Someone asked me to do two illustrations for a book: three potatoes, and an omelette with a sprig of basil. It was both thrilling and scar...

It is Kerala which has made the words “Ayurvedic massage” famous all over the country in the last few years. So I had an Ayurvedic oil mass...

Bundles of thatch were stored under several of the cottages. I took a number of photographs of them. This was my favourite.

The whole reason for Thekkady's existence as a tourist destination is that it abuts the 777 sq. kms. Of Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary. The...

I interrupt the thrilling story of our visit to Thekkady, because someone commented about the Iyers of Palakkad and their language, which is...

Taj Garden Retreat, Thekkady. The place is intensely beautiful: a hazy blue silhouette of mountain in the distance, greener foothills in f...

In the morning we flew to Madurai. This is what the land looked like as we descended: The earth is red, and in many places the vegetation ...

We just got back from two weeks in relatively cool Thekkady, a small town on the Kerala side of the Kerala-Tamil Nadu border (but not by muc...

It's so hot the crows sit stunned on their branches. I'm going to see some elephants. (The illustration is an imagined antique seed...

I confess that I drew this, not from life, but from a fuzzy old photograph taken by R, which we were going to throw away. It is a Chennai c...

R tells a story from his childhood -- about the herbal hair oil which his father brewed up for the family. My post about the Armenian Chur...

I received several interesting comments / bits of information after my post about the little savoury mold that the paperkkaarar had given m...

under the fire star is three years old today. Here's my first post, from April 17, 2003: The God of Death Sells Paint I love thi...

Yesterday the paperkkaarar came to buy our old newspapers, Diet Pepsi tins, magazines, empty bottles and so on. We usually call him in -- ...

I drove out to do some errands today, determined that I would not return without at least one photograph. I was just rounding the corner fr...

I was reading an article about James Agee in The New Yorker . It quoted something that he had written as a film critic, about Bathing Beaut...

Chennai has just joined the cities which particpate in Metroblogging : With almost 40 active sites, Metroblogging is the largest and fastes...

Like many, many households in the south, we have coconut trees in our garden. When I look out the window I can see our three, and four more...

I've been posting photographs and things he has written to r's website . R enjoyed doing his own advertising for the company he fou...