36 Hours in Melbourne

A recent business trip gave me the opportunity to visit Melbourne, Australia.

Melbourne has a serious reputation as Australia’s coffee capital, and with good reason too. A search on the internet and you’ll be snowed under an avalanche of suggestions and recommendations by serious caffeine experts, bloggers and magazine editors. So narrowing it down was not easy, but I chose The Kettle Black for my first. And it certainly did not disappoint.

Set in a gorgeous, lacy white heritage building, it serves gourmet café fare. Folks here take their coffee and their ‘brekkie’ seriously and mostly at the communal table. The hot cakes with ricotta, blueberries, maple syrup, double cream, seeds and nuts were a worthy companion to the excellent coffee.

I was on foot and in the CBD area of the city, keen on my food and coffee. So Higher ground was a natural calling. With its urban, industrial look, it had me at the entrance. The spacious, high ceiling-ed café is a warehouse converted structure. Verdant plants spill out from the first floor and add color to the monochromatic aesthetics. It boasts of a great location as well, heart of the CBD. i had a Berkshire bacon sandwich gribiche, brown sauce.

Dinner was ramen at the casual Little Raman bar. The place boasts of quick service, fuss free dining, excellent food.

Melbourne, known for its wildly popular art scene is a riot of dizzying colours in any available space in a wide variety of mediums: graffiti, paste-up posters, murals, stencils and installations. A wander along the many laneways will show you how the art form has permeated the city as it becomes a part of the identity. Touted for its unique, urban art, Hosier lane boasts of all this and more with its famous bluestone laneway setting. The street art, some psychedelic, some political, and some graphic, are in a league of their own and not to be missed.

This seriously caffeinated city is spirited, feisty and leaves you wanting for more of its artsy lanes, breezy cafés and communal vibes. With coffee holes scattered in every laneway and with a smattering of food joints serving creative and tasty food, Melbourne feels like it takes its food culture very seriously and offers it to everybody willing to partake, locals and tourists alike.

High rise living in Cochin

This is our home in Kochi, a city in the southern state of Kerala in India. It’s a 1650 square foot newly built apartment. After living in rentals for 11 years, this is the first home we have owned.

We love the plentiful light, breeze and sweeping views of the city from the 23rd floor. Everything in our home brings back memories of the different places we have visited or lived in – India, Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Istanbul…

Every object in our home has been collected over the years from all these different places. Rugs from Istanbul, paintings by a New York street artist, curtains from Indian textile shows, a much used IKEA kid’s chair which has been travelled with us from California to Kochi.

Our home has an eclectic collection of antique hand-me-down, custom-made, straight off-the-shelf, and even discounted floor-model furniture. The decor is inspired by our love for Indian fabrics (indigo, block prints, ikat), books, simple functional furniture and an attempt to avoid clutter as much as possible.

36 Hours in London

A recent business trip to London gave me the opportunity to spend some time exploring the city.

From visiting indie book stores, drinking some of the finest coffee in London, amazing burgers, drinking lager at a pub thats been in operation since the 17th century, eating at the Borough market, taking the tube during rush hour –  I’d say it was a well spent 36 Hours in London. Here are the sights I captured.

My post will not be complete without mentioning CitizenM (no they are not paying me..). CitizenM was home for the 4 days I was in London. With good food, a bar thats open round the clock, free movies in the room, a quick self check in/check, a lobby that displays works of designers & artists, the place is less of a hotel and maybe more of design house.

Glimpses of Goa

We had the good fortune to indulge in a collective dream recently when 5 of us (close friends from college who bonded over inane engineering subjects, thin wallets, night outs and failed one sided infatuations) went on a road trip from Cochin to Goa.

In spite of the many paths and cities life has taken us to, the 5 of us have stood the vagaries of time and chance. So after 12 years, all of us got together and we set off on a boys-only road trip, to relive past glories and follies and make new memories.

Cochin to Goa is 760 km by road and we made a few pit stops starting with Thrissur Engineering College(where it all began 12 years ago), Mallapuram, Kasargod, Bekal, Udupi and Murudeshwar.

Goa is a many-splendoured wonder, ridden with the touristy beach spots and little known isolated stretches in equal measure, culture rooted in a colonial past but breaking forth to live upto the tag line of ‘party town’ and an innate ability of the locals to welcome one and all into its fold. Its streets are peppered with boho chic boutiques, quirky eateries dishing out local or ethnic fare and the quintessential shops selling stuff from souvenirs to summery beach wear.

Fort Aguada with its lighthouse on Sinquerim beach is as much a historical landmark as it is site offering a plethora of photo ops for the keen photographic eye.

The Our lady of the Immaculate conception church with its colonial Baroque style Portuguese architecture looks spectacular from the inside.

Thalassa was hands down the crown jewel of all the eateries that we tried. It is an unabashedly Greek eatery perched on a hill overlooking Vagator beach serving authentic Greek food and an ambiance worthy of a Greek taverna in Santorini.

Thalassa also provides accommodation for those who can’t have enough of their restaurant. It also houses Flame, a boutique offering bohemian oomph and style owned by designer Martino Caramia.

Cream choc in Anjuna is Goa’s first gelataria offering cold stone gelatos and also giving you the freedom to make your own flavours-a must try!

Baba au Rhum (not featured in pictures below), also in the Anjuna belt, is another must-visit for their easy breakfast and lunches. Their wood fired pizzas and croissants baked in-house are well worth the visit.

There’s more to Goa than the ubiquitous and easily available cheap liquor or Sunburn or touristy vibes that emanate from all the hot spots. Indeed, if you know where to look, or are willing to get lost exploring, Goa is all heart and soul with something for everybody.

Where to eat

Thalassa – Small Vagator, Ozran, Goa – India

Baba Au Rhum – House No. 1054, Sim Vaddo, Anjuna, Bardez, Goa

Cream Choc – Near Our lady Of Health Chapel Complex, Mazal Waddo, Anjuna, Goa

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Text courtesy –Sweetooth Cravings

Pictures shot on Canon 5D Mark II & iPhone

Processed on Aperture, Pixelmator, VSCO, Snapseed 

 

Dubai

Tom & Serg

There are lots of things that pleasantly surprise you when you visit Tom & Serg.

Located in Dubai’s industrial district, surrounded by warehouses and car showrooms, this is the last place you would expect to find a busy café. The moment you step in, it feels like you have stepped into a café in Los Angeles.

The setting is casual and laid back. Fine attention has been given to the industrial interiors.

We got there  at 11am on a Friday expecting a long wait. Even though the place was busy, we got a seat in 5 minutes.

We found this place while planning for the Dubai vacation. Tom & Serg is featured in lot of venues as a ‘must do’ place. One of them being the NY Times’ 36 Hours in Dubai.

This place is something different from the regular touristy –  Dubai Mall, Burj Kalifa, the dune bashing and the belly dancing ‘experiences’. We would certainly visit this place if we are in Dubai again.  It would be for everything mentioned above and most importantly because they serve good food and amazing coffee :).

I will let my pictures do the rest of the talking.

Athachamayam

Munnar

Munnar has been on my destination wishlist for a very long time. After much planning, we set out on a weekend hoping that the monsoons don’t ruin our much anticipated trip.The light rains had washed away the dust and fresh green sprouts had turned the hills a lush emerald green. I have never before seen a brighter deeper greener ‘green’. It was nature at its best.

We stayed in a beautiful room at the Club Mahindra Resort, with a big picture window overlooking the never ending hills and the winding roads through them. An elephant ride for the kids, a drive up the hills to a reservoir lake, a trip to the local market for tea leaves and fresh local vegetables – there was much to be done before we got back to the grind and grime of the city.

Hope you enjoy these photographs, a beautiful reminder of a beautiful place…

Pepper Cafe

Housed in an erstwhile spice warehouse in Fort Kochi, Pepper Café is a welcoming place that exudes an old world charm.

What was once a dilapidated warehouse, is now renovated into a beautiful café, with a grassy courtyard. The original details of the building, like the wooden roof, the stone lamps, big windows have been retained but updated tastefully. It has a minimalist feel, the white walls providing a perfect foil to the teal accents in the room. A walk around the courtyard leads you outside to an open space looking out into the waters; a lovely place for lingering on, watching the boats and ferries go by.

This café is part of the Avenue group of hotels and restaurants. The food and service is excellent – same as at all other Avenue restaurants I’ve been to. It is a delightful place to stop for a quick lunch, after you get off the ferry and set out to explore Fort Kochi.

All pictures are shot on a Canon 5D MK II and processed on Aperture and VSCOCAM

Broadway

With Google+ celebrating their 2^nd anniversary, photowalks were organized around the world.  Kochi had one on June 29^th.

It started with around hundred photographers meeting up at Marine Drive and then splitting up into different teams. The group I was in headed straight to Broadway. People from Kochi will know this – this place is anything but broad. It is one of the oldest markets in Kerala, crammed with shops and vendors. You can get everything and anything here. From shops selling diamond jewelry to roadside cloth sellers, wholesale banana sellers, restaurants, the list goes on…

Word spreads fast in a place like Broadway. ‘People in black taking pictures’ (the dress code for the day) suddenly became a topic of discussion amongst the vendors. Some of them thought we were from the newspapers or TV channels. Though a little overwhelmed, they were more than happy to pose for our cameras.

According to some reports, Cochin has the highest participation right after New York and San Francisco. Impressive, I say! It was a fun experience. I got to see and meet lot of photogs. We had people shooting film, there were few guys doing just phones. I realized Kochi (and maybe Kerala) is a Canon city 🙂