05 October,2024 07:05 AM IST | Mumbai | Team SMD
Pic/Satej Shinde
A musician tries to board a crowded local train at Andheri station.
Tenzin Tsundue
"The Tibetan in Mumbai likes to flip through the MID-DAY, loves FM, but doesn't expect a Tibetan song" Extract from Tsundue's poem âThe Tibetan in Mumbai' We recently chanced upon a poem by activist Tenzin Tsunde mentioning mid-day sparking our curiousity. The poem "The Tibetan in Mumbai", mentions flipping through our paper religiously, like a true Mumbaikar. Tsundue's mentions that it is an ode to the five years in the city of dreams, way back from 1997 to 2002. During this time he quickly got a taste of the city's grind - couch-surfing at friends' places from Andheri to Cuffe Parade, surviving on vada pav and peanuts, and clinging on for dear life on Virar local trains.
Tenzin climbs up fourteen floors of The Oberoi (now Hilton) and hangs a banner reading Free Tibet: in 2002
As the city grew on him, he says in his essay "My Mumbay Story" - "Home has a very sacred meaning to me. Tomorrow, when we return to Tibet after our independence I will still return to amchi Mumbai" - it says. Tenzin reached celebrity status when he and a few other unfurled "Free Tibet" flag by climbing fourteen floors of the scaffolding of The Oberoi (now known as the Hilton). Though now based in Himachal Pradesh's town of Dharamshala, he tells this diarist that he has earmarked winter has his time to visit to come to Mumbai. "I make sure that I always come to visit the city at the end of the year. It feels like a home away from home," he says.
India's Virat Kohli and Rishabh Pant walk back after winning the second Test against Bangladesh, at Green Park, Kanpur, on Tuesday. Pic/PTI
The Indian cricket team will have no warm-up game before kicking off their five-Test series against Australia at Perth next month. To some, this is astounding and with good reason. Our in-house cricket nut who incidentally boasts of possessing the official tour brochure of India's first Test tour to Australia in 1947, informs us that the Vijay Hazare-led independent Indian team played as many as six tune-up games before the 1947-48 series opened in Brisbane on November 28. And these half a dozen matches were played across five states - Western Australia, South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland. Several changes in the game must be accepted, but how does one discount the importance of acclimatisation? Can the administrators come up with an answer before Rohit & Co leave for Down Under?
Aakriti Patni
IN an age when the printed word is rapidly giving way to digital media, it warmed this diarist's heart to witness a digital-only publishing house leap into the world of good old ink and paper, with the launch of Saga Fiction's rebranded avatar - The Bombay Circle Press - on Friday. The joy and pride was evident on CEO and co-founder Aakriti Patni's face as she unveiled their brand new paperbacks at the launch event. Asked what prompted the decision to go analogue in an increasingly digital world, Patni tells us, "It might seem like print is dying, but it will never die in India. Here, physical books - paperbacks - will always have an appeal. Instead, we found market penetration to be a problem with digital books here, despite their popularity among international readers. We hope to reach both kinds of readers, both online and offline, with a hybrid approach." Write on, we say!
The new garden in Prabhadevi is nearing completion
It is not too often that you hear and witness city authorities keeping their word. So, even as the Mumbai Metro's Aarey to Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) leg started functioning over the weekend, opening a new chapter in the city's transport landscape, it is time to cast an eye on a Prabhadevi Garden called the Sane Guruji Udyan, which had been sacrificed for the Siddhivinayak Metro Station. In December 2016, this paper had highlighted a protest by locals about the park being taken over for the Metro III line. At that time, authorities had stated once the station is over, they will "return" or remake a garden, a claim met with cynicism. However, that has happened and a new garden next to Siddhivinayak Station is racing to completion. Said Jeetendra Pardeshi, Superintendent of Gardens BMC, "This garden is being made by Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited (MMRCL). We have December 2024 as a tentative timeline for completion. At the time of the garden takeover, we at the BMC had certain suggestions/guidelines about the same number of trees, of the local variety to be grown etc in the remade garden. Post completion, the garden will be handed over to the BMC." Then, Prabhadevi will get its garden back - truly dil garden, garden ho gaya.
