Mumbai Diary: Saturday Dossier

Hitting the snooze buttonA security guard takes a nap outside a retail store in Juhu on FridayJerryrsquos back for better or verseJerry Pinto is a man who wears many hats including that of a journalist novelist translator and poet In 2003 he released his debut collection of poetry titled Asylum and Other Poems But this month fans of his poetry are in for a real treat mdash not only is publisher Speaking Tiger reissuing his first work of poetry which has been out of print for a while but also releasing a new collection called I Want a Poem and Other Poems Although one can expect variety with the themes Pinto as always is leaving a lot to the readerrsquos interpretation ldquoWe present word artefacts which are actually the remnants of the first shift in consciousness that produced the desire to write a poem It is the attentive reader who will make these into poems and then they will come back and tell me what my themes were what my concerns wererdquo he saidHitting a centuryLavani artiste Shakuntala Nagarkar PicPradeep DhivarFrom starting out as a research idea back in 2004 to staging 100 packed shows and pushing lavani back into the statersquos cultural consciousness Sangeet Bari has come a long way In these gloomy times this diarist is happy to hear that their 100th show on Thursday ended with surprises and celebrations both onstage and backstage Bhushan Korgaonkar who wrote the production revealed that they only realised that they were hitting a century when someone pointed it out to themNaseeruddin Shah and Ratna Pathak ShahldquoOur favourite actors Ratna Pathak Shah Naseeruddin Shah and Atul Kulkarni were in the audience and they walked on to the stage and then stayed for the cakecutting It was wonderfulrdquo he told this diarist Korgaonkar added that the journey so far has turned the cast into a family ldquoWhen we had started research in 2004 if someone wouldrsquove told us that in 2014 wersquod have a show and that it would continue like this we would have never believed it Itrsquos been a fantastic journeyrdquo he noted We wish them luck for the futureA muted NavrozeThe week leading up to Navroze is when Kurush Dalal and his wife Rhea would usually have their hands full handling a deluge of orders placed with Katyrsquos Kitchen the Parsi eatery they run that can be reached on 9820136511 They expected the same situation last year especially since the festival fell over a weekend But thatrsquos the same weekend that the lockdown was announced and ever since the Dalals have had to deal with a nightmare when it comes to handling the back end of the business They eventually turned the eatery into a smaller homecatering affair meaning they can take only a limited number of orders this Navroze which falls this weekend ldquoI thought of taking up another place on rent this March but then the COVID19 numbers started going up againrdquo Dalal told this diarist The point is that there are many small eateries like his for whom the nightmare of the pandemic is still far from over Thatrsquos something we need to recogniseStories for SaturdayLaunched in October 2020 Goshticha Shaniwar was a fivemonth long initiative by nonprofit Pratham Books for children in Maharashtra to facilitate learning through stories It impacted the lives of 25 lakh children and to celebrate the success the nonprofit is teaming up with the State Council of Educational Research amp Training Maharashtra SCERT and Integrated Child Development Services ICDS UNICEF for an online symposium today on World Storytelling Day March 20ldquoWe hope to highlight the strengths of conceptualising implementing and monitoring a reading programme in close partnership with all its stakeholdersrdquo chairperson Suzanne Singh shared Log on to SCERT Maharashtrarsquos YouTube channel at 11 am to tune inThe winning brush strokeAs part of the 12th KASHISH Mumbai International Queer Film Festival a contest in memory of designer Wendell Rodricks was held to design the official festival poster And we are happy to report that the accolade went to a Mumbaikar Graphic designer Ajoy Kumar Dasrsquos design was picked as the winner by Rodricksrsquos husband Jeacuterocircme Marrel out of 50 submissions About the honour Das said ldquoWhen I saw the theme for this year lsquoUnlock with Pridersquo the idea resonated very strongly with me I attempted to design a minimalist yet meaningful poster Irsquom happy that my entry has been selected for the second timerdquo