Chennai Beach railway station

Chennai Beach (formerly known as Madras Beach), is a railway terminus of the Southern Railway Network in Parry's Corner(பாரிமுனை), Chennai, India. This station serves the suburban services of the Chennai suburban railway and Mass Rapid Transit System (Chennai) and a few passenger trains. It serves as the northern terminus for the Chennai MRTS line. The station is named after High Court Beach which was later built up as part of Chennai Port, and not after Marina Beach, which is located a few kilometres away and is served by Chepauk, Triplicane and Lighthouse stations of the MRTS line. The station consists of 1500 sq.m of open parking area.

The station is adjacent to Chennai High Court and Broadway. There is also Burma Bazaar, which sells foreign merchandise in small shops outside of the station. Most of the government offices and headquarters of some banks, and Parry Group's offices are also located near the station.

In addition to being a focal terminus for much of Chennai's rail network, the station is also a major bus transportation hub for passengers destined to north and northwest Chennai. Most of these local buses are situated near the station.

Chennai

Chennai /ˈtʃɛnnaɪ/ (formerly known as Madras ⁱ/məˈdrɑːs/ or /-ˈdræs/) is the capital city of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Located on the Coromandel Coast off the Bay of Bengal, it is a major cultural, economic and educational centre. Chennai is known as the "Detroit of India" for its automobile industry. It is the fourth-largest city and fourth-most populous metropolitan area in the country and 36th-largest urban area in the world.

The city is host to the third-largest expatriate population in India after Mumbai and Delhi, with 35,000 in 2009 and steadily climbing to 82,790, in 2011. Tourism guide publisher Lonely Planet named Chennai as one of the top ten cities in the world to visit in 2015. Chennai is ranked as a beta-level city in the Global Cities Index and was ranked the best city in India by India Today in the 2014 annual Indian city survey. Chennai has also been named in the "hottest" cities to live in for 2015 by BBC among global cities with a mixture of both modern and traditional values. National Geographic ranked Chennai as world's 2nd best food city and Chennai was the only Indian city to feature in the list. Chennai was also named as the 9th-best cosmopolitan city in the world by Lonely Planet.

Madras (cloth)

Madras is a lightweight cotton fabric with typically patterned texture and plaid design, used primarily for summer clothing such as pants, shorts, dresses, and jackets. The fabric takes its name from the former name of the city of Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. This cloth also was identified by the colloquial name, "Madrasi checks."

Madras today is available as plaid patterns in regular cotton, seersucker and as patchwork madras. Patchwork madras is fabric that is derived from cutting several madras plaid fabrics into strips, and sewing them back together as squares of 3 inch sizes, that form a mixed pattern of various plaids crisscrossing. As a fabric, it is notable because the front and back of the fabric are indistinguishable.

Seen neatly tucked into pressed khaki trousers while darting across the campus green, the plaid cotton madras shirt enjoyed widespread American popularity in the 1960s as requisite garb for a post-WWII generation of preppy baby boomers. But as early as the 1930s cotton madras clothing began to emerge stateside as a status symbol: first popular among American tourists who could afford pricey Caribbean vacations during the Great Depression, the madras shirt was a palpable and overt sign of affluence worn on the backs of returning Ivy Leaguers. Today it remains a wardrobe staple for the resort- and country club-bound, as much as it is regarded as distinctly peasant class in its native India. Spanning some 5000 years, the story of the summery cotton plaid madras shirt is the province of paupers, artisans, and royalty alike.

Madras (costume)

The Madras, also called the Jip or Jupe, is the national dress of the countries of Dominica and Saint Lucia. A traditional five piece costume it was originally derived from the Wob Dwyiet (or Wobe Dwiette), a grand robe worn by the earlier French settlers, and this garment is also recognised as a national dress of the country. The Madras is the traditional dress of the women and girls of Dominica and St. Lucia, and its name is derived from the Madras cloth, a fabric used in the costume.

History

The material, known as the madras, is named after its place of origin, Madras, India. The origins of the Madras lie in the pre-emancipation days of St. Lucia, when African slaves on the island would don the colourful dress during feast days. Beginning in the late 17th century, slaves on the island were forced to wear the livre of the estate to which they belonged. Normally a single colour, one piece item, originally worn as a sarong, later becoming a simple tunic with holes for the arms and head, and a simple rope belt. During Sundays and holidays, the slaves could normally wear what they wished, and through monies earned through selling produce from small plots of land, they would often buy colourful cloth. On feast days and special occasions, free women and slaves would wear the colourful clothes, now known as Creole dress.