Vintage Wheels!

I didn't think machines would find their way to this blog,  ok not cars at least! Two little beauties - a Vee-dub beetle & a Topolino stole my heart, perched neatly side by side, pretty as you please.  There was a run coming up over the weekend.
And so on a hot Sunday morning I was at this Vintage car rally, watching Bombay's old gold driving up to a hill town close by.
I thought it'd be an interesting opportunity to spot folks in vintage attire with their cars. The Parsis sometimes come out togged in period costumes & jewels. Not many this time, but the cars were  fascinating .. better than the new toys on roads today. I mean they had an identity, individuality & character. They had style. And they had expressions (yes, still talking of the cars).  

Must-ASH-io Moda

Each time I dig into my photo-box I manage to get out something new.
This time the crazy mustache 'design' and ash smeared bodies has me amazed at how Indian moda sticks to a definite style and innovates with such ease!

Polka dotted turban, a wild mustache & the red highlight!

Visible inspiration! yes I'm sure you have a smile pasted or having a good laugh.
 

 The Ash men

 I love the silhouette; bulky head and minimal tapering torso.

Funk Monks!

La Fiera di Pushkar..

So much to share about Pushkar, it spills over into a second post..

Food, people, costume, faith, rituals, tolerance, an intact culture and the hippy-ness of settlers from other lands. Temple bells & Bob Marley juxtaposed; apple crumble, tarts & cakes on a cart; Dali & Kikasso, India's Picasso, the chutzpah.

Gal watching! 

This handsome Rajasthani was soaking in the sun & getting an eyeful of damsels passing by! Blissfully unaware till someone nudged him, 'settle your whiskers, you're being clicked.'

There's something alike in the man & his beast; can't say what but I felt the men even walked like camels & they were as unflappable.

Langot

Scientific/comfortable Indian clothing (I like how it contrasts with the next picture)

I don't know if this gets you between the eyes, those pants, they were   b-l-i-n-d-i-n-g. Daring, I'd say, but then who's afraid of color in India!

Food for everyone! Like I said, the sense of sharing was a lesson for us city folk.

Ram Ram sa! Ram Ram sa! they chanted as they circumambulated the town until the swollen moon shone bright.

I used to work with an Italian design house crazy about 'fluo' colors, they could never quite get enough of 'fluo'; this would be their 'fluo' paradiso!

The urban encroach dilutes the style they know best.

 

'Behroopiya Dusroopiya'
You've got to pay to photograph this little costume artist for his painstaking Shiva avatar!

Tea in traditional clay cups (kulhar); frugal pleasures of Indian chai!

The sun sets on the cattle fair!

Pushkarma

The Pushkar mela was on my list of must visits for years .. am I glad I finally made it.

It's the India of angrez books and tourists, something we choose to wave off in dismissal. When a firang remarks about the snake charmers, camels, cattle, dust, color, dirt, crowds, sadhus, bathing in the holy waters, I'd look at them like they'd grown two heads. But hey, it's all here!

We are probably as droll to the locals at the fair as they seem to us. Indians from metros are considered as phoren as foreigners by the village folk.

There's much to observe in the face & demeanour, stories & character etched out; of endurance, patience, of giving, calm, distress maybe, hardship and an honest living. I noticed a lot of giving & sharing (the poor giving alms) and and some taking too (touts), it seemed to balance & come full circle in subtle ways.

The Rajasthani  persona is oh-so perfectly chiseled; poise and simple perfection, I'd sit and gaze for hours; entertaining too for the surprises their guises sprang as I sat & watched from the chaiwalla's. And this chaiwalla was a piece of work, he'd make fancy ginger-honey-lemon tea for foreign visitors & shoo away the locals unceremoniously. I didn't care for him but his shop offered a vantage point to people-watch.

 Nihang Sikhs (Punjab)

 

--- Its a photographer's paradise.. and the COLOR can send you reeling.

Style Archives!

Style grows on one, one creates it or one's just born with it.

These are a bunch of style archives I caught on the Italian streets. I think the pictures speak style, I needn't say much, just that each one's spotted at completely different locations and still there's a string running through.

Montenapoleone

Piazza Duomo

Piazza Duomo

 

Naviglio

See also Fashion'Ages'

Roma Roma

Rome is a monument, the whole city is one big monument! 

Romans 'live' life, si verramente la Dolce vita. The food, the streets, the people, the music and the costume.. its a whiff of LIFE. I could spend days together at a piazza in Rome and go home feeling rich.

There's such a distinct difference in the dialect when we move down from Milan to Rome.  The language just gets more musical and the people more theatrical.

The Vatican ofcourse has fantastic costume and a lot of maybe other fantastic stuff that doesn't take to my fancy really. (The Romans are probably the Pope's closest enemies)

Mime artist

French guards at the Vatican

Gladiators at the Colosseum

Friar at the Vatican

    

Love these jester like uniforms
 

Founded in 1506, the Papal Swiss Guard is the Vatican’s military unit and is charged with protecting the pope and guarding the Apostolic Palace and the gates of Vatican City. The vibrant blue, yellow and red—the colors of the Medici—have been used since the 1600s, and the uniforms have had minor changes through the centuries.

Arrivederci!