Postbox

The postbox hangs out 
collect letters, addressed by

postman in person.

P.s. Image captured from a evening walk in neighbour.

Pongal 2020

Mom's colorful floral Kolam

It’s more than a week since Pongal passed off gracefully, and as expected we had a traditional Pongal made in earthen pot and firewood stove into the balcony, just like the previous year. The day began with mom and aunt drawing colourful Kolams at the gateway and below the balcony (what you seen in the previous post) and we got ready wearing the latest cloths and skipped the breakfast to have an early lunch with Pongal. Mom arranged for the bricks and firewood a day earlier to the festival and late in the morning of Pongal aunt joined mom in preparing Pongal and arranging of things.

The Pongal pot bubbled up well and sustained in its overflowing state sometime for me to capture the moment.  Though it is believed as a sign of welcoming the year and good harvest, I see the real happiness and concern was getting together with the family of uncle and thanksgiving the nature in unison because Pongal isn’t a religious festival to hold back into the home, it is a dedication to farmers and nature what coexists in deciding our food and stepping out of home is where lies all. Other than the day with Thai Pongal, with holidays extended up to 5 days wasn’t anything special and the television programs weren’t interesting and the movies relayed were also already watched in online streams. As usual I went around the neighbourhood to capture Pongal Kolams drawn in front of the houses and found very few color Kolams drawing my attention. And I think of sharing it in another post.

RGB Monday

Colorful Pongal Kolams by mom and aunt

Kolam is a cultural identity of Tamils, as well as to the southern states of India similar as Rangoli that spread all-over India, is believed to bring auspicious to home when it is drawn in front of the doorway or gateway as a sign of welcome. Margali, a month of winter (mid Dec-Jan) in Tamil, is a favourite season for Kolam, where those skipped or unpractised it as a daily activity will make certain drew something in front of the door and the month ends leaving way to Thai – the day celebrated as Pongal, where Kolams take much colourful form from the plain dotted Kolams. Pulli Kolam is a regular art form where it involves drawing a line looped around a pattern of dots (pullis) with certain that all dots are encircled and lines closed at the end.

Shot from the balcony and you could see my aunt coloring the Kolam down in front of home.

Kolam take a special place in our every custom and celebrations and drawing a Kolam creates an elegancy to the occasion and there couldn’t be a better reception than making a smile through a cheerful and colourful Kolam.  Mom used to draw Kolam regularly at the doorstep until we resided in the ground floor apartment and houses in ground, now living on first floor we don’t have space other than mom’s knee pain prevents her going down to drew a Kolam. But during the festival of Pongal and other special occasions she takes a strain and draw colourful Kolams in front of the house, and now along with my aunt in next door they help each other creating the magic of colors, Kolam. I always have an interest in Kolalm and never miss an opportunity in capturing the Kolam and what you see here is from the recent Pongal celebration.

Celebration of Harvest – Pongal Festival

Pongal, the traditional festival of Tamils is left by two days. Tradition is something I always admire and I believe everything has some scientific reasons behind our customs and traditions what in later days turned relevant to faith. Pongal, the harvest festival of south India is a thanksgiving to farmers, cattle’s and nature in support of cultivation, though it is celebrated all over India in different names and custom, the core intention was to stand up for the farmers who the reason for our daily food.

A simple Pongal  kolam or rangoli from the neighborhood, last year.

Mostly, Pongal is a festival celebrated grandly and traditionally in villages and small towns where the farmers and the related sources exist. But in cities I feel we almost lost the touch of real essence of Pongal – the earthen pots, which brings a connection between earth and us and in combination of firewood produce a distinct flavour what any other utensils could promote and the bubbling up of pot with rice is another cheerful part believed to bring auspicious to home and hope to life. And that’s why I try to celebrate Pongal in traditional way each year, even though we couldn’t live up to farmers and villagers dedication I try the best to convince parents to celebrate/cook Pongal in pot and firewood.

I see Pongal brings new spirit to life and by celebrating the festival I feel grateful for the farmers and anything related to farming and food processing. ‘Suriya Pongal’ is another aspect of the festival devoted to prime source Sun (Suriya-n) where the Pongal pot is placed in open area where the sunlight falls, and by boiling the rice from newly harvested crop is a way of thanking its light and energy fuelling in cultivating crops. And ‘Thai Pongal’ is another term refers to Pongal which meant the beginning of Tamil month Thai, according to Tamil calendar, and the month when the harvest begins is believed to bring hope and ways to live with harvested grains.

A earthen pot on firewood stove  getting ready to cook Pongal, from the previous pongal festival a couple of years back.

This year the Pongal extends into the weekend, following Pongal, Maattu Pongal and Kaanum Pongal on 15, 16 and 17 respectively to 18 and 19 as weekend. Though the holidays doesn’t going to do anything with me or change across, but I could end up watching TV programs on special days after try to make firewood Pongal in the balcony, just like the previous year, and others could be the routine. One thing special about this Pongal is I gonna watch the programs and movies in my new big Led TV. Lol

Though Pongal is a piece of cake to us compared to villages and small towns where the celebration is whole, I always try to connect the feel and think back the times at grandparents’ home and visits to villages on Maattu (Bull) Pongal to take part in their celebrations, where cattle’s are decorated and their shelters being cleaned and worshiped and kids taking joy rides in bullock carts, to cherish myself to pick up the energy to go further. I think a festival mood couldn’t be enrich unless added some people to make my belief true that festivals are to be celebrated together with people rather making it a custom to celebrate alone or mark it as holidays only. I always wish to celebrate festivals along with people or at least surrounded by dear ones. I wish people from India a Happy Pongal and Makar Shankranti!

Concealed

From pink to orange

my sky transformed, silhouette 

concealed the target - moon!

P.s  Actually there's a moon behind the tree but I couldn't capture it while I was able to see, my position or angle of shooting missed the target.

Linking this post with Skywatch Friday

New LG Nano cell LED TV, completes my home theatre dream

The year began for me with a real brand new thing; I expected to buy in last few years or at least from the time of purchase of my AV receiver, an initial step in building my home theatre. After a lot research, comparison and reading on various aspects I come down to choose the television that content my hunger for some quality. I was certain I want a direct backlight LED TV, just like my previous 26” Samsung TV, bought in 2010, and I have seen the differences in clarity the led TVs that produced later couldn’t live up to it and many who watched our TV had praise on its sharpness what their own led TVs couldn’t produce. I don’t want to go more on its detail. I know there’re greater TVs in market where finance decides the content and from my budget I looked for the best and I find the year end to be right moment for discounts and the television came in fair tag price of ₹ 57,000 at 35% discount in Paytm Mall online shopping.

We bought a 49” LG Nano cell Led TV and the LG promoted the TV as most advanced Led TV and a step down to OLED TV. Somewhere I read Nano cell Led TV is called poor man’s OLED! Ha ha. The TV has IPS flat screen and Ultra HD resolution with 4K Active HDR and 4K upscaler and wide viewing angle and many more visual enhancers to make watching pleasure. While choosing the TV I was much concern about the visual/image features because I already have the best sound resource in Sony AV Receiver to expand audio up to 7.2 channels, so the TV audio would be seldom used   but still the TV has good sound quality with DTS Virtual surround. Nowadays I watch movies mostly in Prime video (and yet to join Netflix) with almost contents available in HD and 5.1Ch audio, there are some 4K videos too that I am supposed to experience sometime.

I’m someone always lookout for tiny details or observe little things, so the detail was something strongly built within me couldn’t avoid this TV that has Nano cell particle to refine dull colors to accurate colors. The HD movies/videos are a pleasure to watch in this TV than the relayed satellite channels, that are mostly in SD content and it strains the vision with irregular to bright in colors and disband pixels. The best thing about this TV was its magic motion remote. The cursor at the shake of remote is easy to browse the television, access apps and above all it has voice recognition with both built-in Google Assistant and Alexa. The apple airplay and homekit is seems to help connect smart appliances but right away this will only useful to connect mobiles since they are the smart appliance we hold.

I was working on quite a home theatre setting from the wake up of 2018, when I purchased an advanced budget 4K AV receiver at half the price of its original rate through an Amazon offer and discount.  It was a dream comes true for me to buy a proper home theatre system than the regular surround sound existed through the satellite speakers system in market. Following the receiver I waited patiently and particular about the speakers’ purchase that should nowhere loses the signal and compatible with the receiver but the budget was something restricted me to progress step after the other. First I bought two powerful bookshelf speakers from Boston Acoustics for the front right and left, and last year I purchased the centre and surround left/right speakers from Yamaha to get a 5.1 Ch sound and for the sub-woofer I hold back from the previous system. Now with the big Led TV that was installed on the New Year itself my dream of a home theatre had come true really. I’m grateful for my parents to support and understand my need for building a home theatre, although they aren’t much interested they spent quite only because I desired for.  Thank you