Gandhi Shilp Bazaar

The fountains at the entry

The Exhibition and sale of handicrafts and artistic textiles was organised in the lovely green lawns of the Botanical Gardens in Hyderabad. The stalls were not as many as those seen in some other exhibitions, but it was clearly a case of quality over quantity. The fabrics from various states had around a stall each. My yearning for white Lucknow kurtas to wear in the hot months of the year was fulfilled by this really good Lucknow stall run by husband and wife. I also managed to pick a piece of Banarasi material to stitch a blouse.
The Bandhani (my current love) stall from Gujarat was also one of my favourites - i went looking just like that and the sweet spoken Gujarati lady managed to convince me to buy a saree (!!)
The single Khurja pottery stall spread out on the grass had some lovely designs of mugs, plates, serving plates etc. in vibrant colours.
In short, this was one of the best exhibitions I have attended in recent times - lovely natural green setting, limited stalls, quality products. It's there for another couple of days or so, so do not miss it.

More pictures of the products and stalls here

Gandhi Shilp Bazaar
S.K.V.B.R Botanical Garden
Chirec School Road,
Kothaguda 'X' Road, 
Hyderabad

Entry: Free
Parking: Rs.10

Plans washed out

Our plans to visit this exhibition were washed out by the showers - which were otherwise most welcome as they cooled up the city so beautifully!

Mahashivaratri & the Saras Exhibition

 

Though we did a couple of other fun things yesterday like visiting a regional products exhibition and eating super-oily take-away food - this seemed to be my favourite picture of the day - the red Geraniums contrasting the beautiful black of the Nataraja.

My favourite stall from the Saras exhibition was one called the Guntur-Coop run by the rural women in Guntur where they prepare Andhra style pickles, snacks and other food products in a very hygienic way and packaged beautifully too. Take a look at their pickles below - the Gongura is for S, while the other two are my favourites.

 

They are doing some great work and I really wanted to showcase their quality products here, hence the second photo of the day :) Will amend their address and details shortly. If you are visiting Guntur, their food products are surely worth picking up!

My shopping bag from the exhibition had stuff from different corners of India and this is what I love about such exhibitions-

Kerala

Plantain chips fried in coconut oil

Jackfruit chips

Mace

Gujarat

Clay tava

Clay pot with lid

Guntur

Three pickles

One bag of Chekkalu

Anantapur

Bedside lamp with hand-painted lampshade

Madhya Pradesh

Lemon drops

Dried mango chooran

Imli chooran

Assam

Handwoven woolen jacket for Atri

Horticulture Exhibition 2010

This exhibition supposed to be the largest in India is on from 26 Jan to 30 Jan on Necklace road - a wide ranging specimen of plants, trees, seeds and agro products. I managed to go there yesterday morning with Atri in tow, used his stroller to dump all the goodies I bought from there and it was great that they had helping hands with large bamboo baskets to carry all the pots one buys, for a small fee.

My shopping bag / basket in the end had -

• Bulbs of Dahlias and Liliums
• Four types of succulents
• Marjoram
• Geranium plant
• Aloe Vera plant
• Manure
• Pots and saucers
• Brochures
• Soya pasta
• Soya noodles
• Udad dal
• Tur dal
• Udad dal vadis
• Button mushrooms 1/2 kg
• Organic dried oyster mushrooms

I was looking for more herbal plants like lemongrass, thyme etc. which I did not find. We got to see some fine specimens of cabbage, cauliflower and varieties of squash like pattypan, which I'm seeing in India for the first time.
More about this exhibition here.

Sari stacks

Visited the Numaish - 2010 with my neighbour aunty, and boy, what an experience - even for a Bombay girl it was an overwhelming experience - 3 hours of walking and we hardly covered a fraction of the 2500 stalls - and the crowds - what do I say - this happens only in India.

This picture was from a stall of the Bengal cottons - what weaves and what colours - absolutely brilliant - if I did not have two dozen sarees dying to be used in my wardrobe, i'd have gone ahead and bought some. On second thoughts, I might go back on a weekday and buy a couple - especially one off white and gold, and a traditional Bengali red!

Adding two more pics for Indian saree lovers...

(click on the pics for a larger version)

This exhibition is on for some more days in Hyderabad, so if you are here, then do make it a point to visit this.

An article in The Hindu about this exhibition.