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The rainfall in June –
the poems I’ve pasted to walls
peel off, but leave traces.
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It’s been raining for some days now – the monsoon is well and truly here 🌧️. Clouds hang about chatting with each other all day, and every now and then look downwards and send a shower or two our way ☔. The breeze, always cool and soothing, steals in gently every now and then to remind us to keep that kitchen window closed if we don’t want the rainwater to pool on the milk pot lid ⛆. The rainy season is a wonderful time to be in the Deccan – all the more so if you have a job that does not require you to step out of home 🏠.
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As much as we love the monsoon, we had a fun (not!) experience a few years ago when we went to Amboli, Maharashtra in the middle of the monsoon. The idea was to shoot some pictures of the rich reptile life there. While we did manage to get a pretty good look at some awesome wildlife you normally don’t get to see, our patience with the rains wore thin by day 3 of pretty much non-stop downpours. Even the rains are not exempt from the rule that too much of anything is not good! 😛
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All the rain also reminded us of the absolutely wonderful Malvani food we had in Amboli and inspired Vidya to assemble all the ingredients for making Sol kadhi. Whether we will get around to making it is another thing altogether!
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The poetry of ✍️ Matsuo Basho has been a very pleasant, and at times very sobering, influence. Some of his rain poems are especially relevant now – like the one at the beginning. Some, like this next one, also seem especially applicable to life!
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A cold rain starting
And no hat –
So?
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How has the monsoon been treating you? Are you loving it or hating it? Do let us know.
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A reminder: To ensure you don't miss any of our newsletters, move this email to your inbox. We always send all our newsletters from happystuff@sigamany.in – add it to your contacts so that you always get it in your inbox.
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Here's a Photo
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...instead of a thousand words
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Lorry Art | Hyderabad, June 2022
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Interesting Stuff
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Fun things we'd turn around and share with you if we were in the same room as you
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About a year ago, we bought a Damascus rose bush. The flower was supposed to have a wickedly spell-binding scent. After growing vigorously and sprouting all manner of leaves and branches, we were finally overjoyed to see a small bud. However, after all that waiting, we had hardly a day to enjoy the bloom 🌹 of the Damascus rose and its wickedly enchanting scent 🥀. The flower itself looked like a smushed cat’s face (I kid you not – please check out the photo!) and the wickedly enchanting smell was a very mild fragrance you needed to go really close to the flower to smell.
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I guess our special potting mix was no replacement for the redolent soils of Damascus. Though technically, no Damascus rose in India has been anywhere near Damascus for a few hundred years – not since the Persianate empires brought them over and cultivated them in thousands of varieties locally all over the place.
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When Vidya’s mom expressed a wish for a nameboard for their house, we planned to gift them one. Looking online, we were struck by the variety of options and designs available (pebble art, string art, floral, Pattachitra, etc.). We finally settled on an Aipan art nameboard. The fact that it was hand-painted by an artist made it special.
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If you visit the Tateyama Museum in Toyama, Japan, you will find two artefacts there – a copper sceptre-head and an ancient iron sword. The story behind the discovery of these is fascinating. In 1890, imperial surveyors climbed to the top of Mt. Tsurugi, which was then considered the last unclimbed mountain in Japan ⛰️. To their surprise, they found these two artefacts that dated back about a thousand years.
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Apparently, the peak had been not just conquered, but was part of the rituals of the Shugendo religious order whose followers performed religious rites “while treading through steep mountain ranges”. Also, it had been such a long time ago that all records of the peak being climbed had vanished, pushing it once again into the list of unclimbed mountains.
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Fun Poll!
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What's a newsletter without a survey!
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Fun poll was fun – and the results were quite eye-opening!
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Almost half the folks are early birds 🐦 – I guess the worms are getting slaughtered! Slightly more than a third of us are those who finish Wordle by 12:01 am 🦉. Interestingly, we have 13% of insomniacs, and 4% sleepmeisters. What fun!
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Moving on, this issue’s poll is about food. Specifically, it’s about whether you dip your food into a beverage. Could be biscuit into your tea or bacon into your beer (whut?) – but, are you a dunker?
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Nostalgia Kick
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Specially introduced after the response to our first issue 😁
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Here’s a panel from a childhood favourite comic book. Mandrake, published by Indrajal Comics, was an integral part of our growing-up years – so much so that our house is called Xanadu! Question for fellow Mandrake buffs – who is Segrid?
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Navin's Atrocious Translations
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Tamil movie song lyrics translated for comic effect
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Thank you for all the enthusiastic responses to last week’s translation. The song was June ponal from Unnale Unnale. Nimalan, Akila and Vibhu got the song easily, congratulations. Maybe we should hand out points and anoint a winner at some point in time!
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This week’s atrocious translation is of a song that I personally like a lot. As a bonus, the video is an absolute riot to watch – the actors actually mime out the atrocious things the words say! I couldn’t select any single line as more atrocious than the rest – so here are all the lines in the song for your reading (or singing!) pleasure :)
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I jumped up and hit the sky
My feet became birds
My fingers sprouted flowers
My eyebrows descended and became a moustache
I showered in happy tears
I smiled with all of my teeth
I was walking around carrying a block of sugar as an ant
I walked slowly on water as a leaf
The moment I professed my love
Was the moment I saw God
My heart flies as the air
Lightning runs through my nerves
The moon rises throughout my body
As he caressed the white moon
I scattered as the stars
One seed fell on the heart
And sprouted branches till my head
I was an undisturbed pond
When a frog jumped in, I dried up
Is all the sand sugar today
Is all the sea full of drinking water today
Is the shore full of your footsteps
Are the waves full of your smile
When paper touches me
It turns into a book of poetry
After brushing against a rainbow while flying
This crow turned into a peacock
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As always, write in if you are able to identify this song!
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Recycled Happiness!
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A fun post from one of our blogs
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Navin shot some pictures of a beautiful snake 🐍 at Golconda Fort. Five years later, he identified the species. This is that story.
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That's for this issue folks! Feel free to write to us at happystuff@sigamany.in or just fill out the form here with your thoughts, ideas and good wishes :)
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See you in the next issue!
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Disclaimer: We have no affiliation, commercial or otherwise. with any products and services we mention in the newsletter.
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