miscellaneous

Just want to share a small incident with you guys since JKM brought up the subject of mangoes.

I used to visit my grandma's house in Cochin when we were ready to return back to Chennai she would go around the yard and collect different plants for me to bring back and plant in my house. 6 yrs ago the day I was leaving for Chennai she came running to me with a small mango seed that had just sprouted with four leaves and told me to plant it in my compound (i have only 5' empty space around my house). I did not want to hurt her so I carefully brought it back with me and just for fun planted it wondering if I would ever get a chance to taste the fruit of this mango tree.. It grew nice and tall in two years time and the third year yielded fruit - sweet fruit.. I was thrilled to bits to eat mango from my very own tree - Ithink it is the "Sendhoora" variety. Now it is 3 years since my grandma died and whenever I see the fruit on this tree I cant help but remember the day she gave me the little sapling.. Had I thrown it away I would not have been the proud owner of my sweet mango tree. I am posting pictures of my mango tree with flowers and fruit just to share this with all of you - especially JKM... JKM hope when you come to Chennai it is mango season and I am able to give you mangoes from my tree...

This is done with ice-cream sticks. The 16 words mentioned on the sticks are the 16 qualities which one should posses in life. These wordings are generally used by elders when they bless some one. These plates are generally used to welcome the newly wed with an arthi.

This is Dry Coconut Engraving,
procedure: Draw a design on the dry coconut either using pencil or any other marker.
By using small knife or blade peel the required design...you may refer the picture below. In karnataka weddings this kopparai is exchanged between bridge & groom.