Wellcome 2 itS all gOne pHuT!

So its all going pretty badly. What with the approaching recession, and the drought in your marks, and the general painfulness of it all. In short, its all going phut. So what now? You need some relaxation, some timepass. Some nonsense. Well, you’ve landed up at the right place. Mostly nonsense, partly sense. Think of it as Narendra Modi on acid. Getting laid. At a homosexual rally for minorities.

So, see what you can on this blog, make as much sense out of it as you can. Its been a creative drought for me, this past year. Need to do something about it! I have been writing at a blog before this. It was at www[dot]theportalsofhell[dot]blogspot[dot][com]. Sadly somewhat dark stuff, but some of it is my best writing so far. Some bad memories associated with that blog though, and I had to get out of it, so here I am! 

More to follow, what with the end sems just around the corner, and frustration levels running high! You’ll be seeing more of me, I promise! 

Onward to the future, whatever it may be!

Pt. Tarun Bhattacharya- Artist Interaction at NITK Suratkal

Pt. Tarun Bhattacharya performing the santoor at the SJA, NIT-K on September 6th, 2009, while Pt. Abhijit Bannerjee looks on.

Pt. Tarun Bhattacharya performing Raag Kirwani on the santoor at the SJA, NITK on the 6th of September, 2009.

A small sawaal-jawaab I had with Pt. Tarun Bhattacharya ran somewhat like this:

Sir, what is going on through your mind when you’re playing the alaap?

” I am imagining the notes of the raag, and the picture of the raag. As I play, it is like putting different flowers on a garland. I have to choose between this flower or that, this phrase or the other. At some point, I feel putting this note will give it a feeling of happiness, while at another, a sensation of sadness. As I go along, I am painting the picture of the raag for the listener. That is the meaning of Alaap. Alaap means parichay, an introduction of a new person.”

So is the picture the same everytime you play?

“Not at all! Everytime I play, I bring something new and different to the raag. Two renditions of the same raag are never the same. Each time, I paint a slightly different picture in my mind. It is like this: If I were to introduce you to a group of people, I would say majorly the same things, your name is so-and-so, you study in NIT, etc. But the minor details will be different, some new things will be brought out one day, while something else would be forgotten if I were to do the introduction a second time. And it would yet be different if I were to introduce you a third time and so on. The same with the raag and its alaap, its parichay (introduction).“

Then when you do a recording, wouldn’t it take that fluidity away from the raag? The fact that one cannot define it? Do you do any special preparation before a recording, so as to make sure you bring out all the nuances of the raag in that one sitting?

“Yes, its true we give it one defination in the recording, but it cant be helped. And no, we do nothing different before a recording. You saw me before the concert, hum ne kuch nahi kiya, bus aaye aur bajaya. There can be no preparation for playing at this level, one just is ever ready.”

And from the group interaction:

“Today I was very happy with the concert today. The crowd was very vocal with their appreciation. Even though you did specify that the audience was not to clap during the piece, there was a lot of it. I am not completely against it, but there is a good and a bad side to it. We are a very vocal society, we like to express what we are feeling when we are feeling it, not later. Also, music is about relaxation, and expressing that peace one experiences. Clapping is a form of that expression. But the bad side is that one may miss some music in the period that the clapping dies down, since the musician never stops for the applause.” “There was a school where I performed once. The principal there told the students there, that they were not to clap during the performance. Instead, they were to wave their hands if they wanted to appreciate the performance. At the end of the performance, one of the students asked me, “Sir, you are expressing your happiness through your music. But why should we not be allowed to express our happiness?” “

Of Kasab and Kollege

So the blinking cursor syndrome hits again. Too many days have passed since I last wrote, and the rust is beginning to fill my fingers. So its best I break a few knuckles, and then this keyboard. Oh the joys of using my roommate’s laptop. So, let’s hit it off on the random thoughts, while the clock on the wall counts down the half hour I have to can this post, and make it to class in time.

It’s barely been two weeks in college, and yet I can’t bring myself to settle down. There is something about the long vacation and the travelling I invariably end up doing in it, which arouses a nomadic spirit in me which doesn’t die down till the middle of October. Oh well. Hope to go travelling soon, if only to attend blood donation camps in the middle of Western Ghats, where the only benefactors will be slimy leeches. Bring it on!

The Politically correct paragraph:

Like this semester has its own assortment of mentally imbalanced imparters of education. One gentleman, who in every sense of the word is a sajjan, a person who causes no intentional harm to anyone in around him. His humbleness is de-motivating. His teaching style revolves around the concept that he is a self-admitted bogus teacher, and he has been sent by the department as they could not find anyone else. He is famously said to have heard a long doubt posed by one of the students (who rambled away for over a minute), scratched his stubble, and said, “yes, you may be right”, and, looking sufficiently dreamy and glassy eyed, walked away.

There must have been some reminder service which beeped sometime back, which someone was supposed to have read. Only they just shut it off and went back to sleep. Too bad the reminder read “Renew cricketers contracts today.” For someone used to shutting off his alarm and oversleeping, this is excusable. But not at the cost of losing a Test Match to Bangladesh.

Like our dear friend Mr. Kasab has just grown very fat and media friendly in his 9 month stay in Mumbai. There must be some part in his training, how to get the Indian media to hang on to his every word. An extract  from that award winning book: “How to be a terrorist-celebrity”.

1. Speak of simple things. Don’t venture out into the territory of Islamic superiority, the justification of Jehad, position of women in society, and other related topics. You’ll just be sidelined. They have enough people saying that in their own country, to start bothering about an upstart Paki. While some of the newspapers lack the intelligence required to read it.
2. Keep conversation on weather, food, language, cigarettes. Keep an eye on local festivals and customs, and make sure you include them in your daily sound bytes. Ask someone to tie you a rakhi, just for effect.
3. The Indians are very homely people. (For further proof, see any TV channel.) Speak (or invent, as necessary) as many stories of domestic strife as you can. They will start to sympathise and understand you.
4. Trials in India, unlike ones in Pakistan, drag on for decades. (the trials in Pakistan end in military coup.) So, enjoy your stay, because you won’t be coming back for a while. Oh, and we’d have kidnapped your parents so, in case you didn’t kiss your mommy goodbye, well. Too bad.

Well, thats it for today. As they say in those animation films from many springs ago,

That’s All Folks!!!

Travelling in the Ganga valley

A few random thoughts while travelling along the Bhagirathi river and Gangotri glacier. (All my own work):

At Haridwar, we were witness to many an endearing offering. In  a little plate made with thick green leaves of lily, are placed 3 large beautiful flowers. A few dollops of camphor and this unlikely ship is sent off on its journey towards the seas. Its fuelled by the dreams of the people sending them, and of course the rapids of the Ganga. Which even at 300 metres above sea level, retains a large amount of the ferociousness and the devil may care attitude, which we were to see many times in the days to come. Sadly, not many escape the rapids, and capsize just a few metres down the way. Mercifully  it’s just out of sight of the devotee by then.

Like the Lord of the Rings should have been shot on the Himalayas. Scratched by landslides, weathered by storms and ice, and a loud and mighty river cutting right through the middle of it, with or without consent. The faces of the mountains in the Western Ghats and the Deccan Plateau at large, one notices a certain benign and gentle look about them. Like little mishappened eggs. The ones out there have no such pretensions. They are gnarled, gashed, and riddled with scars of battle. Obscured by clouds, their majesty only increases as one’s eyes travel up their misty heights. Last, but not the least, they have the experience in playing out such sagas. In the first ever epics, long before the imagination Tolkein was engineered in a German factory.

The Gomukh glacier is an eerie place. The sound of water rushing through it all around you, but your vision of stones scattered in a careless manner. Big stones and bigger stones. And then some small stones, if u can see a little closer. All on a bed of ice, a few hundred metres thick. If that helps in imagining what I’m trying to picturise. And thats a bird’s eye view.

Get on top of the glacier itself, and it gets eerier. Stones go scurrying down slopes of ice over a hundred feet tall. The smaller ones are the size of a basketball. The larger ones the size of a Toyota Innova, only many times the mass. Oh, here they go again.

A glacier is the perfect place to observe Chaos Effect in live action. One walks on a mixture of stones, boulders and sand peppered with shavings of mica. And not one of these is stationary. Its a bit like that game on Takeshi’s Castle, where you have to jump over large stones made of plaster of Paris kept floating on a lake, only much more dangerous. Though this isn’t half bad, all you get  a drubbing. On the glacier, you have to painfully extricate your foot from under a ton of stones.

Who ever knew that lack of oxygen casn be an extremely potent drug? Just a little less oxygen than you’re used to at home, is enough to send your head spinning and your brain starts thinking off jumping off the six foot wide ridge you are ridiculously perched on (ironically to gather a breather). Into a vast moving glacier, some five hundred feet below, just for the pure fun of it. Boy. Try it at your own risk.

Not that walking on ice itself if a lot better. It has the appearance of white furry fur from afar, but (as one must expect) it isn’t. Its a few feet thick at best, and a few inches thick most of the time. But you really can’t tell the difference. So one spends half one’s time getting out of knee deep ice, some trying to get a move on, and a lot of time in catching one’s breath. Quite frustrating, I assure you.

And getting out of knee deep ice is not as easy as it sounds. Ice packs itself around your foot with the consistency of pavement cement. And quite probably, when you try to use your hands to hoist yourself up, your hand go inside too. And there’s a high chance that if you’ve got your left leg ensnared in the most savage trap you can find, when you try to use the right to get out, that one will sink too. And you’re on your buttocks on ice at 19000 feet, with the option of mobility taken away from you.

After a while on the Kalindi Khal trail, it becomes quite difficult to have random thoughts. Oxygen starved, mentally drained, there is only one thought that strikes your head repeatedly, continuously, without stop, that of reaching camp. Bangalore, NITK, Mumbai, all silently recede away into nothingness. All you can see is your feet hitting the ground endlessly.

And for a final random thought: I met a small fellow at Haridwar. He looked like a typical street urchin. At 8 years and around 2 feet, what he owned was what he wore: a pair of shorts. He came up to me while I was drinking a cup of tea with a pilgrim. At the Haridwar Railway station, close to midnight. While hundreds of people asleep or chatting away the time to their train, in a large open space inside the station. He wanted a cup of tea, and surprisingly didn’t put on the usual beggar look when he asked for one. And he asked the pilgrim, (who was a farmer from Haryana) not me. Possibly he felt that I’d be the kind who wouldn’t encourage begging (and I don’t). Then we got chatting with the little chap, Chotu. The pilgrim’s two brothers also joined us.

Chotu was filled with an enthusiasm that one wouldn’t normally associate with a child of his background. Or whether one associates anything in the family of feelings in the first place. He told us that he was from a village in Bihar, and that his parents had thrown him out of the house. He said this with a matter of fact tone, which one normally uses for leaving the home in the morning. He told us of his travels all over North India, using trains for transport and as  a place to stay. He described, with great detail and panache, how he beat up a fully grown robber who tried to steal some of his money. With action replay! He proceeded to swagger around the porch, shouting “Sub ki gaand marvaunga!”

It is with a snobbish air after all, that we speak of the Other India. The India in slums and villages, those who live on less than a dollar a day. For it we who are the other India. They form the larger majority, they service our lives in many ways, and are always invisible while they’re at it. Or we choose to make them invisible. It is we who are the other India.

A small hiatus

So I’m gonna be off for a little while. The mountains call again! We’re off to the romantic sounding Kalindi Khal pass, perched at 19500 feet. A walk on the Shweta Glacier and views of snow capped peaks all around, its quite an adrenaline rush! Will write with pictures when i return till then, Khuda Hafiz!

MET: Mumbai Entrance Test

There must be some sort of ogre manning the gates of Mumbai. When you enter, he would ask: “Wherefore and what business do you, meager soul of the outer world, have in the poor man’s city of India?”

There is no forecast, no regular way of knowing what the city has to offer you, and the ogre surely doesn’t give the slightest sign. But just talking to him fills your heart with dread, and the reminder that your less than a cog in a big machine, indeed, the machine would not even realise your absence, or presence. It fills you with awe and despair. There is a dank and depressing odour in the air, as you realise just how slow you are in understanding and keeping pace just with the simplest things you are accostumed to performing: breathing. It makes a noise like a hundred local trains pulling into Victoria Terminus all at once, just to bring you back with a jolt, to the city of Mumbai.

And then, with all this (and lots more, depending from where you are) filling your head and chasing its own tail round and round in circles, the ogre asks you another question: “Rich or poor?” For there are only two religions in Mumbai. Well, you may not be really sure where you fit into all this. For the city does sport a wide income range. On the one hand, you have the Tatas and Ambanis and the film stars. And the other hand, the slum dwellers, rag pickers, and so many others. And all the way in the middle, on a delicate bridge across the two hands, millions and millions of other people.

The ogre notes your discomfort in answering this question. He phrases it differently: “Do you or do you not have the capacity to afford a home with a attached toilet facillity?” At this, it all becomes clear. This is the MET. The Mumbai Entrance Test. A test like no other.

The pattern of the test depends on your answer to the above question. If you are poor, you are asked if you can, while fifteen thousand people pass by every 2 mins, can you yank off your pants and do your daily business? Obviously, this is a practical exam.

The test for the rich is even more difficult. They have to watch three hundred and fifty people for every kilometer of the railway track squat down, without flinching. For every working day of the year, come rain or shine. And eventually (though this is not expected of the applicants in the MET) turn a blind eye to them.

Participants who pass the test only are allowed into the city of Mumbai.

There was / is another ogre, who claims to decide entry into Mumbai on one criterion alone. He allows all the  “sons of the soil” only. Thankfully he is also a politician, and does not do much work.

of cricket, cars and companies…

And for today, a few random thoughts, as I watch the second semifinal of the ICC T20 World Cup, where Sri Lanka take on the West Indies.

Like the West Indian National Anthem (no offence, of course) is quite like a Goan song. Since I don’t have the money, I end up in Goa. If I ever do, I should be in Jamaica, drinking Jamaican Rum. Good stuff, not that gunk we’re sold here. Its as good as battery water.

Like the reason why we were kicked out of this T20 World Cup was because we got too involved with communicating with the media about what a great team we were, and how we were taking every game seriously, and forgetting to do just that. And that the IPL didn’t matter, one way or other. South Africa, the Windies and Lanka have done well in the World Cup, with players in the IPL, while Pakistan watched the IPL from the comfort of their hotel rooms and did equally well. And Dhoni would have done well to ignore the media. Just for once. And ignore the Times of India all the time.

Like Bombay is a dirty city. No two ways about it. There’s just too many people, and too little toilets. That image from Slumdog? The one where he jumps into a huge pile of human muck. Thats not too far away from the truth, whether they like to admit it or not.

Like the guy who invents a little bit of code which turns the TV on mute for the duration of the ads, and cranks up the volume when the match comes back on, will make millions of rupees and enemies overnight.

Like everyone is trying to jump on to the animated ambassadors brigade, after the Vodafone Zoozoos we have Virgin Telecom with their own thingabobs. But why? Is it that difficult to be original?

Like Indians are suddenly on the world map, because they’re still spending all over the place. Be it in Australia on education, or in their own homeland. Bankrupt General Motors refuses to give up in India, releases new scheme to woo Indians to their Spark. We’re here for you. Here for India. So they say. But I’m gonna stick my neck out and say that Indians are not going to go for such a ridiculous campaign. In the land where Maruti still rules supreme, a foreign company will always find it difficult. A US company which is facing bankruptcy? They can just pack their bags and go home. Or wherever they have left to go when the banks take back the homes that they bought when they were worth millions of American dollars and are now worth millions of Zimbabwean dollars.

Like the Times of India has become really horrible. These days when they can’t find either articles or ads, they just reprint yesterday’s articles. I hear they’re planning to come out with a “India’s heaviest paper” campaign. Not intellectually, of course. More the amount of junk that they can print, and they dont bother to compress it into the amount of space it deserves: the area of a tissue paper.

Like if you are ever in the vicinity of Worli in South Mumbai, make sure you catch the fresh cream eclair at City Bakery. Surely one of those things you would die for, though I have never met someone who would actually do so. Only make fantastic promises about dying for something, and giving an arm and a leg for something else. When you do give an arm and a leg, its always for a need much more basic than all those fancy things.

And for a final thought:

Its not what about what you say. Its always about who you are. When you’re looking through the Quotable Quotes page in the Digest, you first glance at the name of the chap who said it, then what he said. So I satisfy your urge to read some words of wisdom from someone more knowledgeable than myself:

“Quitting smoking is simple. I have done it thousands of times. ” So said Mr. Mark Twain.

French open 2009.

So a post which I have sadly not had the time to write for some time. And as is the rule with all lazy writers, the article which is (hopefully) their entry ticket into Sports Illustrated, when finally written turns out to be quite the damp squib. But then again, compulsion drives us to drive out the words. So here goes (nothing):

So we have come to the end of the French Open. Finally, a eventful open on a surface which looks like actual tennis is being played too. For however popular the hard courts may seem, they just don’t have what the natural surfaces offer: a sort of living, breathing feeling to the game being played. But I digress. Well, the most major upset, the one which kick-started endless speculation, was the 3^rd round exit of 4 time French Open winner Rafael Nadal, to Swedish upstart and 23^rd seed Robin Soderling. Immediately, the rumor mills were whirring away, even as Nadal walked off in a huff from center court. Will Federer break his French Open jinx, and take his 14^th career Grand Slam? And also win all the 4 majors, becoming only the sixth player in the world to do so?

So in hindsight, Federer had a comfortable ride to the finals. He took on Tommy Haas, Gail Monfils and del Potro, reasonably good competition on their days, but unable to give Federer the fight he deserved, the rattling he needed. So to the finals Federer marched, to take on Nadal’s latest enemy, Soderling. Sure, beating Soderling was, in some minds atleast, as good as beating the Spanish maverick himself. But it wasn’t. As is the case with all finals, the French Open 2009 finals turned out to be quite a tame affair. Federer won in straight sets, but surprisingly not a single break point offered thoughout large parts of the game, including the entire second set. And as is the case with all world domination stories except Mr. Calvin of course, this one too is heading for a horrible and boring ending. Oh, whats the use, Mr. Federer?

In the words of Bobilly Vijay Kumar, Soderling lost the French Open. But Federer didn’t win it, not by a long mile. It is only when he beats Nadal, after five hours of grueling tennis in the wine red hallows, can he be said to have won the French Open.

IPL Progress Report 2012

2008: Lalit Modi shuts a lot of traps, IPL success. Everybody makes a lot of money, from Lalit Modi (who no-one had heard of) to the news channels (who no -one was watching) to Yuvraj Singh. I was wondering why I wasn’t one of those getting some money.

2009: IPL “runaway success”. India shows its “level” by hosting Indian Premier League in another country. Lalit Modi showers moolah in $s to South African charities, shows (near) mandatory Corporate Social Responsibility. Clearly doesn’t believe in “Charity Begins at home”. Gives news channels something different to show after non stop recession blues stories. And I’m not even going to begin to guess what Aaj Tak and its cousins are broadcasting.

2010: IPL explores continents, plans to touch every continent including Antartica by 2015. 2010 IPL conducted in Buffalo, Lalit Modi seen shoving finger up Mr. President’s. Combined spending on players crosses NASA funding. New teams included: Gujarat Shining, Kanpurr Kats, PoK militants. Guesses for the winners?

2011: IPL interest fading, claims that it is too long. Veterans M S Dhoni and R P Singh, among others, clamour for purity of game. Desparate Modi tries Hawaii, unable to find large enough ground space uninterruped by hot mud supply. Settles for Goa as new venue, but the Goans don’t give a damn.

2012: IPL put on hold as cricket undergoes upheaval, emerging form of game a much shorter version of the game, f5, a five over version.

Obama’s Victory Speech: Shades of John Steinbeck?

Congratulation, Dear World. Today, you have a new President.

Today, a different kind of man ascends the throne of the world. He has fought hard to get where he has gotten, doubtless.  In a very short time, he has made a huge mark on the American consciousness. It was only 1996 when he became the senator of Illinois. After serving 3 terms there, he stood for elections to the US Senate in 2004 and won. And today, the 5th of November 2008, Barack Hussein Obama II has become the President of the USA.

In a stirring speech given in Chicago soon after the announcement of the results, Obama speaks volumes of the kind of leader he aspires to be.  He makes continous referances to the various ethnicities which live in the country, and yet have never got their due merit when it came to the credits. It is reflective of

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkivebeentothemountaintop.htm

And also, remarkably like a long forgotten writer of theland of America, John Steinbeck, who wrote about everyday characters and their problems in an everyday world. Much like R K Narayan. Obama not just referenced the American common man, but also sounded like he was lifting lines off Steinbeck, especially these words:

It was built by working men and women who dug into what little savings they had to give five dollars and ten dollars and twenty dollars to this cause. It grew strength from the young people who rejected the myth of their generation’s apathy; who left their homes and their families for jobs that offered little pay and less sleep; from the not-so-young people who braved the bitter cold and scorching heat to knock on the doors of perfect strangers; from the millions of Americans who volunteered, and organized, and proved that more than two centuries later, a government of the people, by the people and for the people has not perished from this Earth. This is your victory.

P.S. this is a draft which i dug up, was supposed to go up a long while back. So dont go off telling everyone I live in a time warp!

On interaction with Rama Vaidyanathan, Bharatanatyam exponent

A memorable day for this writer was a sunny day in January, when he trudged in the hot sun on an empty stomach for yet another artist interaction at the guest house. It was an unusually timed interaction, (most interactions being in the evening, after the concert and dinner). The artist, a Bharatanatyam exponent, was schedued to perform at the SJA the following evening.

The artist was Rama Vaidyanathan. As all our artists, she was a globe trotter, with a packed international schedule. She is a well known and accomplished dancer, having been on the stage for twenty years. She started learning the Bharatanatyam at the tender age of 8, and took the decision to perform as a career at eighteen, and she has never looked back. She had performed in Moscow, the West Indies, Europe, and a plethora of other venues across the world. And like many others, she had descended on our college through Spic Macay.

The interaction with Rama Vaidyanathan was, however, well worth the hot walk to the Guest House. It started on predictable lines, with Subhashini make the first brave foray. Slowly we all got warmed up, and the unique place of Bharatanatyam in the Indian Classical Dances was apparent. Her knowledge of the world in general, and especially of the various facets of her art was terrific. Her attitude of openness towards all facets of her art was refreshing. She spoke unabashedly of the sexuality in Bharatanatyam. More specifically, she spoke on the Shrungar Bhakti pieces, which speak of the love between Krishna and Radhika, which was at once spiritual and sexual. She told us of her first experience with a Shringara piece, at the age of 10, when she could hardly interpret the meaning of the piece, and her growing familiarity with it as the years went along. She told us to watch out for a line from a piece she was to perform the following evening, in which Radhika questions Krishna on his coming late to her home. She notes his puffy eyes and tousled hair, and comes to the (correct) conclusion that Krishna had spent the night with another woman. The dancer, portraying Radhika, questions an imaginary Krishna repeatedly regarding his whereabouts, and her performance of this piece was beyond comparison. It was a lesson not just for the dancers amongst us, but also the actors, for its rich abhinaya or acting. On her many repititions of the line, not once did she use the same expression or movement. The line was portrayed in various moods and degrees of aggression, which made us associate with the wronged woman’s anguish. She goes on to forgive her lover in the piece.

Rama Vaidyanathan had a modesty not seen in many people of her stature. Her concept of herself and the dance was very clear: she was merely an instrument for the dance. When she performed, the Dance spoke to the viewers, very much like a God speaking through a medium. She narrated a recent incident, when a huge audience in Italy gave her a standing ovation after a performance. But she felt no pride, since she felt that the applause was not for her, but for the Dance itself. She called it the most humbling experience of her lifetime.

The talk got around to big sounding words like Indian Philosophy and so forth. We were speaking on the agnaya chakra. The agnaya chakra is the “The third eye.” Located between the eyebrows, this chakra is the seat of intuition and awareness. Her take on that was very interesting. She said that it denoted the movement of the electron around the nucleus. She went on to say that it was a very fascinating concept, and half the reason it was so was that one did not understand it. Furthermore, to get around to understanding it, one must read about it, and look within oneself for answers (which are hard to find) to questions which are harder to find. Finally, she said that the agnaya chakra was so beautiful that one would “be hit by the concept one fine day, out of the blue”, and nothing could quicken or slow down the process. It was a beautiful way of putting it, that something can be complex that it can take one years to understand it, and are amazed by the brilliance of it when we do comprehend it. There was a silent lesson to be learnt, namely that there are some things which one must find out by oneself, and these cannot be explained by even the learned. It is this path of self discovery which she urged us to tread on.

After all this, I was quite keyed up to watch the concert. And as it was way over my high expectations too! At this point, I would like to highlight the importance of the artist interaction, a vital part of all SPIC MACAY events, which helped us appreciate the art much better. A concert which would have largely gone over this writer’s head, because of intricate movements and a foreign language, was an edge of the seat action event!

The concert was as filled with energy as the interaction. The first piece was a Vrikshanjali, which brought out a comparison between life of a man and that of a tree. To put it in a nutshell, the deeper one explores, the stronger one is. She brought out how this applies for both the tree and man. This was followed by the Varnam, which is the main piece. We saw a lady who is physically attached to Lord Shiva. In the course of the piece, we clearly see the transition of the feelings of the lady from a lustful love to a spiritual love for him. Then followed the aforementioned piece portraying Radhika as the spurned lover. This was followed by the tillana, a lively piece with lots of movement and showcased nrutta or pure dance. This is characterized by a strong rhythm, lack of emotion, and involves making and breaking of geometries in space using quick and razor sharp movements of the body. Her concluding piece was Vande Mataram, as interpreted within the framework of Bharatnatyam, which stirred the soul of the audience.

All in all, it was the most memorable concert of the year for this writer, and will be looking forward to many more such performances in the following year.