M’wood stars get inked

Tattoos can be poetic, intriguing or sometimes, even plain odd! But most of the time, it comes with a trendy tag — wear your attitude on your skin. Several stars from the other film industries have been spotted with a variety of tattoos. Of late, the tattoo mania has caught the fancy of Mollywood stars too.
Jean Paul Lal, the young director of Honeybee and son of actor Lal says, his tattoos are not style statements but are associated with his memories.“Tattoos on me reflect my memories. In fact, it has nothing to do with fashion, but symbolises some of the incidents that have made a deep impact on me.” Interestingly, the director has four tattoos on his body. However, he wishes to talk about only two prominent ones, as others are “too personal”. The tattoo on his right arm with a cross, an angel and a halo symbolises his love for his dad. The other one on his forearms depicts the theme dream, inked in memory of his maiden directorial venture, Honeybee.
Actress Kukku Parameswaran says she got inked just for fun. “I am a spontaneous person. One day I felt I want to get a tattoo on my body, and straight away I went to a hospital to get an injection so that I won’t feel any pain as I get inked on my legs,” says Kuku, who has the image of the Sun inked on her. “I am madly in love with the Sun, the star of the solar system. It’s a token of my love towards him,” says the actress.
Actress Lena, who has got a couple of tattoos on her body, says each tattoo immortalises each phase of her life. “It was one of my friends based at Kovalam, who inked an outline for me. Later, an Italian friend of mine did the shading part. It’s a masterpiece as it won’t happen twice,” says the actress, who designs her tattoos. However, she is quick to add that though her tattoos are a reflection of her personality, she does not wish to flaunt them. “It is a personal affair,” says Lena.
Mollywood stars like Mamta Mohandas and Poornima Indrajith too have taken a fancy for tattoos. While Poornima sports a Ganesha tattoo on her right arm, Mamta has a number of tattoos on her body — a clef symbol on her right shoulder, a Japanese word on the neck, besides one each on her arm and palm. Mamta had told us earlier that it was her love for music and faith in Ganesha that has inspired her to get them inked on herself.
Tattoos may be great works of art, but to get inked is a painful process. However, these celebs believe that, where there is no pain, there is no gain. As Jean sums it up, “The endurance of pain makes each tattoo worth it.”