Yellow fever in Chennai

It's the Gold Rush in Chennai. Or Akshaya Thritiya as it's more commonly referred to.

The newspapers are flush with ads for stores selling gold, featuring lasses covered from head to toe in the yellow metal (I kid you not Joe).

The market streets are bustling with people wanting to exchange their year’s savings for a handful of yellow metal. It’s auspicious you see - buy gold now for an ‘aurified’ future. Articles and editorials also urge people to buy gold, playing shamelessly on middle class India’s eternal hope of prosperity and a better tomorrow. And not to mention even more gold.

I’ll be out with my camera to catch some pictures of crowds in gold frenzy. And I’m going to turn down the flash before I step out.

The revolution in the sky...

... and what it achieved on ground.


Copy: Me
Art: Sagar Prajapati

Click here to fly Air Deccan.

Pokkiri

This guy's one helluva entertainer. The dialogues, dances, the dishum dishum... he's got it all worked out. I loved the movie. Bury the Guns 'n' Roses T-shirt. I'm going to get one with Vijay on it.

More about the movie here.

No parking

My second ad of the Mitsubishi Cedia campaign. Art directed by Mangesh Rane.

Love all...

An ad for a tennis academy by the finest writer I've known, Ravi Eshwar.

A call for help...

This ad never ran. The number is a dummy. However, the context hasn't changed much. The tsunami victims still await help (all that the government promised, unlike the tsunami, is turning up in a trickle laced with bureaucratic hurdles).

Just google 'Tsunami relief in India' to find ways in which you can contribute.

An airplane is an airplane is an airplane?

I've written hundreds of ads for Air Deccan in the 3 years I worked on the account. This was one I enjoyed tremendously. Art director, Sagar Prajapati.