Mumbai Diary: Wednesday Whispers

The green walk
DCP Expeditions, a popular wildlife photography academy, conducted its 100th weekend photo walk on Sunday in Mumbai at the Nagla block of Sanjay Gandhi National Park.

Members of the DCP Weekend Photowalks

The self-funded and self-supported photo walk project called the DCP Weekend Photowalks was started in October 2013 with an objective to help Mumbaikars explore the bio-diversity in and around Mumbai and also hone the skills of budding wildlife photography enthusiasts.

These weekend photo walks also provided an excellent medium for documentation of the biodiversity in the city. Geographical locations with natural surroundings and wonderful sightseeing sites around Mumbai are identified and the weekend walks are conducted over a period of 52 weekends in a year. These photo walks are conducted irrespective of the number of the participants.

The meat heat is on
If you still need proof that the meat ban has cleaved (pun intended) the city into two, then look at the war that has spilled on to the streets. We spotted this car at Mira Road.

This car spotted in Mira Road has a message for the ban-dwagon

Since the picture was taken from another moving car the letters on the banners stuck on the car may be a little unclear, so just clarifying. On one side, there was a banner which stated: ‘I ate meat today'. Beside it, was another notice that read: ‘Will eat meat tomorrow too.' Read more on Page 17 (To eat or not to (m)eat.

Sahota in the Man Booker shortlist
Sunjeev Sahota's The Year of the Runaways (Picador India) has made it to this year's Man Booker Prize for Fiction 2015 shortlist.

We had announced about him making it to the longlist some time back, and this diarist hopes that the young UK-based writer actually goes ahead to win the big prize. Way to go!

Bean there, done that
Animation character Mr. Bean decided to do a walkabout in downtown Andheri, much to the surprise of a few.

Pic/Pradeep Dhivar

Eco-friendly is the way
For four weekends, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya hosted an eco-friendly Ganesha idol-making workshop. Here, shadu clay idols were made by participants.

Participants at the workshop. Pic/Bipin Kokate

Young and old were part of this workshop that was held by Pen-based sculptor and idol-artist, Shrikant Deodhar. Deodhar, who completed his Fine Arts Graduate Diploma from JJ School of Art, joined his family business of four generations.

His family has been pioneering mass production of Ganesha idols that are sent across the world. Deodhar conducts workshops in museums and cultural institutions all over the world.