One of my friends, Jedi collects people. He has a huge number of really cool and interesting friends and he likes to mix them in different combinations to spark off the most diverting reactions. It’s great fun. I made some really great friendships from some of those mixes of Jedi’s.

And these days when I sketch from life, it really feels like I’m “collecting” people. I don’t draw just anyone, but people with interesting faces, or gestures or if I feel they could be a real “character”! The brown boy and I often have competitions when we draw from life. For instance, we’ll pass someone on the road or in a shop who looks really intriguing to us. And immediately we’ll try to draw that person from memory and see who’s done the better job. If you know the brown boy, you would know that most of the time he’s the one who wins the challenge. But sometimes it’s me.

Here’s a random selection of people I’ve collected over the last three months. I drew this in the office cafetaria.

This, in a meeting at work. The thing is, if you know the people, it’s not really a collection. Drawing is then merely a way to recede from the present.

This one, at Nehru Place Metro Station, my favourite place to sketch these days.

The next few were drawn at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf in Khan Market.