Tag: Mysore bed and breakfast

More masking.

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We announced in August that Vasanth’s wife Sumati was making Masks.

There was tremendous interest from our Mysore Bed and Breakfast family. Vasanth has now posted masks to Europe, India, Australia and North America.
Victoria in London is very pleased with her Buddha mask.
Of course, I have to go over the top. I have a great selection of Sumati’s but sometimes carry Manjula with me.
And the boys are spreading the mycycle word…

September randomness

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Walking Lucie.
Chai stop
Farmers Market stop
Workers stop
Messing up our park
Will we get a play area like this? and some grass?
It’s all too much.

A little bird told us that we might get a children’s and gym play area. To replace this mess. My initial thoughts are shock horror and against losing our quiet, relaxing natural park. I’ll be waiting a long time for the corporation’s consultation. Ha ha.

Manjula gives masks

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mask mask mask mask no shortage of them at Mysore Bed and Breakfast

As part of remembering Manjula: Vasanth and Satish distributes mycycle masks and small monetary gift to each of our team of drivers.
Our big thanks to Ina seen here on the right at Manjula’s birthday party. Ina sent money to help drivers.
Babu
We love logo as it’s part of celebrating Manjula.
Anjum
Lokesh
Non branded supplies from Vasanth.
Shafi
Akram

Feeding Manjula

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First…. A little faffing, as we prepare to remember her preciousness.
Sowbaghya has prepared a full on meal for Manjula.
Some of her old and new clothing is laid out, in case she needs it, I forgot to ask what the money is for.
The chain around her neck and gold ‘coins’ form the Mangal Sutra which she wears to show she’s married
There’s always flowers and now my and Punith’s drawing of Manjula is also found everywhere.
We forgot the lamps, Manjula wouldn’t be at all surprised. Too many men involved and that useless Yindian. Thankfully SB quickly rescued the situation.
Sensible woman with fire.
Insensible Yindian playing with fire 1
Playing with fire 2
It’s the time of year when we especially connect to those like Manjula who slipped through our fingers. we do Pooja at home and some at the Kaveri riverside where I immersed Manjula’s ashes.
We stepped outside while Manjula came to get her fill. Then washed our hands and knocked on the door to warn her we were coming back inside.
Only then were we allowed to eat.

This annual Hindu event known in Mexico as the ‘day of the dead’ but of course, quite different, is known as Mahalaya Amavasya. We remember our loved ones and provide help and support for their journey to the next place. In our case to Manjula’s reincarnation.

Thank you to Sowbaghya, Satish and Vasanth for your loving kindness to Manjula. You made it very special.

Manjula and her good friend Ina have shared gifts of money and mycycle masks with each of our eight drivers who are finding it hard with very little business in these virus times.

The big guy

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Each year we’d buy a terracotta Ganesh, place him in our Pooja room with the appropriate rituals with lots of food (he’s a hungry god).

Sowbhaghya after preparing himself. The small Ganesh in the middle of the yellow flowers is the one we’ll take to the river.
Typical Indian male with giant belly. Says the Yindian breathing in!
The bigger version of Lord Ganesh lives here. I bought him cheap as a left over from the festival years ago.
We’d usually buy him from the potter’s street

After the stipulated number of days he’d be taken and immersed in the Kaveri river near Srirangaptnam.

Last year there was no ceremony as it was within the first year since madam departed. This year it was more subdued.
Satish did the honours.
While they attempted to drown a girl next door.
And I finished the job, immersing him three times and releasing him into the river.
Manjula was with us and
Lucie was tolerant
The remaining gods were driven back home.

Manjula forever giving

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On Manjula’s birthday she’s provided the meals for elderly people, who might otherwise be destitute, at their ashram/home. The NGO also has a children’s home which we will visit.
There are now four benches in two different gardens.
Tea and cakes in the park on her birthday

We captured each other’s heart

Cycling Manjula around Mysore

Visiting Bamboo Bazaar slum where Manjula lived as a child. Sharing sweets and showing her photo. I wonder what they think of Manjula now and how her life changed so much.
Kanchana’s team have completed a few projects including this patchwork quilt from Manjula’s clothing.
It’s designed to go on the wall or the bed.
Manjula’s memory tree decorated by our team of old drivers and two young people.
Manjula gives BIG photo album (that’s for me) and shopping bags.
Manjula’s plaque on the tree outside our door.
Manjula gives steel lifetime straws and personalised pens in pouches made from her clothing.
Thank you Manjula for being with us on your birthday. I can’t say it often or loud enough and show how much I miss and love you.
In the future Manjula’s giving will be to support to specific projects in a sustainable way.

Here’s a challenge:

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How to keep in touch and show one’s love, on her birthday, when she’s not physically here, anymore.

I think I have a solution

I have found a famous time machine on eBay for sale by Leonard of the ‘Big Bang Theory’.

so I can travel back in time …..

  • to deliver a bunch of flowers
… pick her up and take her on a trip (she called it a’ rounding’) ….
and pass on a message

That was then and this is now. What fun and a great success but I think I’m back one day early. What date is it?

The next test is whether my strong-willed, determined most positiveness wife can somehow gets a message back to me. As she said: “we’ll see.”

Expect the unexpected

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Nothing ever seems to go to plan in India……

to help commemorate Manjulasness on her birthday we’d invited a few friends to celebrate in the park opposite where we’ve placed three benches.

But two days before, this happened…..

There’s now the beginnings of a new path. We’ll just about manage if it doesn’t rain and create a river of mud.

One or two great books

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In Manjula’s library on grieving…..

Adult books. My two top picks would be Didion and Grief and Grieving.
and children’s books, that this child loves. Memory Tree and Heart and the Bottle are fab but they’re all great.

Birthdays

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Events that bring people together help create our Mysore BnB community.

Manjula, special in many ways also had two different birthdates but unlike the Queen, celebrated neither of them. Once Mr English lets-get-organised differently was involved, she decided to adopt the 21st August birthdate and drop the one she shared with Jesus. After that she expected a celebration every year that was full on fun.

2016 age 43

We might have breakfast, a visit out for the day and a meal at home or in a restaurant. It was a celebration of Manjula’s choosing: our life, and good fortune, the home we’d made, together with local friends and often with special guests like Ina from Australia.

Fresh from our second holiday in the UK and Manjula’s 44th. On our day trip out we found a wonderful garden restaurant Thotada Mane where we’d host our wedding lunch. The birthday card, I painted, adapts a famous graffiti picture to show Manjula capturing my heart.
We visited a Temple, Satish, Vasanth’s families and randomly an elderly gentleman I know from my cycle tours, in 2017.

Her 45th, in 2018, was extra special after that worrying time in Intensive Care. Ina and Willian, (he’s from Brazil) were with us for a ’rounding’ as Madam would say: a visit to Somnathpur, lunch on Srirangapatnam and a gathering of our immediate clan for dinner at the Roopa. My ‘sweetness’ was on form making the best of her every single moment.

We will always celebrate Manjula and her birthday whether she’s here or there. As we approach her 47th birthday we’ve placed the benches in the park and paid for meals at the Old people’s home. I hope for more to follow, maybe I’ll hear from herself and could the phantom smiley painter return?

…….watch this space….