Hellooo, people!
It’s my birthday today! :) Hence I release this personal museletter every 13th of the month.
I turned 31 - and this summer also marks 23 years of writing. Yes, I started writing in Marathi (my mother tongue) when I was 8 years old. And gradually moved to English. And Hindi and a tinge of Urdu.
Friends sent some flowers and a birthday cake last night - and I wondered about the tradition of cake cutting for birthdays and life events. I read a bit about it.
Birthday cakes with candles trace their origins back to ancient times. The Greeks offered moon-shaped cakes to Artemis, lit to glow like the moon, while Romans celebrated common men’s birthdays with cakes. The tradition evolved in 18th-century Germany with Kinderfeste, where candles represented each year lived plus one for future hope.
Thanks to the Industrial Revolution, cakes and candles became widely accessible. Today, they are a global symbol of celebration, marking life’s milestones with a sweet tradition of making wishes.
People from various countries and backgrounds typically celebrate birthdays in a similar way: they blow out candles, cut the cake, and sing the "Happy Birthday" song.
In Hindu (Marathi) culture, we do aukshavan (औक्षवण) too. :)
#NaPoWriMo 2024
Did you know April is also the poetry writing month?
National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) began in 2003 as a challenge by poet Maureen Thorson to write a poem daily in April, mirroring National Novel Writing Month's structure. Quickly evolving from a personal blog project to a global event, just like Jake Parker’s Inktober, it now draws thousands of poets who share their work and engage with daily prompts and community resources via an official website. NaPoWriMo has become a celebrated literary occasion, fostering a vibrant community of poets worldwide each April.
I am currently on my National Poetry Writing Month (#NaPoWriMo) run, and it is going great. I had doubts about attempting it this year, but as a friend said - it’s my tapasya. :)
Sharing my favourite till date:
Kashmiring
I took a birthday trip to Kashmir this year. And I am sipping Kahwah as I write this.
Kashmir was phenomenal. I saw tulips for the first time. We experienced snowfall too. From apple orchards to shikaras - we did it all! :)
No amount of language is enough to describe this paradise on Earth. Attaching a few photos to inspire and inkspire you to book your next trip.
Inkspirations this month
Kashmir is one of the few places in the world where saffron, the world's most expensive spice, is grown. The town of Pampore near Srinagar is known as the "Saffron Town" for its extensive saffron fields. It is grown at an altitude of 1,600 meters to 1,800 meters above sea level, which is ideal for its cultivation. The planting is done in August and September, and the flowers are harvested by hand in late October and early November.
Pregnancy Tourism is a real thing. Ladakh is not just famous for its Pashmina, Apricots and Seabuckthorn... but also Pregnancy Tourism! Here’s more on that.
‘SUNRISE FROM A SMALL WINDOW’ (2020 onwards) by Sho Shibuya in the New York Times
Happy Baisakhi, Vishu, Bihu, and Noboborsho to you all! :)
Keeping it raw -
Until the thirteenth,
Writeously yours,
Shalaka Kulkarni
Hey Shalaka, been getting your newsletter for a few weeks now, and very impressed and intrigued with your writing journey. I would love to have a longer chat with you about it. For context, I run something called Purple Pencil Project, a portal to bring Indian literature and writing from different languages on one platform.