<h2>Wake up and smell the flowers</h2>
<p>A man makes a gajra while a child naps beside him in a cradle on SV Road in Borivali</p>
<h2>The tale of a broken guitar</h2>
<p><img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/may/Piyush-Kapoor_e.jpg" alt="Piyush Kapoor&rsquo;s broken guitar" width="1280" height="720" /><br /><strong><em>Piyush Kapoor&rsquo;s broken guitar</em></strong></p>
<p>When Piyush Kapoor, frontman of art-rock band Daira, recently opened his guitar case after 12 years, he discovered it had turned into a tremolo! Magic? Kapoor doesn&rsquo;t think so. &ldquo;My guitar had cracked open due to mishandling by an airline, who hadn&rsquo;t bothered to provide a solution when I raised a complaint 12 years ago, but reached out now when I made a video and posted it on social media,&rdquo; he told this diarist. Within a few days, the video received 450k views, with musicians sharing similar stories of mishandling of their expensive instruments by various airlines. &ldquo;Airline policies take musicians very lightly. So, I decided to make a light-hearted video, where I told people that if they want their guitars to sound like a tremolo, all they need to do is board a flight!&rdquo; he chuckled.</p>
<h2>Keeping up with the cats</h2>
<p><img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/may/Amanda-Tong-Cat_e.jpg" alt="" width="1280" height="720" /></p>
<p>You&rsquo;ll find many who wear their love for cats on their sleeve, but only a few who actually know what a cat loves, believes city-based animal behaviourist Amanda Tong (above). The Cat People Club, a new community formed by Tong in collaboration with fellow cat lovers, Vinda Dravid of Curious Cat Co. and Darshan Kaur Khalsa of Pets of Paradise, will aim to bridge this gap. &ldquo;We have been conducting online webinars on animal behaviour and understanding a pet&rsquo;s needs for more than three years. It was time we turned it into something tangible,&rdquo; shared Tong. To that end, the trio is set to debut with an inaugural set of live interactive sessions next month. Giving us a peek into their plans, she revealed, &ldquo;There will be educational quiz sessions, behavioural workshops, and cat comedy nights.&rdquo;</p>
<h2>Visiting cards go green</h2>
<p><img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/may/Visiting-cards_e.jpg" alt="" width="1280" height="720" /></p>
<p>Subhajit Mukherjee (inset), founder of the initiative Mission Green Mumbai, has announced his next venture &mdash; Har Ghar Tulsi. To reach his aim of planting 1 crore tulsi plants across homes in the city, he made a plant-able visiting card. &ldquo;I want people to look beyond tulsi&rsquo;s religious significance, to its medicinal properties,&rdquo; Mukherjee shared with this diarist.</p>
<p><img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/may/Subhajit-Mukherjee_e.jpg" alt="" width="1280" height="720" /></p>
<p>&ldquo;Usually, we take a visiting card, use it once, and drop it into a dustbin. Hence, I turned plant-able paper seeds into visiting cards, which can be used once, and then planted in soil. These cards give definite results and can be made at R2 each,&rdquo; he revealed, adding that he will launch and distribute 100 of these on World Environment Day on June 5. Those keen to make such visiting cards, message 9323942388.</p>
<h2>Time to relook at your bookshelf?</h2>
<p><img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/may/Bookshelf_e.jpg" alt="Participants can drop off any number of books in the anti book swap pile" width="1280" height="720" /></p>
<p>As book swaps become a favourite activity among reading groups, Bandra Reads will host a gathering named Anti Book Swap this Sunday. &ldquo;There are books we won&rsquo;t read again, started reading and lost interest, or were gifted one that is not our preferred genre. These books cannot be swapped because you need to pitch them, which isn&rsquo;t possible without reading. We encourage people to add such books to our anti book swap pile, and if they want to, they can pick something they like from it. We will donate the rest,&rdquo; shared co-curator Abhimanyu Lodha. For more rules, head to @bandrareads.</p>
<h2>Let&rsquo;s celebrate dugongs</h2>
<p><img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/may/Fish-1_e.jpg" alt="The dugong. Pic courtesy/Wikemedia Commons" width="1280" height="720" /><br /><strong><em>The dugong. Pic courtesy/Wikemedia Commons</em></strong></p>
<p>On World Dugong Day yesterday, Anurag Karekar (right), founder of Naturalist Foundation, recalled his recent encounter with the mammal in Little Andaman. &ldquo;It had been my long-standing dream to spot one,&rdquo; he said.</p>
<p><img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/may/Fish--2_e.jpg" alt="Karekar spotted the mammal in the waters of Little Andaman" width="1280" height="720" /><br /><strong><em>Karekar spotted the mammal in the waters of Little Andaman</em></strong></p>
<p>&ldquo;While I spent a lot of time snorkelling in Havelock Island, I spotted it where I was least expecting it!&rdquo; He revealed. A few researchers had declared that dugongs had gone locally extinct from Little Andaman after a tsunami. But the research, he said, was not absolute.</p>
<p><img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2024/may/Anurag-Karekar_e.jpg" alt="" width="1280" height="720" /></p>
<p>&ldquo;Currently, researchers from Wildlife Institute of India are studying their population closely. They are still vulnerable, but their numbers are better than what was estimated. Dugongs are herbivores. Their relatives are manatees in the sea, and elephants on land,&rdquo; he explained.</p>

The city - sliced, diced and served with a dash of sauce

Mumbai Diary: Thursday Dossier

Wake up and smell the flowers

The tale of a broken guitar

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