The Character of a House - Symphony of Ruins

The Character of a House - Wires

Dhobi Ghat - Rhyme & Rhythms

The thing about Bombay or Mumbai is you go five yards and all of human existence is revealed. It's an incredible cavalcade of life, and I love that.

I love that scent of buzzing human movements and it so much reminds me of the Bees. I can fairly imagine Bombay as The Queen and us acting like bees tending the time as a beehive. We are all moving and at times this movement becomes the metaphor of Stillness.

And maybe if you're staying in Bombay you would have observed that how the city has beautifully carved herself into frames. Frames of life! A life full of renewed life force extinguishing every night and springing up yet again each morning.

Such display of continuous deaths and births are rarely seen in any cities I have ever lived in. Maybe Newyork is such I am being told. But I am sure the waves and textures of human colours are unmatched and unique from everywhere.

And the most remarkable part is the huge mellowed heart of the city.She places the grotesque and the ugly next to the refined and subtle and yet it creates a Rhythm. Her indomitable spirit and desire to exist supercedes every lil' imperfections she carries.

Dhobi Ghat - Blue's Playin

Dhobi Ghat (Mahalaxmi Dhobi Ghat) is a well known open air laundromat in Mumbai, India.The washers, locally known as Dhobis, work in the open to wash the clothes from Mumbai's hotels and hospitals.

I was always fascinated with the stories of Dhobi Ghat and more so seeing the film with the same title.

It was just 6.30 am in the morning and the scent of Dhobi Ghat with chlorine, dim light, half clad men beating the clothes in a rhythm with splashes of water wrenching the blue's out, was enough to produce a music that could only match with Billy Joel in his saxophone.

I was standing there quietly and watching the clock taking me back to somewhere in between the 60's to 70's.There was this humming sound of the drier, in distant, giving it a feeling of Time Machine. I could feel some curious eyes trying to catch my glance but they were too busy to clean all the mirths of the city than watching me through my lens.

I could see tons of shirts and trousers shedding their blackness and getting whiter. I was thinking how men have learnt to clean the dirts and whiten their lives at the expense of other fellow men.

I was wondering where do all these dirts that are getting cleaned travels to? Does these travels to the inside, within the darkest corners of the city ? How will the city clean itself?

I think too much! Let me watch the Blue's for now...

Short Story of a City - Ahmadabad.

Cities were always like people, showing their varying personalities to the traveler. Depending on the city and on the traveler, there might begin a mutual love, or dislike, friendship, or enmity.

Where one city will rise a certain individual to glory, it will destroy another who is not suited to its personality. Only through travel can we know where we belong or not, where we are loved and where we are rejected.

Short story of a City - Ahmadabad

याद पिया की आये ।


"याद पिया की आये
यह दुःख सहा ना जाये- हाये राम

बाली उमरिया सूनी रे सजरिया
जोबन बीतो जाये- हाये राम

बैरी कोयलिया कूक सुनावे 
मुझ बिरहन का जियरा जलावे 
हाँ पी बिन रैन जगाये – हाये राम"



Oh memories of my beloved haunt me!
Alas, I cannot bear this grief!

I am yet young but my bed is forlorn ;
my youth is passing by – Alas!

The cuckoo, my enemy, coos his song.
Bereft of my beloved, my heart burns.
Yes – I am kept awake all night without my beloved!
Alas!




Background! 

This is a Thumri but in essence, it is a lament.The song is set to the Hindustani raag Bhinna Shadaj.

Written by the great Maestro Bade Ghulam Ali Khan on the death of his wife who passed in 1932, it has certainly stood the test of time! This is in the Punjabi Thumri style, which is faster paced and sounds generally ‘lighter’ than traditional Thumris.

Translated with a bit of artistic license, he says ‘Oh memories of my beloved haunt me! Alas, I cannot bear this grief!’. He was only 30 when his wife died. ‘I am yet young but my bed is forlorn! Alas, my youth is passing by!’.

Was he crying for himself or his wife? A bit of both, I think. ‘Bereft of my wife, my heart burns’ he says.

I have given a faint try for Transliterating this song and used it over here because the image was composed thinking about this great moment and song. 



(Street Walk in Old City of Ahmadabad with Cine Prime Lens DS 50mm, 1.5T. )

Short Story of a City - Bhadra Fort, Ahmadabad.

Ahmedabad gets its name from king Ahmed Shah Abdali who ruled and built this formidable city in the 14 the century. Ahmedabad gets its name from king Ahmed Shah Badshah who ruled and built this formidable city in the 14 the century. Ahmedabad is also known by a variety of other names like: Rajnagar, Shrinagar, Amdavad , Ahimdavad, Ahamdavad, Ahamadpur, Akmipur and Ahmednagar. Legendary historian Todalmal and celebrated musician Tansen who were two intellectuals from Badshah Akbar’s court, were actually from Ahmedabad. 

Short Story of a City - Bicycle Thieves

When i saw the Bicycle, waiting in a corner of a busy street of the old city of Ahmadabad, i couldn't help but remember Antonio Ricci. 

Do you remember Antonio and his beloved Bicycle? How happy he was riding throughout the city of Rome and putting up colourful posters around the city? 

And why me? Like Antonio, i was,too, already thrown out of a job from the company i help founded.

And like Antonio i was happy too founding the pillars of my dreams and build a company painstakingly until one fine day i was asked to quit. And with that my love for bicycling into work remained a distant dream. 

And to top it my bicycle was stolen too, the very next day from the company premises. My beloved bicycle. 

And after days when i saw this bicycle, i was wondering what would have been the fate of the owner of this seemingly old worn out bicycle? 

And seeing the bicycle alone for so many hours made me feel so sad for Antonio and his child. Maybe i was sad for me and my boy Ishaan too. He wanted to drive with me in my lost bicycle. 

Maybe someday i will buy it again and make my boy ride with me. And in the mean time if you happen to pass by those streets of Ahmadabad do try to look for that bicycle. It must be there waiting, lonely and sad. Maybe waiting for its owner to take it back to where it belong. Maybe...

P.S Even if you are not visiting Ahmadabad, but do try to see Antonio Ricci in "The Bicycle Thieves", a seminal work of neo-realism film would have fatally undermined Vittorio De Sica's intention of presenting an authentic snapshot of everyday life in postwar Italy. 

Short Story of a City - Ahmadabad

“A Traveler's life had two lives now: the life he would have and the life he would forever wonder about.” 

Himalaya Calling - The Character of a House

The Character of a House - Ruins of a City, Old City, Ahmadabad

"Something always attracts us towards the ruins, because ruins remind us our fundamental problem: The problem of impermanence! Amongst the ruins we see the very end of our road! Whatever shows you the simple truth, it is your Master Teacher; whoever repeatedly recalls you of the plain truth, he is your good master!” 

Salaam Bombay - The Character of a House (The Magen David)

This house is supposedly older than the first British settlement in Bombay Presidency and dates back to early 1700's when Bombay was governed by the Portuguese and owned by the famous Jewish Trading family.

Now the emblem on the house is called The Magen David ( Shield of David, or as it is more commonly known, the Star of David ) which is the symbol most commonly associated with Judaism today, but it is actually a relatively new Jewish symbol.

It is supposed to represent the shape of King David's shield (or perhaps the emblem on it), but there is really no support for that claim in any early rabbinic literature.The symbol is not mentioned in rabbinic literature until the middle ages.

Scholars such as Franz Rosenzweig have attributed deep theological significance to the symbol.For example, some note that the top triangle strives upward, toward G-d, while the lower triangle strives downward, toward the real world.

Some note that the intertwining makes the triangles inseparable, like the Jewish people.Some say that the three sides represent the three types of Jews: Kohanim, Levites and Israel. Some note that there are actually 12 sides (3 exterior and 3 interior on each triangle), representing the 12 tribes.

While these theories are theologically interesting, they have little basis in historical fact.

The symbol of intertwined equilateral triangles is a common one in the Middle East and North Africa, and is thought to bring good luck. It appears occasionally in early Jewish artwork, but never as an exclusively Jewish symbol. The nearest thing to an "official" Jewish symbol at the time was the menorah.

Abstracts of a City - Ahmadabad