2 new things I learnt today

2 items I came across today, which I thought I should record for my own reference later -

1) Michael Lucas's sculpture - 'The Menger Sponge level 3'

Check out this pic (Source).



So that made me look up what is the Menger Sponge? You can read more abt it here.

2) One of my friends updated his facebook status to the following -
THE FACEBOOK TRICK: press up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, b, a, Enter key, then right click and then press up and down and magic circles will appear. The only way to get rid of them are to log off or refresh the page.

I tried it out on Facebook and it really worked and was perplexed why that was so. That is when I learnt from one of my friends that it's the konami code, from an old video game. You can read more about the Konami code here.

Hampi

I recently had to write about one of my travel destinations for my office magazines. Reproducing it here on the blog as well...

Hampi – A UNESCO World Hertiage Site

Last year I travelled to Hampi during the winter and unarguably had one of the most culturally enlightening trips of my life. Hampi is a village in northern Karnataka state, India. It was the 14th-mid 15th century capital of the Vijayanagara empire and is the world's largest living UNESCO heritage site.

The rickshaw ride from Hospet train station will give you hints very early on what’s in store - a temple here, a large rock there. But nothing prepares you for what you see in Hampi - gigantic boulders arranged as if with geometric precision, ancient water ways and of course the ruins of temples and palaces, harking back to a magical kingdom that your grandma's stories always began with. By day two of my stay in Hampi, on a ride back to my hotel on a deserted road, I could swear I saw one of those couples etched in stone on a nearby temple scampering across the road.
Though the temple ruins spread across a 26 square kilometre areas date back to the 14 century Vijayanagar empire, the mythology goes back to Lord Shiva and the monkey kingdom of Kishkinda , that features in the Ramayana.

Though nothing – not even the pictures – can put into perspective the sheer grandeur of it all, I am sharing some images below to give an idea of what you can expect when in Hampi.

1) Virupaksha temple


The Virupaksha temple is located at the foot of the hill called Hemakuta hill is the core of the village of Hampi. The temple, often called Pampapathi temple, is the most sacred of the temples of this place. The temple contains the shrines of Lord Shiva, Pampa and Bhuvaneshwari. We were witness to even a small marriage ceremony in the temple precincts when we visited there.

2) Hampi Bazaar

Starting at the entrance of the temple is Virupaksha Bazaar or market, largest of the many bazaars of Vijayanagara. Each major Temple complex had its own bazaar around which a township developed. This is the only bazaar around which a township of a sort still exists. Domingo Paes said of Hampi bazaar in 1520: "There is a very beautiful street of very beautiful houses with balconies and arcades, in which are sheltered the pilgrims that come to the temple"

3) Tribals having their stores and living across Hampi Bazaar

Some structures from Hampi bazaar still survive to this day, but many have been taken over by squatters or hawkers. And, inside a 16th century colonnaded arcade, one is likely to find a tea shop or a telephone booth. Here we see a group of tribal artisans living within the Hampi bazaar

4) Achyutraya temple – View from the Hemakuta hills

Achyutaraya Temple is a large complex built by an officer of the King Achyutaraya, Salakaraju Tirumaladeva.

Following is a view of the temple complex from Hemakuta hills at night time


5) Ugra Narasimha

This image of Lakshmi-Narasimha, popularly called Ugranarasimha, meaning Narasimha of terrifying countenance. Originally, the icon bore a smaller image of Lakshmi sitting on his lap, which fell off due to an act of vandalism and is now housed in the ASI (Archaeological Survey of India) museum in Hampi. Narasimha with an articulately chiseled and well delineated mane and large bulging eyes and broad chest still retains His awesome charm. He is seated on the coils of the snake Adisesha, who rises behind him with seven hoods, which serve as a canopy.

6) Vitthala temple

Any number of words would fail to do justice to this wonderful monument dedicated to Lord Vitthala or Lord Vishnu. Legend has it that Lord Vishnu found it too grand to live in and thus returned to his own humble home. The Vitthala temple respresents the highest watermark of the Vijayanagara style of art and architecture. Vitthala is the Krishna aspect of Lord Vishnu. The cult of Vitthala or Vithoba, originates from Pandharpur in Southern Maharashtra. Although associated today with Krishna, Vitthala was worshipped in pre-Vijayanagara times as a folk god of cattle

7) Stone Chariot

The Stone Chariot is situated inside the Vitthala temple complex. By far, this is the most amazing monument in Hampi and is often portrayed as the icon for Hampi. Stone chariot has stone wheels which some believe actually rotate. The chariot is a miniature temple. It resembles the temple chariots or rathas in which the idols of the temple are taken out on a traditional procession.

8) Lotus Mahal or Kamal Mahal

This two storied palace, is one of the finest examples of Indo-Islamic architecture, with its typically Hindu base and Islamic superstructure. The palace has nine pyramidal cupolas or shikharas on the second story of which the central one is the largest. The patterns on the arches are typically Islamic in influence.


9) Hazaara Raama temple

This temple for Lord Rama is popularly called "Hazara Rama Temple" because of the large number of Ramayana panels on the walls. This temple is believed to have been the private place of worship of the Royal family. The Ramayana epic is carved in detail. Incidents in the story like Dasaratha performing a sacrifice to beget sons, the birth of Rama, his exile into the forest, the abduction of Sita and the ultimate fight between Rama and Ravana are all carved in a vivid manner. In these panels, the story of Rama and through it the triumph of good over evil is brought out.

Kaminey, just good.

If there is anything other producers can learn from Vishal Bharadwaj and the production house UTV motion pictures, it is how to market your movie well. With all the tricks in the book and some out of the box, from expected Shahid-Priyanka romance rumors to pandering to the artsy school of Vishal's followers, the makers got the marketing machinations right. The buzz surrounding the movie in the week upto its release was so great that one and all were awaiting the release of the movie with bated breath. And then God disposed. The swines flew over the Kaminey's nest, and movie halls and multiplexes in Mumbai and Pune were shutdown by the panic stricken city corporations on the same weekend that Kaminey was to be released. Any producer worth his salt will be able to easily rattle off that Mumbai and Pune constitute about 40-50% of any Hindi movie's opening weekend earnings in India. Rumors suggest that the movie might have easily lost about 5-6 crores because it was not showing in these 2 cities in the first 3 days of its release in India. By Monday when the movie released in Mumbai, the reviewers had mostly given the movie positive reviews, but they had also let out considerable plot lines, and the pirates were out with their copies. In short, the movie lost considerable amount of money, and if it were not for the viruses, it could very well have been a runaway hit.

So it was with huge expectations that I set off to see Kaminey after a long working Monday. Even after reaching the movie hall a good 1.5 hrs early to book the tickets, we got tickets just 4 rows away from the screen. And by the time we walked into the theater it was houseful, on a 9.30 pm show on a rainy Monday. Just goes on to show that probably the virus refused to kill the hype created by the movie.

And then the movie starts. And from there onwards begins the downward spiral. Sure the movie is good, but is it great? Na, I beg to differ.

The movie starts well. An excellent plot. Twin brothers from Mumbai slums getting separated during their school days. As expected they are as different as chalk and cheese, with one added twist. One lisps (says 'f' in place of 's'), one stammers. They haven't been in touch with each other for the past 3 years, and then things turn turtle in a span of 24 hrs and they are forced to come to terms with each other. The first 20-25 minutes of the movie is power packed, and if you lose attention, you will be forced to seek clarifications from nearby seats. The movie introduces a slew of characters, all of them more kamina than the other, and that's why the title.

I won't dwell into the storyline. Just suffice it to say that goodie-boy Guddu (the stammering one) needs a huge amount of money to keep his same night wedded Maharashtrian wife Sweety (the Maharashtrian bit is important in the plotline), for which he needs help from cunning-boy Charlie (the lisping one), who quite by accident chances himself upon an illegal drug consignment and has the entire Mumbai underworld and the police behind him. Everyone has a gun, and no one is afraid it fire it. So there are people killing people in every other scene, and you have to keep pace to remember who was the last one killed and by whom. Which is all good, but by the end of the movie, when there are still at least a dozen more characters left who are still ready to be as kamina as it can get, it begins to weigh down on your nerves. There are just too many characters. Except for Shahid, Priyanka and Amol Gupte, there is less screen space for the the director to develop the rest of the characters. They just don't stay enough with you.

Add to that the non-linear writing and the very unpredictable twists and turns. Which is again not bad at all. It reminds you of Quentin Tarantino's style of movie making. And it would come as a shocker to the Bollywood audience, who are used to being treated as an unintelligible species for most of their movie watching lives. So all this is good, but somehow by the time you reach the end of the movie, there has been so many twists and turns that VB had to resort to a forced wrap-up. And that is where probably my biggest disappointment with the movie is. All the characters in the movie indulge in a climactic gang-war which is hugely unconvincing and unintentionally funny at times. It reminds you of the Priyadarshan type of slapstick movies, where in the end everyone ends up dishooming each other. If Priyan does it, the critics pan him. If VB does it, the critics praise him. Partial, I say.

The film's dialogue is top-notch; VB has written some dark, humorous lines. Take the example of the one of the last scenes where Guddu is explaining to Charlie how much he loves his brand new wife and would want Charlie's drug consignment of coke to keep his wife, and in Charlie retaliates "Toh kya meri kokh ujadega?" (kokh-coke kinda analogy)

The movies boasts of stellar performances from all of its lead actors. Shahid Kapur has put on easily the best performance of his life, and in his varied roles as Charlie and Guddu, he brings an amazing range of emotions from innocence to raw sexuality to the table. It was high time he broke away from his chocolate-boy image, and Kaminey was just the kind of movie that would help him move further in an industry which is increasingly looking for younger actors to take the place of its ageing superstar Khans. Priyanka Chopra has another hit and a gem of a movie in her kitty after 2 consecutive hits - 'Dostana' and 'Fashion'. In her role as the feisty and aggressive Marathi mulgi, she initiates sex and abuses her goon of a brother - all in fluent Marathi. Amongst the slew of supporting characters, Amole Gupte stands tall as the 'Jai Maharashtra' chanting Bhope bhau. But it is easy to see him getting slotted in similar kinda roles just like Manoj Bajpai after 'Satya'.

VB again comes across as a very very good music director, and all the songs in the movie are excellent. 'Dhan Te Nan' will probably remain an eternal club favorite, just like 'Beedi' will remain an eternal jhatka-licious favorite from his previous 'Omkara'. And he does a brilliant job incorporating two brilliant RD Burman numbers in the soundtrack - 'Duniya mein logon ko dhoka kabhi ho jaata hai' & 'Do lafzon ki hai'.

In all a good movie, but it comes nowhere close to VB's previous good movies like 'Omkara', 'Maqbool' and even the kiddie movie, 'Makdee'. His last movie, 'The Blue Umbrella', which I didn't watch, also got good reviews. So it was but natural to expect a lot from Kaminey. It's one thing to deliver an excellent take on a solid Shakespearean tale, or a good Ruskin Bond story; its another to pick a script, write a screenplay, and direct it from scratch. Tough ask. The movie doesn't fail or disappoint completely, but it doesn't rise upto all its expectations. If you tone down your expectations, then Kaminey is quite awfome.

Ignite and Pecha Kucha style presentations

We might all have sat through boring presentations in our academic and professional life where the talkative speaker just goes beating around the bush and takes a good 10-15 minutes to arrive at the point. I know I have and have also dozed through many of such presentations. In this age of real-time instant gratification, how can corporate presentations be left behind? So welcome to the new world of presentations, a new style that is creating a buzz around the world - present all your ideas in a slotted time of 5-10 minutes in 20-25 slides or less. This brainwave is said to have started first from the Pecha Kucha style of presentations. In Japanese, Pecha Kucha stands for "chit chat" and the aim is to come to the point as quickly as if you were chit chatting with a friend. Recently Mumbai hosted its first Pecha Kucha night and the newspapers were abuzz with news about the presenters and their topics from that night. The presenters on Pecha Kucha night in Mumbai were mostly from the fields of architecture or design.

Taking a cue from this style of presentation, the IT and business world are also fast moving to adopt a style of brisk paced presentations. "Ignite" nights are being held all over the world and sometime in November 2008 and January 2009, Bangalore held its first two nights of Ignite presentations. The format for the Ignite style of presentations is to present your ideas in 20 slides, at the speed of 15 seconds per slide. That would give each presenter 5 minutes altogether to present their ideas. The presenters for the Bangalore Ignite night spoke about topics very diverse from wildlife to mountain biking. There was not a specified range of areas where the speaker had to limit himself to. The Ignite nights in Bangalore have been a huge success and were followed by Ignite nights in Pune, and there are some networking groups looking to bring Ignite to Mumbai next.

Our firm too started on a similar presentation pattern lately, and to introduce the firm members as to how to get used to a brisk presentation style, we held our first session of 'Lightning talks' similar to the Ignite format yesterday. The firm members had to pool in with their topics and an abstract by a particular date, out of which 10 topics were selected for presentation yesterday. I was one of the selected participants and I spoke on the following topic "Decoding Indian General Elections 2009". Since we were presenting from Mumbai for a worldwide audience and video conferencing options are not that trustworthy given bandwidth issues, we decided to record a video with the presentation playing by the side and send it across for the conference yesterday. Here is a link to the video and here is a link to my presentation (Pls ignore the weird master slide formatting differences coming up on the slides, I didn't have enough time to work on those). Play both of them side by side, and you can see the slides rotating every 15 seconds with the audio output playing simultaneously. I had fun presenting my first Ignite style presentation, let me know what you think.

Teach India: Day 1

Last Saturday was when I began my first set of teaching lessons to students from local language schools ('vernacular' is a cringe-inducing word, I try and avoid it as much as I can). Thus finally ended my month long initiation into the Teach India program. You can call TOI's Teach India campaign a body shopping campaign looking for volunteers to invest their free time teaching under-privileged kids under the aegis of some non-profit NGO working with such kids. After presentations and talks by multiple NGOs, I chose Kotak Education Foundation working in the slums of Bhandup close to where I stay. Two weekends were then spent with the KEF volunteers understanding the background of the kids, what they expect and how to go about it. Finally we started our coaching sessions with the kids last Saturday. I would be responsible in coaching them on English conversational skills. Some points that I noted from day 1:

1) We were specifically instructed to try and weave in Cricket and Movies into every conversation with the kids. Invaluable advice when dealing with them. MS Dhoni is a huge hit with the kids.
2) I realized how huge Shahid Kapoor is. My volunteer partner, Sanyo & I together have been entrusted with 11 kids. 7/11 kids named Shahid Kapur as their favorite actor. Just goes on to show that the Khans and Akshay and Hrithik have grown too old for an upcoming movie generation's tastes, and in all likelihood, will be phased out with the younger lot of actors replacing them. Shahid with his chocolate boy looks and great dancing skills holds maximum potential. If only, he knew how to act.
3) The kids are very undernourished. All kids that we handle are 14 yrs old, but they could easily pass off as 10-11 yr olds in posh India or even younger in the western world.
4) The boys and girls are really shy to interact with each other. When they were asked to sit with each other, the girls sat on one side and the boys on another. When we try to mix up the girls and boys there was much resentment and for the first hour the group exercises yielded no results because the mixed teams refused to interact with each other.
5) Don't get into written English. Spoken English in itself is a tall task, getting into written English would mean much, much more efforts.
6) This exercise also made me realize the price that India has to pay for globalization. A more globalized India means a more 'English' India. A more English India means that most of rural or poorer India would need to learn a foreign language. If not that, then they would be excluded from the benefits that come from globalization. We really need to figure out a more inclusive approach for growth.

My science project from Std V

I recently came across an article that reminded about my school Science project in Std V.

In our elementary school, every winter vacation we had to do a science project, where we had to research on a subject and make a poster, live project, prototype, etc. on some science topic we learnt in school that year. The best of the projects throughout school would then be selected for a project display that year. Of those, couple of good ones would be selected, and sent for further interschool competitions. I guess this was the standard procedure in most of the schools in our area in those days.

Most of my school projects were quite unmemorable. I remember only two, the ones that I had done in Std V and Std VI. Both these projects were selected for the school level display. In Std VI, I made a poster on AIDS. Std VI would mean 1990-1991. Those days I didn't know anything about sex, and had no idea at all about the disease. I had a neighbour who was studying to be a doctor, I referred to many fat books that I borrowed from her, and made a huge poster. Those were the days when no one, I guess not even most of the teachers had heard of HIV or AIDS, and hence there was a huge curiosity about what I had done. The project got selected for the school level display, but as compared to other live, working prototypes, it didn't hold on its own, and sadly I did not make it then to the interschool level.

The earlier year, when I was in Std V, I had learnt about the concept of good and bad conductors of heat at school. So that winter I was wondering whether I could make any science project with the heat conduction principles in mind. When I checked with my mom, she suggested that since we need heat to cook items, boil rice and pulses, I can think of something on those lines. On further discussion with her, we came up with an idea. Take a small box and stuff it with thermocole, which is used for packing delicate items. Thermocole is a bad conductor of heat. Place a semi heated and covered bowl of lentils immersed in water in the box filled with thermocole and leave it for couple of hours, and the lentils should be cooked and ready to be used. When we actually implemented it, there were couple of flaws and the lentils were not cooked enough: 1) Thermocole pieces when stacked would still leave some air gaps and the heat would escape from the air gaps. 2) The heat was just not sufficient for the experiment. Further working on the prototype led to the following model: Cover the box with black colored craft paper that was available in all the local stores, and leave the box in the hot sun. The black color would attract more heat from outside and retain the heat inside. Also rather than thermocole, fill the box with sawdust. The reasons being sawdust was smaller in size than tnermocole and hence the air gaps were lesser. This option worked fine, and in fact I realized that I also didn't need to pre-heat the lentils in water as much as earlier. I just had to leave it outside in the hot sun. The black colored outer part of the box would attract the heat and transmit it to the steel bowl and after couple of hours the lentils would be cooked enough.

The project was quite successful and appreciated and went upto the interschool Mumbai level with that project representing my school and my ward. Sadly at the interschool level, I did not make it.

It kills me today when I read in the newspapers that a similar idea has been patented as the Kyoto Box and as the world's cheapest solar cooker, and the idea has even got a grant of $75,000 to be developed further.

When I look back on my life, maybe I will count this as one of the opportunities that I lost upon.

Speaking about lost opportunities, an excerpt from David Sedaris' write-up 'Guy Walks into a Bar Car':

"When you’re young, it’s easy to believe that such an opportunity will come again, maybe even a better one. Instead of a Lebanese guy in Italy, it might be a Nigerian one in Belgium, or maybe a Pole in Turkey. You tell yourself that if you travelled alone to Europe this summer you could surely do the same thing next year and the year after that. Of course, you don’t, though, and the next thing you know you’re an aging, unemployed elf, so desperate for love that you spend your evening mooning over a straight alcoholic."

The opportunities lost in my case and David's are completely different, but the feeling is the same.

Click here to read more about the Kyoto box.

Natale Tumchyasathi

I bumped into a long lost acquaintance sometime last month in one of the film fests in the city. Bhushan Korgaonkar, who I used to meet on-off through some of our mutual friends is this quiet, composed person who seemed pretty much at ease in his skin during all our previous meetings. That day, he asked me and Shibu to wait outside the auditorium after the film fest since he wanted to catch up with us. After the film fest when we found him waiting outside, after our initial exchange of pleasantries he began digging into his jhola and took out couple of CD covers. And that’s when he told us where he was keeping busy all these days. Over the last 3-4 years, he had been working on making a movie.

Working as a freelancer journalist some years back, Bhushan had written some article on the art of Lavani dances in India. He had become so enamored by the dance form and the fabulous stories of the dancers that he decided that this needs to be captured on camera. For the past few years on a very meager budget of a little more than Rs. 1 lac per head (along with his partner in this movie, Savitri Medhatul), he had been filming a documentary movie on the lives and times of the Lavani dancers in Maharashtra.

For the unknown, Lavani is a genre of music, incorporating a song-and-dance routine popular in Maharashtra. The word Lavani comes from the word Lavanya which means beauty. The Nirguni Lavani (philosophical) and the Shringari Lavani (erotic) are the two types.

Finally his movie was ready, and when I met him he was going through the post-production process for the movie. Titled Natale Tumchyasathi, (translated as ‘Behind the adorned veil’), both the cover photos had the lavani dancers dressed in colorful sarees on the stage during a lavani performance. While one cover had a close up of couple of dancers showing their faces as they were lifting the veil, the other cover photo showed about 6-7 dancers on the stage at a distance, some of them with their heads covered and some of them with the veils off their heads in various dance poses. I preferred the latter, and told him so. My point being that it seemed more active, more crowded and more colorful.

We spent some more time talking and Bhushan narrated some of the troubles he had gone through while making the movie, and we provided all the encouraging words to let him know of what a fabulous attempt he has made. While all of us would love to do something beyond our routine jobs, there are a very few who move on to a different direction while they are on a steady 9-5 job. That he has managed to make a full-fledged documentary and that too on a topic, not so often spoken about was truly a feat, and I offered my services for any help he might need to get his movie out successfully. While he did not need any of my help, I thought I would at least provide word-of-mouth publicity for his movie. The least I could do is that. The movie is scheduled to be released in a few weeks and it is already creating a buzz in the Marathi literary circles. There have been a few news items regarding the movie, and I am pasting the URLs below for the readers to know more –

http://www.mumbaimirror.com/article/57/20090318200903180306455957e2b03ff/Behind-the-adorned-veil.html

http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/dancing-queens/434956/