Awaiting The Moment
To celebrate..
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Pictures taken at Fort Cochin’s New Year Carnival
Putting On A Show: Waiting For The Call
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(A clip worth playing, if only to hear the eccentric pronunciation of Richard Attenborough’s surname!)
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Picture taken in Fort Cochin
A Certain Aloofness
A tourist observes the evening street-life of India from her guest-house balcony.
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Picture taken in Pattalam, Fort Cochin.
An Awareness Of Waiting
A fisherman waits for dusk.
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Picture taken in the Kerala Backwaters, Chellanam.
Ready and almost willing
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Picture of a worker in the Koottickal Rubber Factory, Kerala.
Time And Tide
Time and tide may wait for no man,
but the parish hearse is patient..
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“The origin of the phrase “time and tide” is uncertain, although it’s clear that it is ancient, and predates modern English. The earliest known record is from St. Marher, 1225: “And te tide and te time þat tu iboren were, schal beon iblescet.”
A version in modern English – “the tide abides for, tarrieth for no man, stays no man, tide nor time tarrieth no man” – evolved into the present day version.
The notion of ‘tide’ being beyond man’s control brings up images of the King Canute story. He purposely demonstrated to his courtiers the limits of a king’s power by failing to make the sea obey his command.
That literal interpretation of ‘tide’ in ‘time and tide’ is what is now usually understood, but wasn’t what was meant in the original version of the expression. ‘Tide’ didn’t refer to the contemporary meaning of the word, i.e. the rising and falling of the sea, but to a period of time. When this phrase was coined tide meant a season, or a time, or a while. The word is still with us in that sense in ‘good tidings’, which refers to a good event or occasion and Whitsuntide, noontide etc.”
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Picture taken outside the Holy Cross Basilica, Fort Cochin.
Origins of the expression “time and tide” taken from “The Phrase Maker “.
Northern Exposure: Part 4
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Picture taken behind the Taj Mahal, on my north Indian travels.
Waiting To Be Seen
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He’s told to wait
Outside.
Someone will let him know.
Locked gates are hardly opened.
Prospects are narrow,
Hopes are slim.
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Picture of a young man in conservative Muslim dress, taken during Ramadan, the Islāmic festival of charity and fasting.
A Long Wait
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Still he waits,
Impassive.
The future shuttered,
Empty.
All doors are locked,
Each window bolted.
Again I pass.
And still he sits:
A tableau.
The street his home,
The film-set of a silent role:
His vigil barren,
And purpose spent.
Still he waits,
For what?
A piece of paper, signed and sealed,
The chance that someone hears.
Blind justice,
Just,
In case.
The script is blank,
His part unspoken:
A life deformed,
Bleak Housed,
Deferred.
His curse slow-fused,
His hope unfounded,
Sitting,
Still,
He waits.
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Official figures show that more than 30 million cases are pending in Indian courts – some since 1950.
Picture taken In Palace Road, Cochin.
A Matter Of Waiting…
Just waiting..
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Picture taken at the Mattancherry Ferry, Cochin
Watchful Waiting
– or –
The Hazards Of Compression
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Yesterday morning found me waiting at the jetty.
We had just missed a ferry. There were twenty minutes to watch and wait.
Photo-opportunities effortlessly presented themselves and time happily clicked by.
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Later I downloaded the pictures from camera to computer.
Mindful that picture space on the WordPress servers has limits, I opted for measured frugality. I would compress the size of my new photo files.
In the click of a mouse it was done.
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But this was an act of undue haste. I had not checked which level of file compression was suitable.
My photographs were reduced to hardly more than postage stamp size. Their intensity was lost. They were spoilt.
Belatedly I read the warning:
“File compression can not be undone.”
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I have relegated the pictures into a slideshow, hoping their impoverished pixels might pass unnoticed.
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Note to self: watchful waiting has its merits.
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