Africa

“A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes

My husband recently whisked me away to Africa on a surprise holiday for our anniversary. Whatever notions I had about Africa so far had been derived from watching the Lion King and boy was the experience a real Hakuna Matata, an extraordinary and unforgettable adventure.

We spent all our time at Kenya, in the plains of the Masai Mara, exploring its rolling grasslands through every sunrise and sunset. The safaris, the weather, the people and the surreal surroundings were never something I would have dreamed of witnessing.

The adventurous plane ride -

To get from Nairobi to Mara, we hopped on a short flight, aboard a small 15 seater Kenyan Airways non pressurised air cabin, where one can look down and see the giraffes, zebras and antelopes frolicking around in the plains! It is the most spectacular ride one can take, and this is an introduction into the cheeky african sense of humour, where our security announcement was "there are 4 exits on the plane, 2 up ahead at the cockpit and 2 behind. So if you see us jump, you know what to do!"

The adventure joyride

All smiles after the ride

The Lodge -

The earthy, friendly, welcoming and luxurious lodge of Sir Richard Branson - the Mahali Mzuri was where we were at home for a week.

It is a rather intense jeep ride from the bamboo shed airport at North Mara to the campsite, but we were welcomed by all the staff at the entrance enthusiastically waving and greeting us to welcome drinks of champagne. One step into the campsite and one cannot help but gasp at the site. It overlooks a valley with a river down below, a watering hole for all creatures of the forest, in plain view, while one has breakfast.

View from breakfast

It has happened, that a majestic lions and a herd of elephants quietly came to have a drink and went along on their way, while we were having our morning tea. The glamorous tents are right in the midst of nature, where we heard lions grunting all night, not very far away, on many of our nights there. 

A lioness looking on at our tents in the backdrop

I will never forget the people who took care of us at the lodge. The managers Anja and Rosie left no stone unturned to fulfil our every whim. Everything on the resort was on the house, including the alcohol, with every bottle of wine explained in detail by Anja who is also a sommelier and a chef! We had a driver and a beast of a jeep personally allotted to us at our service 24/7. The driver was a character straight out of a fairytale. A Masai tribal elderly, who had binoculars for eyes. For e.g., he spotted a leopard in a tree 5 km away without binoculars, whereas we took a few min with binoculars to find it as a small silhouette far far away on another hillock! He could hear the sounds of the dragonflies and the flutter of the birds and tell the position of the animals in the 15000 acres of forest that the resort had leased, and he was never wrong. Each safari was more rewarding than the next. My husband and I each had bodyguards day and night, Masai tribesmen dressed in their majestic Shukas, so silent in their demeanor, always around us, but never in our way. In fact, what we didn't know, was that this camp employs 50 people for their 12 tents, and you see and hear no one, such is the privacy they allow you.

Pride of lions visible from our tent!

I could go on, but I would never be able to describe in words the experience of this campsite, where every imaginable detail was tended to, in the midst of nowhere. So remote is its destination, and so eager they are to please, that on occasion, when a certain product (a certain requested bottle of whiskey perhaps) is unavailable on order, they charter a flight from Nairobi to bring it to them!

The Safaris-

Oh the safaris. One cannot expect in their wildest dreams how exhilarating the experience is to be out there in the wild open plains, under the equatorial blue skies, watching the sunrise, the thundering rainclouds and the miles of rolling hills. The animals, are a hefty bonus to this already surreal atmosphere.

The mesmerizing sunsets of the equatorial sky

The first animals to welcome you are the hordes of curious zebra, with their rather bountiful posteriors greeting you with a quiet nod of their head before they resume the business of further fatting of their behinds.

Some zebras definitely needed to be put on diets

Why did the zebra cross the road? Because it was a zebra crossing.

At this time of year, the grass was plentiful, the animals well fattened, with a contentment on their faces one cannot miss being amused at.

An elephant being photobombed

The giraffes had to be my favourites, as they just stand there and stare and you, and if it can be believed - even smile at you. Eating berries off treetops, they look like goofy overgrown babies who are so happy to see you!

Tall fellow with our tents in the background

The hippos - smelly fellows look adorably cute, but are in-fact the most dangerous creatures of the Mara. Stand in their path to the water, and they readily trample you, as their skin is extremely sensitive to the sun, and they need to be submerged at all times of the day.

My husband was most concerned about their hygiene habits

The cats - something one has to experience in their lifetime to witness what it is to be human and a part of nature. To be in front of a wild spirit like that, some of them deigning to look at you, some of them curious about you, is thrilling and humbling. To be at the mercy of another creature more powerful than you, one cannot help but be in awe of their grace.

The cheetahs, an extremely endangered species (with only 70 left in the Mara) are an acquiescent lot, agile, lithe and exquisite. Their cubs are in so much danger from their immediate surroundings, where only 1 out of 20 survive past their first year.

Spotted this fellow on the way back from the hot air balloon ride

The prince of the plains

The adorable cubs - a most unlikely pet for some

Crouching their way to an antelope they were considering for dinner

The Lions, the majestic magnificent czars and aptly named so - as such is the pride in their swagger and poise in their stance that one cannot be but in admiration and fear of their presence. The cubs however, are the cutest things one can see, curious little cherubs who come prancing around you with their deep blue eyes and twitching whiskers and ears. On the last day, we were gifted an experience one would never believe to be true. I opened my eyes and looked out the window, to see this enormous male lion walking down in the valley outside my tent, and watched him climb up to the resort, cross through the camp 2 tents away, and onward to his family of a pride of 17 lions eating breakfast - a topi they had recently hunted!

An adolescent basking in the warm sunlight on a rocky outcrop

Curious cubs who come right upto you

You don't mess with a lioness who's having lunch

A pride of 17 lions eating breakfast

Cub drinking from little pools in the rocks

The others - the topi, the antelopes, the thompson gazelles, the wildebeest and the buffalos - aka food for the predators, abound the plains, frolicking, playing, grazing and fattening up, ahead of the rutting season. There are miniature deer fully grown to become the size of rabbits - and families of gazelles skipping along everywhere one looks.

The hyenas, and foxes - while made out to be mean looking nasty characters in fairytales, are actually cute little fellows, hanging around the lions on the periphery, waiting to get the scraps.
This little fellow - a silverback fox fearlessly followed the aforementioned male lion, who was on his morning walk outside my room.

A silvertail fox following the lion waiting for some scraps

As time progressed through the holiday we realized how our perception of the environment changed too. On the first day, we were trying to spot animals only with our eyes, but by the 5th day, we unconciously using all our senses - hearing for the chattering of the monkeys to see if the lions were nearby, smelling the sulphur in the air to know that there was a hippo pool in the vicinity. The eyes adapt to further vision, and small flicks of the tail from the tall grass suddenly seem visible. And this is how they say, that through nature, one learns to be more aware, and connect with oneself.

While it is always a bit gloomy when its time for a holiday to end, we actually shed a few tears when it was time for us to leave this time. At the risk of sounding soppy, I'm going to say that we had unknowingly fallen in love this valentines day, and I mean not just more in love with my husband, to have shared something so special, but also with Africa. The people, the plains and the animals. I hope to go back some day, and be able to witness more of the magnificent unspoiled nature that lies there, which one could easily term as paradise - but its not, its better than that, its our marvellous mother earth, in its unadulterated form.

A hot air balloon ride we took on Valentines day, even though we didn't realize until later that it was Valentines!

Solace in solitude

My current situation is that I have a few hours of work a day, and absolutely nothing else to do, yet I wish there were more hours in a day, so I could remain a few hours more, in my dreamy languor.

I remember myself to be a sleepy child, spending a lot of my time daydreaming on my grandparents' sofa, while the sunlight filtered in, highlighting all the floating specs of dust in its rays. There was, and is a sense of guilt, that in the peak of my youth I could be doing something else, yet there is a comfort, contentment and cheeriness in this idleness.

A few years ago, I was tired of spending the day all by myself, and I decided to partner with somebody for work, to keep me entertained. It worked out well for me, but since the past few months my partner has been on a sabbatical, and while work doesn't happen with the same fervour, I have really enjoyed the solitude.

I spend the whole day reading books, online watching videos, allowing my mind to absorb bits of politics, neuroscience, biology, and savour whatever catches my fancy. My palatial house currently has many well lit nooks I like to snuggle into, and allow myself to meander down this rabbit hole that is the internet. There is guilt, that I spend too little energy, at a time when I should be doing high energy activities, but theres also a knowledge that there is no right way to live.

My current dilemma is that I am not able to streamline, or absorb knowledge at the rate at which I would like to. Im intrigued by the body, its functioning, yet I don't know enough about anything to be able to do anything fruitful out of it.

I have existential issues about my work, whether it will ever amount to anything worthwhile. With my current plan, or lack of thereof, there seems to be no scope for growth. Yet everything is overshadowed by my happy state of restfulness.

I feel guilt for the incredibly happy life I live, and I wonder if I could do more socially. Help a large chunk of people, in any way. 

In loving memory of toby

Toby our annoying pug does so many things he's not supposed to. Urinates in the laundry room, begs during all meals, and cries when the maids leave to go back home. Today he's been laid to rest, and I wish he would annoy us one last time. Come back and whine by the bedroom door to be let in, and in 7 seconds whine to go out, and repeat the process again. We were all his personal doormen in the house, and thats how he saw us. We used to think he's an unusual dog to drink so much water, what we didn't realise, was that his kidneys were failing.
This has been a year of loss. My grandfather left us in June, and toby hurried to join him soon after. Dadaji gave him the best cuts of fruit every morning, and those were the juiciest sweetest fruit bits in Kolkata, because dadaji really knew how to choose his fruits right. We were no match, and he's gone to get his morning papaya and cucumber from the master of fruits, my grandfather.
We are burying him in farmhouse and planting a big tree on the burial ground, so toby remains immortal forever.
One of the difficult things about coping with death is that you worry that their memory might fade. I'd like to write down some things here so my fear gets alleviated.
He was such a naughty pup when he arrived, would love to climb on to everything he could, including us. Bursting with curiosity and full of ticks. The energy levels declined, but the ticks never left him till the end, the bloody parasites, even though he hardly had any blood left. Although there were years that he was tick free, we recently realised that they were hiding in the house, and proliferating in corners, cornices and under furniture. Towards the middle of this life, he was like an old man who didn't like change in the house. He grumbled quite a bit when the gardener would take buckets from the washrooms to the balcony, or when the cleaners would come to sweep and swop. As a pup he would often latch on to the mop, and be swung around along with the mop but refuse to let go. Pugs seem to have such human expressions, it provided never-ending amusement to us. Between confusion, curiosity, being indignant and sleepy summed up a majority of his day. He would eat flowers off guests shoes, stole a piece of chicken from my brother's plate, all in a days work. It would be hard to eat eggs or papaya without giving him a piece of it, and when I went away to hostel, eating papaya never felt the same again. I'm certain that it became sweeter when we shared it with him. Papayas without you toby, will forever be flavor-less.
I held him in my arms while the anaesthesia was administered to him, and it felt like it was the right thing, the only thing to do. My friends told me that they could never do it to their dogs, but looking at him in last few days, it felt like we couldn't not do it. Earlier today, he sensed that he was going to go, and he didn't let any of us leave his side at all, until the point the anaesthesia men arrived. At that point he climbed on our laps, and then went back down and became aloof.
I don't know how much language dogs understand, but they must have a part of brain that we don't, as their ability to sense situations, and give love is unparalleled.

Watercolor mistakes

I recently attended a workshop about the basics of watercolor and realised what I had been doing so dreadfully wrong all my life.
When you start to use crayons in school, the purpose is to develop your motor skills, and not to introduce you to art. The exercises involve colouring all over, keeping inside the lines, and not leaving any white spaces. Then you graduate onto color pencils which gives you a little more control, and its a therapeutic pass time to continue filling out all the white spaces with gusto, all the while ruminating about something else.
In most schools, the next step is to get introduced to watercolor. And then you tend to apply the same way of laying down color, first filling up the white spaces, and then thinking where to add the light and shade elements. This is the first big mistake. Watercolor is more about the white spaces rather than the filled out spaces. White spaces in a watercolor painting represent the most exposed areas in light, and hence immediately attract attention. For me, these provide respite for the eye, and are the most beautiful part of a painting. For this reason, before one touches the paintbrush to their paper, a whole plan needs to be first made. No stroke in watercolor is put down without deliberation. There's no way that you can spare mental space thinking about something else, unless you grow extremely comfortable with doing this, and are capable of multiple levels of meditation.
Watercolor is very close to Japanese Sumi e style of painting where what you put down on paper reflects your state of mind.
This was my biggest mistake, to ignore the concept of white spaces and to try and fill in color without thinking about my strokes.

Mistakes I made in advertising

Today I've been very happy to have made a mistake in my new advertising job. It made me understand something that is crucial.

My  job is to primarily create ads or logos for companies who do regular work, like consulting or real estate brokering. The challenge is to have people notice these, over and above the 3000 odd ads an average person is subject to everyday. So my approach is to have an element in these designs that is identifiable. Either as objects which are used in regular plebeian life, or popular mythical concepts. 

The mistake that I made, was that I used the concept, but I did not use a symbol that was easily identifiable. 

The logo above, was made for a real estate company called Spacecraft, hence the obvious thing to do was to use "alien" as an identifiable concept. The problem here, is that I got carried away. I ended up making this alien which looked like an octopus. A third person was unable to identify the connection between octopus looking alien, and spacecraft immediately. Nobody has the time to mull over something, since people are subject to a visual information overload anyway. Hence I'd already lost their attention. 

So the lesson learnt here is, if spacecraft was infact a company that imported aliens, it would have been ok for me to make this image, but since I'm using the alien as just an object of identification, it has to be something that is very simple, and easy to identify as an alien. 

The final journey is inward

I approach the end of my course in movement arts. It has been a year greatly fulfilling and educational.

I realized that after all else has been explored, the final journey is to dive deep into yourself. There are many paths one might take to go there, and this year I used my body as a tool.

I was a very lonely teenager. While growing up I often felt claustrophobic in my own body and the space around me, waiting for something to happen, day after night after day. The waiting never seemed to end. The empty sense of waiting still exists, although whilst being so physically and mentally occupied, it aids the passing of time.

Its ironical, how Ive always felt that wasting time is the worst sin one could commit, and I try and squeeze in as much productivity/happiness as I can to my day, yet it seems as though at the back of my mind i'm still waiting.

People ask what my purpose in life is, and I think there is no such thing for the non superhero. My goals are all short term and keep changing.

This course above all has taught me the virtues of patience. In this information age where everything is instantaneously obtainable, one never has to wait, and has forgotten the art of waiting. The body though has not evolved as quickly as the times. Having sustained numerous injuries while experimenting with different forms of dance, I realized that time spent nurturing your body meditatively is directly proportional to the benefits you reap from it.

Feldenkrais has been a life changing learning for me. I sometimes aspire to be like a tree, to just be, exist, and observe everything happening around me. Old trees seem so intelligent, who've been around for years just observing un-imposingly. Feldenkrais has taught me to just observe my being as it is, and not try to alter immediately what I observe to be a defect. I have learnt that just accepting a problem and observing it, is a starting point to solve the problem. By actively trying to solve a problem we might be getting obsessive and actually making it worse, as the being is far too complicated for the conscious intellect to comprehend. Instead trusting yourself, and all the acquired wisdom through our years of information accumulation, a problem can solve itself if we give it some time and space. By information accumulation I don't just mean the history and mathematics we learnt in school, but acquired sensorially and perceptively starting the day we were conceived.

I get very irritated with myself sometimes because I'm habituated to give opinions and sound intelligent, whereas all opinions are imposing, and by imposing i'm interfering in someone else's karma. Not an intelligent thing to do at all.

This year i've tried to protract my learning through movement into everyday life. Patience is something that applies even for relationships, as even relationships haven't evolved as quickly as technology. By that I also mean my relationship with other people, animals, the environment and my feet.

I have realized that similar to a warm up exercise, the beginning of many things that lead to bigger things can be the most difficult part of the routine. But while sustaining the hardships of beginning something new, one mustn't be too aggressive and ambitious in trying to push oneself during warm up. In exercise, a build up over a few hours is what ultimately leads to long lasting strength. By pushing oneself in the beginning one might be able to achieve certain goals temporarily, but it is not sustainable. By stressing about anything, we only dilute our capacity, as worrying consumes energy and masks intuition. I'd like to think that the same principal applies to life.

This year i've found answers to many questions I had as a child. Sometimes the answer being that there is no answer, and that everything I thought I was odd for, is perfectly in accordance with nature. For example, I never liked the sound of the drums, and never understood why. I found a book written in 1875 by Surendranath Tagore (Rabindranath's grandfather) about how the drums started to be used in mediocre bands as a tool to keep in time . It explains why classical music never has the drums, because the artist doesn't need an external redundant source to keep rhythm. Rhythm is inherent in us because everything in nature has rhythms, from the heart beating 72 times a second, to the earth turning once in 24 hours.

If you observe a child going about its business, the observation is interesting because the child is so unpretentiously involved and focused on what its doing. An artist who does the same, is one whom its interesting to watch. I have had various kinds of teachers this year, and there is a distinct difference between a teacher who encourages you to dive deep, makes you understand the intention behind the movement, versus the teachers who show you images, makes you a 'performer', and hence work outside in. There is also a kind of teacher who makes you imitate images continuously and patiently all year, so you figure out for yourself what it looks like from inside your body. The kind which works for me is the first kind. With my limited memory, images never last, whereas a feeling lasts much longer. It brings out a certain kind of gold which is far more appealing even to an audience. To be endearing to an observer, the intention behind the movement cannot be to please the audience, but to really feel the movement beyond the physical.

It scares me tremendously, that in 2 weeks time, I will have limited access to this plethora of wisdom that resides in schools. If I had it my way, movement is the one thing I could commit to for the rest of my life.

My condolences to Indian Classical Artists

I watched a traditional chhau performance today. Having gone through half a diploma in dance now, and acquiring rudimentary knowledge about bharatnatyam and chhau, I found the performance pitiful.

Chhau is a recent addition to the 6 original Indian Classical Dance forms, previously practiced as a martial arts form. There are different variations of it, and todays performance was the aspect of dance concerning plebeian village life, as is a common theme in folk dances. It had 5 parts.

1. Was the invocation and salutation to the diety, as is a usual starting point. It starts off slow and is a warm up for the dancer as well as for the audience. This conforms to most pieces of dance, music or theater as they start slow, zenith somewhere and end either on a high energy note, or a dramatic note.

2. The part of a boatman ferrying across his beloved - Depicting everyday village activity, except that the part of the lover was played very obviously by a shorter man. In effect it looked like a manly woman wooing another mans potbelly.

3. Radha and Krishna - Throwing in what a classical piece is incomplete without

4. Shiva and Shakti - Right side dressed as Shiva, Left side dressed in Parvati.

5. Fisherman - Who looked like he was going hunting for either a lake or an airborne fish.

Most parts of the above-mentioned were clumsy, lacking spontaneity or creativity. A lot of people would say that it was good, but I'm sure that would be out of pity, and comparing this to an underdog performance when put on the same pedestal as an international level performance.

I think its time we stop excusing mediocrity in the name of tradition.

Why I thought it was pathetic?

1. Redundancy: I understand that this artform is centuries old, and the audience back then had the patience to receive information really slow. Also, as a friend pointed out, each character could be established over a long time with very little happening on stage. But in today's context, where people are used to digesting a lot of information all at once, and where redundancy is seldom tolerated, I found the beginning just plain pathetic. Except that I was greatly entertained by the idiocy of it, am probably going to be giggling about it to myself all weekend, karma which i'm sure will be justly returned to me when I perform.

2. Visual Appeal: Indian Classical Dance relies greatly on the visual, with adornation being one of the 10 most important aspects of a dancer. But unfortunately too many Classical Dancers rely too heavily on it. Its just as irritating to watch a really good looking actor do a botchy job of acting. A lot of Indian Classical Dance training, such as Bharatnatyam, is more about co-ordination of the arms and legs, completely ignoring the body consciousness aspect of dance, where you are really dancing, and not just imitating someone else.

3. Lack of Facility: I also understand that most artists in India don't have the facility, (studio, wooden floors etc) exposure or faculty to train their bodies like they do in the west, and that the sense of aesthetic is entirely different.But I just don't understand how a potbellied guy twisting and turning with little sense of control or line, can be a guru and be appreciated. I also find that the movements themselves are childish, and not conducive to add strength or control to the body. Even though Indian art forms date back many centuries, its sad that enough research has not been done in the right direction to really understand the internal aspect of the dance, rather than what it looks like externally.

4. Done-to-death themes: It is extremely cliche to have a part of the performance as "The eternal love of Radha and Krishna". As Indians, that information as redundant as cows being sacred. It might have exotic appeal to gora audiences in broadway who like to draw simple associations, but it is most insulting to an Indian Audience's intellect to have to talk about that. It would be far more enriching if a specific incident between Radha and Krishna would be played out, with the artist adding his own bits to the story.

Nevertheless:

Through the first part of the performance, it is endearing to note that Indian forms acknowledge publicly that the stage is a sacred space, as is to every artist, whether or not they believe in god. When you dedicate your whole life to your form, your stage is your sanctum.

To me dance is an expression of the body.

Fortunately: I have a teacher who has had the exposure in athletics and gymnastics to understand the body aspect of chhau, and not just the visual aspect. With a bit of research one finds that it is surprisingly similar to ballet, which is also an evolution of a martial arts form from Italy.

Unfortunately: I have to alongside go through the rigmarole of "traditional" Bharatnatyam training. It breaks my heart to see so many people being brainwashed into doing this worldwide without knowing why they are doing it, except as a desperate attempt to hold on to their culture. Is stamping my feet about in different directions, while I sit in aramandi really dance for me? Not at all. It is infact torture to my fragile knee joints and back.

Rukmini Devi, a revolutionary dancer in the early 1900s revived Bharatnatyam as a form and established the Kalakshetra school, where she did away with the erotic aspect of the danceform, which had originally brought about its decline. It was the need of the hour. (roughly speaking). What is easily overlooked is that she started training in Bharatnatyam only in her late 20s, after having been trained in Ballet, and having a deep understanding of every muscle in her body. What is passed on to generations below, like chinese whispers, is just the rote movement aspect of it, without the curvy temple dancer juice, and without the knowledge or understanding of the body. It angers me that most Indian Classical Dancers in their 50s are fat, with knee and back problems and blame it on arthritis.

But yet we must 'respect' the Indian Traditional Art form because of its linkage to the divine. Really? Blame it on the supernatural? Sometimes you need to see things for as they are, and not make justifications based on culture, divinity, history, heat, diet, poverty, politics and so on.

I wish more people like Rukmini Devi would emerge to suit the need of today, this hour in 2011, and reform the bountiful plethora of intricate and complex Indian movements, study it from the inside, to put it up on a truly international pedestal. To find ways to challenge the body in its capacity of agility, flexibility, strength, internal connections and respect its sensitivity. There are people doing work in pockets, and I really hope that it is a pivotal time for the Indian Contemporary Arts scene in India.

P.S. My apologies to Varun Nair who is the only dancer who can bring out the sexy quotient in Chhau. Inappropriate but skilful.