View allAll Photos Tagged writeups
My DIY version of a Spiderlite. Total cost to build including 5x 27w daylight (5500K) compact fluorescent bulbs was under $100. All parts are off-the-shelf and only require basic tools to assemble. Click HERE for the full writeup.
Boboli Gardens, Florence, Italy, 28th June 2016. Konica C35 and Agfa APX 100 film.
I'd like to know the artist and title of this sculpture. If you know, leave a comment.
Two Fantastic cars from Honda, owned by one person. This is a 2004 Acura NSX and 2009 Honda S2000. More pics/writeup @ www.jdmchicago.com
My photo from the 5 October 2022 Air Tahiti Nui launch of a new route from Tahiti to Seattle & back. Simple Flying writeup up at bit.ly/ATNSEA .
All photos can be used with attribution.
PHOTO CREDIT: Joe Kunzler | Simple Flying, Joe.K@simpleFlying.com
Only in love are unity and duality not in conflict.
~ Rabindranath Tagore
This was taken on the night before my grand parents 80th anniversary wedding @ my native village. This is our house, which is the place of venue for all marriages of the family. The interiors you see are the typical signatures of Chettinad houses.
In almost all of 60th/80th anniversary weddings of South India, some form of Shiva Shakthi will be the centerpiece. They are to Hinduism what Yin Yang is to Taoism. They denote the duality of nature and yet one can't exist without the other. They complete each other. Shiva is thought and Shakthi is action. Shiva is the male force for which Shakthi is the female energy. She's is the morning while He is the night. The list goes on.
The brass pot adorned with garland is called kumbam (கும்பம்); it contains holy water (water with herbs) in front of which sacred hymns are sung in praise of the divine couple. There are 80 of them to denote 80 years. On the day of the wedding, each well wisher will sprinkle this water on the actual couple, after this the wedding happens.
And yes, happy birthday to me :)
My photo from the 5 October 2022 Air Tahiti Nui launch of a new route from Tahiti to Seattle & back. Simple Flying writeup up at bit.ly/ATNSEA .
All photos can be used with attribution.
PHOTO CREDIT: Joe Kunzler | Simple Flying, Joe.K@simpleFlying.com
Apis mellifera, I believe. Seen at Boyce Thompson Arboretum.
Check out all my Species a Day posts, with writeups, here.
Emotionally I am done.
Mentally i am drained.
Spiritually I feel dead..but
Physically I Smile..
.
yes with confidence,I smile.You come across many in streets.Most wont look at the camera,but she took her head smiled with confidence.Sometimes I stand the mirror ,i try to smile and see how i look and then think should i smile in photographs or not.This lady didnt have a question in her mind,.You try to click some pictures and she keeps smiling to every photograph.I even spoke to her for sometime.She was happy though she isnt well to do.But some have everything but dont even smile at us when we interact or get an eye contact.but Why?!!
Keep smiling..Make everyone Smile.
I've been holding on to this one for a bit now. Was going to write a crazy long writeup...ended up going with this:
BLOG (plus larger)
www.afeinbergphotography.com/blog/2013/05/false-kiva-and-...
It was a special evening...and I'm still afraid of the dark.
aF
I had a suspicion these bodies wouldn't quite match up, but I tracked one down to be certain.
Spoiler: Lies.
Full writeup on the blog, www.RequiemArt.com
I shot Patryk's lowered and clean Civic recently for a feature blog post for the auto club I'm an admin for. Check out the full writeup and more pictures here: nwautocrew.wordpress.com/2013/03/02/patryks-clean-civic/
--
Strobist info:
The show is a composite of many flash exposures put together in Photoshop so I could get specular highlights I was happy with.
Key: Walked around car with LP160 into Softliter II umbrella
Rim: LP160 to back camera left (cloned out) w/ 1/2 CTO
--
Facebook: www.facebook.com/JLanier.Photo
Follow me on Instagram: @JLanierPhoto
Twitter: twitter.com/JLanier_Photo
Catching up on the ol' backlog. This batch from January when we visited Ōsaki Hachimangu Shrine for the New Year festival, Donto-Sai.
Full writeup at this this blog post.
ちょっと先に取った写真の山を片付けていま〜す。これは１月に大崎八幡宮でのどんと祭の束です。
詳しくはブログの投稿でご覧になてください。
Slick to Full Loadout: Building a Scaleable and Modular Armor System
Check out the full writeup on ITS Tactical: itstac.tc/1b54VRV
Kara Danvers (@casualcosplaykatie) meets herself as Supergirl (@houseofnyecosplay)
Saturday at WonderCon 2017 (writeup)
Slick to Full Loadout: Building a Scaleable and Modular Armor System
Check out the full writeup on ITS Tactical: itstac.tc/1b54VRV
I'm pretty sure it's a canyon wren, though the bill is a little lighter than some I've seen. Captured at Boyce Thompson Arboretum.
Check out all my Species a Day posts, with writeups, here.
Quote by Stephan Grellet
கோலம்/Rangoli is form of sandpainting decoration done by female members of Indian families in front of their home, daily. These days it's done using limestone or red brick powder. But the proper, age old, traditional way of doing it, is with fine-grained rice powder, so that miniscule creatures like ant, insects, etc. can feed on it. This colourful tradition that dates back to the Indus Valley Civilization (2500 B.C) was started not for it's beauty but for the humanity, for the consideration that other living beings too are worthy lives. I hope some day it will come back to it's original form.
This koolam (as called in Tamil) I saw some 5 to 8 women draw, for around 4 hours with sheer dedication, at the night with very poor lighting, for the next day ceremony of the deity's procession, from the Pillayarpatti temple (can be seen in the background) around their village.
Here's the local LA Times writeup for the Inaugural Event held in Dec 1924.
The 1924 AAA Season saw the last race (Feb) to be held at the wonderful Beverly Hills Track and the first at its replacement. Benny Hill won the inaugural in the former Miller House Car built in the Fall of 1923 for Argentinian playboy Martin de Alzaga who ran out of cash and rich American socialites and so Miller put Benny Hill in the seat with great success. (Michael Ferner) After a good finish in the car at Indy 1924 Miller decided to give in and installed the first ever SC in a Miller 122 in the car (Mark Dees) Hill went out and immediately won the Culver City Inaugural. On a sad side note the Hill win sealed the deal for the deceased Jimmy Murphy who was posthumously awarded the 1924 AAA Driving Championship.
Feel free to use this image. Just link to SolarDave.com www.solardave.com/
www.solardave.com/index.php/diy-solar-install-photos-and-...
This is a late submission for our church's Decade on Purpose project. I'm not entirely happy with this writeup yet, but it adequately describes my thought process here. This one is cropped to a 16x20 ratio, but there's more empty desk available on each side if we need a wider print.
Born in 1884, Thomas Russell Hollingsworth became a Presbyterian minister in southeastern Nebraska, most notably in the town of Adams. More importantly than teaching his flock, he taught his two children to love God. His son Robert learned that lesson well and passed it on to his three boys. John followed suit, passing his father's and grandfather's faithfulness on to his own four boys. This wonderful heritage continues today, as Ben attempts to model this to his three children. Our prayer is that Micah and the others will be intentional about continuing this heritage for future generations.
This writing desk is the one on which T.R. prepared many of his sermon notes like the ones pictured here lying on his Bible. The Bibles shown here belong to each of the five generations mentioned. Photos illustrate the link between the generations and the importance of intentionally teaching the next generation of God's love and faithfulness.
The reference on the small sermon note is from the parable of the prodigal son -- a poignant reminder of the consequences of failing to teach the next generation. The remainder of the sheet contains a number of God's attributes, including, "So God is a Father (Jesus loved this title)." God himself models our role as parents, and we are never more like him than when we care for our children.
There are a few details in this picture that would be visible in a large print, but aren't on Flickr:
* Names embossed on three of the Bibles identify the most recent three generations: John, Ben, and Micah. Incidentally, all three of us are pre-school Sunday School teachers at Berean because we understand the value of teaching the next generation about Christ.
* The four lower photos have dates printed along the borders. From left to right, they are APR 61, NOV 72, 1898, and JAN 2010. The old photo on the right is T.R. as a youth, circa 1898. The top (undated) photo is my grandpa Robert, taken around 1980. The far left photo is Robert and his three boys standing in front of T.R.'s house in 1961. Robert is 2nd from left and my 15-yr-old dad (John) is far right in the yellow vest. Next to that photo is my dad holding me at 21 months, standing in front of First Baptist church. The lower right photo is my 10-yr-old son Micah and me building his Cub Scout Pinewood Derby car in our garage this past January.
* The article underneath the front Bible identifies T.R. as pastor of the Adams Presbyterian Church.
* The lower of the papers sitting atop his Bible is the schedule for a church service. The topmost paper contains notes from a sermon.
I need to thank my mom for all her work in tracking down the two older Bibles, Pappy's sermon notes, and the older photos. I also want to thank my dad and brother Casey for their help in coming up with the layout of the objects that you see here. This is a "family photo" in a somewhat unconventional sense.
Shot through my old, manual Nikon Micro-Nikkor 55/2.8 AIS @ f/11
Slick to Full Loadout: Building a Scaleable and Modular Armor System
Check out the full writeup on ITS Tactical: itstac.tc/1b54VRV
While in Tokyo last year, I retraced the steps I took during my first vacation there, almost 20 years ago. I tried to recreate some of the photos I took to see how things had changed.
I made a full writeup in this blog post, which will also include more photos than I'll be posting here on Flickr.
去年、東京にいる間に、ほぼ20年前の初めて東京へ行った旅行の行った道を戻りました。景色はどうやて変わったのかと思いました。それで、昔に撮った写真と比べるために、出来るだけ同じように現代版を撮りました。
もっと詳しくは このブログの投稿をご覧になってください。
This house is on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. It is supposedly perched on the highest point between Weldon, NC and Raleigh NC. It daces the railroad and is across the street from a large abandoned factory I am trying to identify to post pix of. It received the name Mistletoe Villa because back in the day Mistletoe hung thick in the surrounding trees. It is the second huse on the foundation and appears to be under restoration. See the link below for a old picture and also the wiki writeup.
Picture of house in bygone times:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mistletoe_Villa_circa_1895.jpg
Additional information:
Vintage Riley at the 2011 GNSF.
For more images and a writeup of the event visit the Beamish Transport Blog.
As part of the activities of the 2013 Railfest at the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum in Chattanooga, Southern Railway's EMD FP7 #6133 made a visit. This Diesel locomotive built in 1950 was used to pull their excursion, the Missionary Ridge Local throughout the weekend. It is normally on display at the North Carolina Transportation Museum which offers this writeup:
"Southern Railway #6133: The locomotive was built by the Electro-Motive Division of General Motors in 1950. This FP-7, operated by the Southern Railway, was the property of the CNO&TP (Cincinnati, New Orleans & Texas Pacific). The FP designation meant the locomotive could be used for passenger or freight trains, using a 567-B 16 cylinder prime mover, generating 1500 horsepower. These were F-7 freight locomotives with a steam generator placed at the rear of the locomotive, increasing body length by four feet. FP-7 locomotives were used on small branch-line passenger trains throughout the Southern Railway System. By the late 1970s, there were very few FP-7s left on the roster due to Southern eliminating many passenger trains. The 5-8 left were used for excursion trains as part of the Steam Program begun in 1966. The 6133 was donated to the NCTHC in 1980, and restored by the volunteers to its original green/ imitation aluminum paint scheme. It is used to pull the train ride around the property when needed."
I took more photos of #6133 than I have posted to flickr. You can also see quite a thorough collection of photos of the highlighted steam locomotive Southern #630, the Missionary Ridge Local with #6133, and other rolling stock on the grounds. This gallery is on my website here:
seemidtn.com/gallery3/index.php?album=chattanooga%2Frailfe...
Also, I took video and put it on youtube: All the steam footage, plus the Missionary Ridge local: youtu.be/AhCCpvO41iM
Facebook...'Like' this for future shoots and content
Check out www.alexDPhotography.com for writeups from my shoots, high-def wallpapers, videos and other content.
We did a panel with the faculty and students.
Just another surprise from Myriad 2018. Writeup by Business News Australia and promo video
Rome, 27th June 2016. Konica C35 and Fomapan 400 Action film. Probably shot something about 5000 times better on my iPhone but this is what happened with this camera, this film and the judgement of the developing lab. I did crop it slightly though for some symmetry.
A little crazy Mayan flash flavor experience
full writeup on: www.flashflavor.com/2007/11/26/165/for-the-next-time-you-...
Crosshair from G1 Transformers Cartoon Series transforms into a futuristic buggy.
For more photos and writeups on this LEGO creations:
alanyuppie.blogspot.com/2018/03/lego-transformer-crosshai...
Follow me in FB!
www.facebook.com/alanyuppiebrick/
..and subscribe my youtube channel!
www.youtube.com/user/alanyuppie
...Instagram, anyone?
From Neon Genesis Evangelion. Sort of an appropriate weekend to be carrying around the Lance of Longinus, come to think of it.
Saturday at WonderCon 2015. Writeup of the con.
Temporary home automation gateway using RaspberryPi, Moteino, ATXRaspi
Writeup:
lowpowerlab.com/blog/2013/10/07/raspberrypi-home-automati...
Demo of implementation:
lowpowerlab.com/blog/2013/10/11/raspberrypi-home-automati...
Dogwood week 10: Perspective
This perspective challenge was pretty hard. I feel the story in here is pretty weak. Or at least not the one I wanted to tell.
Longer writeup and some other images for this challenge: renku.smugmug.com/2017Dogwood52/Week-10
CC very much welcomed.
Slick to Full Loadout: Building a Scaleable and Modular Armor System
Check out the full writeup on ITS Tactical: itstac.tc/1b54VRV
"How fair do you want the elections to be Sir" The question came from senior civil servant G. Muenuddin then working as Chief Election Commissioner. It was posed to the all powerful President of Pakistan Field Marshal Mohammad Ayub Khan, N.Pk., H.J., in 1964. Ayub had not yet fallen out with the powers that be nor was there any major or visible internal dissent. Nor yet had be suffered from pulmonary embolism till then. What he therefore said was the law. "As fair as practicable" came the cryptic reply. The Field Marshal had a formidable opponent. It was no less a person than the Founder of Pakistan's sister Ms. Fatima Jinnah. The orders had been issued nevertheless. Mueenuddin was a senior member of the Indian Civil Service whose name appeared third in the gradation list of ICS turned CSP officers, appearing immediately after Justice A. R. Cornelius and Justice S. A. Rehman. Ayub Khan ruled Pakistan exclusively through his civil servants. His reliance on them was indeed so great that Yahya Khan erroneously believing that the civil service was responsible for Ayub's downfall, tried to cow them down and fell on his face. Anyway to cut a long story short, the elections could and would only be that much fair as was consistent with Ayub Khan winning them. He won - although Ms. Jinnah swept Karachi, Dacca and Chittagong!
But let us go a little back in time before this uncanny conversation. It is 1947 and the Indian sub-continent is about to be divided. A fierce argument is in process between two men. One is not only the Viceroy and Governor General of India but also the cousin of the British monarch, Lord Mountbatten. The other is a polished and brilliant lawyer in the old Anglo-Saxon tradition who liked to be called plain Mr. Jinnah. Mountbatten was trying to force and intimidating Jinnah to accept him as first Governor General of Pakistan just the way Nehru had accepted him in India. Jinnah wanted to be Governor General himself and had an intense dislike and distrust of Mountbatten who mentioned, "But Mr. Jinnah, all the powers will be with the Prime Minister". Mr. Jinnah firmly replied, "In Pakistan I will be Governor General and the Prime Minister will do what I tell him to do." The argument was over. Some opine that this decision led to the inclusion of Gurdaspur in India giving it a clear route to Jammu and Kashmir, as Mountbatten tampered with the Radcliffe Award.
But let us move on. Pakistan came into being - Jinnah was revered and the governance of Pakistan proceeded as planned by him without even an inkling of dissent from any corner. The Secretary General Cabinet Chaudhry Muhammad Ali of the Indian Audits and Accounts Service was also made head of the Planning Committee (not to be confused with the Planning Commission) to determine what decisions could be made by the Prime Minister and his cabinet and which needed to be made by the Governor General. Things proceeded seemingly well but something was amiss. Jinnah remarked to Sindh Premier M. A. Khuhro, "The Prime Minister is average and most of his cabinet is below average." It was true that there was a huge gap in the stature of the Quaid-i-Azam and the men who constituted the new Government in Pakistan. Yet the absolute parting of the ways came with the inauguration of the State Bank of Pakistan on July 1, 1948. After that no one saw Mr. Jinnah until the Secretary General Cabinet called a physician weeks later to tell him to proceed to Ziarat. When asked who the patient was, the reply was significant, "the Quaid-i-Azam". The rest of the story is rather murky and need not be repeated here. Mr. Jinnah returned to Karachi but only to die within 3-4 hours, two of which were spent in an ambulance devoid of fuel. The Prime Minister arrived at Government House Karachi weeping bitterly only after Mr. Jinnah's soul had left his body.
As the Government of Pakistan gradually came out of mourning, the pious and ineffective Khwaja Nazimuddin was installed as the Governor General and the Prime Minister soon emerged as one of the most powerful in the history of Pakistan. As with Mr. Jinnah, there was virtually no dissent against Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan - at least - not then - except from one source. That was Ms. Fatima Jinnah, the sister of the Founder of Pakistan who lived on to tell her tales. In 1949 two pages of her book My Brother, specifically directed against the Prime Minister and Secretary General Cabinet, were censored out. Much later they were published in Q. U. Shahab's memoirs Shahabnaama by the time Liaquat Ali Khan had been assassinated, half a dozen more prime ministers changed through palace intrigues and two martial laws had been imposed. Naturally by that time Ms. Jinnah's assertions could neither harm nor benefit anyone of the worldly wise people running Pakistan and Shahab could publish the two pages. Ms. Jinnah had died by then of - mysterious causes, to say the least.
Then came the early nineties. Lady Sughra Ghulam Hussain Hidayatullah asserted that Ms. Jinnah had actually been assassinated. The news got a one column heading in the Dawn. Lady Hidayatullah couldn't have chosen a worse timing for her disclosures.
Pakistan was then caught up in an unfortunate controversy at that time. It had been pointed out in the Supreme Court that while after the death of Gen Ziaul Haq, the court was just about to announce its judgment reverting Muhammad Khan Junejo as Prime Minister and indeed even his security escort had arrived, a courier came in the way of all that. The courier was a Law Minister and future Senate Chairman, the message was from the most powerful man of Pakistan (not to be confused with President Ishaq Khan) to the Chief Justice to let the will of the people prevail. It was one of those things that should not have happened but had happened yet could not be admitted by anyone under any pretext and hence tempers were running loose. During the process, the Chief Justice remarked that even God could not stop him from reaching the truth, immediately provoking a blasphemy charge against him. It was in these conditions that the good Lady Hidayatullah said what she said.
After around a decade came Ms. Jinnah's centenary in 2003 happened with one of her bodyguards in the Muslim League Zafrullah Khan Jamali in the saddle as Prime Minister. Ms. Jinnah had even condoled the death of the then prime minister's uncle Mir Jaffer Khan Jamali exactly three months before her own death. However, there were the same rituals with wreaths of flowers oh her grave and all the politically correct statements delivered.
As the centenary fervour seemed to die down, I sent a widely distributed email maintaining that, “It is high time that the nation attains a level of maturity whereby it can come to terms with certain realities and attempt to address certain unanswered questions relating to her (Miss Jinnah’s) life... The lady was ostracized, persecuted and marginalized to a point that people had even forgotten about her existence when she decided to take on Field Marshal Ayub Khan in the 1964 presidential elections. The manner in which the elections were conducted and their unfortunate aftermath are known to all”. I went on to ask, “What is the real truth? Will the teeming millions of Pakistan ever be considered worthy enough of being taken into confidence about these pranks played by a few chosen ones? And those naïve people amongst us who think that our press is free should reconsider their opinion. The real truth is simply not for consumption of the ordinary mortals in Pakistan”.
And lo and behold - a couple of days later celebrated lawyer Sharifuddin Pirzada came up with the revelation that Ms. Jinnah had actually been murdered. This was President Ayub Khan's Attorney General talking and he immediately came within the mischief of 5-6 articles of the Pakistan Penal Code for not disclosing something which was in his knowledge relating to a heinous crime. And so the matter was again hushed up.
Let us again go back in time. Mr. (later Justice) Javed Iqbal narrates in his memoirs that he was told during the late fifties or early sixties that he would make a good Law Minister of West Pakistan and advised by a friend to meet the Central Law Minister. The gentleman in question, Mr. Khursheed expresses surprise and remarks, "but you are a decent person" adding hastily "we are looking for a rogue!". The powers that be's eyes fell on Ghulam Nabi Memon who was appointed to that position. Any matter relating to Ms. Jinnah death ends up with mention of Ghulam Nabi Memon, Hon'ble Law Minister of West Pakistan and the not so honourable Commissioner of Karachi Syed Darbar Ali Shah, who was later dismissed by Yahya Khan.
Going through her apolitical activities, I find that she was chief patron of the National TB Association as it was then called for decades and took an active part in TB prevention and control. She donated 100,000 rupees in 1962 to the Sindh Madressah Board allowing it to prosper as per her brother's desire. She went about performing inaugural ceremonies of colleges and universities, with a keen focus on women's issue. The 1964 elections (actually January 1, 1965) demonstrated that had she come in power, she could have served as an indispensable bridge between East and West Pakistan and perhaps reversed the tide set in motion to the contrary almost immediately after the creation of Pakistan.
Ms. Jinnah was found dead in her bed on July 9, 1967 indicating that close to 52 years have gone by. Will someone ever tell what happened after she slept the earlier night? It is clear that those governing Pakistan had seen one Jinnah and dreaded the prospect of another ruling Pakistan. Ayub Khan would not even allow her brother's tomb to be completed and it remained a dome of mud for over 2 decades. Then as Khaled Ahmed noted in 2003 the lady "revealed too much too soon in our history". Writing in the Daily Times in 2003 , Sir Cam questioned: And who strangled Miss Jinnah? Even if not physically throttled, she was strangled by the ‘system’. Like millions of ordinary people every day.
So be it - this country didn't deserve the Jinnahs, it deserved charlatans or worse! May her soul rest in eternal peace.
Copyright: Dr Ghulam Nabi kazi
Goddess Durga (துர்கை), who is the fierce form of Goddess Devi, shows the duality inherent in all mothers. Devi is a loving, caring woman for her children, while Durga protects them from evil or corrects them when they go awry.
Blessings on the hand of women!
Angels guard its strength and grace,
In the palace, cottage, hovel,
Oh, no matter where the place;
Would that never storms assailed it,
Rainbows ever gently curled;
For the hand that rocks the cradle
Is the hand that rules the world.
Infancy's the tender fountain,
Power may with beauty flow,
Mother's first to guide the streamlets,
From them souls unresting grow--
Grow on for the good or evil,
Sunshine streamed or evil hurled;
For the hand that rocks the cradle
Is the hand that rules the world.
Woman, how divine your mission
Here upon our natal sod!
Keep, oh, keep the young heart open
Always to the breath of God!
All true trophies of the ages
Are from mother-love impearled;
For the hand that rocks the cradle
Is the hand that rules the world.
Blessings on the hand of women!
Fathers, sons, and daughters cry,
And the sacred song is mingled
With the worship in the sky--
Mingles where no tempest darkens,
Rainbows evermore are hurled;
For the hand that rocks the cradle
Is the hand that rules the world.
~ William Ross Wallace
This poem (of the photo's title) praises motherhood as the preeminent force for change in the world. The poem was first published in 1865 under the title "What Rules The World".
[View this panorama Large on Black]
This is the famous Cauvery/Ponni river in South India, which is also called as the Ganges of the South here. Rivers are treated as Mother Goddess in India for wherever she flows flourishes by her blessings. Based on Ponni, there is a legendary historical novel in Tamil named Ponniyin Selvan, by Kalki R. Krishnamurthy. Meaning 'The Son of Ponni'. This novel is very unique in lot of aspects.
The novel is based on Raja Raja Chola the great Tamil king, of Chola Dynasty, who is still known for building the first ever complete granite temple, The Brihadeeswarar Temple in Thanjavur, India built in the 11th century AD, now a well maintained UNESCO world heritage site by the name The Great Living Chola Temples. This Shiva temple has a Nandhi (sacred bull) monolithic granite statue of about 16 feet long and 13 feet high. The entire temple structure is made out of hard granite stones, a material sparsely available currently in Thanjavur area where the temple is located, meaning it was ported to Thanjavur from some place.
This temple has tablets that speak of the important happenings during Raja Raja Chola's times. The reasons this story is nail-biting is that, him being the last son of his father, and a person who hates the idea of kingship and likes to be a part of vox populi, had almost no chance of getting the throne. A succession of events including betrayal, love, loyalty, friendship and a lot of fate, eventually forced him to become King. And he turned out to be one of the most known, accomplished and successful King in Indian History. These event logs in the temple were researched by Krishnamurthy, the novel's author. He made a fiction based on those events I.e. the key resultant events stay unaltered in his novel, while the dialogues, in-between happenings which could have led to the actual result was weaved by him.
Krishnamurthy was a freedom fighter who started a weekly named Kalki, which later became his pen-name. In this weekly he wrote this historical novel. Before it was published as a 5 volume complete novel, originally it was as a weekly serialised novel written in the pre-independent India. This is the longest ever serialised weekly novel, running a period of 3.5 years. My grandma still recounts how she fights with her brother when she was 12, to grab the subscription copy first :) After the last episode, many wrote letters to him on why did he stop the story. He rightly replies that "mine is not a complete fiction novel to go on writing on pipe dreams, but this is a portrayal of an age, and I don't wanna kill it by overdoing it". This reply of his, came a week after the last episode, as an epilogue.
Almost all of my family members, including me have read it, and yes its my most favourite novel ever. Due to its success, it was translated and published in English by McMillan publishers. This novel has almost 4 sequels written, and still a lot of budding new novelists in Tamil quote this as an inspiration.
Btw, this is my first attempt on a stitch/panorama. Shot freehand using Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ18 (which doesn't have a stitch assist/panorama mode). Pardom me, if it was too descriptive, couldn't cut out any line.