Hello — I draw for a living, which means I'm rich in unfinished sketchbooks and poor in stable income. Bhubaneswar boy who talks to strangers far better on paper than in person. This anonymous thing honestly suits me perfectly.

Splurged on the expensive stylus everyone online swears by. The truth? My decade-old cheap one still feels more like a real pencil in my hand. Sometimes the tool isn't the thing standing between you and good work — it's just fear wearing a shopping cart.

Creativity is a cruel joke — the best ideas always arrive at 2am when I'm far too tired to hold a pen, then vanish by breakfast. My notebook is basically a graveyard of half-remembered brilliance.

Took a slow train to a village near Chilika just to sketch the fishermen at dawn. The light on that lake at 5:40am is a colour I've genuinely never managed to mix properly. Went for two days, stayed five.

Three years freelancing as an illustrator and clients still open with 'it's a small job, should be quick.' The small job is never small. But when someone frames my drawing and sends me a photo of it on their wall — that feeling pays a little of what the money doesn't.