Greenery, everywhere...!

 Arecanut trees against the backdrop of setting Sun...

 Coconut tree...

 Beautiful yellow flowers...

 Wonderful white flowers...

 Green pepper!

 This is Chinese chilli (Kanthari mulaku, in Malayalam ), a very hot chilli variety...

 Green pepper...

 A cute rose flower...

 Tomato cultivation...

Plantain, a fruit, and a plant...
A common sight in most of the households in Kerala, especially in the villages.

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Camphor Tulsi (Karpoorathulasi, kapoor tulsi, camphor basil) and other common varieties of this divine plant in India

Camphor Tulsi

Camphor tulsi/Karpoorathulasi/Camphor basil is a rare variety of Basil. Rub the leaves of this divine plant, the fragrance resembles camphor!

Tulsi (Thulasi, basil), as you all know, is a holy plant worshiped in India. All Hindu households will have a Tulsithara, a raised structure in front of the house facing the main door where this holy plant will be grown. Some use a special clay pot as the container to grow Tulsi where space is limited.  Nowadays people have started growing Tulsi, somehow or other, in pots and containers in small apartments as well.

Thulasi leaves and flowers are used in Hindu rituals of worship of Gods and Goddesses. This holy plant is considered sacred in Hinduism. It is a divine plant.

There are three varieties of Tulsi (Holy basil) popular in India.

• Krishna Tulsi - the leaves and stem are purple in color, the aroma of the leaves is mesmerizing. 
• Rama Tulsi - the leaves are green. 
• Shyama Tulsi - the leaves are long and narrow.

Krishna and Rama are the varieties commonly grown in houses in India. Other varieties, if present are said to be auspicious. I have here Krishna, Rama, Camphor and Lemon varieties. Trying to get Shyama tulsi, God willing will get it as well asap.

There is a lot of confusion regarding the nomenclature of this species and the local names in India. I tried my best online, but I feel there is no consensus regarding the classification, local names, and varieties. Hope someone knowledgeable will enlighten us sooner or later. So I have used the common names that I am familiar with in this post.

Lemon Tulsi

Tulsi has innumerable medicinal uses as well. It has been claimed to be having anti-diabetic, carminative, immunity boosting, anti-cancer properties and the like. Some varieties have culinary uses as well, like Thai basil.

Camphor Tulsi/Karpoora thulasi is a water-loving plant. You miss it to water one day, hmmm...it will collapse if it is growing in a pot!

Rama Tulsi

We worship this divine plant. May God bless you all.

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Do it yourself - self watering plant pot

Things are all fine until we go for holidays for our plants especially the indoor beauties. I have tried self-watering plastic bottles with cotton wicks while away on holidays and it had served the purpose very well. 

Recently I began researching more about organic vegetable growing that led me to self-watering plant pots. Read a lot about watering, organic manures, organic pests repellents, organic seeds etc. There are plenty of commercial plant pots that are self-watering but expensive. So I thought of making one like this one with materials available locally.

Here is a plastic plant pot. I have kept two stones inside so that the square blue plastic sheet you will find below will fit perfectly about an inch above the base of this pot. Holes were put on this blue sheet and two cotton wicks inserted. Below this water will be collected and above this blue sheet good quality soil, cocopeat, vermicompost, and a little neem cake powder were put. 

A small hole was also put on the brick colored plant pot about an inch above the base so that excess water may be drained out. I have not fixed a plastic tube that extends from the top of the soil to the base reservoir because this is a small pot and I am quite sure that I can control watering this plant to prevent overflow and over-watering. For bigger pots, it is better to use a plastic tube to pour water that reaches directly the reservoir at the base so that the source of water is at the base and water absorption takes place from below. No topsoil watering in this case. Also no need to keep the plant pot on a base plate here to collect excess water like we do in normal plant pots if we can control watering.

As you know cocopeat has great water retention properties. Neem cake prevents pests invasion and Vermicompost is rich in plant nutrients. The excess water that we pour together with the nutrients will collect in the reservoir. It will be absorbed by the wick by capillary action and enters the soil.

So this should work for 3 - 5 days even if we are not available at home to feed these beauties. For more days go for bigger pots and reservoirs.

You are all familiar with the second plant😊  It is an easy-care indoor plant that figured in NASA's list of awesome indoor plants which purify indoor air.

But what about the first dark green plant?
Please name it😊

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Silent night, holy night...

Silent night, holy night...!
With his magical voice, Elvis made this song divine! Hats off to Elvis Presley!

Merry Christmas!

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Backbone, a sculptural installation by Shanthamani Muddaiah at Aspinwall house grounds, venue of Kochi - Muziris biennale 2014

Nestling on the beautiful grounds of the Aspinwall house lies this brilliant sculptural installation!

'Backbone' was created by Shanthamani Muddaiah.

This beautiful coastal land full of greenery has a rich and colorful history. Blessed by natural beauty, suitable for the growth of exotic spices and condiments, inhabited by simple souls centuries ago, life here was peaceful. They welcomed visitors with great hospitality. Visitors wanted business relations as well that turned later on to hostile takeovers and acquisitions.

This art has captivated me. Spent a lot of time appreciating it and taking pictures. An awesome work, no doubt!

 Cinder and cement...awesome!

Standing here all these thoughts surfaced in my mind like an archeological excavation. Each and every piece we have unearthed are precious, they all have awesome stories to tell, nature here speaks volumes, only we need to listen, the backbone of events that shaped the lives of scores of generations who lived here. Moreover, still it is getting reflected on one and all; we experience it...just be here😊

 One of the best!

Thanks for portraying such a brilliant, a thought-provoking work😊

http://www.shanthamani.com
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AiFT-fViHU  watch artist interview.

Visit my other blog for more about Kochi - Muziris Biennale 2014.
www.magicalpresent.blogspot.com     Started a series about this historic art event yesterday. You will see a lot of posts from me about this awesome event in the coming days.
http://www.kochimuzirisbiennale.org

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Christmas decorations!

Malls, shops, and public places here have already been decorated welcoming Christmas!
We visited Oberon mall the other day. The whole place looked really wonderful!

www.oberonmall.com

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Elephant wearing Nettippattom in the heart of city!

Well...this is not a real elephant but a life-size model!

I shot this in front of Penta Menaka, a popular shopping complex at Marine drive in Kochi. It looked real... amazing! An air pump was attached to it by which the trunk was moving.

'Nettippattom', an ornamental gold plated sacred caparison is worn over elephant's forehead during temple festivals in Kerala. Nowadays miniature versions of this beautiful caparison, you will see in cars and houses also. Being sacred it is thought to bring prosperity.

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Dubai mall waterfall - a very beautiful video!

Serving as a gateway to Burj Khalifa, the tallest structure in the world and the Dubai fountain, this beautiful waterfalls is created inside the Dubai mall adjacent to many awesome restaurants.

It is about 24 meters in height with the water column traversing all the four floors with sculptures of divers made with fiberglass along the flow of direction of the water feature.
During the daytime, Sunlight gets reflected from it and at night it is illuminated beautifully!

http://www.dubaimall.com

Enjoy these videos too :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDxis3wIIR0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijvJ0ZzaoSM
Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world and the beautiful Dubai fountain!

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Crazy fire - an awesome ride at the Dubai creek during DSF 2011 - 12!

Wow, what a thrilling ride!

This was recorded during the 2011 Dubai shopping festival at Dubai creek.
As you all know Dubai is a wonderful city and walking along the creek during the time of shopping festival is really fun!

For more info about this ride:
http://www.happyfun.ae

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Kozhukkatta - rice flour dumplings filled with sweet jaggery

Today's post is about a yummy Kerala dish called Kozhukkatta.

This is very similar to dumplings. The outer thick shell covering is prepared using rice flour. Rice flour is mixed with hot water until it assumes a paste-like form to make the shell and filled with jaggery mixed with grated coconut. Then these dumplings are steamed in a steamer. That's it!

Jaggery is the unrefined, concentrated product of cane sugar. The color varies from dark to a golden brown. The Jaggery that we use (shown in the picture) was bought during a natural farming product sale conducted some time ago by Mr. Hilal at Kochi, a natural farming proponent in Kerala. They are cultivating many varieties of rice by natural, organic methods in Kerala.

Kozhukkatta is easy to prepare, one of my favorite dishes. It is a cool breakfast dish😊
Yummy!

More info :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kozhukkattai

Yep, it is famous, it even has a Wikipedia page!!

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Arabian sea - coastline at Thalassery (Tellicherry), Kerala

These are the spectacular views of the Arabian sea from Thalassery (Tellicherry), Northern Kerala, South India.

All these pictures were taken at Overbury's folly, a viewpoint and at Sea view park, Court road, Thalassery.

Thalassery has a lot of historical importance. Being a strategic location geographically this place served as the administrative center during the British rule.

Thalassery is famous for its cuisine. Thalassery biriyani, a rice dish prepared with exotic ingredients and chicken or mutton, as the case may be, is a yummy dish.

Hermann Gundert, grandfather of Nobel laureate Herman Hesse lived in Thalassery for 20 years. He was a great scholar and authored the first dictionary in Malayalam, the native language.
William Logan, who served as district judge during the British era, wrote Logan's manual, an authoritative reference of North Malabar. Captain Edward Brennen, started the first educational Institution to give English education here and now this is known as the Government Brennen College.

The nearby Mahe was a french occupied colony in the olden days. Thalassery was nicknamed the 'Paris of Kerala', it being in close proximity to Mahe, the sole military base of France in this region.

Thalassery - a very important destination in North Kerala.

Check this post too :
http://magnificentdewdrops.blogspot.in/2013/04/muzhappilangad-drive-in-beach-hidden.html

Muzhappilangad beach is only a few kilometers away from Thalassery. It is the largest drive-in beach in the region.

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Vazhachal waterfalls...a famous tourist attraction in Kerala!

 Vazhachal waterfalls!

Kerala, a place of natural beauty and lush greenery is known as 'God's own country'. Vazhachal waterfalls is an important tourist spot in Kerala. This place with scenic beauty is simply amazing. It is about 5 km from Athirappilly waterfalls about which I have posted yesterday on my other blog. 

Vazhachal waterfalls is also in Chalakkudy river like Athirappilly. Cascading along the rocks this strip of the water column is a treat to the eyes. The surrounding forest is the habitat of hornbills that are actually endangered species of birds.

There is a herbal garden here. Clearly written descriptions of medicinal plants and trees...

 This is the Indian giant squirrel, or Malabar giant squirrel (Ratufa indica).

 Just meditate sitting here listening to the lullaby of the flowing water😊 Nature in full bloom!

 A spot where one visit will not suffice! Wow...

Picture perfect, all throughout!

Peaceful...!

Vazhachal forest division is huge. From Vazhachal, we can travel through the forest to Valparai, the border region between Tamilnadu and Kerala. Hairpin bends, breathtaking views of the valleys, river, forest, and wildlife are the attractions of travel through this route, about which will post later😊

This forest is full of life...very lively!

When a sapling is planted...
A shade is planted...
A cool shade to lie down is planted!
And a flowerbed for a daytime nap is planted...

Mr. O. N. V. Kurup, a famous poet and the winner of the Jnanapeeth award has written these beautiful lines about the importance of planting trees. The picture above shows his beautiful lines.

Check this video of the waterfalls :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=to8-WyZU1no

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Shawarma

Shawarma, an Arabic dish is very popular in the middle eastern countries.

Have you ever tried this dish?

Large chicken slices marinated in a mixture of special shawarma spices are arranged on the vertical rod of the shawarma maker grill intermingled with layers of fat. Sometimes lemon or big onion is hooked on top of the meat for more flavor. The metal rod with meat is slowly rotated in front of the gas flame to cook it evenly. The grilling takes place slowly. The juices together with spices percolate through the meat imparting a wonderful flavor to the dish. Pieces of meat are shaved off using a long knife and are mixed with tomato. The outer layer of Shawarma bread is peeled, a little garlic paste is smeared, chicken pieces with tomato is stuffed into it along with lettuce, french fries, and slices of marinated cucumber. Sometimes the outer surface of the bread is smeared with oily fat and the whole thing will be shown in front of the flame before wrapping.

The accompaniments include green chilly marinated in vinegar or red chilly paste, cucumber, radish or carrot marinated in vinegar.

There is a lot of variety in the preparation of Shawarma. Recipes also differ. Chicken or beef is used commonly to prepare it. It's quality, the spices used and the culinary expertise of the chef all matter in the yumminess of this wonderful dish!

                    

Bought this today from the mall. Yummy! Together with green chilly marinated in vinegar, it was simply delicious😊

I consider these shawarmas special. Tasted these while in Dubai last year. Enjoyed with red chilly paste and sulaimaani (black tea). Yummy!

If you ever visit Dubai you may try Shawarmas from the hotel in front of the Bur Dubai bus station. The bus to Dubai Global village comes in front of this hotel. Good hotel!

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Google plus post picture, pixels matter now

I have enabled the 'share automatically' option to Google plus when I post something new in my blog. Immediately after clicking the 'Publish' button once I finalize the post another window will open to share it with Google plus. Here I noticed a problem with my post picture some days ago. Instead of the picture that I have posted on my blog post my profile picture was getting displayed in Google plus! The same problem happened when I posted the video upload link in a blog post. Noticed this problem with some other bloggers too.

The reason for this was the image pixels. To reduce the image size load bloggers were using small sized images in blog posts. If the original images were large it were reduced both in size and pixels and posted to ease upload, reduce page loading time and for quick layout settings. I was also doing the same, resizing the pictures, reducing both the size and pixels using photoshop or pic monkey to limit the storage size. Blogger gives us free Google drive storage space of 15 GB, as you all know. Google plus photos of size bigger than 2048 x 2048  pixels occupy storage space as well as Gmail attachments. Click on Accounts under Google profile, check data tools, manage storage plan and have a look at how much storage we utilize.

Recently Google made changes to enable users to upload high-resolution images to Google plus in tune with other social media. So if we would like to see our post image to appear in Google plus window our images should be of high pixels. What is the minimum pixel size required is still not clear though. The image with high resolution will be displayed in Google plus post if we share it automatically.

Now I am using 1000 pixels images and my post images appear in Google plus, no problem. The image size in kb or MB doesn't seem relevant. So use high pixels for your blog pictures and you will see your post pictures clearly in Google plus instead of your profile picture or the picture having better resolution than your post picture in all the posts! When using high-resolution images you will see serrated lower edges signifying a larger picture in Google plus posts.

If you do not want to show pictures then just hover your mouse over the right-hand side of the post that you see on Google plus post. The drop down menu shows many options like edit the post, delete the post etc. Click edit the post and there is an option to remove the picture. If we remove the picture only the post text will be displayed on Google plus and no images.

Likewise when you post text only and no pictures in the blog post, your profile picture may get displayed automatically if you have enabled post to Google plus automatically. Edit the post and remove the picture to display only the text in Google plus. Better not to enable share to Google plus automatically; do it manually after publishing a post to design what and how to share.

Always make it a point to check the Google plus page after publishing the blog post, and edit it if necessary.

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