The city - sliced, diced and served with a dash of sauce
Pic/Shadab Khan
Lunch on my mind
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A construction worker has his lunch at a site on Marine Drive
Getting sporty in the city
Kids set up their worn out gymnastic mats amid dirt and perform stunts in Bandra
mid-day’s principal photographer Atul Kamble won in the Special Merit category for two of his photographs — one in cricket and another in gymnastics — at the World Sports Photography Awards 2023. The picture of kids practising gymnastics amid a garbage dump was taken in the Garibnagar slums near Bandra East station on August 25, 2022.
Cricket practice at Shivaji Park. Pics/Atul Kamble
“I was amused when I saw kids playing there without a care. I observed them having fun for nearly 45 minutes. It took some time before I realised that I am a photojournalist and this needs to be captured. I was so engrossed in watching those playful kids,” said Kamble. The second photo, with young cricketers striking the same batting pose at Dadar’s famous Shivaji Park, was taken on February 1, 2022.
Not all old is gold
The buildings in 2021. Pics Courtesy/Debasish Chakraverty
Santa Cruz-based Debasish Chakraverty (inset) would agree. For the local Bandra history enthusiast, the two buildings that were abandoned for over 45 years on Carter Road were barely a sight for sore eyes. “These buildings had been standing unoccupied for as long as I have been alive,” the 48-year-old laughed over the call.
(From left) A part of the building collapses; during demolition
One of the two buildings, Dev Chaya, was finally demolished in the evening on Wednesday and people, including the site workers and locals, were seen rejoicing immediately after the structure was brought down. “Due to some internal disagreement among the builders, the buildings remained one of the few sights that would hurt the eyes in this otherwise up-market area. In February of 2019, news surfaced that Salman Khan was set to buy one of these,” Chakraverty shared, adding that the news died soon after.
It wasn’t until May this year when it was confirmed that another property in Bandra would now get a Bollywood tag. “A few months after it was sure that the actor was converting one of these into a five-star hotel, a part of one of the buildings collapsed naturally on July 30. And soon after, the building finally bit the dust. It was quite ironic,” Chakraverty signed off.
Divorce, so what?
Shasvathi Siva poses with the first draft of her book
Leading to the September release of her book Divorce Is Normal, Mumbai-based writer Shasvathi Siva revealed that she has written the book for everybody, not only divorced people. Explaining that where marriage exists, so should an open conversation about divorce, Siva points to the need for destigmatising divorce for people to be able to get out of bad marriages with the support they need. “Don’t be the ‘log’ in ‘log kya kahenge’. Don’t make it difficult for divorced people or those contemplating it. Divorce has to become dinner-table talk which shouldn’t make families uncomfortable.” The book will be a crowd-sourced guide to navigate divorce in Indian society through the lens of stigma.
Poetry with the tragedy queen
The group at Gaiety Cinema. Pic courtesy/Wikimedia Commons
On late actress Meena Kumari’s (inset) 90th birth anniversary on August 1, poetry enthusiasts relived moments and memories left behind by the tragedy queen in Bandra. “We wanted to shift the male gaze that the actor experienced all her life. She was an Urdu poet too and it is important that people get to know Meena Kumari, the shaayar,” shared Saranya Subramanian, founder of The Bombay Poetry Crawl, who hosted the event with Vasvi Kejriwal’s poetry community Fresh Mint.
The group of 20 participants covered six locations, including Iqbal Bungalow (Kumari’s first home in the city) where they recited Gham ki talash; they narrated Aakhri khwahish at Landmark (the apartment she last lived in), and Sheeshe ka badan and Zamana that was read at Gaiety Cinema (which opened in the same year that she had passed).
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