Chennai Times

  CHENNAI - PREPARE A CITY THAT CAN SURVIVE FUTURE EXTREME WEATHER Obviously, this article is triggered by the Michaung cyclone that hit the city in the first week of December 2023. However, it is a summary of my remembered experience that pans 4 decades of the city.   I have forever lived in Chennai and it is my home. I have lived in the central Chennai Triplicane during schooling, moved up to Madhavaram in North Chennai during my youth and later moved south to Velachery and now live in Besant Nagar. Over the past 5 decades of my memory in this city, the last two decades are quite striking for the consistent natural disasters that I have witnessed. I have written this article in parts, first as my own experience as someone going through the several experiences of floods over the years in this city, the second part of it is about the struggles of activism and policy making in the building of the city that is today and the last part is to give an idea about how all things can b...

When Ilayaraja was our breath music,  We embraced Rahman as it tucked out heart strings Yet we didn't give up Raja, MSV or the 100 before and since Vishy is our Grand Master, but, Dhoni is our adopted boss That's why he can give up being Indian captain  But can't leave the city team   The colonial Central is our entry space and Then we built a Koyambedu as large as it gets and speedy Metro The city prefers to saunter slow in the Marina We may rub shoulders with Nobels, Oscars, Champions Scientists, Teachers, Thinkers and Masters, and we do so But the lingo and spirit is set by our auto-drivers and fishermen Its not  what we built or what we achieved That gives the city its flair or fervour, its the uniqueness  Of reaching out the the world and within We reach out if it quakes in Gujarat or floods in Himalayas We reach out if cyclone hits Odisha or landslide in Kerala We reach out because that's our spirit To reach out is an extension of what we are within A...

later added: the incident narrated is most likely around 1987.  last year during the chennai week i read articles by several people who have lived and worked in Chennai at different times and i promised that perhaps if time permits this year i will write and share some reflections on chennai...this is a long ramble about chennai, i decided that i will not edit this and continue to ramble as far as i can and then post! read it if you are 70s chennai kid and want to re-live some memories... However, after writing much of the ramble usual memories partly crowded with nostalgia and partly crowded with recounting ones own story, i decided to write on top the most dramatic visual of chennai that has made a deep mark in me - The Day Chennai turned communal  - ...it was one of those Sundays when we all hung around after the rover scout classes, played basket ball, then planned for one thing or the other that we do at the big street in triplicane where we all went to school. som...