Tag: Chennai

Pizzeria on Wheels – A Mirage

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Pizza shop on a truck

Was excited to come across this pizza shop on wheels. Little disappointed when I came to know that the truck is just an order & delivery desk and pizzas are actually made in the kitchen in basement of the hotel.

Location: R A Puram, Chennai

Date: 20th August 2025

Den of the Lion

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Address plaque

Stumbled upon the house of Thiru T N Seshan, the former Chief Election Commissioner of India, the man credited with safeguarding India’s democracy through his electoral reforms. He may be no more, but his legacy still lives on. Nearly three decades after leaving office, he is still held as the epitome of an honest and fearless Chief Election Commissioner.

Location: Chennai

Date: 18th August 2025

Ozymandias

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Came across this postbox at Raja Annamalaipuram during my evening walk. Reminded me of Shelley’s Ozymandias. The mighty postbox which over the years served as a portal that kept millions of relationships in tact looks like a superhero during his twilight years. The postbox’s fate is worse than the statue of Ozymandias which survived while nothing around it remained except the desert sand. The world around the postbox has flourished and moved on relegating the postbox to a relic.

Location: Chennai

Date: 14th August 2025

THRIVING IN TIMES OF COVID19 – 4

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Got an extended weekend due to Friday being May Day. Woke up early on both Friday and Saturday (just 6.30 AM, pretty early by my standards for a weekend) to order groceries and vegetables on Food Delivery Apps. I was not successful in ordering on Friday but was able to order on Saturday. Somehow I have not been sleeping at the usual hour and I have been staying awake till 2 AM on both Friday  & Saturday morning. So the combined effect was that, during the first part of the day I was feeling extremely sleepy and moving around my house like a Zombie.

For about an hour on Friday evening and about an hour on Saturday evening, I played cricket with my daughter & son. I also played cricket with my son for about an hour at around Noon on Saturday as well. We used my son’s plastic cricket bat and a bunch of plastic balls. I was the bowler to both of them as they took turns as batters. It was fun play time for the three of us. 

One of the things that I have realized is that the only Truest Measure of Love is Time and not money. And you get to see that and feel that when you have very young kids. I have heard Conor Neill ask in one of his YouTube videos, ‘How does a child spell love?’ And went on to spell the answer as: ‘T-I-M-E.’ I got to experience this fact so dramatically a couple of days ago. On that day, I was going for my evening walk  trying to catch up on my step count for the day (more on this in a later post). As I was going from one room to another, my son was frequently crisscrossing my path and making it difficult for me to walk fast. So I told him, “Let’s go for a walk,” and held his hand. At this very moment I saw his face lit up with a smile that was better than the sight of a million flowers blooming at the same time. As we were walking from one room to another and taking left or right turns, he was visibly excited and was laughing out loud. During that indoor walk session, I  realized that parents spending time with kids means a lot for them, even if that time is spent on simple activities. In fact every activity and every moment that parents spend with kids is absolutely special for them.

On Friday night, post dinner as I was sitting with my son in our room not knowing how to keep him engaged, I made paper boat and paper gliders for him. As I finished making the glider my daughter walked into our room. She too wanted to make paper boat. I gave her a sheet of paper from one of her old homework notebooks. As she was making the paper boat I thought this could be a good way to pass time. So I went to YouTube and typed ‘simple Origami for kids.’ I got a string of results from which I chose the video about making a paper shirt. We did not have colorful Origami papers so we decided to use papers from my daughter’s old homework notes. After finishing the paper shirt, my daughter chose the video about how to make princess dress. The instructions in both the videos were easy to follow and we ended up with final products that looked like something shown in the videos. It’s a big surprise to me that even I was able to get it right!!! 

On Saturday night, we decided to do a couple of Origami stuff once again. My daughter chose both the videos. The first one was on how to make sun glasses which was very easy. The second one was on how to make sword. This one was more complex than the other three stuff that we did. We kept missing the folds here and there and had to watch sections of the video multiple times to get the sword design right. But finally we managed to get both the swords right. Overall the time and effort was well spent. Not only did my daughter like it, even I found the time spent on doing the simple paper craft very refreshing. 

Just before the lock-down I had gone to Odyssey to buy some craft-work DIY kits for my daughter. I had picked up an Origami kit in my hand initially, but decided to a buy the Quilling Jewellery kit and Amar Chitra Katha Mahabaratha book-set for her. The Origami kit would have come in very handy yesterday and the day before it. But it’s OK as long as we get any paper. For sometime now, my daughter has been pleading  to open the Quilling kit and make the rings. But, I have asked my daughter to make the rings the week before her school reopens so that she can gift those rings to her school friends. Instead she has been keeping herself busy reading or drawing. 

Checked on Amazon for Origami kits but they are still delivering only essential stuff. Till we are able to get Origami kits from some shop or Amazon, guess we will have to use papers from daughter’s old homework notes.

THRIVING IN TIMES OF COVID19 – 3

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I live on the third floor of our building. Most of the houses in the neighborhood are either G+1 floor or G+2 floors. As a result, I can get visibility of far more buildings and terraces than if I were living on the first floor. One the results of the COVID19 lockdown is that the terraces of the buildings in my neighborhood have become relaxation/ socialization spots for people in the evenings. I live in a densely crowded part of the city and going for a walk on the streets is not advisable. Since its peak summer here and staying indoors for an extended period of time is extremely suffocating, a stroll in the terrace is a welcome break or rather an unusual luxury during these extraordinary times.


The terrace of the apartment complex immediately behind my house gets converted into a cricket field @ 5.20 pm almost everyday. A guy in his fifties comes to play with his two sons, one probably in his late teens and another in his preteens. They look like Tamilians but the boys talk only in Hindi. As is usually the case with boys of this age and age gap, they keep quarreling a lot about a potential catch, wrong delivery, bad shot and on and on. The dad is an extreme contrast to his sons, he rarely speaks and the look on his face resembles that of a Zen monk. After the match and on days when his sons don’t come to play cricket he goes for a brisk walk on the terrace. I think the elder son goes for cricket coaching and I have seen him do exercises (similar to the ones done perform cricket coaching sessions) on the terrace. 

I have seen a couple of ladies go for walking or do warm-up exercises in the evening. But they never interact and one of them is always wearing a earphone connected to her mobile. Around 8 to 8.30 PM a couple of college guys come to the terrace to talk on mobiles. Sometimes they also do group study on the terrace. The terrace of the building beyond this one gets converted into a playground for less than 10 year olds. They are mostly accompanied by their grand parents. Sometimes I see these kids lean on the parapet wall and talk to kids in the next terrace or kids standing in their balconies in the next building. 

On the terrace of the house immediately to the left of my house an elderly man and an elderly lady (most likely a couple) go for a walk in the evenings. The lady goes for a very brisk walk while chatting on mobile phone; Abishek Bachan would be proud that she is following his maxim: Walk & Talk. The guy generally strolls slowly with the look of reluctance in his face. The house and the apartments next to this building also  have someone or the other in walk & talk mode. The family in the house immediately in front of my house never venture to their terrace or their balconies in the evenings. However one of the persons who lives in the house aging about sixty comes to his balcony in the mornings and chants come mantra while holding a little bit of water on his right palm. 

On the terrace diagonally in front of my house, there is a very small roof garden with flowering plants. Every evening a guy in his forties or a lady in her sixties are either watering the plant or doing some sort of attending to the plants. There is a railway line of Elevated Metro Train Service very near my house. In normal days you could see and hear the sound of the trains. With the lockdown in place, the trains have gone silent. Despite all these people that I have described doing some activity or the other, a vast majority of the people still do not venture out to the terraces. Not sure, what do they do keep themselves occupied and remain sane.