Ripples on the brain

Bhaktaswara Bhajan Mandali
I had probably an overdose of music in the past week. Attended the 19th interschool Bhaktaswara Bhajan Mandali competition at Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in Mylapore last Saturday. This is a very prestigious group bhajan competition open to all schools in Tamil Nadu. I have been a spectator to this event for some 2-3 years. Having missed it for quite some time, it was great to watch it - the intensity of the competition, the best talent, the strategies etc.

The competition is usually held for 2 days - one Saturday for the prelims and the next Saturday for the semis and the finals. It’s usually held as a day-long event on both the days. Obviously “All are welcome” (this is a very important term rasikas in Chennai look for whenever they search for concert listings in newspapers ) and food is on the house. I attended only the finals (i.e afternoon session of the final Saturday) of the event as I had to play in a company cricket match last Saturday. This way I got to view the best teams perform.

First things first. The spirit of the competition has been maintained for the last so many years. You can feel it as you enter the hall, the confidence and the tension. In that sense, I was a little sad that my school, KV IIT, didn’t participate this time - I could’ve got an opportunity to see them devise strategies and practice first hand. The strategies are important to choose the right song at the right moment. This depends on the mood of the audience, the prior song (generally a fast paced song followed by a slow bhajan will be a good combination), the percussionists’ skill and so on.

In the earlier years I’d gone there, I could see a definite difference between the standards of the top-performing teams and the other ones. This year, I could see that that difference has diminished. All the schools in the finals (some of whom I haven’t heard before) with the exception of one sang exceedingly well. But unfortunately, in closing this gap, the schools have copied each other to such an extent that the competition has turned out to be monotonous after sometime. Same kind of start, same kind of lead singers, same kind of ending and so on. This is probably something that teams have contemplate. They have to bring some innovation - somethings I could think of are parallel singing in different swaras, use instruments like violin, and so on.

Still this competition is something I am going to look forward to every year.

Abhaswaram Ramji’s Isai Mazhalai
I had a chance to see this troupe perform for the first time last thursday after having heard about them for quite sometime. For starters, Ramji has got a troupe of school children who give concerts. They sang the Pancharatna kritis of Thyagaraja. Though some members in this group sang well (I had already seen some of them singing in the Bhaktaswara competition itself), I really felt the performance on-the-whole was below my expectations. These days, the kids that sing on stage have set such high standards that you begin to expect them to sing well everytime. More so with Ramji’s troupe simply because of the publicity he’s generated for it. In that sense, the kids seemed to sing without any concentration - one could see them looking in all directions, switching off and then switching on after sometime, missing some sagathis. It clearly showed that they lacked practice and the motivation (obviously they are not to be blamed. They probably came there after finishing their day at school and would have to go back and do their home works etc.)

Still their performance was enjoyable. Remembering the order of the swaras, I believe, is difficult in the Pancharathna kritis, especially if you’re singing all of them at the sametime. The kids did a wonderful job of singing all of them at the sametime.

Unnikrishnan
He’s one of my favourite singers. I have a lot of his cassettes and somehow I learn the songs I hear him sing sooner than I learn the others’. His voice is absolute magic, especially his range. There is a lot of difference between his concerts and TM Krishna’s concert that even a layman like me can spot. I couldn’t stay till the concert ended as I’d to travel a long distance back home.

All in all, a wonderful week of music.

Thanks to Ram, I witnessed an excellent concert at Chettinad Vidyashram Sabha yesterday. This is a new sabha started (only yesterday) on the premises of Chettinad Vidyashram school off Santhome Road.

TM Krishna, Nagai Muralidharan on the violin, Guru Karaikudi Mani on the mridangam, and Suresh on the ghatam made my evening. I have heard a lot about TMKrishna from my friends and I became a fan of his even before watching him in a concert. After his performance yesterday, I understood what my friends meant. His raaga alapanas were so divine that even a novice like me couldn’t but be touched. His tukkadas were amazing and the packed crowd really enjoyed them. I cannot forget the way TMK spotted the mood of the crowd and gave a hint of his next song “Eppo varuvaro“. It created a buzz in the crowd and some oldies started clapping even before he began singing that song. TMK has a base voice that continues to stay with you even after the concert ends.

A special mention needs to be made of guru Karaikudi Mani. Admittedly I have not attended a lot of concerts. Nevertheless, I’ve never seen someone playing so well on the mridangam. What a pace! He packed so much within one beat that, I could hardly believe this man just had 10 fingers. When he was playing alone for around 15 mins in the concert, TMK almost forgot that he was the singer and enjoyed KM so much. All in all, an enthralling exhibition of the purest form of Carnatic Music.

Is blocking of blogspot by the India government a response to the lack of response from Google to the innumerable requests from the President/Army chief/ISRO chief to block some sensitive defence establishments being shown through Google Earth? By blocking blogspot.com, the government has virtually forced exodus of bloggers to other blog hosting sites.

Though the decision of blocking blogspot.com in India seems ludicrous at the moment going by the means the government adopted, I think the reaction from the blogging community has also been way too much. I know that some people consider blogging and blog-browsing an important part of their daily activity, but if the Indian government has considered blocking them for security purposes, I think the bloggers can wait for a few days before raising a storm over it.

My memory goes back by a couple of years when one of my colleagues’ mother was diagnosed with cancer. My colleague was working in Chennai, but her parents stayed in Kashmir. After the diagnosis, her father wanted to take a second opinion and consider bringing her to Chennai or some other place for treatment as the doctors there had declared that she wouldn’t survive beyond 30days. My colleague approached some hospitals in Chennai and they suggested sending the scan report of her mother through fax as soon as possible given the severity of the first diagnosis so that they can look at any possible treatment. But STD/ISD/PCO/FAX and probably internet were banned in Kashmir at that time to avoid communication between the millitants and there was no way they could take a second opinion. Though many of us tried some other ways of passing the scan report as soon as possible to Chennai it didn’t work out and sadly the mother died within the 30-day deadline.

I am sure bloggers don’t need to blog as much as my colleague needed a FAX machine that day. The government would have definitely considered the pros and cons before making the decision. It might turn out to be a completely wrong decision in the end, but my only advice to the fellow-bloggers is to just be a little patient for a couple of days.

After I studied at the ISB, whenever I attend a family function or a get-together, the fees at ISB becomes an important part of the discussion. I attended a cousin’s betrothal function yesterday in Mumbai, where I was introduced to the groom’s parents. The discussion veered to ISB too soon, as expected.

Groom’s dad: What is the fees? I heard it is 11 lakhs.
Me: No it was totally 15 lakhs including the fees and the accomodation. It comes to 16 lakhs this year.

Gd: How was the experience? Is the whole thing worth?
Me: For me it was worth it. I think generally people who have a clear idea of why they need an MBA and what they want to do after an MBA benefit a lot from the program.

Gd: I heard they give laptops and all to their students.
Me: Laptops are compulsory, but we buy them ourselves.

Gd: That 15 lakhs is costly even when you compare US MBAs. If you have a green card, you can do your MBA in $20,000.
Me: Is it? I thought $30,000 was the minimum fees.

Now my uncle, the bride’s father who was watching it joins.
Uncle: If you have a GC, I think it is only $20,000.
Me: Ok, probably. As I said, for me ISB was worth it.
…..

Neither is this the first time, not am I the first ISBian in this situation. Somehow people are caught up with this 15 lakhs figure (either this or the 1 crore salary, but 1 crore has now faded in the public memory I think). I am sure I’d asked the same question, if I was on the other side. I don’t know if they expected me to provide any justification for the 15 lakhs, but I didn’t care to provide one.

In these circumstances, I honestly don’t know whether to respond or not. Obviously a conversation of this nature is too short for me to explain anything.

Last week I had a chance to sit with my manager and clearly draw the contours of my role. We had an open discussion about how I can add value to the account and I presented the ways in which I can contribute. I was very satisfied with the outcome of the meeting and with the way the whole meeting went. Though it is still loosely defined, my role offers me tremendous scope if I put my heart and soul into it. Let us see how it spans out in the next few months.

Ramkumar has saved us the effort to write about our trip last week by posting the details in three parts here (follow the link in that post for the other parts) so religiously that I suspect he made it to the trip only to find something to write in his blog, just like the newspaper or magazine columnists.

Though I would’ve liked a more adventurous trip (as one of us pointed out, the places that we went were fit for a family trip to show the wife and kids, a piece of history), nevertheless, it was a chance to be with my friends again on a weekend.

Though I actually missed the exact anniversary date, it is still not too late to celebrate one year of my blogging in this space. If I look back, I have not been consistent. I have written in spurts with long gaps in between, as I am doing even now. But I feel that exactly depicts me - though I strive to be, I have never been regular. So…let’s see how long this continues.

For the last two days, all the news channels looked like vultures to me, feeding on the dead bodies of the Mumbai public. What a way to do business! Phrases like “Police told CNN-IBN”, “In a exclusive interview to NDTV” were used generously while reporting the misery. I think there should be a re-look into the news channels already existing and ban some if required. In one of his recent blogs, Rajdeep had argued that if only these new channels had been available in 1992, Babri Masjid demolition could have been avoided. I was like “Oh yeah! why couldn’t you stop Gujarat? How responsible of your erstwhile colleague, the award winning journalist Barkha Dutt, who reached one of the localities just after hooligans torched it to ask the residents ‘Aapko kaisa lag raha hai?’!”. What do these channels think they are doing? Public service?

“Do you think Manmohan should go. SMS 6868.” As if based on the SMSes, these guys are going to evict him from the PM’s chair. Wonder if somebody really SMSes them or they make up the numbers. Then there are channels like Star News. I still cannot pardon myself for watching a piece of news in that channel that talked about how statistics proved that after Chappell took over as the coach, Pathan’s performance as a bowler had dropped - In 25 matches before Chappell’s entry, he had taken 11 wickets, but in 25 matches after Chappell took over he could manage only 10 (I might have got the numbers wrong, but believe me, it was this ridiculous!)!. All the channels invariably kill English both on TV and in their websites (I’m probably overdoing this news channel bashing, but to me the news channels seem to be worse than the millitants at the moment). It is amazing that all of them speak in the same way - they don’t pause at the end of a sentence, pause at somewhere in the middle, no modulation in the voice - the words come out as if they are in a haste to make it before the next pause, the reporters at the locations are invariably agitated and they cause a commotion in the place surrounding them (in fact the police end up managing the camera men before reaching out to the people in distress).

And now a new way to show the misery - praise the people. “The spirit of Mumbai”, “Resilience of Mumbai”. What resilience? If there’s been a bomb blast today and people continue as if nothing happened, that is indifference. Indifference born out of helplessness. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not blaming the people. People are well aware that the next day of bomb blast is not going to be more dangerous than the other days (In fact, the next day might be a little safer). I’m blaming the way they are being portrayed for the benefit of the channels. Did you visit the houses of people who died and saw if their blood-relatives went to office the next day? I received a mail today that talked about the resilience and about the way Mumbai residents are “teaching the terrorists a lesson”. Are they? You dumbos need to first understand that the terrorists are not against the people. They are against the government. The people are being used as tools. The people ought to be angry against the government. What happened to the intelligence? Especially after the large haul of ammunition in Aurangabad just a few days ago.

My mind is probably as messed up as this post indicates. But I’m really angry with the media and the government. Mr.Manmohan Singh, Just how many of these do you need to convince yourself that you are incompetent? Stop bowing to every other member of your coalition. Just resign and leave it to someone else.

One of my friends has his engagement today and again a pattalam descended on Chennai. That enabled me to plan something yesterday evening for all of us (not that I needed them to decide what I wanted to do this weekend). I had already decided that I would definitely watch the play “The cut of Hamlet”. This is my first play of the Evam group and in fact my first brush with the English theatre and I was planning for this ever since I read reviews of the play in the Hindu and Express last week.

The auditorium was very good though we didn’t get a chance to check its acoustics. The actors rendered dialogues on top of their voices without microphones - a good decision since mikes will hinder the free movement of the actors - an important aspect of the play. From the reviews, there were somethings that I already knew about the play - that the actors were going to use the entire auditorium (and not the stage alone) and that the audience will be involved during the course of the play.

The play itself is split into two - “The Cut”, which was like an unconventional play before the actual one, “Hamlet”. The main actors (three of them) surface during the start of the play supposedly planning to do the Hamlet when one of them, referred to as TMK, decides to run away from the stage. Karthik Kumar (one of the reasons I wanted to watch the play was he, for he is my favourite RJ Suchi’s husband. Remember the guy in “Alaipayuthey” who ponnu-pathufies Shalini and says, “Enna achchu, churidhar potta appo neria pesineenga, ippo podavai kattina apparam peche varale. Unamaiya sollunga, naa ok ya, ok illaya“? It’s the same guy) chases him and goes out of the auditorium with him. That chase was very funny because it happened in the place where we were sitting. Even as the play began the late comers were still trickling in and as TMK was running out, he caught hold of a guy wearing a Superman t-shirt, as if using him to make good his escape. That Superman was totally caught unawares and he took sometime to realize that this was part of the play! The exit of these two people supposedly gives them the excuse to stage the first play “The Cut”.

“The Cut” was hilarious till it lasted. It was clear that all the actors were amateurs, but they gave an excellent performance. Everybody had a good screen, err… auditorium, presence and definitely charmed the audience. “The Cut” started off on a seemingly serious note, but as it proceeded, it provided for some unadulterated fun. The whole play was based on the concept that the players act in a play which is directed as a part of another play which itself is directed as part of another play and so on. So everytime some sequence happens on stage, there’s a director who emerges from the audience who points out something from the sequence. As it turns out, that director himself/herself ends up as an actor of another play, playing his part of the director who is directed by another director of play in which he (i.e the first director) acts as a director and this continues. (Well if you didn’t understand it, then I had the same feeling watching the play!). The actors end up forgetting their original identities and try to identify themselves from the script. The idea for this play seems to have been emerged from Shakespeare’s “As You Like It” - “All the world’s a stage and all the men and women are mere players…”. Dialogues started flying thick and fast from all the corners of the auditorium, audience really had to turn 360 degrees to spot the actor among the audience. At the closing stages of the play, the audience was made to guess where the next actor is going to emerge from. Just as I started feeling that it was getting boring, the play ended. The ending was again very hilarious and probably the best part of the play with each actor trying to find an excuse to leave the stage. The actor I liked the most in this part of the play is the tall girl who comes in to replace the bulb in the stage. When the director suggests that she might be offered a role in the next play, the way she looks at the other girl was very funny.

The second play “Hamlet” started after a break. The two actors who fled the stage (okay, one chased the other) return and the three take up all the roles in the play switching from one to another at break-neck speeds. The comfort that the actors had, however, was that if there was an error in the costume or dialogue delivery, they could always make it look intentional. The main theme of this play was also hilarity. Somewhere during the play they also involve the audience, grabbing a girl and then a guy to play a part and then asking entire sections of the audience to deliver dialgues. This part was funny to us again because one of our friends, Kaustabh, was so disgusted with the play that he wanted to run away from the auditorium. Suddenly, Karthik Kumar came down and picked this guy and took him to the stage. This proved to be too funny for the rest of us. . The clear man-of-the-match of “Hamlet” was TKM. I liked the way he renders a long dialogue very fast only for the other guy to suggest that they skip that .

On the whole, the play made us laugh hard till the time we were inside the auditorium. But when we actually thought if it was worth the money we paid, I think we couldn’t justify it. It was funny alright, but there wasn’t anything else to feel satisfied about. My friend put it aptly when he said, “It’s okay I watched it today as it was a good time-pass, but I wouldn’t suggest this to anyone”.