Arty curriculum

Just hit upon an article on dance and this particular excerpt was intriguing.
When asked to comment on the inclusion of theatre, dance and music in the academic curriculum, this was the remark of Geetha Narayanan, an educationist and a close associate of Natya.

"Its a near-impossible task of taking fine arts to schools. It is not at the core of the education system but remains at the periphery. Worse, it is brushed aside as an "extracurricular activity" or used in a lackadaisical "let's give the kids a bit of creative expression" kind of manner."

Further she cites that this curriculum shift is necessary not for the sole purpose the child's growth alone but for the betterment of the society too.

"All children who learn dance do not become dancers. They fill another, crucial role: that of the audience. If children don't know dance, how will we get audiences for our dance recitals in the future?"

I can personally relate to the latter. I dont expect an audience who are connoisseurs but yes knowledgeable. And the very fact that "extracurricular activities" are given a drag reflects where our education system is heading!

Do I see another Taare Zameen Par happening here?
Hope so!

Welcome Change

After all the hustle-bustle surrounding the marriage, our family decided to relax and what better way to relax than watching a movie. So I booked tickets for the Aamir Khan starrer Taare Zameen Par . The ease with which I got tickets in PVR bang on the first day of release surprised me so did the big price on it too! An Aamir Khan movie that too on the first week is quite a good recipe for the malls/multiplexes to cook up a good price. But I say the movie was worth every penny spent.

Taare Zameen Par is a brillant movie by all standards. Although the movie conveys a message it can neither be categorized as one of those boring art movies nor as a meaningless entertainer, it is a genre by itself. Mr.Perfect Aamir Khan displays his versatality with his directorial debut. He has portaryed the seriousness of the movie in a beautifully entertaining manner. But it is the little one Darsheel Safary as the dyslexic child Ishaan who walks away with the honour. He is a taci-turn boy who doesnt depend on the dialogue delivery for acting. It is astonishing to watch the boy use only emotions as a tool to act. Kudos, to Aamir for bringing this out in the boy. Aamir Khan's acting is flawless as usual, further he proves the point "men look better with age"........... :-). The movie has some hummable songs too.

Though the movie centers around a dyslexic child and his parents, it doesnt emphasize more on Aamir training the kid to get out of that cocoon. Because the movie is not only about a dyslexic child alone but its about parents letting children be what they want to be. The reviews recommended tissues for the second half and I recommend the same too. When the movie ended, I heard a few ppl in the hall applause............. definitely this movie needs a standing ovation.

Movies like Taare Zameen Par, Chak De India, Iqbal are the much needed whiff of fresh air on the Bollywood scene challenging the usual dancing around trees themes. These movies stresses the need of India's position in the global film circuit.

I just felt like..........

When I scrolled back and read my own archived blogs, I realized how serious some topics were ....... so here I launch something for light reading............... :)

Nothing spectacular to blog this time around but just my weekend experience. There were two things that happened.

First, I spent some "quality time" with a friend for more than a decade now. She has been my school friend and we both had some crazy fun as school kids but as time went by, our colleges werent the same so were our workplaces, so that explains the "seldom meetings but the often phone-calls" tradition. A month back she shifted close to my place.............. ah! I luv her for that. This gave us both the privilege of meeting over the weekend. Apparently, we had loads to chatter n no idea about what. Isnt this friendship?.........even after days, we got back as though nothing had changed between the both of us.

Second, Sunday evening, 4.30PM, BTM main road, my speedometer showed a whooping 60!!!.......... for all the speed freaks out thr, I know 60 kmph does not qualify as "fast", but on BTM main road, 60 is definitely comparable to the speed of ICE train. This is one of the arterial roads connecting the IT estates to the civilian habitats of Bangalore. Translating it into a "pathetically busy road". But on that sunday, it was a like a piece of cake. It took me flat 10 mins to reach kormangala from jayadeva flyover, this includes the parking time too............... n no I'm not dreaming??? After a long time I enjoyed driving in the city limits.

An inspiring rendezvous

Recently I happened to meet a set of people whose nature of work is diametrically opposite to mine. They were professionals in the field of fine-arts. I met them in a mega event which served as an art symposium. It was a pompous gathering with a potpurri of shows. The participants were an intermixture of the "who's who" of that industry, students, interns, freelancers and professionals of that field. Among them, it was the freelancers who particularly interested me.

I got acquainted with a freelancer of the same age as me. Over a casual talk, I came to know she was as well qualified in her form as I was in mine. What puzzled me was, regardless of the fact that she was a freelancer without a fixed pay and a secure job, she had an air of placidity flowing around her. She was incredibly happy to be in the rat race in a tough place where creativity scored. In the conversation which followed between us sounded quite sensible.

When I asked her "Isnt it tough to be a freelancer?", this is what she had to say.
When she was out of school and on the thresholds of choosing the right career naturally she was confused. Weighing her likes and dislikes, she gave in to follow her heart. She decided to pursue arts as a career much to her parents surprise. In the art field, there is either a hit or a miss but no intermediate state of sustainment. And if anyone is here to stay, the unwritten rule is they have to be the best. Her parents doubted her calibre but they were supportive though. With her graduation done, it was the time to enter the professional world of arts. But unlike other conventional fields she did not find any company which induces her into the practical world and hence she took to freelancing looking for oppurtunities and grabbing them when the best came in. Freelancing gave her the time and the freedom to learn new things practically and also improvise them theoretically back home. This made her strengthen her fundamentals and constantly update herself. Most important it gave her the much needed time (which is a priced possession in a full-time job) to think at a relaxed pace. She felt freelancing gave her the time to learn, think and rectify.

Ok, Keeping aside her passion for learning, I asked her about the vital- monetary gains. She said she earned enough to make herself financially independent. Being a freelancer was just an initial struggle in her path to making arts her full time profession. She believed if she turned out to be good professionally, money would find its way automatically and then she could thinking of saving. Freelancing laid the base for this. And she also mentioned that she would indulge herself in liabilites only when she was in a position to cover it up. I was awed by her confidence in managing her life. Inevitably I compared my software life with her life. Sadly I found such startling dissimilarities.

Survey reveals that staff working for a multi-national companies earn the highest average pay among the middle class Indian population. Software crowd being a part of this population has a completely different perspective towards work and money than what the lady above has.
After graduation, indecisively we enter the big world of software as freshers, where we are trained and moulded the way the company wants. We get a good job with good money and we are happy. It presents a rosy picture right?, Wrong ! Now, this good amount of money gets into savings, assets and liabilites at a very early stage in our career. So to cover up these liabilites, we yearn for more money resulting in a switch to a higher paying job. And the story goes so on and so forth.

When I mentioned these facts to my friend, she simply brushed it apart saying "You software folks are simply overpriced! I accuse you of an imbalance in the economic status among the Indian youth!". My first reaction for her outspoken remark was that she was jealous but when I thought with an open mind, I'd to agree with her. Accepted that we techies do slog but people in every other profession work as hard as we do or even more at times, correct? It is an injustice that their compensation is not on par with us.

My friend did not like the idea of a mechanical and monotonous job, so what if it was high paying, it was not her cup of tea. Instead she loved the freelancing where she was expected to come up with creative and innovative ideas. She would be openly appraised in public for her efforts. You need guts to face such kind of criticism on a regular basis. She was truly an inspiration!

Dancing to the tunes of rain

Bangalore witnessed torrential rains on the eve of Ganesh Chaturthi recording around 200mm of rain in one single day! Unfortunately it was a friday and the lovely festive season kept both the people and the roads jammed. Ganesh Chaturthi being a 3 day grand affair in my house, I'd taken the friday off, so I was blessed with not witnessing the "Black Friday" as the papers termed it.

A week earlier the sun shone rather too brightly surprising the september weather and the downpour that followed wasn’t a surprise after all. On Friday, it kept raining incessantly. It was only the next day the papers updated me the magnitude of the damage done by rain. People from e-city actually used caracoles on the hosur road !!!! ... Its funny the way they had the caracoles handy, did they actually foresee this?? Lalbagh lake had overflowed again after a gap of 2 years. Houses built on dried lake beds were flooded. Among all these the one that was thought provoking was the photo of the IT fav Silk Board Junction. Instantneously, I was reminded of the TV clips of Mumbhai monsoons. The scenes were strikingly similar, kms and kms of stranded traffic and people wading through the dirty rain water almost upto their knees. Will Bangalore become another Mumbhai? Agreed Mumbai monsoons are way too severe but the problem is not the rain, it is the city's infrastructure. Mumbhai is so badly crowded with humans and their establishments that the poor rain water has no escape and it stays on. Isn’t a similar story unfolding in Bangalore? Yes, it is expanding at a very fast pace but not at the cost of the city’s safety. Did I forget to mention Mumbhai is a port city! Well, this is my foresight and I’ll be glad to be proved wrong.

When I started this blog, my intention was to describe about one of my latest performances in rain…… yes rain :) ……… but I ended up writing about my city. Some of my fnds ridicule me for this excessive patriotism abt my city and I always laugh back and say blame it on my stubborn leo trait… :D

Anyways let me get back to my rain dance….:) I was to perform in Vidyapeetha temple on the occasion of Krishna Janmasthami. I was told it shall be held in a open auditorium. I was excited since I’d not performed in an open auditorium till then. My dance Guru was out of station then and I had to prepare for the event all by myself, which was actually tiresome. Having her around would have been a great relief. On the day of the performance I was well rehearsed although in the corner of my heart, I wished I’d little more time to fine tune the items. Be it performance, exams or client presentation, no matter how well one is prepared, there is always room for perfection – man the insatiable animal…..:)

It was a usual bright and a busy morning and by noon the weather turned turtle. Suddenly there were thick grey clouds and the skies opened up. It poured, poured and poured. By evening I was worried for obvious reasons and the disappointment of audience absence. Audiences are the prized possessions of we performing artists.

After the customary welcome, I was about to start my performance in the inside auditorium, when the temple head announced that the rain had stopped completely so all cultural programmes shall be shifted to the open auditorium. I was thrilled. But only after I performed an hour later I realized what it is like to perform in an open audi after rain. The carpets on the stage were totally drenched in rain. My every footstep created a small fountain by itself which was very uncomfortable. The sound system was in a playful mood too. To cater to a big crowd of around 500 people, there were multiple loudspeakers which were echoing back and it was an effort to synchronize to a single sound. By the mid of second item, it started drizzling and the audience got restless. I’d to end the program half way through since it was already late, thanks to the delay by the rain-god. My hardwork was wasted. The program was disheartening despite that performing in an open place with cool rain-kissed breeze cant be penned but is to be experienced.

At the end of all this I still feel “only if I’d got to complete my program!”………….. man the insatiable animal…. :)

Un refusable Offer...:)

Its quite rare that a good book has been translated to a good movie. There are many illustrations in Hollywood to support this point. For ex the movie Da Vinci Code did no justice to the book… considering the craziness that book created ! Or take The Bourne identity…the book is amazing and the movie by itself is good......... although the gist remains the same, deviations are found. Movies like The Firm, Air Force One are a few exceptions which follow the book.

Among all these “books made into movies” ritual, one which adheres to the tradition is “Godfather”………….. I finally got myself to watch the first part of this movie over the weekend…. well if u r thinking “what took me this long to watch GODFATHER !!”….. well then let me introduce u to my ever procrastinating self. The way I got to read this book was funny actually. First time I heard of this book was when in college…… the whole mafia description abt the book put me off … although all my fnds had good things to say abt the book !…. But 2 years bak when I’d a leg injury and was confined to bed for a few days… the only book I’d to pass my time with was godfather...and it did captivate me immediately!

Now that I’m in a spree of watchin ol’ classic English flicks… godfather was one among them.
This flick is virtually the book itself in action.... expressive and descriptive. When comparing a book to a movie, I sometimes feel when we get engrossed in a movie, we fail to recognise the subtle descriptions mentioned in the book. But in godfather I noticed all the subtlities… maybe bcos the author Mario Puzo has done a part of screenplay along with the director Francis Ford Coppola. Movie is marked with powerful performances by Marlin Bando and Al Pacino..... nothing too boisterous but just a silent yet impactful dialogue delivery. Al Pacino’s performance is very convincing... he conveys a hundred thoughts thru his eyes.
Although it has been 2 years of me having read the book… as the movie unfolded, the characters and the story came flooding bak to me…. It surprises me specially owing to the memory power I’ve ! But the last scene of Kay going to the church with her mom-in-law is skipped. Nevertheless the movie is just perfect…..

And this was my first movie whr I saw Al Pacino so young and swear it… he is truly handsome… Italian men, famous for their looks :)
On the whole be it the book or the movie The Godfather experience makes me go into a trance.

Soapy Impact...:)

Has a TV soap ever inspired you?..... and that too when it is a daily soap!!
Well with a zillion TV channels trying to prove their mettle, the quality of serials has been deteriorating, thanks to Ekta Kapoor's revolutionary or should I say evolutionary mega serials.....well! Gonna are those days when every serial on Doordarshan was a gem! Even the simple chitrahaars and rangoolis were eagerly awaited. But days now, I switch on the TV, aimlessly surfing channels and endup seeing nothing completely! But among all this mess, offlate I've started watching a daily soap diligently and that has actually impacted me !

"Manthana" telecasted on a daily basis in ETV Kannada is a serial with brains! Its protagonists are mainly the females (NO!...not the Ekta Kapoor heroines) and have got a slight feminist angle to it. But looking at the problems women face in today's world, there is a necessity for every female to have a small degree of feminism in herself. The script is evidently a compilation of pragmatical and the rational problems faced by a woman in balancing her professional and personal lives.

Story goes something like this: A commissioner in the Income Tax Dept set out to do her duty honestly encounters tough resistance. A lady when young took to a thorny path, now cant think of heading back but struggles to reach the destination. A daughter whose family life has been anything but peaceful. A wife’s dilemma whether to back the son or the husband. Well these stories might be a common affair but the beauty of the serial is the simplicity in which these are portrayed. The script raises the problems like boulders but tactfully they are reduced to pebbles. It brings about the individuality in every person and no matter how close you are to a person, you have no right to humiliate that individualism. And when such an individualism is provoked, the person stands up straight and bites you back.

My favourite character in the serial is ShivShankarReddy, as an illiterate but a shrewd and a cunning businessman. For a debut in direction, Mr.Sethuram has done a fantastic job. The USP of this serial are the dialogues which are witty one-liners - concise and powerful.

It illustrates the fact that shortcuts to fame are shortlived and it defines practicality in simple terms…….... listen to your heart but follow your mind because your heart can only feel and not think!..........:)