Merry Christmas!

 Merry Christmas!

The Great Hall at PAT

 It was a great evening on the 16th October - the inauguration of the Great Hall - a business and Amenities lounge we had curated and designed at the Phoenix Asia Towers office building in Bengaluru.  My colleagues Pallavi and Pooja had done the interiors. The who's who of the commercial industry in bangalore were invited as guests. The evening culminated with the stage show of the world famous Mentalist Suhani Shah.

Mentalist Suhani Shah 

With Pooja. Pallavi,  Shoby and Subodh

With my team

Book release with my sketches

Yesterday I had attended my School teacher Mr.Kalaimani's book launch. The book was a compilation of stage plays based on biblical stories. The highlight is that I had done the illustrations for each of the stories. :) 

The event happened at Chennai amoung few of Mr.Kalaimani's students and the chief guest was Mr. Soundararaja, film actor and environmental activist.

With my school juniors Sunil, Sam and Veera

 

With Actor and environmental activist Soundararaja

Moses

Moses

Queen Esther

King Solomon and Queen of Sheba

Samson

John the Baptist 

Met my schoolmate - drummer and music director Godwin Kodan after 33 years...

Dada

 

A quick selfie at the Abu Dhabi airport with 'Dada' - Saurav Ganguly - former Indian Cricket captain and a legend in his own rights. 

09.12.2024

Happy New Year !

 It has been a spicy year 2024 ...

Many memorable events and milestones...

God has been kind to me and my family through all the ups and downs...

Wishing you a very happy and prosperous new year 2025 !

Orkut

Anyone remembers Orkut?... 

This old mail dated 10 years ago brought back memories of this pioneering social media site by Google that was quite popular until Facebook swiped it out of context.

Jailer

Yesterday (August 15th) was India's 77th Independence day. It was a holiday and we ended the day by watching the much awaited Super star Rajinikanth block buster action movie " Jailer" 

This was my 2nd Rajini movie in theatres in the last 10 years. The previous one was 'Pettai'. 

The movie is only about Rajini-ism..If you leave your brain at home and go watch only with your heart, you will not complain. Rajini at 73 has given what his fans want.. his swag and style are mesmerizing! Beyond Rajini there's nothing great in the film. Anirudh 's music is loud and his bgms do justice to the "mass" genre. Director Nelson had impressed me with his black comedy and comic timing in his debut movie 'kolamavu kokila'. But here in jailer the comedy clicks in very few places. 

The short and forced cameos by Mohanlal and especially Shivarajkumar are cool with lots of goosebump moments. Their screen presence keeps you craving for more from them. 

Overall an entertainer if you come mentally prepared for the Rajini show!

 

Shivanna and Laletta at their stylish best...

 

Goodbye Jeevan

Jeevan kumar was a differently abled blogger who was an inspiration to many through his blog  "Jeevan's world".

I met him through blogger almost 18 years ago and he was one of my oldest blogger friends still actively blogging till a month ago. He was full of positivity and his posts reflected his energy and enthusiasm in everything around him. He will be greatly missed. May his soul rest in peace...

Goodbye Jeevan...

The plastic doll

Clicked on the way... Mom carrying her daughter carrying a plastic doll! These plastic girl dolls are cheap and remain popular among girls in rural areas for the past few decades!

Mr.Kalaimani's books

Receiving the first copies from Kalaimani sir

Mr.Kalaimani , my School teacher has authored two books in Tamil. One book is a collection of his Tamil poems (agara mudhala) and the other a collection of comical & satirical plays (Sulukkia sahabtham). I had the good fortune of doing the illustrations for both the books. For agara mudhala I had done mostly simple line abstracts to convey the poems visually. But for Sulukkia Sagabtham, I had to illustrate epic characters and events with a comical touch. It was an interesting experience!

Kalaimani sir had come down to Madurai from Sydney for the book launch and I could catchup with him after almost 25 years!

Took Kalaimani sir for lunch along with my friend & schoolmate Chellakumar

 

         

 Both books are available on Amazon

Few of my illustrations for the books...

Click here for my earlier tribute post on Kalaimani sir