Chennai Photowalk plans . . .

Chandrachoodan is another passionate Chennaiite.

And he promises to host at least three Photowalks in August.

Great news this is.

The Chennai Photowalk is Chandra's idea ( chandrachoodan@gmail.com)

Every second Sunday, Chandra leads about 30/40 people down a colourful/heritage/shopping/green/unknown/strange neighbourhood of Chennai.

Most walkers carry cameras, click lots of pictures and share all that they know of the place.

Some go on to post these pictures. Velachary Balu is a well known face and so are his pictures.

More info at Chandra's blog - www.selectiveamnesia.org

Chandra has this weakness for the 'rising sun'. So his walks start at about 6.12 a.m. So you will have to sacrifice your Sunday snooze if you want to be on the Madras Day- Chennai Photowalks!

A docu-film on Mount Road

I meant to do take a walk down Mount Road this Sunday last. 

To prepare for the Heritage Walk scheduled for August 24 morning.

I dropped that in favour of the Chennai Photowalk of St. Thomas Mount. 

Almost. And didn't do either!

I better do a recce midweek because there is a stream of  postings on my blog on Mount Road.

Stories, experiences, anecdotes.

I have invited everyone who has stories to share on this road to join us on the walk - we may have to arrange for a car to transport the elderly . . . to ensure that this Walk turns out to be truly a community Walk!

Our plan is to walk from Simpsons to Spencers and am hoping the sudden rise in daytime temp to 38degrees doesn't persist in August.

The more I hear about Mount Road the bigger the temptation to document this road on film.

Do you think a docu-film is a great idea?

Heritage Walk of Film Studios

A walk of the film studios of the city would be a big draw.

I tried to get film writer and historian Randor Guy into it.

Randor isn't biting. He says he has lots of writing to do - he begins work at 3.30 a.m.!

I am not giving up.

Our idea is to have a trail from Vijaya Studios to Prasad Studios via AVM's campus.

The people at these three places will welcome us. But we need people who worked in the studios in the 50s and 60s to join us and share stories.

We also need people who worked here and lived closeby to share stories of this area.

A film editor has promised his notes. But who will lead the walk?

Two walks have been firmed up. One inside Fort St. George on Aug.17. And one on Mount Road on Aug.24.

It would be nice to have a walk in Vepery and Purusawalkam. Are there old-timers who can put this together? There are no costs involved in this! Plan the walking tour, let people know and go! If some one can sponsor coffee and snacks, the walk can end on a warm note!

Plans roll for Madras Day 2008

Madras Day 2008.

August 17 to 24.

So what has been lined up for this year's celebrations?

Walks, talks, exhibitions, films, contests . . .

We are making an attempt to get communities in the city's neighbourhood's to get involved.

Perhaps this is one way of spreading the celebration.

We emailed a group of active residents in Kilpauk. How about organising a Sunday walk of the old parts and end it with coffee at an old bungalow? We hope there will be a positive response. . .

My colleague Sashi Nair has put up a programme in Vadapalani. Hotel Green Park will be the host. Readings, a puppet show and a talk on ' Temples of Chennai' by Dr. Chitra Madhavan.

Putting together an event isn't difficult.  

A walk around the neighbourhood which has a past is certainly a nice start on a Sunday morning. Get senior residents to meet, do a recee and then lead the walk and share stories along the way.

If your local school can share its hall, you could organise a talk on a city-related topic. Look around and I am sure you can locate a great speaker. A film professional, a police officer, a journalist, a community activist . . . give them time to work on a theme and I am sure you will have a great evening.

My friend D. Hemachandra Rao of Virugambakkam has a huge collection of everything related to ships. He is also a senior philatelist. Rao has been an active host of Madras Day events.

Rao has been documenting the Buckingham Canal, which runs north to south, from Andhra Pradesh to Marakkanam. Last week, he drove to a few nooks along the Canal to take pictures of the giant levers and gates used to regulate water in this once-navigable Canal.

Rao hopes to exhibit these pictures at an exhibition. If you lend him a hand and help on creating a PP package, the Canal can be a theme for a talk.  His contact no is - 98408 70172.

Rao would love to loan pictures of the Canal as it was 50 years ago. Can you help him with leads?

DOCU FILMS ON THE CITY

We launched this event for 'Madras Day 2006'.
Inviting film makers to produce docu-films on the city; its people, its institutions, its communities, its issues . . .
The idea is to generate more visual content on Madras that is Chennai.

This year, the contest attracted 11 entries. And we short listed 5 to be screened at an event we hosted at Srinivasa Shastri Hal in Luz on Sept.2.
We felt good when about 100 people turned up for the screening.

There was a film on the dhobis of Saidapet; another on the industrial estate of Ambattur, said to be the largest of the kind in Asia; a film on trans-genders and one on Madras Basha (language, or lingo, as some would put it!). And there was a film on the Buckingham Canal which runs from a point in Andhra Pradesh and ends at the Marakkanam Lake in the the Cheyyur area, south of Mammallapuram.

These were nice efforts but we found that they were sorely lacking in professional inputs.
Venkatesh Chakravarthy, who teaches cinema, who judged the films, said so.

We also screened a short film I had made with Mohan Das Vadakara during the last Corporation of Chennai elections. The film focuses on one woman contestant in the Mylapore area who was a local councillor. It records her campaign through an urban sum as well as a quiet colony of Pelathope, once famous for its lawyer residents.

We also screened Venkatesh's film - 'Chennai -The Split City' which looks at different sides of this city; the neglected north, the expanding IT corridor, the makeover of the East Coast Road, the shifting of the Kotwal Chawadi Market; the religious rituals and celebrations of yore which continue to be held in the heart of a metro, the vandalisation of the seashore by big time developers . . .

We welcome ideas from film makers who wish to make films on the city.
We would like to help them with books / resource materials / guides and specialists to enrich the script that ensures we have better-made docu-films.

Perhaps, some of us will be making Chennai-focussed films through this year and next so that we have a small body of new films to be shown next year.