Miss Adventures

Looking online at the spring and summer offerings from the likes of The Gap, Banana Republic, Zara, H&M, etc., I’ve noticed that just about every store has something inspired by India. Embroidered or sequinned tops, cotton kurtas, long, full skirts, and paisley prints, appear to be - from this vantage point - all the rage in the U.S. and Europe, so much so that these designs have trickled down to the mass market. I don’t know if I like this, as this whole India fashion explosion was supposed to happen next year, when I return with an enviable stash of fashion forward Indo-garb. Okay, so I won’t be so special. But I will have a nice array of custom-designed, custom-fit clothing.

Over the past two weekends, I have discovered the extremely addictive world of fabric shopping in Mumbai’s Mangaldas Market. Walk past the chaos of placemat and plastic sellers opposite and slightly caddy-corner from Crawford Market and therein lies the covered bazaar where many Bombay tailors and designers buy their silks, chiffons, and printed cottons. This being India, the vendors are crammed side-by-side along bustling lanes - not aisles, because that connotes wide, empty paths - but numbered lanes, which are as narrow and congested as Churchgate rail cars at rush hour.

According to a recent issue of Wallpaper Magazine, John Galliano has been spotted in past years strolling through Mangaldas Market, snatching up bolts of fabric for his ready-to-wear collections. Keeping his motto of the month in mind, I decided it was time for me to jump into the designer game, if only for myself.
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Lots of web troubles going on as of late. Looks like BootsnAll, the site through which I have my blog, decided to do some upgrades. And, as a result, my blog no longer has formatting.

Talked to a guy at support, and he said the site looks the same to him. Am I the only one seeing a completely different look in my browser?

Anyway, I can’t concentrate on writing until the technical kinks get fixed. I could tinker with the templates myself, but I’m a little short of time these days: Yoga and Hindi classes this week.

I just stumbled across this poem of sorts that I wrote last year for some shoe-loving jingle contest. Not quite sure why I didn’t win. I still think this is kinda cute:
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All I have ever heard about the great Indian mango is true – it is the ripest, freshest, and one of the most enjoyable fruits ever. Forget the scrawny, stringy tasteless Mexican mangoes that we have to settle for in the U.S. Mangoes are the real deal here – and there’s more than one kind.

Eight long months we have been waiting for mango season. In the meantime, we have had plenty of fruits to make us happy: papaya, oranges, sweet limes, pineapple, grapes, watermelon, cantaloupe, tender coconut, and guava. I like papaya in doses (not dosas!), but it can go gelatinous fairly quickly if you cut it and put it in the fridge. Fresh pineapple has been a godsend, and I still try to have it every day if not every week. It was a joy to discover that watermelons were at their peak here in November and December; cantaloupes have also been quite good for some months now. Around Christmas, a Goan co-worker introduced me to Guava cheese, a traditional yuletide snack that’s basically just equal amounts of guava and sugar boiled and blended together, then hardened and shaped (sometimes into triangle wedges so as to attain a cheesy resemblance). And limes and sweet limes are around all the time for making fresh/sweet lime soda, a local specialty that’s so much more light and refreshing than a lassi.

Unless, of course, you’re talking about a mango lassi.
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