Palace of Illusions by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

I completed "Palace of Illusions" by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni today. Its a narration of one of the greatest epic of Indian Mythology "Mahabharat" but from the point of view of its most famous female protagonist , who was somewhat responsible (read destined) for causing the greatest war that the Indian subcontinent ever had changing its landscape forever, Draupadi or Paanchali.

Although Sita , who was part of the other Indian epic Ramayana  is more revered and enjoy a stature of Goddess , I find more fascination in the character of Draupadi , more so because she is more humane. I have a little more inclination towards characters who have more human traits than to people who are God (except of course Sachin Tendulkar). Also I do have a inclination towards reading stuffs which are more of a  first hand account rather than some third person narration.

So ever since my friend told me that there are books which narrate the epic from a characters point of view and that too from that of Draupadi , I quickly jump to search for the same. Although I picked up this book reading its review and popularity on Goodreads , I somehow still hope that there is a even better book than this on this subject.

So as you can sense I am not that much impressed by this book and hope to come across a more well written and put forth one.

Draupadi was the daughter of King Drupad who was the ruler of Panchala . Drupad was humiliated by his dear friend and tutor of Pandavas Drona, after he refused to acknowledge a promise he made to Drona. So in order to avenge that humiliation Drupad organised a Yagya to have a male child who will kill Drona. From that yagya ,apart from the male child also came a female child, Draupadi, who was prophesied to change the history of the continent and thus will be instrumental for the epic war "Mahabharat"

Palace of Illusions is a book which captures all the events that happened in that epic and narrates it from the point of view of Draupadi. So right from the Yagya til she died , the book narrates what all part she played in it and most importantly what was her state of mind during all these times.

Since it is a woman we are talking about here, the level of emotions depicted are vast ranging from desires, love, lust, jealousy, happiness, agony ,humiliation, sadness, despair , affection and so forth and so many.

A war from a Man's point may contain more valor, courage and avenge but when you put it from a woman's perspective you add certain more humane emotions of sympathy and jealousy.

Whats good in this book ?

Well, since its written by a woman , of a woman and from a woman, it does provide you a more humane and emotionally rich perspective of the epic stories or legends that we Indians have so grown up with. The way the relationships are woven between Draupadi and her brother, with her Dai Maa, with her husbands, with her Mother in law Kunti, her elders like Bheeshma and more so ever with Krishna are quite commendable and believable.

One thing that makes me admire the humane quality of her is the fact is that I never found her suppressing the emotions or the desires that she experiences . In our Indian culture, woman are brought up to behave in a certain manner , with a certain second class citizen nature where they are taught that the male in their lives are their supreme commander so naturally the women feel oppressed and portray a fake character of as if they are contented with whatever their fate is but in truth all of them have many hidden desires. So in conventional terms you may call Draupadi rebellious but I find her "Real".

This book portrays her that trait beautifully , whether it is questioning the elders or harshly speaking her mind despite the norms saying that a woman should keep it to herself, working for to get what she wants , manipulating people and even playing the true MIL-SIL duels that's so common in our Indian culture.

Draupadi is depicted as Woman who is short of the regular emotional feelings that we Indians have known woman to have ,say for example a mother's love for her children. She had little or no contact with her 5 sons , Agreed that she had the situation to blame or plainly she was different that's why we are reading about her.

The story told is nothing new as most of us who live in Indian sub continent are well versed on it , so it was a kind of refresher too. One thing that this book mentions which I dint know was that even Draupadi was granted the power to view the battle of Kurukshetra from the tents that was sheltering the woman folks. As per my knowledge this power was only granted to Sanjay, Blind King Dhritarashtra's charioteer , so that he can narrate each day's happenings to the king.

Well what I did not like ?

First of all the comprehension is at times too dramatic thus making it sound more fictitious. Yes its a fiction I know but the art of good writing is to make you read a fiction as if its the most real thing. If I may, I will call  the writer the female version of  Amish (of the Shiva trilogy fame).

Second , yes it was a known fact that Draupadi adored Karna more than she adored her five husbands but in this book it has been played a time too many to my comfort. Ok I may sound hypocrite with at one time appreciating her speaking her mind and at same time not liking her overflowing love for a man other than her husband. For me it was a touch disrespectful to her but again going with the theme of Draupadi may be apt.

Third, in totality, the book was ordinary. I don't know what I was looking for but it fails to leave a mark. I felt despite the rich flow of emotions there was much more to touch upon. Especially since it was coming from a woman's point of view , there could be more. There was nothing that makes me think, oh that's why she did this or huh so bad on her.

Ok may be I am little over critical as Draupadi may have been different from a stereotypical  female and me having grown in this other culture may find it little unusual to digest and also I have read or heard of these stories so many times that somehow the level of empathy that I should feel on seeing her plight is subdued.

To be honest as I mentioned earlier that I admire her more than Sita , so I would like an ideal woman to have more of her traits and little of Sita's.

I will rate it as 3.5 out of 5 and although not highly recommended but you may read it just for the sake of reading Mahabharat again.

Oath of Vayuputras and Others...

 

 

 

I completed Oath of Vayuputras. And I don't know if you will call a book a success if you expected it to disappoint you and it succeeds in doing so?

 

There are few reasons why it disappointed

 

1. It came quite a while after the second installment of the trilogy, so you tend to have a vague remembrance of the characters and incidents. And it takes a while for the flow to restart.

 

2. There was a lot of scope to play and demonstrate the passion and compassion especially the part where Shiva destroys the city (spoiler alert). There was so much opportunity to show the Rodra roop of Lord Shiv, his Tandav ( Dance of Destruction) , his anger , probably his Trinetra etc. The only passionate part I felt was the depiction of Kartik as the warior lord. The way he deployed his War tactics and the intensity with which his battles were depicted were commendable.

 

Rest like his previous book was mediocre. Surprisingly I came to find that he is an IIMK alumnus.

 

Ok I may sound hypocritical of him as I dislike his writing so much but at the same time I ardently read through his novels unlike those of Chetan Bhagat which I just labour through. I agree with his content and masala rendering he appeals to masses but I personally feel he could be more articulate. But having said that I will recommend people to read the triology and also awaiting to read his next series which he hinted to be on Mahabharata.

 

The next bunch of books ( I like to read couple of books at I time) I have picked are quite popular, kind of modern classics, that everyone who is into reading must have already read.

 

The Alchemist and The Fountainhead.

 

I was kind of avoiding these for the reasons that one they are popular , second I am a non fiction lover and last the font size of the copies I have seen have been too small to be comfortable.

 

Luckily this time I got a copy of Alchemist which is decent and I have already read most of it and should complete it by today. To be honest I find it quite simple but of course appealing. With its plot of chasing your dreams and proverbial lines ,I can see why it is so popular.

 

Having read few pages of Eleven minutes and then failing to proceed I had my apprehensions about Paulo Coehlo but now I am glad that I picked Alchemist and now again want to pursue Eleven minutes.

 

Coming to Fountainhead ,I have purchased a second hand copy long time back but never had the courage to read it, so it was lying packed as it is in my cupboard. But recently with having nothing else to read I took the plunge. With its minuscule writing I could manage few pages, I liked it and have made up mind to read at least 10 pages daily.

 

Having started so late to read novels is something that I regret about my life and is one thing I would like to change if given an opprotunity to start life again :)

Saaf Safai Seekho O Padne Likhne Walo

 

 

I was a firm believer of Educated people are more civilized. Yes , was not am. I mean yes I still believe education can be a solution for a lot of problems but definitely not in the present form.

 

With spurt of crimes and uncivilised behavior still so rampant in India especially with educated people involved, seriously makes me think that there is wholesale overhauling required with our education system.

 

Cleanliness is something that is very closer to my heart. Something that really disturbs me when I am in public places. The level of garbage and dirt I see carelessly sprinkled everywhere makes me sad.

 

Once when I visited a slum with a friend of mine , I was surprised to see that despite of their mean surrounding each of them had clean huts with TVs but each of them had dirty muddy water either stagnated or flowing haphazardly outside their homes. I was  shocked to see that how could these people who could afford some more basic necessities than their other unfortunate lower class people can be so ignorant of the need for a clean surrounding. I mean I who knew that I won't have to be there for more than half an hour was not able to bear the stench then how can those people stay in that stench and filth without doing something about it?

 

Everyday on my way to office , I see two government schools on Mathura road. And everyday in the morning you could see people defecating outside them. Baring the area outside the gates, which should be hardly few meters, rest all is full of human faeces. And I can see children entering the gates or praying just on the other side of the walls. I simply don't understand that how can anyone let this happen ?

 

Yes we all can take the path of blaming the authorities of not doing anything when all is required is to have a will to take things in your hand. And in both cases somehow I blame the children and thus our education system for the situations . Our education system does not instill the courage and initiative taking capabilities in our children that they educate their parents and even school authorities to take these things seriously.

 

Yes we have the problem of public or toilets at home in India with our 70% people still defecating in open but that does not mean that people can continue to live with its side effects. Having a clean and hygienic environment is one of the most basic need for a healthy life.

 

Like in this news story , it was the determination and courage of a 13yr old child which brought such a drastic change. So its high time our education is revamped to put more stress on civil and moral issues. 

 

Keeping our homes clean is something we have valued, with our women folk who stay at home, working all day to ensure that everything is spotless. But when it comes to places outside our houses we just become careless. People still don't think before littering around in public places, spitting wherever the urge comes irrespective of whether they are walking in crowd or standing with people next to you. And what hurts more is that this is being done by people who do have a brush with education either directly themselves or indirectly from their kids at home but still we are not able to change their habits.

 

And at the same time revamp requires a careful and meticulous effort and just not some blind following like in the initiative taken by CBSE to introduce open book exams when ironically US which has open book system is contemplating introducing the stricter exam system that India has. Of course open book has some pros but at the same time the cons should not be neglected especially with India having the advantage that its not the first to implement it.

"Good news...."

Working in a MNC makes you come across diverse human behavior and which makes yuou both proud and guilty of your customs and traditions.

We Indians are always portrayed as quite emotional and dramatic people especially when it comes to our family and relations. And we somehow take pride in our those strong bonds. But I still somehow feel we have a lot to learn as far as events surrounding birth of child are concerned.

 

It still seem quite a taboo to share the news that you are expecting a child with your friends and others.

 

In last few months , couple of my french colleagues have become parents and I found it quite amusing, but at the same time satisfying, the way my manager over there and other colleagues were sharing the news affront in the weeklies, even before the couple have delivered. They were equally excited in the way they used to say " He is on leave and we don't know when but soon we should expect the good news". Of course they had a shyness in their voice but the excitement made you feel and sense the strong bond they all socially shared.

 

In India on the other hand its all hush hush affair till the child is born. People are not at all comfortable in involving people before hand the actual event has occurred. 

A close friend of mine is expecting and after coming to know from another common friend I congratulated him and his first reply was "Please don't share with anyone else, its quite a personal affair". I won't say I was not taken aback but somehow I could understand his reservations in making it public or letting others participate in it.

 

Me and one of my colleague wondered about this socially different behavior we encountered.

Why our elders and society teaches us to be so secretive and uncomfortable about such things? With due respect to the privacy of each individual , what could be the reason for the same ?

 

Foremost that we could think of was the fact that we are scared that something bad might happen if the news is made public. (Seems insane right ?). In India people are more jealous of others success than they are happy of their own achievements. So they feel any ill - thought may prove harmful for the baby thus its advisable to keep the thing under wraps for as long as possible. India in its earlier times had a huge number of infant deaths or miscarriages (its still not fully eradicated) and instead of accepting it wholly as a result of poor medical facilities, we get comfort in our superstitious beliefs. 

 

Second , people feel embarrassed to touch anything that is even remotely related to sex. In a country where the sole purpose of sex is still to procreate , the reverse is also true. Ask any recently married guy jokingly "When are you giving the good news ? " and don't be surprised to get the most embarrassed look that person may have ever given.

 

Ok I am not implying that we people need to be totally forthcoming about our pro creating activities with everyone , I duly respect the notion of keeping your personal life reserved but what I personally feel is that people in India should stop portraying these things as one of the most heinous crime that you may have committed and be so uncomfortable about such things with your friends and well wishers.

Small can be Big...

 

 

As per the book Tipping Point , ( and since I have not read any other book on criminal psychology, I will take it as my holy grail ), if you want to curb a serious and major crime, you need to stop the petty crimes.

 

So I feel the provision to make Voyeurism , stalking and eve-teasing as punishable crime as per the new Crime Against Women bill can be quite instrumental to bring down the cases of rape in general.

 

In that book, when murders and thefts were quite rampant in subways and metros of New York city in 90's, the police decided to tackle the problem at petty level.  Most of the people , seeing  the law and order situation at such places , used to dodge taking tickets and used to jump over those turnstile. So the first thing police did was increase the vigilance at the turnstile ensuring that people do punch tickets and whosoever tries to avoid that was caught at that very moment , handcuffed and taken to police station. This not only made people follow the basic rules of subway travel but also reinstalled the respect and faith in the law and order system.

 

Soon people found that the murders and thefts that were becoming so common in New York subways, became extinct overnight, whereas nothing as such was drastically done  for that specific problem.

 

So the point is that if we prevent people from even doing small basic crimes, which at times we tend to overlook, then it very much discourages them from doing even heftier crimes.

 

The problem with India is that no body (read public) does anything when you encounter someone teasing or passing lewd comments at public places. And if somehow somebody takes the courage to protest then the teasers don't even blink before harming them gravely.

And because of this, they slowly slowly gather enough courage to commit even more heinous crimes.

 

I think most of the rapists don't straight a way jump into raping someone, they have a prolonged history of eve-teasing and stalking, so if they are stopped at those points itself then it may prevent them from becoming sex-offenders.

Want to be a Foreigner in my own country

I envy William Darlymple.

Ever since I started reading books regularly , William Darlymple has been one of my favorite writer rather person. He is a person who is living the life I dream.

It has always been my dream to travel significant places , interact with people of different diversities, study their culture, traditions and capture them not only with my camera but also in words, to share with people around the world. And this guy William Darlymple does exactly the same san the photography part (to an extent or at least he does not make it the primary objective.)

But that is not why I envy him. I envy him because he does the same thing in my own country. This guy has more access and knowledge about my own country than what I can ever garner and I personally feel its because of the fact that he is a Foreigner. I am not comparing our intellect or charm, he is way ahead on that , I just feel its the ease with which people open to strangers from abroad and that's what makes me envious.

Ever since I have started clicking people in public places , I have always experienced that Indians will readily pose if a foreigner is clicking them but will take all the objections if their fellow countrymen tries to capture them.

Its just not about photos , lets see the books that have been published about Indian culture, history and traditions in last few decades , I am yet to come across an Indian writer who has written an impartial and globally well received book about our country. Yes Arvind Adiga won a Man Booker's prize for his book the White Tiger but that book is more about a life of a particular person then India as a whole.

The movie made on the Father of our nation, Mahatma Gandhi was made by a foreigner , was enacted by a foreigner and was based on the book "Freedom at Midnight" which was again written by two foreigners. The fact that they could easily retrace and reconstruct the sequence of events leading to his assassination by the Hindu extremists somehow substantiate the fact how comfortable it was for them.

Yes I agree , we Indians tend to trust fellow Indians less and always feel the other person is always going to exploit us or take total benefit out of us without crediting us. And these things make them more comfortable and trustworthy of a foreigner.

Yes we all want our 15 seconds of fame and interacting with a foreigner is the easiest way to get that.

I may be underestimating the problems that these Foreigner face as I myself don't have the first person account of their interactions or behind the scene account of their work and at the same time I still need to horn my skills of public / street photography where I sometimes need to politely first ask people about clicking their photos, so kindly forgive my ignorance about the same.

I do have due respect to these peoples people skills but being an Indian myself I know how we people react differently to our own countrymen.

My apprehensions might be getting the better of me at this moment but some day when I do embark on fulfilling my dream of being a William Darlymple I just hope I am more determined to put more effort to make people comfortable to share themselves with me :)

How will it change ?

 

 

With the spurt of rapes still continuing in the National Capital of India and our government being as always inactive in curbing these atrocities against Women, I wonder how are we going to change the mindset of men when we are so surrounded by traditions , culture and even government policies which don't consider Women at par with Men.

 

A friend's mom need to visit him in Singapore for couple of months and I was asked to check for the Visa formalities for her and I was surprised to find that since she is a housewife and will be travelling alone without her husband , Singapore Embassy requires her husband to present a  No Objection Certificate stating that he has no objection to her visit.

 

I simply don't understand what is the logic behind her requiring the permission of her husband. What if he does not allow her , won't she be allowed to visit her own son ? Has it been the other way around that her husband was travelling alone,had he too need to submit a NOC from his wife ?

 

I honestly did not expect a rule like that from a developed country like Singapore.

 

Another funny thing happened today while I was at an Aadhar centre getting my Aadhar enrollment done. There was a lady there, who too had came for the same and she had her face covered with her dupatta , as you normally find village women in India. When her trun came , she had to get her photo clicked and she was quite reluctant to remove her dupatta as she was accompanied by a male who was elder and as per Indian customs a lady should not show her face to her elders. It was quite amusing with people trying to convince her and they finally had to ask the elder to turn around.

 

Although it was amusing but at the same time quite saddening to see. And this has been the state of our country for ages.

Kai Po Che....

Watched Kai Po Che yesterday . Its based on the book  "3 Mistakes of My Life" by Chetan Bhagat which narrates the story of 3 friends trying to make big in life.

 

Have never been a fan of Chetan Bhagat and his writings and have only read them when I wanted to read some masala stuff to lighten my mind. Some critics once called him the "Rakhi Sawant of Indian literature". Although I don't completely disagree with this but the only positive thing I have about him is that he knows what sells. He knows whats the pulse of the Indian youth (has a book published by the name What Young India Wants), what they can easily relate to and to top it he add some prominent facilities or event of India in the mix of it, which makes it quite popular. 

 

 

So coming back to the movie. The movie revolves around 3 friends based in Gujarat. And it shows their dreams and how they go about it and how their life is impacted first by the Bhuj earthquake of 2001 followed by the Godhra riots of 2002.  It touches various emotions that we Indians go through during the course of our life. So you have die hard Friendship, Innocent Love, our religiously followed passion for Cricket and lastly but not the least Our insane reverence to one's religion in such a way that we forget about humanity.

  

The movie with its fresh faces and masala content makes it watchable but I personally felt there was a lot of scope for improvement but nevertheless a nice one time watch.

 

There is a song in the movie called Manjha and I really liked it a lot. I feel after the song Ye Hosla from the film Dor this is one inspirational song that I will always like to hear.

 

The lyrics of the song goes like this

 

Roothe khaabon ko mana lenge
Kati patango ko thaamenge
Haa haa hai jazba
Ho ho hai jazba
Suljha lenge uljhe rishton ka manjha
Hmm ka manjha, hmm ka manjha...

 

 

Prevention is better than cure....???

All our budding years we have been taught "Prevention is better than cure"..thats why now we hear everyone saying that instead of curing the males of their lustful immoral intentions, better force the girls to wear against their wish inorder to prevent those lustful thoughts in men. Sick.....

Photography learning II

My best photograph will be the one that I am going to take tomorrow - Ansel Adams.

This is what one of the pioneer of photography quoted when asked about his best photo.

So photography, like life, teaches you new things everyday and like life here too you will have to keep improving and rectifying your mistakes.

As I have shared some time back, after I visited Agra and Humayun's tomb, the things I need to improve upon, today too I share few things that I have learned or noticed in the last couple of months in which I have been extensively involved with photography.


Being Hasty - First of all on this list is what I often do when I see some nice people or things and want to click them as quickly as possible. .. so as  a result I get a lot hasty and pictures comes out blurry or out of focus

The above pic was taken while I was on my first photowalk to Rastrapati Bhawan and honestly after clicking those buildings for some time, I was kind of getting bored . Just then my eyes fell on these two sisters who were looking so cute dressed in same dress and at that very moment I thought to click them. I was so excited seeing that I thought that this pic was going to be the best of the walk.  But when I came back and checked this at home , I could see that the girls have come so out of focus. Had I steadied myself a bit or calmed myself  first I would have really captured them better.

Ask people if you can take their photos - Although in street photography the sense of being voyeuristic helps you portray people candidly, without them being conscious about getting clicked but I do feel that by doing so you at times miss out on other angles that would have reflected things in a better way.

As in the above pic, the pic is nice just because the girl was not only looking at me but was smiling. And this all happened because we had spent some time playing around with each other standing at bus stop.

Taking straight photos, although I have corrected the symmetrical flaw that I had with my earlier photos that I took of monuments but now I see quite a lot of issues with the horizontal axis of the photos. As you can see in the below pic , the monument seems to be falling to the right. 

At present its more due to that fact that my hand is not yet accustomed to handing the big bulky camera and I tend to slant towards one direction or other but it has been so apparent in my photos that I seriously need to keep it in mind every time before pressing the shutter down.

Less post processing - as I am currently spending a lot of time on touching them up in software. 


The left pic below is what the camera produced and right is after some post processing was applied to it.

Could I have managed this without PS ? Yes and No. 


Speaking of this picture only, yes may be I could have done better with the camera itself but in general, I will have to quote Ansel Adams again :


“Dodging and burning are steps to take care of mistakes God made in establishing tonal relationships.”. 


So its not always possible to capture the correct color and tones with your camera as it too is a machine and you too are human so quite prone to errors.


Earlier I was strictly against using any software to enhance the photo as I used to feel its against the principle of capturing that moment correctly but now I have understood that although its still quite an important thing to be right at the first time  and many times just by knowing your machine well you can get similar results out of the camera too but at the end what matters is how the photo is presented to the viewers. If post processing helps you to convey your photo in a better way then there is no harm in it. In fact I have learned that most of the photographers shoot RAW, and since we cannot view RAW directly we have to always apply post process to them. But the final idea is to spent less time on computer and more on the field :)

Taking less snaps or be ruthless in deleting them... someone very rightly said that more snaps you take more things you learn but they take up so much space that at times its quite difficult to manage and since there are so many pictures that sometimes you get bored in correcting them that it takes a while before you transverse to the good ones and by that time you lose interest. So with advent of digital cameras, people do have the liberty to click as many pics as they want and honestly even famed photographers don't get a perfect shot all the time in first go. But at the end you should be able to discard them quickly too.

Thats all for this time.... Will share more as a learn more :)

Phool - II

Hey Friends, I am back to posting after a fairly long gap. Well of late life had been little unsupportive and also have not been in the best of my moods so thought of not reflecting all that here.

So today in order to clear my mind , I thought of doing something that will not only keep me busy but will also make me happy. And although in recent times photography has been one thing that I really enjoyed and since I cannot  do it the whole day , I thought of doing the next best thing i.e. sharing the ones I have clicked.

So to start I will like to present the next version of my earlier post which now I have renamed as Phool (Flowers).And this time I am glad to share the names of most of them.  (Have also updated some names in the previous Phool post.)

First of all I have these large and vibrant colored Dahlias ,which I clicked way back in 2010, on my visit to Grenoble , France. Incidently these were the earliest photos that I ever took from my Digital Cam and the photos which introduced me to the world of Macro Photography. Actually it was my colleague who taught me that and I will always be indebted to him for that.

These were growing in a park in the middle of the city council area of Grenoble and the place was really well maintained and serene.

I was thinking of sharing these since sooo long and am glad that I could finally do so.

The below ones are taken in India recently and unlike the above ones these are quite small and were growing in flower pots. Although I might be wrong in identifying them but it seems to me that they too are from Dahlia family.

Next up is another common flower, which I assume grows in almost all parts of the world, is Daisy. These ones are too from my society garden and have been clicked a week back.

I really like the way some of the photos have come up.

A Bed of Daisies



A Budding Daisy



Next up are some flowers that I clicked on my trip to Bali, Indonesia last August. These were clicked while we were walking early morning to the Nusa Dua beach. And honestly it never stuck in mind that time that the area through which we passed could have been full of flora specific to that region. It simply never stuck me and I missed out on clicking many more but luckily I clicked some.

These are called Crown of Thorns or botanically named Euphorbia milii. In my previous Phool post I have already shared some of these which incidently were clicked in my society garden and I was surprised today when I finally found their names and found them to be the same ones that are growing in my society.

Incidently in the second photo you can see a bee sucking the nectar. Unfortunately I couldn't click a better picture of the bee than this one.

This yellow colored flower is called Yellow Lantana.

The next one was clicked from the garden of the hotel in which we were staying and is named Red Ginger  or botanically, Alpinia purpuratta. Not that good a picture but the only one I clicked.

I don't know whether the next picture is that of flowering shrub or vine as I am yet to get them identified but nevertheless they were quite peculiar.

Identifying these purple flower with needle like petals was really getting tough. Infact I had them wrongly identified as some other flower and luckily while searching for another flower I landed on their correct identification. These are Blue mist flower or botanically known as Conoclinium.

Now coming back to my society garden. I am sharing few more that I couldn't share last time or have clicked in the meanwhile.

These white ones are called Carissa Macrocarpa or Natal Plum.

Next is another common flower called Plumeria or commonly known as Champa.

This one I clicked few days back and was really attracted to it. I am yet to identify what flower but would definitely like to click more pictures of this. I also liked the grey background that mud has given to this photo that has helped brighten the red color more.  Now I know that this is Poppy..

Poppy

Lastly but by no means the least , is the most common flower used for religious decorations and offerings here in India. Its called Marigold and commonly known as Gendha Phool in India. I am pretty surprised that this is the only picture that I have clicked so far of this lovely flower and that too so recently . Nevertheless I feel this is one flower that I am going to click quite often.

Will come back soon with more photos....

Humayun's tomb

Humayun's tomb

Continuing on my lucky trend of visiting historical monuments , this weekend I went to Humayun's tomb with my folks.

As I mentioned earlier that nowadays I am reading "The City of Djinns" by William Darymple, which is the travelogue about his stay in Delhi for a year. So anyways I was fascinated to visit what all historical places he was mentioning in his travelogue. Although he din't mention Humayun's tomb yet but still it was one place which was on my list as as far as I remember I never been to that place (My dad doesn't agree with that and strongly stats that we have been there when we came to delhi around 15 yrs back).

Interestingly I was not planning to visit Humayun's tomb at the first place and instead last weekend itself I told my folks that we will go to India gate. But in the morning my colleague called me up enquiring about that place and on finding that it was on the way to India Gate , I made up a plan to visit it too. (Its another story that we couldn't see India Gate because of the huge crowd that descended there due to the lovely weather)

So coming to Humayun's tomb. Humayun was Babar's son and Akbar's father. He was the second of the Great Mughal rulers to have ruled India. He ruled India in 1532-40 and then from 1555-1560. While coming down from stairs, on hearing the Azan (Muslim call of prayer) as it was his habit that wherever he is ,on hearing the Azan he will kneel down in reverence ,is robe got stuck in his feet and fell down from stairs. He was succeeded by his 13 year old son Akbar, who later on became the greatest Mughal emperor to have ruled India.

View from center- Humayun's tomb

Hamida Banu Begum(Akbar's mother), his grieving widow, built his Mausoleum after his death. This building is touted as precursor to Taj Mahal. It stands on a platform of 12000 sq m and reaches a height of 47m.   

Peeking at the Emperor....

The earliest example of Persian influence in Indian architecture, the tomb has within it over 100 graves, earning it the name of "Dormitory of the Mughals".

First monument built with red sandstone and white marble.

Built of rubble masonry, the structure is the first to use red sandstone and white marble in such great quantities.

Lawn in front- built in Persian style

Like all Persian buildings , this one too had the 4 block garden structure with water channels separating each block from other.

Entrance to Humayun's tomb

Quite symmetrical

One striking thing about this monument is the symmetry. No matter from where you look at the main building, the lawn, the path to the monument etc everything has a symmetry and each half is a mirror image of the other.

Humayun's tomb - The Red Taj

I was glad that unlike last time when I clicked Taj Mahal, I learned to keep the base line horizontal to the ground and also clicked most of the pics keeping in mind the proportions.




Nevertheless a lovely and serene place to visit with your family and loved ones. :)