KOCHI: Life is not meant to be spent idling, says K Parameshwaran as he deftly weaves ‘kuruthola’ or tender coconut palm fronds, turning them into eye-catching shapes and designs. A resident of Amballoor in Thrissur, the multifaceted Parameshwaran has been living his values by continuously engaging in one work or another.
TNIE caught up with the 65-year-old at the venue of the school pravesanotsavam at the Government HSS, Elamakkara, where he was setting up a series of corn stalks, complete with the fruit.
Unassuming, Parameshwaran is not your run-of-the-mill person. “I come from a poor family and didn’t have the means to go for higher studies. But that didn’t deter me from studying as a private candidate. I did my PG in Economics from Calicut University and then worked as a teacher for 16 years,” says Parameshwaran, who learnt the art of weaving coconut fronds from his father.
All through the years that he studied, and then worked, he has been continuously creating various sculptures using the ‘kuruthola’.
“This is an inborn talent and my youngest son too has acquired it,” says Parameshwaran who has been a regular at the pravesanotsavam venues.
For him, this is voluntary service. “Art if commercialised loses its soul,” he says. After his teaching stint, he took up a job as a chef with the ISRO. According to him, that is another talent innate in him. “Everyone asks me whether I learnt the culinary art, and when I say that I have not, they find it difficult to believe me! But the fact can be checked with the researchers and officials who worked at ISRO and ate the food I prepared,” he added.
He worked as a chef with ISRO for six years and then donned the mantel of a sales manager for various companies. Later, he worked as an assistant security supervisor at a shipyard in Dubai. “All these roles that I took up were a means to eke out a living,” says Parameshwaran who also pens poems. Explaining the process of weaving, he says, “Every design takes shape in my mind. And the time required for every piece differs. I am also planning to make small birds out of the banana flower. These will be hung in a string fashioned out of the ‘kuruthola’. These will be hung at the entrance.” Parameshwaran also helps out with an event management company.