Fakhruddin Shah Baba Dargah Mahim

Hassan Ganda Rafaee .. Makdhoom Shah Baba Urus 2016

I went back to the Dhuni as today was the last day of the Urus of Makhdhoom Shah Baba ..and luckily I met my old friend Hassan Ganda an exponent of zarb... eye ball piercing with two swords ..he showed me his new sword concealed in his Sufi stick.
Hassan Ganda and I have been friends over 20 years or more ,, he has aged but once he was very handsome and goodlooking , he has two sons and a very pretty daughter ,, I meet them during the Ajmer Urs.. he brings them along , his youngest son does zarb..
Hassan Ganda offered me tea and we chatted about old times .
Now the Chancawalli Rifais will move to the Dargah of Fakhruddin Shah Baba,, for the Holy Saints Urus that is a grand affair .
Hassan Ganda is well known among the Madarriya Malangs and the Qalandari Malangs of Bu Shah Qalandar Panipat...
Today there was a massive crowd at the Urus at Mahim I did not hang out much and returned home a few minutes back ,

Documenting The Rifai Silsila At The Dhuni Of Makdhoom Shah Baba Mahimi 2015

I think I miraculously reached the Dargah of Makdhoom Shah Baba miraculously .. it was not crowded as such.. I had butter tea made on the holy fire of the Dhuni,.

From here I went to the Dargah Of Fakruddin Shah Baba on Mahim main road ,,

Bonding With The Rafaees at The Dhuni Makdhoom Shah Baba ..2016

It has been ages since I visited the Mahim dargah of Makhdhoom Shah Baba Mahimi ,,and I am uploading those pictures now at Flickr over 300 shot in about 2 hours ... the Dhuni the Rafaees and the Food lane .
This picture of me and Gunhegar Baba was shot at the 100 Urus of Abdul Rehman Baba Dongri last year , Gunhegar baba has stored our images on Whats Up ,,and we go a long way back .. he was very rude to me and would not allow me to click his pictures when I first him 20 years back but now we are good friends .
We respect each other he calls me Firoze Bhai Malang and you cant miss him .. he is at every Urus in Mumbai or Ajmer ,, he is a mystic a shaman an exorcist and a healer ,, he mostly lives at the Kurla cemetery ,, he is an expert in oils and herbal medicines .
I missed Hassan Ganda last night and the Chancawalli Rifais have splintered up ,, joined other Sufi orders or groups ,,, I document them when I am in Ajmer at Jalali Chowk.
Once a lot of hijras thronged the Dhuni not anymore ,.. the Chancawalli rafaees have invited me for their sandal but I dont know if I will be able to make it..

Two Iconic Street Photographers Of Bandra With Twitter Handles Marziya And Nerjis

Two Street Photographers of Bandra

Both have their own Twitter handles since several years

https://twitter.com/MarziyaShakir

https://twitter.com/nerjisasif

Learn Tennis Under Coach Surendra Pawar MET Grounds Bandra Reclamation

For those of you who want to learn to play Tennis I recommend Coach Surendra Pawar ,, MET Grounds Bandra Reclamation..he is absolutely reasonable and at the courts under his training are very young kids and guys much older than me ,, he supplies the tennis rackets if you dont have one ,

The team of his instructors are dependable and lead from the front polite courteous and teach very well.. Sundays off ..

I joined his tennis coaching to get my blood sugar under control..

And I now play more tennis than before ,,, the people who come to play here are from all walks of life and we have now become one big family .

The essence of Bulawa or being called

Last few days I am trying to go to the Dargah of Holy Saint Makhdhoom Shah Baba to meet my Rifai friends at the Dhuni but somehow it just does not happen .
And I am not very far from Mahim I could take a cab and be there within a few minutes but the moment genuinely evades me work that I have taken up does not leave me and my poor health ever since I came back from Lucknow .
I pass by Hazrat Fakhruddin Shah Babas Dargah in the bus and I make a hurried wish asking for peace for all ..I want to meet the bawas selling gemstones on the roads meet some malangs but yet again it is love from a distance .
Most of my outings take me more towards Shastri Nagar Santa Cruz and Juhu .
I pass by Bandra Talao but no time to wish my dear friends the ear cleaners .
And I believe every moment in life is cosmically connected nothing happens accidentally or deliberately .
I use my mobile phone to blog my stray thoughts instead of the laptop and I blog first on Facebook than copy paste to Flickr .
I am not too excited to run to Twitter.
My congested chest cough and cold don't seem to leave me .
I wished most of my friends I had lost touch with on Whats Up.
I have no work that takes me to the slums in Bandra east or even Bandra Slaughter House compund .
I shoot randomly on my phone and the Muslim mother with her new born child begging at Shastri Nagar on New year's day hit me hard and this is a total Miya locality I gave her money bought her buns and gave her milk from the nagori shop while the old Miyas watched me curiously not saying a word of reprimand when I took her pictures .
So a few moments in life on the streets will never change .
I see pictures all the time happening in front of my eyes as though a greater god was showing me what my camera on its own would never be able to see and I walk away as the moment could not be held on my mobile phone .
What this year holds in its bosom I don't know and today is the second day and I have taken a resolve I will go to the Mahim Dargah in the evening .
Most of my working time has gone into a film work of precision detailing I took up for my favorite actor even in Lucknow I was busy sourcing stuff for this film.
And I will go to play tennis at 7.30 am ..meet Fabian Namory and the rest of my friends .