Tag Archives: Bangalore

Extraordinary Eats

Deranged Clown Cream Biscuits

These Milk Bikis Milk Cream Biscuits might just be the creepiest teatime snack I've ever seen. Like the John Wayne Gacy of high tea.

Posted on April 10, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 2 Comments

Offbeat Museums

Dr Shankar’s Wonderful Collection of Brains and Other Medical Obscura

It came up over a bowl of brain stew at Karim's, Old Delhi's famously-dingy 1913 eatery. "Tasty," I said, wiping my mouth. "By the way, did I tell you about the brain museum in Bangalore? The architect told me we should go." Michelle tore off a piece of naan, and sopped up a wet chunk of brain. ...

Posted on April 8, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 7 Comments

Holy Curiosities

Another Little Bangalore Boat Church

53 weeks ago, I posted about my first boat church. The other day -- deep in Bangalore's Austin Town -- I found another. So what does this represent? St Thomas coming to Kerala? Or Jesus and Mary coming to India? Is the boat a little Fisher of Men? Or the stormy trip ...

Posted on April 5, 2013 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Consumerism

Damn Strong Tarps

I love this hand-painted ad for Bhadra Tarps. You know they're tough if even this mustached hunk can't rip them! (Then compare to their rather lackluster website. Oh....)

Posted on April 4, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 4 Comments

Sweet Movies and Wild Books

Elvises, Genies, and Sandalwood Beach Madness

If you know me, you know I like things big and overdone. I care less about the society of the spectacle than I do the spectacle of the spectacular. And Shangrila fills that fetish. It’s this month’s hit song from next month’s hit Sandalwood movie, Topiwaala, starring the legendary Upendra (Uppi to his fans). And you ...

Posted on March 9, 2013 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Holy Curiosities

Noel Wilson’s Awesome Soccer-Themed House

In a street filled with single-storey houses, Noel Wilson's juts up like a skinny football-worshipping minaret. It's bizarrchitecture! You know Noel, right? He plays football. (Of course he does.) The outside is decorated with over 100 footballs, a shrine to Mary, and the words "God's Gift." The inside is plastered with IFA trophies, ...

Posted on February 18, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 1 Comment

Holy Curiosities, Modern Ruins

Hindus Are Buried…?!

I didn't know Hindus were buried. Like, they're always cremated, right? And then we stumbled on our local Hindu graveyard. And realized how wrong we were. The Bangalore architect laughed at me when I asked him about it later. "That's the great white myth," he said. "You Westerners still like to romanticize us Indians ...

Posted on February 17, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 2 Comments

AO Events

PechaKucha Bangalore: Coming This Friday!

UPDATE: Event in the past. Sorry if you missed it! Was great! Do sign up for the PKB Facebook group though! If you're in Bangalore, I hope you can come to Jaaga on Friday night Feb 15th for a night of glorious trash. I'll be there talking about Trash Film, but the whole line-up ...

Posted on February 11, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 1 Comment

Sweet Movies and Wild Books

Great New Indian Sidewalk Movie Posters

First, does anyone know where in Bangalore, or perhaps India, I can get cardboard mailing tubes for posters? They just don't seem to be available. What is this nonsense!!! Second, if you missed these posts about the grand outsider Ramachandraiah sidewalk posters, see them now! Batch 1: Original sidewalk posters for Harry Potter, Tintin and more Batch 2: More real ...

Posted on February 5, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 18 Comments

Other Obscura

Dr. Ambedkar in Duplicate

For the last year, our local Dr. Ambedkar statue has been surrounded by rubble and faced by a 14-foot block of blue tarp. He's the second most important figure in Indian politics. He wrote the constitution. He led the untouchable rights movement. He wears awesome glasses. Well, this morning some kids took down ...

Posted on February 2, 2013 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Sweet Movies and Wild Books

A Lovely Moment from Ghungroo

Standing alone, so desperately alone, she waits outside the Odeon. Will he come? Oh, will he ever come? This lobby card for Rajendra Jain's Ghungroo, which I pulled ripped and bent from a stack at Balaji's Rare Antiques, reminds me of college. Although I didn't wear a sari.

Posted on January 31, 2013 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Extraordinary Eats

21 Amazing Bangalore Breakfast Dishes

The first time I saw the menu, I was lost. Sure, I knew dosas and idlis, but that was as far as it went. The other items were utterly alien to me. And so I did the only thing I could: I decided to eat them all. It took longer than expected. Tasted better than ...

Posted on January 28, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 70 Comments

Lost in Translation, Sweet Movies and Wild Books

Metropolis finally finds the right marketing campaign…

As currently promoted and sold, of course, in India.

Posted on January 27, 2013 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Sweet Movies and Wild Books

The Great Poster Contest

So yesterday I got up to some dark nonsense... I ordered 600 more Bangalore sidewalk posters. You know, like these.... But not any of those. Chronologically, the movie's leads were Buster, Louise, Glenn, Lloyd, Hayao, Johnny. Hint: might be directors. Hint: four are Americans. Hint: If you know my taste in film, ...

Posted on January 26, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 7 Comments

Sweet Movies and Wild Books

Amitabh Bachchan: Comic Superhero

abitabh-bachchan-as-supremo-cover_zps00d3ebeb

I'm a huge fan of Amitabh Bachchan. But then again, who isn't? He's the king of Bollywood. BBC readers chose him as the greatest star of stage or screen of the last thousand years. I'm sure you've seen him as the angry young man in Sholay, or the angry old man in Kabhi Khushi ...

Posted on January 14, 2013 by Andy Deemer / 2 Comments

Sweet Movies and Wild Books

A Huge New Horde of Hand-drawn Indian Movie Posters

I hadn't seen Ramachandraiah for far too long. He's the movie poster artist. Some locals curse him as a ruin on this garden city. I hail him as an urban beautifying legend. - See his first batch of posters here. - His posters for my favorite movies: Suspiria, Wild at Heart, M, The Third Man, and ...

Posted on December 20, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 30 Comments

Lost in Translation

Some of the lost tribes?

(Nice headline, Mike S.)

Posted on December 16, 2012 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Extraordinary Eats, Lost in Translation

Tastes Like Chicken

Since moving to India, we've seen a lot of Julie. And this is what Julie saw offered in Koramangala today.

Posted on December 5, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 4 Comments

Lost in Translation

Truth in Advertising

I guess they were out of the Just Okays.

Posted on December 3, 2012 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Consumerism

More MaxiPad Fun, with UnSticky Stickers

Hannah took us deep into the bowels of City Market, a mad maze of alleyways crammed tight with shops stacked atop one another. Porters and motorbikes race past, honking endlessly and piled unrealistically high with samples. Cows tread through it all, slathered in shit and chomping slowly on four-foot piles of trash. ...

Posted on September 16, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 1 Comment

Fashionista

Sidewalk ad for Adira’s Period Panty

Not sure what I loved most about this banner we passed in a Bangalore market: the complete unexpectedness of it, or the incredibly bad photoshopping of two different women. Anyhow, I'm going for the hipster style.

Posted on September 15, 2012 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Cute & Kawaii

Best Pix from Bangalore’s First Ever ComicCon

Hey, baby, wanna come back to my fortress of solitude?

The blog has been ill-attended these last few weeks, with the move to India. Several grand projects are already underway here, but we'll have to keep those hush-hush for the time being. But in the meantime, we did manage to escape the craziness of the city for Bangalore's First EVER Comic Con this ...

Posted on September 12, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 1 Comment

Consumerism, Cute & Kawaii

Bangalore is Just Too Emo

Posted on September 10, 2012 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Sweet Movies and Wild Books

The Amazing Indian Amazing Spider-Man Poster

My Bangalore pal Hannah just came across this new Ramachandraiah movie poster... Absolutely gorgeous -- I love it!

Posted on July 3, 2012 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Sweet Movies and Wild Books

A Brief Aside on Dr Rajkumar, the James Bond of Southern India

Alone in the hotel, drinking Kingfisher and watching old Karanataka films. In 1981's Keralida Simha, an honest cop has to break up a party of riotous and drugged out delinquents. And it's something akin to poetry. I don't know much about Kannada cinema -- it's called Sandalwood -- but the cop with the sweet mustache ...

Posted on May 7, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 1 Comment

Lost in Translation

A Sweet Series of Chinglishy Gift Fails

Christmas wrapping paper always works well. Especially for Papa Pickles' belated birthday present... But the wrapping paper turned out to be a little more generic than we'd expected. And the greeting card, which Woo bought in Bangalore, turned out to have a rather unexpected adhesive. That's right, as in the maxi pads. At least we didn't have to ...

Posted on April 12, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 4 Comments

Holy Curiosities

Sweet & Holy “No Pissing” Signage

If there's a wall in India, someone's planning to treat it like a latrine or a dump. Official signs, unofficial pleas, it doesn't matter. Notice the dribbles of urinet spray below. What if you tried painting a Hindu god or two on the wall? Surely that would help. Is that spray diarrheal??? Really?!!?!? ...

Posted on April 8, 2012 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Holy Curiosities

Jesus and Mary in a Little Indian Boat

It’s Good Friday, and so why not mention this delightful little boat I pass every day? It gives passage to Baby Jesus and Mama Mary, who endlessly sail the open seas of Bangalore’s Shanthinagar district. Of course, by “open seas” I mean a dirty, dusty, honking, traffic jam. And by “sail,” I mean sits on top ...

Posted on April 6, 2012 by Andy Deemer / Leave a comment

Historical Wonders

Obama and Hitler, Together at Last

On sale in the Bangalore airport, right now: Historical Heroes, the complete DVD set. Which of these people doesn't fit? (Was this produced by Rush Limbaugh????) That's right... Che, MLK, Himmler (?), Castro, Hitler, Mussolini and Obama, all under the loving gaze of Obi Wan Gandhi. In Asia, Hitler isn't a bad guy. He ...

Posted on March 12, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 3 Comments

Our Weird Projects, Sweet Movies and Wild Books

A Sweet New Batch of Indian Movie Posters

I just got some lo-res photos of the new batch of 20" by 30" hand-drawn litho-printed Sandalwood/Kannada movie posters, and they're fantastic! (If you missed reading about Raju, who draws a new movie poster every three hours, and the 1901 litho machine they're printed on, go now!) I have 100 of each of these, ...

Posted on February 1, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 73 Comments

Our Weird Projects, Sweet Movies and Wild Books

India’s Incredibly Cool Hand-Drawn Movie Posters

Bootleg Indian Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Poster

Ramachandraiah prints movie posters for a living. He's done it ever since 1971, when he bought an ancient lithograph press. He keeps it in a factory north of Bangalore, far from the English town where it was built 111 years ago. Most movie posters here are lavish. They're digitally-printed, full-color, and reach up to 30 ...

Posted on January 25, 2012 by Andy Deemer / 109 Comments

Consumerism