music and Dance Festival, known colloquially as the ‘Music Season’, which is one of the largest cultural events in the world. The Music Season showcases the talent of renowned Carnatic vocal and instrumental artistes as well as upcoming classical musicians and dancers. The month-long calendar of events is organised by music organisations or sabhas, who vie with each other to present the best of musicians on their platforms around the city. The Tamil film industry, whose output is equal to that of Bollywood, is centred on the suburb of Kodambakkam, once the western temple town of Vadapalani. This is a city where the traditional and the modern famously combine to present a distinct culture. 1

KYC - Know Your City

3 Madras Day is marked by a week-long celebration of the city’s history, identity and character. Take part this year from 17–24 August 2014, details on the website: http://themadrasday.in

4 Visit the Royapuram Railway Station – India’s oldest surviving railway station. It was the first railway station built in South India, and started operating in 1856. 3 Go for a walk along the Marina Beach – one of the longest city beaches in the world, running for a distance of 13 km from Fort St George to Besant Nagar, and continuing to fringe the Bay of Bengal all the way south to the temple town of Mamallapuram. 1 The seventh edition of Madras Rediscovered by S. Muthiah (Westland Books) is the most authoritative historical guide to the city.

1 Tamarind City: Where Modern India Began by Bishwanath Ghosh (Westland Books) is an evocative portrait of the twin souls of Madras and Chennai. 1 Degree Coffee by the Yard: A Short Biography of Madras by Nirmala Lakshman (Aleph) captures the soul of the city through the eyes of a long-time resident.

culturama

August 2014

Advertiser's Feature

Intl The Learning Route 1 Find out how European International School(EIS) is different from most traditional primary schools. Primary Year Programme (PYP) of International Baccalaureate (IB) Curriculum at European International School encourages International mindedness. Over the last decade we have had a lot of questions about what is the meaning of internationalism and what makes a school international. There are now many schools around the world with the word ‘International’ in their title. European International School (EIS) is different from most traditional primary schools.

whether or not something would be globally true and should be able to apply anywhere. This allows the children to take the idea and fit it into their own culture or any other culture they are interested in or had experience with. Our school expose students to an idea that can be studied at any age, in any culture and is not value laden to a specific culture. IB believes that this is true cross-cultural understanding that students can use in their lives.

Internationalism

In a traditional school, adults have the control over what is going to be taught and how it is to be taught. In our school, teachers work together as a collective group to come up with concepts that can be looked at by students in different ways. Students then take this concept, and can go about exploring an aspect that interests them. This ownership helps the students to become more invested in their studies and learn how to explore things they are curious about. Students self-assess their learning and tell their teachers how they think they did in understanding a topic. This reflection helps kids to see how they can apply what they’ve learned and start to take action. 1 Website: www.eischennai.com

The Primary Years Programme (PYP) at EIS refers to the concept to international mindedness. Internationalmindedness is about recognizing that we do see the world in many different ways. The PYP also cultivates internationallyminded learners who actively demonstrate responsibility for and commitment to making a difference in the world. This is why a lot of emphasis is put on the action component of our children’s learning.

Cross Cultural Understanding EIS strives to make the cross cultural connection in a much more meaningful way. When coming up with the central ideas for our units of inquiry, thought is put into

Students’ Voice in their Learning

August 2014

culturama

Cultural Lens by Ranjini Manian

What’s your CCQ?

Photo: Cara Louwman-de Bruin, The Netherlands

1 When doing business beyond borders, understand small differences in habits and cultures People are the same everywhere; it is the habits that differ. When doing business beyond borders, it is this small difference that needs to be most understood. This means you pay close attention to brushing up your CCQ – CrossCulture Quotient. At an office party thrown to get to know his Indian colleagues and their families, he circulated with drink in hand from group to group. Quite the extrovert, he made small talk with ease and cracked jokes. But as the evening wore on, he began to figure out that something was not going right. Groups broke up nervously at his approach, and some people even began leaving. Alarmed, he called aside his next in line and asked him what the matter was. After hemming and hawing, the visibly embarrassed Indian choked out: “Please don’t wink so much, Greg. And not at the wives!” The gregarious American had been accompanying his completely kosher jokes with winks and hearty laughs, but the poor Indian wives only saw this loud American, drink in hand, winking broadly at them!

What to say, when and how Communication styles vary from more or less direct to the reverse depending on the culture we are operating in. American culture is very direct, whereas Japanese culture is most indirect. In Japanese, “Onamae o oshiete kudasaimasen ka?” broadly means: “Would you not do me the favour of

teaching me your name?” This reflects the level of formality indirectness of this culture. In American culture, it would be enough to say, “Your name please?” In India, even more abrupt usages are seen – such as, “Name?” This would not be meant to offend, but would definitely do so in both the US and Japanese cultures.

Proper Greeting Bow, shake hands or join your palms in a namaste – the choices are many! In Asian countries, bowing is an art and very elaborately done to show respect. Hands on sides for men, held in front for women, bending waist down, eyes going down to the floor, is the rule in Japan. Shake web to web, firmly and just a couple of times before letting go for a Western handshake, between men or women. The Indian joke about greetings, however, is: “My bugs are my bugs and your bugs are yours!” So traditionally people never shook hands, but simply folded their hands in greeting, though not in modern business circles anymore. Knowing whether to greet with a bow, handshake or namaste is one thing, but only practice makes perfect and then it comes naturally. Trust me, handshakes and everything else improve on practice, including your CCQ. 1 (This article is a modified version of a piece published by the author in the Hindu Business Line print edition, March 27, 2006. Read the article at http://tinyurl.com/q2xd7qw)

culturama

August 2014

culturama

Look who’s in town Mumbai

Mumbai

s r e t t a M

1 New Yorker Zachary Bayman, Brand and Operations Consultant with Keys Hotels in Mumbai, gives us an exhaustive list of wine and dine spots in Mumbai

It would be rare to find Zachary Bayman dining at home, even on a weekday. Zachary’s job in the hospitality industry gives him an excuse to dine at different places every day. “Eating out is a professional obligation – every restaurant I visit is competitive research (or so I have convinced myself!), so I dine and cocktail out multiple times a week, enjoying cuisine from a highway dhaba to a Belvedere martini at Asilo atop the Palladium Hotel,” he says. Though Zachary has been in Mumbai for less than a year, childhood years spent in Delhi trained his palate to appreciate Indian spices.

Food Spots My neighbourhood spot for Indian food is Bandra's ‘Pali Bhavan’ – the dal makhani and butter chicken is addictively divine. On Thursdays, the chic restaurant converts into a wild dance party. ‘Ellipsis’ in Colaba provides Mumbai’s best Nouveau American meal. Executive Chef Kelvin creates wonderful fusion delicacies – be sure to try the pork belly dishes. Make sure you that you reserve a place if you are going there for dinner. Japanese food lovers will appreciate ‘Kofuku’, hidden on the second floor in a Bandra building. ‘Big Bang’ is a fun bar to wash down the wasabi, and next-door ‘Bonobo’ occasionally hosts terrace parties. ‘Pali Village Café’ in Pali Hill provides a serene ambience and a tasty menu. The décor mixes elements of left-bank chic, rustic Brooklyn and Indian touches. The watermelon-and-feta salad is not to be missed.

For Sunday brunches, ‘Salt Water Café’ in Bandra is a light, airy place to enjoy eggs and a few Bloody Marys. In Juhu, the brunch at Le Mangii is expansive and delicious.

Tipplers time For the tipplers among you, ‘The Daily’ in Bandra is a lounge with inventive drinks. ‘Asilo’ (Palladium Hotel) and ‘Aer’ (Four Seasons Hotel) are luxury rooftop bars – visit for a Sunday Sundowner cocktail and watch the sun melt into the Arabian Sea. Colaba’s ‘Woodside Inn’ serves fantastic craft brews from the Gateway Brewing Company. ‘Escobar’ in Bandra has a large terrace on which one may happily imbibe well-mixed cocktails. ‘Toto’s Garage’, just off Pali Market, is a dive bar mixed with samplings of every type of Mumbaikar, a great playlist and cheap Kingfishers – always a surprise and always fun.

Tip Time I advise my expat friends to drop the cautious attitude. Ignore the terrified looks of the kind waiters and request for extra chillies, drop your fork, eat the dosa with your fingers and expand your comfort zone. The best part about Mumbai is how friendly people are. Remain open for the chance encounters and Mumbai will surprise you in ways you never imagined! 1

culturama

August 2014

Advertiser's Feature

Beauty with the Best 1 Chennai Plastic surgery is a one-stop-shop for all beauty needs with specialised offerings and superior technical platform. Be it a simple hair removal procedure or a specialized tummy tuck, Chennai has a new destination for all these beauty needs. Chennai Plastic Surgery (CPS), a upcoming chain of cosmetic units has developed a strong clientele in the country and globally, thanks to their innovative methods, superior technical platform and quick-to-implement state-of-the-art technologies. The chain is located at Chetpet, on OMR and Nungambakkam. Teaming up with Naturals beauty salons, CPS has kick-started their latest innovation, a unique and first of its kind MedSpa in Chennai in Khader Nawaz Khan Road. They employ scientific time tested and globally pproved procedures that are non - surgical. It offers counseling for both surgical and non surgical services, ensuring that the patient makes informed decisions. For conditions, that are not addressable by non surgical options such as under-eye bags, under-eye dark circles etc. they advise the clients on surgical alternatives. The Non Surgical Services include : Hair Fall Management, Laser Hair Removal, Non surgical skin tightening, body contouring and Lipolytic injections, Chemical peels to manage acne, skin pigmentation, post

ance scar including microdermabrasion and dermaroller treatments, skin glow programmes, skin lightening injections, Botox, fillers, Mole / Wart Removal etc. And for the first time in Chennai, CPS introduces the highly effective Intraceuticals: a skin care system that revives, revitalizes and protects the skin, exclusively made available at this centre. The surgical services include Liposuction, Male Breast Correction, Tummy Tuck, Six Packs, Hair Transplant, Rhinoplasty, Blepharoplasty, Otoplasty, Breast Lift, Breast Implants / Fat Fills, Breast Reduction, Facelifts etc. And the good news is that most of them are minimally invasive, day care procedures, with the patient free to go home on the same day of the surgery. Managed by highly qualified healthcare professionals, at CPS the promises made are real and you can be assured that the limitations or the extent of any procedure is clearly stated. In a bid to support awareness and provide information to the community CPS has started the Beauty Because Club as part of its Corporate Social Responsibility. To join this club you can sign up at beautybecause2013.cps@gmail.com 1

August 2014

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Look who’s in town Chennai

At Home in

Parrys

1 If you are wondering about the best place to go shopping for apparel, accessories or things for the home in Chennai, French woman Veronique Clais is the person to ask Veronique Clais from France has been there, done that – when it concerns shopping for clothes and accessories in Chennai. Her experience with shopping for Indian clothes in the past six months is worth listening to: “The most difficult part was buying a sari. After stepping in and out of several specialty shops with miles of fabric of different materials and colours, I was exhausted. When I finally found what I wanted, the shopkeeper very kindly handed me a leaflet that explained the process of wearing a sari. I tried it out at home and it was impossible! Then I realised I had missed the petticoat (inner skirt) – essential to hold the sari! A visit to a tailor fixed these problems and now I wear a sari in a minute!” Her take-away from the experience? “If you want to wear a sari, ask an Indian to teach you!”

French Fashion France is the country of fashion and diversity. Designer fashion is accessible to the rich, and also for every day wear for the rest of the population. Clothes are worn according to the season – winter, summer, spring and autumn. So, you can have a wide variety of clothing and footwear. Jewellery in gold or silver is available from designers as well as other simpler ones including costume jewellery. What surprises me in India, especially in Tamil Nadu, is the uniformity of the clothes, especially for women – sari or salwar kameez. Diversity and originality are in the colours. Here, women adorn their hair with flowers while in France we do not wear flowers in our hair but do a lot of hairstyling.

Shop till you Drop In Chennai, there is something for everyone. All major brands are present in different malls. My favourite places for shopping in the city are Big Bazaar for Indian and Western clothes and Pothys and Nalli for typical Indian clothing including saris. In the seven-storied Saravana Stores in T. Nagar, you can find absolutely everything for clothing and for the home. You can find inexpensive but good quality jewellery at Saravana Jewels. Parry’s Corner is also a great place for shopping at very attractive prices.

When in France France also has something for all tastes and all budgets. In Paris, Champs Élysées is where all major designers and jewelers are located. Even if you do not buy anything, it is always good to walk through what is called ‘most beautiful avenue in the world’. Lowbudget shoppers should go to the famous Tati store where you can get fashionable clothes and accessories at low prices. Generally, the French do their shopping in town centres where there are all brands and all styles, for clothing or decorating houses. 1

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August 2014

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Word: Love; Place: Bonharishpur; Language: Bengali Riya lives in Bonharishpur, a small village in West Bengal. Although there are several chai wallahs in the village whose stands are hubs of activity, Riya, an eighth grader, prefers to drink her mother’s special tea at home.

Picture Story by Zach Marks and Resham Gellatly

In a Nutshell Zach Marks and Resham Gellatly, who have been contributing to the ‘Daily Cuppa’ column, have met people in different parts of India during the course of their travels. They usually ask people for the first word that comes to mind when they hear the word chai, then have them write it on a whiteboard in a language they are most comfortable with. This collection of photos – part of a larger project called ‘Ek Shabd’ (‘one word’ in Hindi) – depicts the wide range of languages, settings and individuals that come together to make up this wonderful country. 1

Word: Coffee; Place: Bodh Gaya; Language: English Suchetan Giri Goswami, a sadhu or holy man, is visiting the Mahabodhi Temple in Bodh Gaya, Bihar, the site where Siddhartha Gautama attained enlightenment and became the Buddha.

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Word: Camel; Place: Pushkar; Language: Hindi Bakram Devashi from Rajasthan's Nagaur district can't imagine life without his herd of camels. His mornings start with a cup of camel milk chai, and his days end with the same.

Word: Morning; Place: Bangaluru; Language: Kannada Raj has been selling flowers in Bengaluru’s City Market for 10 years. The flower market opens before sunrise, and Raj needs at least one cup of chai to start his morning off right.

Word: Iranian tea; Place: Mumbai; Language: Persian Boman Kohinoor, owner of Britannia & Company Restaurant in Mumbai, enjoys a cup of tea brought from the chai shop outside after finishing off his lunch of berry pulao, one of Britannia’s most renowned dishes.

Word: Plucking; Place: Munnar; Language: Malayalam Born and brought up on Surianelle tea estate in the hills of Munnar in Kerala, Delma plucks tea leaves eight hours a day. Delma is married to a worker at the tea estate’s processing factory, where the leaves are turned into tea dust.

Word: Ginger; Place: Delhi; Language: Hindi For four years, Khushi has been a driver for Sakha Cabs for Women, safely transporting women in and around Delhi.

August 2014

Seeing India by Devanshi Mody

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In Search of Buddha

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A carved door jamb to the brick monastery at Ratnagiri. (Left) A sculpture depicting the Buddha in meditation at Udayagiri PhotoS: All photos by Samir Mody

1 A walk through Odisha’s lesser known Buddhist trails can spring a few surprises – and remind us that the journey is as important as the destination

August 2014

We almost miss our flight to Bhubaneswar – it is Samir’s (my brother) fault. We mutually decide to maintain a cold silence, but by the end of the day, Odisha’s lesser known Buddhist trails, terrific but languishing in oblivion, have us gushing. We embark on our expedition at dawn. Even so, a monolithic block of traffic lies between us and Dhauli, our first stop. It takes us 45 minutes to reach this place, which is just outside Bhubaneswar. Dhauli is serene – so serene, it is impossible to envisage that it was here in 261 BC that King Ashoka purportedly fought the Kalinga War. Suddenly, a one-armed guide, like some spectre of war ravage, emerges from the surrounding. He relates how Ashoka supposedly guffawed at his victory. But the war had engendered misery enough – 100,000 people were butchered, 150,000 enslaved and 100,000 exterminated in the aftermath – to cause the war-craven monarch’s conversion to Buddhism. We never do find out the guide’s name, but his unsolicited narrative is helpful as Dhauli has few explanatory placards. Putting together his account and (mutually inconsistent) pamphlets that the India Tourism Office at the airport stocked me with, I glean that Kalinga (an early republic that comprised most of modern-day Odisha) is amongst Buddhism’s 12 prescribed places for attaining perfection, and equals Lumbini and Sarnath in sanctity. After the Kalinga War, the region saw the flowering of art, scholasticism and monasticism. Thus, Dhauli’s environs are aswirl in remarkably well-preserved ruins. On the war site remain pronouncements of universal tolerance in

August 2014

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An ornate freize at Udayagiri. (Right) Sculptures of Buddhist figures.

Brahmi and Pali scripts – one of Ashoka’s celebrated edicts. Behind the edict looms a monolith elephant; a contemporary Ashoka chakra stands atop pillars in pretty parks. Placed upon a hill beyond is the modern peace pavilion that resembles melting vanilla ice cream – no architectural marvel. We don’t bother with it, much to the delight of our driver Kunal who is impatient for his breakfast. We wait impatiently as Kunal breakfasts abundantly; we want to locate Kuruma, the last-uncovered spot of Buddhist antiquity, now called Yama-Dharma because villagers worship an excavated buffalo-mounted heruka (a category of wrathful deities) and crowned the statue of a Buddha in bhumisparsa mudra* as Yama and Dharma. Kunal hasn’t heard of Kuruma, nor has anyone we ask – although this village is just 8 km from the Sun Temple at Konark. We redirect our efforts at finding Langudi, which boasts recent discoveries of a pancha dhyani* Buddha with – and this is unusual – female accompaniments, and an image of Ashoka embossed in rock flanked by two consorts. However, asking a policeman for directions elicits a dismissive, “Waha kuch nahin (There is nothing there).” Instead, we find ourselves dispatched on the routine ‘Golden Triangle’ of Lalitgiri-Ratnagiri-Udayagiri. It is Lalitgiri then. Dejected as we are about missing Kuruma and Langudi, we can’t complain much about our new destination – which boasts some of the world’s oldest Buddhist edifices dating from 3rd century BC to the 15th century AD. Votive stupas (domes) lend a brooding air, remains of a chaitya (a Buddhist shrine with a stupa) evoke Greco-Roman amphitheatres, a truncated Buddha arrests, whilst the excursive brick monastery boasts admirable drainage facilities. There is a monument with brick “steps” that mount into a mound, but no official can explain their significance. Presiding over a sandstone hillock is a stone * Bhumisparsa mudra – When the fingers are pointed to the ground. * Pancha dhyani – Representing the five qualities of the Buddha.

stupa that dominates verdant surrounds. The discovery in 1985 of golden caskets with sacred bone relics, supposedly of the Tathagatha (as the Buddha of the Pali canon refers to himself), further enhances this stupa’s significance for Buddhists. The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) sculpture shed – it’s a shed, not a museum – displays some splendid life-size figures, most bearing original inscriptions. However, there is no one around to provide extraneous descriptions, so the visitor remains unenlightened. Those towering Buddhas whose draperies slither from shoulder to knees are evidence of influences of Gandhara and Mathura art. The Bodhisatvas rank amongst India’s finest, but the caretaker seems blissfully uninspired by his beauteous surrounds. The Golden Triangle’s second point, Ratnagiri, is located amidst emerald inclines. Ratnagiri’s Mahavihara temple was a great and unimpeded centre of Buddhist philosophy from the Gupta reign (circa 320 to 550 AD) to the 12th century. We meander through a mesh of immense 6th century monasteries, shrines, sculptures and innumerable votive stupas. The carved stone door jamb to the brick monastery is beautiful, as are the expansive courtyard it opens into and the sanctum with a Buddha ensconced within. Admittedly, the architecture isn’t as exuberant as at Hindu sites, where art and craft were executed religiously as a celebration of divinity.

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August 2014

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Ruins of a chaitya (Buddhist shrine with a stupa) at Lalitgiri.

Buddhism’s sternness notwithstanding, Ratnagiri has an air of sensuality about it – we are astonished by buxom damsels sculpted into an ascetic monastery. Even more sensational are the sculpted couples in compromising poses, quite like those at Konark. Then, one learns this was a place of tantric Buddhism – initially expounding Mahayana Buddhism, which inspired the terser architecture, Ratnagiri transformed between 8th and 9th century AD into a stage of tantric Vajrayana art and philosophy. Tibetan source Pag Sam Jon Zang further refers to the subsequent emergence of kalachakra tantra* in 10th century AD. Hence the rather risqué dharinis* and Vajrayana pantheon divinities. The ASI’s new museum is an effort at relating Ratnagiri’s fascinating tale. But until tourists visit, urchins – who claim their school has been shut for six months – play cricket amidst the ruins, as their cricket balls bounce off meditating Buddhas. After lunch, we reach Udayagiri, the youngest and perhaps largest of Odisha’s Buddhist sites (7th–12th century AD). It is here that Samir and I resume our dialogue; we are surprised by Udayagiri’s austere look. One would have expected Buddhism’s abstemiousness at older sites and a manifestation of decadence with time, but Udayagiri has none of Ratnagiri’s raciness and panache nor its garlands of greenery. Indeed, even the “King’s Palace” is less than meagre; one ornate gate redeems. Cradled below a U-shaped hill, Udayagiri rests in rugged seclusion. Nowadays, however, it

1 The ASI’s new museum is an effort at relating Ratnagiri’s fascinating tale. But until tourists visit, urchins play cricket amidst the ruins has acquired a certain celebrity status since archaeologists uncovered an ancient Madhavapura Mahavihara. Exhumed too were a network of monasteries, a sliced pyramid-like brick stupa, rocks faceted in sculpture, an inscribed step well and, significantly, ample and elegant depictions of dhyani Buddha and saints such as Avalokiteswara, Aparajita and so on. The monastery is two-storied with a shrine and circumambulatory path. A reservoir makes it unique amongst Buddhist sites. And yet, enormous sculptures remain supine. The caretaker indicates a precipice that supposedly conceals sculptural masterpieces. But he withholds directions to the pinnacle, as it were, of architecture. He must accompany us, for a price, naturally. Samir says, “Up there will be more of the same”. Nevertheless, I begin clambering up. Until barb wire crosses me – clearly, the hilltop isn’t to be accessed. The caretaker grins from below; he says he just cuts the barbed wire when he needs to. “Want me to come along?” he asks. As we leave Udayagiri, I recall V.S. Naipaul’s words from In a Free State, “…an American… said he had himself brought back a whole head from one of our ancient temples; he had got the guide to hack it off… ‘That’s why I had to give the guide two dollars. If I had a bottle of whiskey he would have pulled down the whole temple for me.” 1

* Kalachakra means ‘time cycles’, while ‘tantra’ is a complex and esoteric teaching in Tibetan Buddhism. * Dharinis – female bearers.

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August 2014

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Seeing India by Chengalath Charulekha

Life's Simple Pleasures 1 In the coastal town of Kozhikode, you can watch a boat being built by hand, sample Moplah delicacies or See a dolphin taking flight

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Wet, salty, sandy, the smell of fish, and a green bar of herbal soap going down a greener pool of water – mention ‘Calicut’ and my brain instantly picks out these sensory experiences from the memory bank. Calicut or Kozhikode was home, the small town I grew up in. My earliest memories are centred around a time of climbing trees, feeding cows, splashing about in the natural pond in my mother’s ancestral house, and drowning several bars of soap in its waters. Sibling fights for fallen mangoes and countless festivals where we fought some more for crackers, clothes and coconut water. Where heavily pregnant clouds from the Arabian Sea arrived to break its waters and bless that land with a lush of green fecundity. It was this land, thick with memories and strong scents and images, that I was now revisiting – as an adult and a tourist. An interesting aspect of travel is how it has a tendency to offer varying experiences, depending on the nature of your visit to a particular place. How sometimes the same, familiar place will take on an entirely different character. You see and learn of things that have been there all along but had never visited the ambit of your everyday existence – such as the Dolphin Point at Calicut beach, for example. A discreet Google search prior to the visit revealed the whereabouts of the place where dolphins could be spotted. Over 15 years, I had visited this sea and played in its waters, but not once had I known of the dolphins’ presence. But off we went to the sea excitedly to spot these lovely, now ‘non human persons’. After staring at the sea for what seemed like an eternity, where our brain tricked us and we jumped up at every dummy object we spotted, from palm trunks to coconut shells, we gave up and went about our original plan. Which was to visit an ancient port town called Beypore, some 15 km from the city.

Beypore Beypore was once a prominent trade centre for the Arabs and Chinese, even the Europeans, but, today, it is most famous for handmade ships known as uru. The urus are probably one of the largest handmade ships built according to a unique set of ancient ship-building techniques in this day and age. The tradition of ship building is over a thousand years old and the major clients continue to come from Arab countries. At the workshop, brown dust scented the air with a woody fragrance. Workers were standing on, and hanging from, different parts of the ship. It is rigorous work and requires the effort of workers over several months – even years. First, a miniature of the model is created, translated from an idea in the mind of the shipwright. Once an approval is received from the client, the local contractor begins the project. What is fascinating is that the men do their work without a blueprint.

August 2014

1. Egrets watching the sunrise at the broken bridge in Calicut beach. 2. A ship worker at Beypore. 3. A fisherman makes his way through the placid waters. (Left) An uru being built at Beypore PhotoS: All photos by Chengalath Charulekha

The work site for the uru is always located near backwaters connecting to the sea – when the work is finished, the ship is manually rolled over the tree trunks below the platform upon which the uru is constructed. The brand new ship then sails from this small port town to its glamorous new destination.

Food trails Calicut is known to be a paradise for seafood lovers, with fresh catch cooked in exotic spices. There are a variety of dishes that offer a blend of Moplah cuisine and other local flavours. the Malabar biryani is the undisputed king of the table, and a trip to Calicut would be incomplete without tucking into a bowl of this spicy rice. Malabar biryani is different from other Indian varieties because of the use of the fragrant kaima variety of rice. The rice is cooked separately

August 2014

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A finished uru model ready for a makeover. (Right) Dolphin-watching at Calicut Beach.

in ghee, not mixed in with the masala. The rice and masala are then laid out in layers – one on top of the other – and cooked. Do not forget to top off the meal with a glass of hot Sulaimani chai – black tea infused with a blend of spices – which makes an excellent after-meal digestive.

Thali temple: On the second day of our trip, we headed to the famous Thali kshetram, a Shiva temple said to have been built sometime around the 12th century. A strict dress code is observed and those wearing pants or jeans are barred from entry. Fresh clean dhotis are available for purchase or rent for those who need them. Non-Hindus are not allowed to enter the temple. The temple had beautiful wooden reliefs and mural paintings – as my friend from Nepal said, and I agreed, they share some common features with temple art and architecture of Nepal. In what could be said to be a beautiful coincidence, we had walked into the temple on a special day and were treated to a beautiful musical procession by the priests. Licking on the delicious prasadam and momentarily escalated to a feeling of peace and harmony, we headed to our final destination on our list. Kappad beach was rocky, hot and crowded for a weekday – but the beach was clean, with none of the dying debris of garbage that one often sees in the beaches in other coastal cities. We clambered up the rocks; I might have concluded it sheer lunacy to be perching upon hot rocks if it hadn’t been

for the sudden flip of a tail we suddenly spotted in the water. As we waited with bated breath, a pointy nose broke through the waters, and a slender grey body glided gracefully before it dived back into the water. Soon we had cameras clicking and people chattering excitedly as a whole school of dolphins went about finding their early evening snack. On our way back, elated by the wonderful new experiences, I developed a sudden urge to ride an ordinary row boat on a stretch of backwaters. When I shared this unlikely wish with our auto driver, he immediately stopped to befriend some local fishermen and initiated a deal. They, in turn, readily agreed to ferry us around for a fair price. As the oars hit the water sending ripples across its surface, and our bodies gently swayed to the rhythm, the wind and the song of the palm fronds dancing in the breeze, I once again reconnected with my childhood. I took comfort in the fact that not all stories and people of my childhood have died – they were, in fact, continuing to thrive alongside a newer, growing Calicut city. 1

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August 2014

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Calendar of events

August

Presenting the best of India’s events in different categories across Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chennai and nearby suburbs

Art & Exhibitions

Art Show Mumbai

Art Exhibition Delhi

Art Musings presents ‘Solitary Spaces’, a solo exhibition featuring the works of artist Lalu Prasad Shaw. A gifted artist and print maker, Shaw’s work is notable for its smooth synthesis of disparate stylistic elements. His works capture private corners within domestic spaces, inhabited by solitary women and men. Whether through a carefully positioned line, or other unexpected nuances, Shaw articulates distinct spaces within and beyond the picture plane. Call +91 22 2216 3339 for more details.

An exhibition of textiles, paintings and sculptures from the donation of private art collector C.L. Bharany will be held at the National Museum. The exhibits include hundreds of items such as sculptures, paintings, terracotta, wood pieces, coins and more. The objects represent every era from the 1st to the 20th century across every region in India. They are diverse in respect to the social context, ranging from courtly art to items used by rural folk. Call +91 11 23019272 for more details.

Date: July 25 to August 31 Venue: 1, Admiralty Building, Colaba, Mumbai Time: 1100h to 2000h

Date: July 11 to August 14 Venue: National Museum, Janpath, New Delhi Time: 1000h to 1900h

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Exhibition of Paintings Chennai French artist Diane de Valou will showcase her paintings in an exhibition titled ‘Abstract Prose from the Desert’. Diane embodies artistic elegance and timelessness, and she is faithful to depicting beauty ignoring trends. Space becomes the transitional object in her work, where illusion becomes the substitute for the actual image. Call +91 44-28332226 for more details. Date: August 1 to 31 Venue: Apparao Galleries, No.7, Wallace Garden, Nungambakkam, Chennai

August 2014

Events

Ganesh Chathurthi Walk Mumbai Experience the festival that celebrates the elephant-headed God through Breakaway’s Ganesha Chathurthi walk. Meandering through Ganesh shaalas, where Ganesh idols sit at different levels of completion you will learn a little more about the science of making these idols. Traditional snacks are included in this three-hour walk. Call + 91 9310007855 or email at bindu@breakaway.in. Visit the website at www.break-away.in Date: August 9 to 24 Venue: Lalbaug area, Mumbai Time: 0930h to 1230 h

Artisans Market Chennai ‘By Hand from The Heart’ is an artisan and farmers’ market that will present all things handmade and wholesome. The market place will have the makers of exclusive handcrafted jewellery, stationery, bags and more displaying their products. Organic food – mangoes, rhubarb preserves and sundried tomatoes – will also be on sale. As their byline goes, the market will have one show with many stories. Date: August 22 to 23 Venue: Hanu Reddy Residences, Poes Garden, Teynampet, Chennai Time: 1000h to 2000h

August 2014

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English Theatre Delhi

Indo-Korean Theatre Bengaluru

Akshara Theatre is hosting the ‘Hotter Than July Summerfest’ – a set of plays that promise to be a treat for theatre lovers. In August, the theatre company will host the play Lysistrata – Make Love Not War: A Sexy Ancient Greek Comedy. An adaptation of a classic Greek comedy, the play tells the story of how Lysistrata, a brave woman who decides to end the war. Call +91 11 233643260 or email Aksharatheatre@gmail.com for tickets.

‘Beyond Binary’ is a commissioned Indo-Korean theatre collaboration that draws inspiration from Indian mythology. It has been developed after a series of workshops, extensive research and in-depth interviews in India and Korea. The production is directed by Bae Yosup, Artistic Director of Performance Group Tuida, one the most innovative in Korea. For tickets, please contact www.thehindu. com/theatrefest, or contact InKo Centre at +91 44-24361224 or enquiries@inkocentre.org

Date: August 16 and 18 Venue: Akshara Theatre, Connaught Place, Delhi Time: 1930h

Launch of exclusive crockery line – Bengaluru Fine Tableware designer Nishita Thakurdas will launch her line of exclusive dinnerware at the Oberoi Hotel. Her designs are contemporary, global yet rooted in Indian aesthetics. Nishita’s collections are limited editions and are not mass produced. Visit www.nishitadesign.com for more details or connect on Face book at https://www.facebook. com/nishitadesign Date: August 2 Venue: Hotel Oberoi, M.G Road, Sampangi Rama Nagar, Bangalore

Heritage Motor Rally – Chennai The Madras Heritage Motoring Club will have their annual parade of vintage cars. The parade will be held between 9 a.m. and 10 a.m., followed by a display of the cars from 10 a.m. to 12.30 p.m. The heritage rally is in its 10th year now. Call +91 98404 12262 for more details. Date: August 24 Venue: Don Bosco School, Egmore, Chennai Time: 0900h to 1230h

Date: August 15 Venue: Chowdiah Hall, Bengaluru Time: 90 minutes (Exact time not mentioned)

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August 2014

Advertiser's Feature

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"I trust Satin Skin for my skin and body care" – Chinmayi

August 2014

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Photo: Images of Asia

Spotlight by Team Culturama

Celebrating Madras August 17 to 24

The city of Chennai, or Madras as it was called, is celebrating its 375th birthday this year. The founding day of Madras is considered to be August 22, 1639. This was the day when the land where Fort St. George stands today was transacted by the East India Company. From this fort grew small settlements, which later grew into what we now call Chennai city. The Madras Day Celebrations started a decade ago and have now reached a scale where citizens participate with events that highlight little known aspects of the city. The event was started by a group of Chennai enthusiasts. Heritage walks, exhibitions, contests and more are held across this week for public participation. Days of celebrations have now been extended to across a week to ensure wider participation. Walks across the city have been organised such as the one inside the Government Museum, Egmore, or the walk through the magical world of insects in their tree habitats at the Nageswara Rao Park. Go through an exhibition of 375 cartoons on the city and its people by cartoonist Biswajit Balasubramanian. Visit the official website of the Madras Day Celebrations at www.themadrasday.in for more details. 1

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Postcard from India beach at Besant Nagar e ur ct pi is th I took nearby, re is a temple he T . ai n n he C in ppening. as a festival ha where there w ival and ere for the fest People were th ll these at the beach. A y da n fu a g n havi , looking were strung up ks as m ed ur lo co ild happy by ould make a ch at me. They w like the super heroes. I to in em th g turnin patterns, its saris, kolam a, di In of s ur colo asks. 1 ts and these m temples, marke enoir, France â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Jean Denis L

August 2014

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At Global Adjustments

Campus to Corporate The definition of professionalism, punctuality, communication and body language does not translate across cultures. We often forget to remind ourselves that understanding and, more importantly, adapting to crosscultural differences is a must. Recently, Global Adjustments held a ‘Campus to Corporate’ training programme for young professionals at Hitachi Automotive, India. Hitachi, a Japanese company, required fresh recruits to learn how to work with their Japanese colleagues. The ‘Campus to Corporate’ programme revolves around the acronym ‘PROUD’. Effective, culturally sensitive communication should be proactive, respectful, oriented to solutions, understandable and direct. The programme modules for the session with Hitachi included PROUD communication, workplace expectations, Japan sensitisation and Japanese language lessons in a social plus a business context. The programme enables young professionals to recognise cultural differences, incorporate these differences into their day-to-day interactions with expatriate colleagues

and teaches them to work in a professional environment with people from multi-cultural backgrounds. The programme runs for seven days and features content in the areas of cultural understanding, international communication and global etiquette. Indians are typically verbose by nature and need to learn to communicate with fewer yet impactful words. Participants at Hitachi learnt that first impressions – including meeting and greeting someone especially in Japan – are extremely important. Octoli Tuccu, the facilitator for this programme, says, “Greetings make an all-time first impression in Japan”. Following the norms and customs of a particular country make the locals feel comfortable. Some new recruits at Hitachi wrote to Global Adjustments to say it had benefited them greatly. As one of them summed up, “This programme has taught me how to be confident in dressing, time management, speaking up and learning from mistakes.” For more details or to learn about other programmes, email us at courses@globaladjustments.com. 1

culturama

August 2014

culturama

Give to India by Shefali Ganesh

The Change-makers As founding CEO of Teaching Leaders – an initiative to raise attainment in disadvantaged schools in the United Kingdom, Sharath Jeevan was no stranger to the field of education or its impact on the lower strata of society. And during his annual visits to India, he would observe how children in India were struggling to earn their livelihood, rather than spend their time fruitfully in schools. However, Sharath did not blindly assume that merely getting the children into schools would enable to them to embark on the path towards better education. Neither was the question one of technology or resources available – he had been to countries where laptops were distributed to all children without forethought as to how it would improve their learning.

It was while he was mulling over the question of how best he could help the children in India that he came across the story of a successful teacher in Kenya, who had achieved the second highest mathematics results in Africa through small changes in teaching patterns. The story stood in stark contrast to the one about the mindless distribution of laptops – and planted the seed of an idea in Sharath’s mind. “The contrast between those two interactions – both within a matter of weeks – really galvanised the idea behind STIR,” he says. Sharath understood that the key to success lay in the teachers – and, based on this core belief, founded School and Teachers Innovating for Results or STIR. The organisation firmly believes that the ‘biggest determinant of a child’s success in school

1 School and Teachers Innovating for Results (STIR), based in Delhi, harnesses the ideas and energies of teachers in India and makes them a dominant force of change Teachers, education industry professionals and NGOs in the education sector can partner with STIR. Visit their website at www.stireducation.org for more details.

culturama

August 2014

– and therefore in future life – is the quality and commitment of his or her teacher’, and follows a model wherein the teachers are empowered to ‘fundamentally reimagine their role in leading change in their classrooms, schools and the wider education system’. STIR set up its pilot project in early 2012, and engaged teachers of government- and NGO-run schools in Delhi. The sole objective of the project was to shed light on, and lend support to, innovative ideas that teachers had for improving their learning of disadvantaged pupils. These ideas were called ‘micro innovations’ – small ideas that made a big difference to both teacher and pupil. STIR identifies teachers who have developed micro innovations, and form a change-maker network to implement these changes on a larger scale. As Sharath says, “Education is critical and the role of teachers critical within that. Our work is about finding what’s already good in the system and trying to find novel ways to spread that energy to re-energise an education system that’s become cynical and malignant.” With an initial reach of 3,000 teachers across 264 schools in Delhi, the STIR movement impacted around 22,000 children. Within the first year of the pilot project, 25 microinnovations were identified from around 170 finds and these were scaled by partner schools and organisations. Within just two years of its founding, STIR had partnered with nine NGOs, who had adopted the methodology in their schools. Further success came when the Government of Uttar Pradesh partnered with STIR in the state’s schools. In a country where the guru (teacher) is placed on equal terms with God, it still requires a catalytic movement to bring about the belief that ‘teachers matter’ – and this is what STIR does with its strong change-maker network. 1

india • srilanka • maldives • and beyond

August 2014

culturama

Festival of the Month

Photo: Francois Daniele, France

Photo: Basia Kruszewska

Ganesh Chathurthi August 29 India’s much loved elephant-headed god, Lord Ganesh, celebrates his birthday in the month of August with magnificent celebrations across India. Lord Ganesh is known as the remover of obstacles and the harbinger of good fortune, so his birthday is celebrated as a communal occasion and by families in their homes. The festival is observed over 10 days – it all begins with huge statues of the God made from clay or plaster of Paris and displayed in podiums in almost all street corners. Lord Ganesh is treated with reverence, and prayers are conducted every day during the course of the festival. The Lord’s favourite sweet is the modak or steamed rice dumplings stuffed with jaggery and coconut – versions of this sweet are made over the 10 days. At the end of the 10 days, the clay idols are taken in processions to be immersed in the sea. Celebrations are particularly grand in Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. 3 Sample the different sweet and spicy varieties of modak. The celebrations are grandest in Mumbai – join in a procession and enjoy the walk to the sea.

culturama

August 2014

Global Wellness Series

Liver Trouble Fatty liver issues.

A chubby child is considered healthy, but most parents don’t seem to know that obesity or being over-weight increases the risk of fat deposit in the liver. Bad dietary habits can damage the liver by depositing fat. This ‘Fatty Liver’ problem eventually may lead to liver failure. Intake of refined carbohydrates, fried food and carbonated drinks are some of the major contributors towards fatty liver disease, even in non-obese children. It is estimated that 3-10 % of normal weight children have fatty liver, whereas this increases up to 50-70 % in obese children.

Tips towards healthy lifestyle: • •

1Dr.Naresh Shamugam, Paediatric liver transplant physician at Global Hospitals tells us how a healthy diet and lifestyle can help children stay away from

• • • •

Have a balanced diet with lots of vegetables and fresh fruits. Food portion size matters – Pizza’s, fried chicken/ chips are not “junk foods” when eaten in appropriate portion size. Home food eaten in large quantities can cause calorie excess and could lead on to obesity. Keep fried foods and fizzy drinks as treats for special occasion rather than a daily snacks. Avoid watching television during mealtime as it is associated with over eating. Limit video games and encourage children to take part in physical activities and outdoor games. Check your child’s height, weight and body mass index (BMI). This will help in early identification of obesity. 1

August 2014

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Myth and Mythology by Devdutt Pattanaik

Domesticating

Rules

Photo: Anthony Walker

culturama

August 2014

1 We want a society where everyone is genuine and authentic and rule-following; but we will find such a society boring – the excitement comes from the thrill, the breaking of rules, the subversion, the revolution One day, in the same newspaper I read two news items. One spoke of how technology is being used to ensure that members of a particular religious group visit places of worship at regular intervals as prescribed by the scriptures. One spoke of how a European country is now using measurement to check if there is adequate gender sensitivity in a film. It got me thinking. Both use the same means – rules and measurement to shape human behaviour. One uses it for religious reasons. One uses it for secular/social reasons. And yet, we are conditioned to mock the religious activity and not the secular activity. Why? Are we saying the ends justify the means? So if the end is secular, coercion using rules and measurement is good, but if the end is religious, then such coercion is wrong. Why so? I remember a serial on DD channel where the mother goes on fast because the son wants to marry a widow. The technique she uses is the same used by Gandhi to stop riots. In the former, fasting is used to block social reform. In the other, fasting is used to stop social madness. Who is right in this case? Who determines what end, what goal is right, appropriate or good? Every person who fasts, every person who institutes rules and regulations, is convinced that his or her goal is right. But the person who feels victimised by the fast, the rules and the regulation may not think so. In Hindu mythology, he who imposes rules on others is visualised as Daksha Prajapati, patron of the yagna, who controls everyone around him: his daughters, and his sonsin-law, the devatas. He despises Shiva who is indifferent to rules. The clash between Shiva and Daksha is inevitable. But

while we may glamorise Shiva, we forget that it is Daksha who is Prajapati, the lord who creates society, civilisation and culture. His rules may be unfair, or extreme, but he establishes some order – which is why, when Shiva beheads him, the gods beg Shiva to restore him to life. Shiva does so with a goat’s head. Why a goat’s head? Why not a human’s head? A reminder that rules are nothing but methods of domesticating the human-animal? I find all institutions function like Daksha – whether they are secular or religious. Through rules they force everyone to behave in a particular way that they deem to be good. It is akin to domesticating farm animals so that they are obedient and productive. And that is good – for the farmer! But humans are not oxen or horses or dogs. We think. We love rules when we follow them voluntarily. When imposed involuntarily, we resist, but ultimately submit, as submission grants rewards and recognition (carrot) and keeps away retribution (stick). The assumption in many institutions is that obedience is good. So children who go to the place of worship as prescribed by the scriptures are good. So filmmakers who show stories without gender bias are good. But such affected behaviour cannot be deemed genuine or authentic. We want a society where everyone is genuine and authentic and rule-following. An ideal society. But we will also find such a society boring. The excitement comes from the thrill, the breaking of rules, the subversion, the revolution. We are not supposed to jump off buildings, but to do so (with a harness) is all what bungee jumping is all about. 1

Published on 17th November, 2013 in Mid-Day. Reprinted with permission from www.devdutt.com

August 2014

culturama

Realty Bytes by Anita Krishnaswamy

Where Danger Breeds Photo: Basia Kruszewska

How do I proof my home from malarial mosquitoes? Mosquitoes are like the population of India – they are far too many in number and there’s no escaping them! While all mosquitoes bite, it is the female mosquito that carries the malarial virus – a bite that leaves a red mark or slight swelling is mostly due to the male mosquito’s bite and is not harmful. It is only when you suffer chills or fever that you should be worried. Mosquitoes thrive in damp conditions – indoor plants and decorative pots that hold water and gardens with damp grass are places where they breed. When you are building a house, do a complete fumigation of the rooms, then install Netlon filters on the windows. If you are taking a house on rent, request the landlord to fumigate the house and install Netlon filters. Avoid the use of sprays inside the house. They are said to be harmful to children, and adults in some cases. Mosquito coils are effective, but they tend to give out smoke and fumes. When using a coil, keep it under a table or covered space – this will ensure that the fumes permeate the room in a slow, measured way. Use only one coil per room, and light it in the early hours of the evening – between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. If possible, leave the house for a walk while the coil burns. Do not burn a coil at night when you are sleeping, especially

inside a closed room. Another option is devices with liquid mosquito repellents, which can be plugged into an electrical socket and switched on. When using these, follow the guidelines as for the coil. If you are living in a house with a garden, you could buy electrical mosquito killers – these are rectangle machines with mini tube-lights inside. The mosquitoes are drawn to the light and killed by an electrical charge upon contact. If you are comfortable with the ‘bzzz’ sound every time a mosquito makes contact, this would be an excellent option for use in the garden. The threat of contracting malaria is not a major one, and you don’t have to panic at the sight of a few mosquitoes in your home. Once you have decided one of the above-mentioned methods to mosquito-proof your home, you can rest easy. 1 •

Mosquitoes are attracted to the colour black – so avoid the use of dark-coloured curtains and objects in your bedroom.

•

You could buy a ‘mosquito bat’ – a battery-operated handheld device that resembles a tennis racquet – which is sold in most stores for less than $10. When the centre of the bat comes in contact with the mosquito, the insect is electrocted.

•

Mosquito repellants come in the form of creams or patches. The patch should be stuck on to your shirt or shorts, not on bare skin. Herbal variants are availabe in organic stores.

culturama

August 2014

4 Chennai Property Akkarai Modern Villa for Rent

Injambakkam Architect Designed Bungalow for Rent

• Brand New, luxury villa • 5,500 sq.ft. built-up area • Generator back up, Garden • Deck overlooking Infinity Swimming pool • Parking, Servants Quarters

• 3 Bedrooms, 4 bathrooms • Spacious living and dining areas, • Landscaped garden, • Plunge pool, Workout room, • 2 Private terraces; ACs -fitted

Adyar New apartment for Rent

Kotturpuram Individual Bungalow for Rent

• 3 Bedrooms, 3 bathrooms • Kitchen fitted with microwave, dishwasher, washing machine • 2,800 sq.ft., Centralised ACs. • In the heart of the city, and surrounded by trees

• 3 Bedrooms + Study, 4 Bathrooms • 4,500 sq built up area • Bright, spacious rooms with large bathrooms • House surrounded by gorgeous old trees

Client Feedback

OMR Luxury Flat for Rent • 5 Bedrooms, 5 Bathrooms, • Built up area – 3,500 sq.ft. • Designer Wardrobes and cots fitted • Club house with plenty of amenities

″I am happy with the follow up set up of Global Adjustments in its property services. The support given in understanding the requirements of the client is very good.″ – Executive, French bank, Chennai

Luxury Bungalow for Rent on Copper beach Ave, Akkarai

• Spacious Beach side villa • Plot size: 9 grounds • Built up area 7500 Sq Ft • Big pool (Aprox. 55 Ft x 15 Ft) • 4 en-suite bedrooms, • 1 informal living room and 1 formal living room, • 1 Italian kitchen, 1 Indian kitchen, • 2 servants quarters with toilet/bathroom • Full backup with 55 KVA generator and master stabiliser. • AC in all rooms of the house, including Kitchen - total of 11 ACs • Global Adjustments given exclusivity

For more properties, call Global Adjustments at 91 44 24617902/91 72999 12605 (Chennai), or e-mail: realty@globaladjustments.com Please note that any changes to the information above are done at the property owner’s sole discretion. Global Adjustments assumes no responsibility for such changes.

August 2014

culturama

4 Bengaluru Property Central Bengaluru House for Rent

North Bengaluru Apartment for Rent

• 5 Bedrooms • Designer architecture • Fully furnished • Gated community

• 4 Bedrooms • Fully furnished • Apartment complex • Overlooking pool

Central Bengaluru Duplex House for Rent

North Bengaluru Large Apartment for Rent

• 3 Bedrooms • Semi-furnished • Independent duplex • Quiet neighborhood

• 6 Bedrooms • Fully furnished • Modern furnishing • Apartment in gated community

For the above sample and many more such properties call 91 80 41267152 /9986960315 or email: blr@globaladjustments.com

4 Delhi Property Gurgaon, Magnolias New property for Rent

Gurgaon, Belaire Property for Rent

• 5 Bedrooms • Fully air-conditioned • Large balcony and living room • 100% power back-up, security, clubhouse • Tennis, swimming pool, spa, restaurant, bakery, in-house cinema, business centres.

• 4 Bedrooms • Centrally air-conditioned. • 100% power back-up, security and club house • Fully fitted kitchen with all white goods.

Delhi, Rajokri Farmhouse for Rent

Delhi, Vasant Vihar Duplex apartment for Rent

• 5 Bedrooms, lounge • Swimmining pool, well maintained garden • Air-conditioned with power back-up • Nice location

• 4 Bedrooms • Aesthetically designed, with character • Air-conditioned, 100% power back-up • Terrace

the above sample and many more such properties call 91 124 435 4236/ 981551070 or email: del@globaladjustments.com For

4 Mumbai Property Powai Large Apartment for Rent

Bandra West Furnished Apartment for Rent

• 2 bedrooms, 1,050 sq.ft.. • Fully furnished, marble flooring • Modular kitchen, car parking • Servant’s quarters

• 2 bedrooms, 1,200 sq.ft • Modular kitchen • Car parking and servant’s quarters

Tardeo Spacious Apartment for Rent

Powai Apartment for Rent

• 3 bedrooms, 2,125 sq.ft. • Furnished, modular kitchen • Marble flooring, Car parking space • Gym, pool, garden, children’s play area and servant’s quarters

• 3 Bedrooms, 2125 sq.ft. • Fully furnished, Modular kitchen • Two car parking spaces, servant’s quarters • Gym

For the above sample and many more such properties call 91 22 66104191/ 9769001515 or email: mum@globaladjustments.com

culturama

August 2014

culturama

August 2014

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