Good truth v Bad truth

A horror house, a dungeon with secret chambers, where lived in captivity a family for 24 long years. A tender girl child of 18 year was lured in there on a casual pretext of carrying some stuff, then she was imprisoned leashed, handcuffed, raped and impregnated for 6 times over a period of 24 years. The devil behind this dance of horror, her own father. [Source 1] 

Josef Fritzl’s daughter disappeared from home one day when she was 18. The family lodged reports with police but the search was ended when the parents received a letter from her asking them to ’stop looking for her’. The father soon convinced the rest of the family that she has joined some religious cult and is not coming back.

It was only in April 2008 that the daughter, victim Elisabeth Fritzl, now 42, was rescued along with her 3 children. In these 24 years, she gave birth 6 times, while her elder children continued to be in captivity along with her the later borns were shifted upstairs after their father-also grand father set it all up to appear as if Elisabeth has left them at the house door step.

As bizarre as it can get, it seems there are no walls in the cellars so in the later days once the children grew up they had no choice but to witness their father-grandfather raping their mother.

Not having ever seen a ray of sunlight the children grew up to be anemic and lacked vitamin D. It was when the eldest daughter Kerstin fell too sick to be kept away from medical attention that their captor took her out of the cellar for the first time ever since she was born and took to the hospital. The Hospital authorities suspected foul play. Police were called and the captor was asked to produce the patient’s mother. Thus Elisabeth saw day light after 24 years and her sons for the first time in their life.

Once outside, Elisabeth reported to the police about her captivity and the captor was arrested. He confessed to the crime and DNA tests have established his fatherhood for all of Elisabeth’s children as alleged.

To say this is a horrific incident of mindless cruelty torture and violence is nothing but short of words. I am not sure which statuette in the world has a punishment which is in proportion to such crime. Not sure how would this family ever become normal. What would it feel for Elisabeth’s mother to have a home full of grand-children fathered by her own husband. The more you think about it the more bizarre it gets.

But I just can’t come to terms with the truth of it. The truth as established by the DNA tests, which is so much stranger and scarier than fiction. There are dots I can’t seem to connect and I can’t seem to understand how could this devil act go on for 24 long years without anybody ever suspecting anything.

Hell I can recognize patterns in the way my Gtalk friends come and go off line and I know what each one of them say or do to initiate a conversation. No matter how big or small it is, we human beings have a natural tendency of watching and recognizing patterns. But this family didn’t see any patterns or aberrations for 24 long years. Or is it that the aberrations were so obvious that they became the patterns.

How could the other members of Fritzl family not suspect this man’s continuous visits to the underground cellars. I mean shouldn’t they have asked him, “hey why do you keep going to the cellars.” If he said, “I got some work,” shouldn’t they have tried to find out after all what work is going on for 24 years? Isn’t 24 years too long a period for status quo to be maintained?

7 delivery took place without any medical assistance? Didn’t the man have to get some basic medicines, nappies, sanitary products, baby food to the cellar. Amestteton is a small town, a man shopping for child care products / medicines over and over again the local pharmacy won’t get suspicious?  

 

In 24 years the cellars never needed to be cleaned / repaired / attended by any kind of maintenance activity? For 24 years this man kept carrying food and other household stuff (including drawing paper and colors for the children) every 2-3 days a week. That’s 2days x 52weeks x 24yrs = 2496 times carrying food inside the cellar and none from the family noticed? Theory of probability ain’t at work?

In 24 years Elisabeth didn’t try to escape? Didn’t she together with her two adult children try to physically overpower the captor, kill him beat him or something. She didn’t think of killing herself to the least?

There were 100s of other tenants living in this same house of horror. None of them noticed anything? If they did they didn’t think of investigating it further? Why are we not shown any picture or footages of Elisabeth’s sons whose life, reportedly, is so dysfunctional that they communicate with each other by a mix of word and animal sounds like growling and cooing?

The answer to all of the questions above might be a ‘No’. May be at times destiny does play such a role of being an ally of the devil. Yes, may be. But I am also repeatedly reminded of the child sexual abuse case of the Friedman father and son in 1987 in Great Neck, N.Y.

Friedmans were a perfectly happy middle class family till the day police knocked on their door to arrest Mr. Arnold Friedman an award wining, retired teacher and his 18 year old son Jesse on account of around 100s of child sexual abuse charges, the victims being students of computer classes he used to take at the basement of their residence, 17 Picadilly Road.

Andrew Jarecki’s path breaking documentary film, “Capturing the Friedman” is based upon this real incident. The film is a frustrating account of truth and representation in media. Throughout the film Andrew takes us through the entire incident, family footages before and after the incident, how each of them reacted and what followed. The way the family coped with the shame of it. The film also takes you through the evidence, interviews both the victim side and defense side, from investigators to psychologist.

At the end of it, there is only one point that Andrew makes, that you can’t ever tell what is the truth unless you are yourself the person in question. That, even in a documentary, which is nothing but factual representation of truth, what you see may not be true, at the least, you can’t be sure if its true. As an unbiased audience you are left with utter confusion and serious doubts both about the accusation followed by conviction and the Friedman’s innocence.

The film raises questions about the role media plays in such sexual crimes where a whole community gets involved, where once the incident is captured on television, everybody from the milkman to plumber to the accused’s ex-girlfriend’s school bell boy all seem to have a moral opinion to make, all have something more incriminating and weird to be revealed. And how media can actually play a big role in making or breaking a family’s honor.

More readings on Capturing the Friedmans. (1) (2)

The reason I compared the two cases is because I felt today media is playing a big role in the Fritzl case. As much as I want to see this man be punished with the most sever punishment possible, I also seek answers to the many questions media has not addressed.

The detailed story of House of Horror, that I told you above is what I found from TV and web. Having myself been a part of a tragedy on which media has written extensively (my friend Kakan’s accidental death by drowning in 2006) I now know how many factual errors media commits. It was frustrating to read the wrong reporting.

So I am thinking how can I be so sure what I am reading about Fritzl family is truth and nothing but the truth. And if that is not the truth, could there be a more bizzare truth. I wonder when there is a question of a sexual aberration in a moral society, where only a certain form of sexual act is acceptable and everything else is a sin, could one form of the aberration be more acceptable by the society than the other. In this case, is it more easy to accept that the father must have raped and captivated the daughter than to accept that the daughter might have consented?

There are good truth and there are bad truth but do we as a society accept both?

—

I have been having some discussion off line regarding this case and the points I raised. A few things came up I thought I’d add them here. The sole link to wikipedia sighted herein was not my only source behind this story. The news is all around the TV and web. And its exctly the same version of the story everywhere. Here are some more links. BBC CNN Guardian Times online

 

A friend said, there is no good trut or bad truth. Truth is just truth. Precisely my point. But my question - is society happy to accept truth just as it is. With so many missing links in the case, it is not very difficult for me to assume that the daughter is a part of this whole thing. She agreed to have a secret life in the dungeon and is now making it appear as rape. And the society (media being the spokeperson of society) readily accepts her side of the story, where she is a victim and passes a judement on the accused.

 

The man reportedly said and I quote, “Nonetheless, I am not the beast the media depicts me as. When I went into the bunker, I brought flowers for my daughter, and books and toys for the children, and I watched adventure videos with them while Elisabeth was cooking our favourite dish.” I think this could be true, but do you think the society would accept this as true? For the society, a father raping the daughter is still a more acceptable sexual aberration than the thought of a daughter giving consent to have a sexual relationship with her father.

 

I am not trying to make any judgment here at all. All I am saying is that how the society looks at a crime situation needs to be revisited. 

 

She was walking, searching

I wrote this poem some time in 2005. Reposting this again with some polishing.

She was walking, searching,

A little girl
with a dream,
a song, a smile
and a bright red balloon.

She was searching for a post,
Where she could tie,
the strings of her precious balloon.

She had colors all around,
Had rainbows,
The sky above was blue
ground beneath was green.

She was walking, searching,
The path became rough one day,
the last stretch of grass was past
she was still smiling and walking.

This she knew,
if she doesn’t find a post,
the string would slip away
And her balloon would be lost,

So she walked on.
She found a few post,
but could never tie the string.
May be she didn’t know how to,
may be the posts were broke.

She was walking, searching
Through roads that no body took,
walking alone through a desert,
sand all around.

The ground beneath
pale and dusty now
sky not so bright.

But she still smiled
In bafflement though,
Why can’t I find it?

She was walking, searching
cracking up inside,
loosing herself,
Quick sand all around,

She wanted to hold on
but all she had in hand
was sand,
all slipping away.

She was still walking,
Searching,
asking questions
to never find answers.

She cried, till the tears dried
heart and soul lost their strength,
like everything inside were flying out,
like she was disintegrating

Then,

she felt lighter,
like a dead fish,
she floated up.

A bullet could pass through
If you would shoot her,
She felt hollow,
She felt nothing more.

Its been a while walking,
still smiling,
would be sometime,
before she figures out
that the balloon is already lost.

 

A break is a break up

A lot of things have happened in the recent past, some never before incidents. All of them together has made me write a thousand words with many emotions, I cringed a thousand times too to express them all but I couldn’t. I am now going into a long silence, I just can’t express what I am going through not even on my blog. May be couple of months later I would. Till then it would be difficult to update this space.

I am taking a break. I would continue writing in another blog but that I shall keep secret for a while.

As a last update from my side, I was live on air on Radio Indigo today, giving a full length interview  on Blogathon.

Paulo Coelho said in ‘The Alchemist’ “If you really want something hard enough, whole world conspires to get you to it” Seems to be true for me. Fame is what I wanted and I get it without doing much for it. Today on my way to the Radio Indigo studio I felt I was stepping into some one else’s share of fame, but I didn’t do it deliberately, destiny had it that way. They all conspired to make me famous.

Today, I am the face of Blogathon, but to disclaim my fame, it wasn’t my idea. There was one person who gave the idea, then there was another who took it forward, then there is a team which has put in a lot of efforts in the website and other tech stuff, there is somebody who designed the logos and other badges. Unfortunately as a coordinator I can’t even take all these names, for the fear of missing other names, after all every effort is worth a million no matter how big or small.

Someone dear is losing charm for the things he once held dearly, if i could, I’d do anything to put it all back to the way it was, but he won’t tell me how.

I am signing off for an uncertain period of time…but I will be back.

 

Live Blogging: Photography session at BCB6

2.20

I am at BCB6 in IIM Bangalore attending the Photography Session. Am starting the live blog a bit late, low connectivity and low battery too so not sure how far it wud go.

We just had a round of introduction. There are 30 of us barcampers interested in this session.

Talks about taking portraits on the street and otherwise street photography. The ethical issues, what to you tell people when you take their photos. If the subject is not happy that you are taking their pic, what do you say.

2.50 pm

Vinayak: I am always more comfortable talking to my subject instead of taking an absolute candid photo. It’s always better to get the stories directly from your subject.

 

Blogalorean’s Meet 12th April 08

The Blogaloreans are meeting again. This Saturday, 12th April 08. On agenda this time is something beyond blogging, an attempt to know our favourite city, Bangalore, how? See below.

Venue: Bangalore Traffic Police Park on St. Marks Road.

So why this venue?

Simple reason - Not everybody knew about the park, as a Bangalorean we all should, and now we do. The park is described thus on the Bangalore Traffic Police’s website “This traffic park has a facility to train citizens and students in road safety and traffic rules.” So you know, may be it would be a good idea to visit the place and find out what are our traffic administrators are upto, something worth blogging about may be?

Time: 4 pm onwards

Agenda:

• To ask and answer all possible questions on Blogathon India April 2008
• To revisit the concept of Blogathon
• To brainstorm on how we can make it bigger and better and how to reach out to more non bloggers.
• To strategise our participation, role and responsibility in the BCB6

Please blog about it. Please mark your attendance in the comments section.

 

Savage Love

My love visited me last night
Glad I am he did.
“I missed you my love,” said I.

Everything I ever had,
I’d let them go.
Of all the things let gone,
it’s only my love that kept coming back.

Last night he came again,
took me in his arms,
led me to the place we’d make love.

A small cluttered place it was.
I couldn’t see anything.
Couldn’t hear either.
Could barely move,
I curled up to fit in.
Curled and shrunk was I,
inside that cold dark silence.

Outside,
they were looking for me.
“Where are you”, “come back, we need you”
I heard them say.

But I curled and shrunk some more,
in my lover’s arms.
Pained body, mind and soul,
choked voice and sore throat,
we made love.

We made love,
even as tears gushed out.
Even when we were torn,
burnt and worn out.

What is this savage love you ask?
Savage it may be,
But don’t you see?
What he left me with,
This eternal poem I wrote.

 

Holi 2008

Holi was good. Nothing much to write about it. I uploaded some pics on flickr, in 2 sets, Pondi and Alleppey’s Holi and Our Holi check them out.

  

The long weekend was eventful.

Wrote an emotional email, contemplated marriage, got on everybody’s nerve pushing them for Blogathon Admin tasks and then on Sunday evening I went out for a bit to quickly visit the parlour. Parlour was closed, so I thought let me pick up some DVDs from the local rental library, picked up 9 movies. The next thought on mind was, I also need a good ear phone to enjoy the movies, laptop speakers aint enough. So I walked a bit more and reached this electronic shop, checked out a few earphones with mic, picked up one and while I waiting for the shopkeeper to prepare the bill, I did some asking about the many DVD players displayed. The next thing I know, I came back home with a Philips DVD/ MP3 / FM player with 1200 watt PMPO speakers instead of the earphones.

Yet to catch up all the movies that I picked. So far I saw The Darjeeling Limited and Lions for Lambs.

Still from The Darjeeling Limited

The Darjeeling Limited was sweet and nice, directed by Wes Anderson its a story of 3 American estranged brothers Owen wilson, Adrien Brody and Jason Schwartzman. Owen who is the eldest of them invite the 2 bothers to join him on a spiritual trip across India to find back the love and emotion they once had for each other. The movie ends with that note exactly. It’s shot entirely in India. Good watch. Incidentally the film is dedicated to Satyajit Ray.

Tom Cruise and Merryl Streep in Lions for Lambs

Lions for Lamb’s directed by Robert Redford is an honest and thoughtful attempt but failed to hit hard enough. Still its worth a watch for Robert Merryl and Tom alone and to reiterate the many quesitons we all want to ask America regarding their so called “war on terror”.

I’ll write about it in details later. Work calling.  

 

Updates on my Life

Been a year and a month in Bangalore. Time flew by indeed and I have finally begin to feel I am settled here, only thing I miss is my car. I always wanted to have a car because it gives me a tremendous feeling of independence. As if those are not wheels but wings.

I guess I’ll get the car in May when my sister would be finished with her MA classes.

A friend today asked, “you still in Bangalore?” I said, “yes and I’ll be here for some more time, kind of settled now, rented out a home looking for a man.”

This person is some one I befriended when I had just come down to Bangalore, we spent a short span of some interesting times as friends which got screwed because of some even more interesting facts related to sex and romance. I got a blow so hard, I would never fully recover from and would never fully tell about to anybody.

We lost touch for almost a year. I have now forgot and forgiven. So he asked, “how have life been” and I said, “Been good. Nothing extraordinarily great, nothing to complaint about either. Just a smooth ride.”

Smooth rides on the journey of life are boring. So I always try to do something different, something that makes my life more exciting. But it ain’t easy to find the right kind of activity that would keep me entertained.

To talk a bit on men and their manhood:

Few months back I thought may be a lot of wild sex is what would add that edge-of-the-seat action in my life but I got weary of the idea after I was hugely put off by a 40 something married man trying to bed me for the Nth number of time in his life.

Admittedly, I initially agreed to see him. Because I have stopped bothering to figure out the background of these people’s extra marital sexual pursuits. I don’t care if it’s something about me or are they forever looking for a hole. I also don’t even care anymore what’s with their wives, whether they are aware of their husband’s feats or not. All I cared about was, if this guy is good looking enough and have that princely charm and chivalry, if he knows how to treat me like a queen I am game for a good fuck.

Alas, all those ‘ifs’ remained ‘if’, not one which could fit the bill. Tom was too bald, Dick was too fat, Harry was too tall and so on. So these married morons are just completely hopeless. If they knew how to be charming they would probably have had a healthier relationship with their wives and not wandering on the streets.

I have also begin to turn down ‘friendship requests.’ So when this guy who met me in Barcamp asked me out for a drink, the conversation went on something like this…

Guy – You wanna catch up for drink
Me – Sure, where are you taking me?
Guy – XYZ place.
Me – Where is that I don’t know, could you pick me from work?
Guy – Err, well your work is on the other side, I’d have to take a U turn, kinda detour.
Me – [In my mind, right since your dick is up straight and erect you can only go straight, U turn is an impossibility both anatomically and navigationally] Well I can’t take the pain of haggling with the Auto guys so either you come to this side, at some place I know or forget it.
Me – [Before he could respond to the above] Actually you know you should just pick me up, I like a bit of chivalry, you should also get some flowers, take me to a fancy restaurant instead of some cheap pub and must pay the bills.
Guy – I don’t believe in these rules, may be friends should be equal.
Me – Well, currently am only accepting lavish dinner dates coupled with flowers n wine, no friendship request please…sorry your bad luck.
Guy – Ok.

Whoever says ok in response to those kind of statements, what a boring guy. He didn’t ask anymore since then.

So basically I am largely ruling out meeting any more new random men. My priorities are very clear and am very focussed. I am also some one who doesn’t like to sexually hook up with friends. I find it very difficult to take a U turn and change track from being friends to romance or vice versa.

So these days am being single and celibate.

On meeting some one unique:

I didn’t tell anybody but I met an interesting person some time last year and been knowing him more with each day, finding out more unique things about him. And when I say ‘unique’ I mean weird.

He is the man I always wanted to meet. Somebody whose wit is hidden in his sarcasm, care is hidden in apathy, compliment is in criticism, somebody who is an awesome blogger and a community guy and lastly some one who demands to be and almost is my boss. And I let him be my boss because he takes my opinion on everything anyway. This has been my idea of romance always, to be everybody’s boss and to be with a someone who could be my boss. To lose myself when am with him and be a child he’d take care of.

It’s fun to be with this friend. From time to time I’d do something to challenge his position of being my boss which would piss him off to the extent of we fighting like cats and dogs calling each other names and promising to never talk again. But few moments or days of not talking and we’ll be just fine. I look forward to see him on gtalk not to have a sweet talk but to crib and complaint about something he did or didn’t do. And we fight again and again.

We are quite like a couple except that we are NOT. Neither do we want to be. But it’s interesting to know him, as long as I know him for one day we would really stop talking and would really not see each other ever. I know that as a matter of fact. I don’t know why and how but this would end. It’s a pattern about my relationships with most people, coincidentally most of them being Libra men. Great opening, rapid growth and a sudden crash.

On a weird recurring dream:

Which has been interpreted, by my sister to be a symbol of the conflict between my over active mind and my tired body.

I had this dream for about 5 times in the past one year. In different places, different time of the day, in the bus, flight, my place, friends place, night, afternoon. The common thing about its occurrence is that it occurs only when I am extremely tired. The content is exactly the same.

First time it was when I and Snig were on our way back from Hampi in a rickety bus. She was sitting in the window seat behind mine. I dreamt, the man next to me is trying to abuse me, touching me in wrong places and then he was trying to strangulate me and take away my laptop. I wanted to fight him but couldn’t move a finger I thought of calling Snig for help but couldn’t open my mouth, I thought I was going to die, thought how would Snig react when she’ll find me dead. Then, I put together all my strength for one last time and push the guy away and I woke up to realize it was a dream.

These dreams begin at the same time and place where I slept, so if I am sleeping in my bed that’s where my dream begins. Today I took an afternoon nap. Soon as I slept I felt the same way as I felt before. Presence of a man on my bed, I was scared and wanted to open my eyes to check if anybody was there, I opened my eyes, had a look at the main door it was closed, couldn’t see anybody but I could feel the invisible man lying on top of me. I tried to move and cry but I couldn’t I struggled some more and then woke up to realise there was a dream within a dream.

Sis said, “its your body trying to sleep and mind trying to wake up. You should sleep because its time to sleep and not because all your work is done, you are done reading all your google alerts and reader feeds, done writing all that you wanted to write. If you wait to finish everything and then sleep your mind would never let your body sleep.”

Interesting interpretation and it is 1.30 in the night right now. Time to sleep I guess. Feel good for writing so much of my truth after a long time. There’s more though. But later.

Oh but before I go I want to share one last thing. I recently for the first time in my life had a fear of death. I was afraid of dying too soon before I could make it big as a writer or otherwise be enough famous. Then I was afraid of being too famous to die at all. I am pretty sure there is no life after death, so I don’t want to die at the peak of my fame. I also don’t want to give tears to my parents. After fearing for some time I told myself, what the heck, if it has to happen it would happen.

Signing off at 2.44 am.

 

Photography workshop: Live Blogging

2.51pm

I am at this photography workshop which is being organinsed by Flickr based group Bangalore Weekend Shoots at BreawHaHa Kormangala. I was the first one to reach and we are some 8 of us right now. Vinayak Das (one of the moderators of BWS) and Dr. Vivek (the founder of BWS) are the two the resource persons of this workshop.

Coffee is being ordered.

2.59

Round of introduction. the participant count right now is 13. People from various walk of life are pursuing photography more seriously than their original profession. We have Vinayak who is an engineer and a techie but is looking forward to be a professional photographer, then we have Vivek, a doctor, who is pursuing this hobby from photo journalistic point of view. Most of the people here are in this hobby since 3-4 years.

3.10 pm

Vinayak is taking the basic quetions everybody wants to ask and then they’ll respond to them one by one.

1) What are the thumb rules for taking pictures with a basic point and shoot camera.

10.50 pm

I am now sitting with Vinayak and taking recap of the points I missed.

Framing and Composition

Using the Rule of thirds. Divide the frame in 9 equal parts and place your subject in one of these parts. If you are shooting a scene with land and sky you can place the land in the bottom one third of the frame and sky in the rest of the frame. This is for the alignment of the objects. The following pic of mine fits the rule.

The lights are in the lower portion of the frame

Using of leading lines in an image to create depth and also draw attention towards the subject. Following is an example of the same (photo by Vinayak)

Use of leading lines or patterns.

Usage of frame within a frame: Some times to enhance the photo, some times photographer use a natural frame within the photo to create more effect. This natural frame could be anything which is around the main subject of the photo, like a door or a window. For example the photo below (by Vinayak) where the doors are being the natural frames.

2) What are SLR cameras, difference between point and shoot and SRL cameras.

The difference is the same as one between a Black and white TV and a color TV. SLR cameras are high end cameras. The question you need to ask is what kinds of pictures you want to take. If you are just taking day to day pics, your friends pics etc. then a point and shoot is good enough. One can start with a Point and shoot and move to SLR or DSLR. Or even better is to get a high end point and shoot like Panasonic Lumix FZ7.

3) How can I make good black and white pics out of colored ones.

4.43

- Vinayak explains - Techniques of post processing - Nikon capture, I convert it to grey scale, then I fiddle around with the red blue and green channels and see which look good and I keep in mind that it doesnt look very different from what I have seen. Post processing is an attempt to get to what I had captured and not to make something very different from what originally was.

Dr. Vivek explains - In Adobe photoshop there are techniques like dodge and burn for giving good effect in black and white. Dodging is to give it details, and burn is to make it sharper. Black and white image is itself a manipulation because the mind doesn’t see anything in BnW so you burn the background and then bring details by dodging. Another good tool is adobe lightroom.

4) How can I take good portraits by my point and shoot camera

5) Some thumb rules to decide the right settings

Dr. Vivek talking about point and shoot cameras. I cannot hear anything except that he just said, what your lense see is not the same that your mind sees.

3.20 pm

Point and shoot and SLRs there is a difference in sensor. (I might not be getting it right i can’t hear anything. Will gather all the info later from vinayak)

3.30

This is very sad, first I can’t hear anything because next to me is a group of rowdy girls who are yelling their asses off, must be girls from the JNC. If at all I can hear anything I cannot understand what is being discussed.

3.45

The workshop is virtually stalled. Thanks to the noise at brew haha. to be honest I have never seen such loud crowd in a public place since college days. They should know this is not their college canteen. Anyway may be I shouldn’t complaint, freedom to talk and yell et all.

Vinayak is considering an alternative venue.

4.45

We are moving to the nearby Cafe Coffee Day.

5.00

Workshop resumed now. Dr. Vivek talking about a composition. If you are clicking a moving object say a bird flying from the L to R if the bird is placed more towards the right it is better. So instead of your subject entering the frame if you show it exiting the frame you have a sense of the speed of movement. If you are taking a portrait don’t always keep the face in the center rather put it in a corner that would give a space for hte viewers mind to play with thoughts. You shooting a landscape, say a mountain and sky, keep a proportion to the frame. Vinayak added, you should mentally divide the frame and then place your object.

Direction of light?

Your background shouldn’t be too cluttered in a portrait. Vinayak saying, “for me the most important thing is where the light falls. You need to be careful of which way the light is coming from otherwise you’ll not get the proper effect. Make sure your subject is properly lit. If you are shooting a subject which is back lit you might consider using a flash or some other method of illuminating the subject otherwise your subject will appear as a silhouette.” You learn by taking more photograph. For example the following of Vinayak’s photo.

I asked Vinayak about two of my photographers where this silhouette effect has come but that is what I intended to do which he said is fine. If I intended to capture people’s expression then I must put light on the face. The following are two of my pics where I deliberately kept the faces dark. The first one is perfect according to Vinayak but the second one he would have preferred some light on the face.

Pic 1

Pic 2

Talking about symmetry in nature photography it is not always a good idea to keep the horizon at the center.

If you taking the pic of an animal a pet, don’t take it from a high level, take it from the level of the eye level of the pet. Vivek added, in photo-journalism, if you are shooting some pics in human rights documentaires, you should come down to the level of your subject rather than stand away or above coz that gives a disconnected look.

5.29

An example of converging lines. A photo of a tunnel and a man standing at the end of a tunnel taken by Vinayak.

For landscape photography you have to be very careful of the light. Try to shoot early morning or after sunrise. Use tripods if you planning to shoot landscapes.

Usage of a frame within a frame.

Depth of field - A photo where a potters hand is in highlight. Question if these kinds of photography is possible with a point and shoot camera.

4.52

How important is technology in being a good photographer? This was a question made by me.
Vinayak, well there are some photos I was not able to capture in my point and shoot. I now use a DSLR. For eg. a low light image grainy ness is a big problem. secondly, precise focussing is very difficult with PnShoot. To answer the question the most important thing no doubt is to have the eye to capture a great moment but a high end camera comes into play to make you able to capture exactly what you wanted to capture.

5.00

I had a quick chat with vivek on the usefulness of cropping a picture. He said, “there are 2 school of thoughts some don’t like cropping much, I belong to that school, I think you should prepare your mind and your frame as much as possible while taking the photo itself instead of doing too much of processing.” So does that gives the photographer some sort of satisfaction for being able to have a great pic without doing the post processing. To certain extent it does, but at the end of the day when a photo is on exhibition no one wants to know if it has been post processed or if its pure. If its a good photo its a good photo.

5.20

Photography at nights - You definitely need a very steady tripod. How do you chose a good tripod. You expand it totally and check how much it vibrates, heavier ones are better, Manfoto is one good name.

So what is a good photograph

Vivek saying we once had an big idea of a photo exhibition where we thought a few of us would sit and judge some great photos for it. but i think these kinds of photo meets and workshops are more important than an exhibitions. You should retrospect what you think is a good photograph what appeals to your eyes. While some pictures can be out of focus for some one but could be telling a story to the artist. Therefore these days there are exhibitions where photos are also coupled with multimedia presentation about the background story of each photos.

National Portrait Gallery, a London based magazine. Vinayak said he learnt a lot by subscribing to this magazine. “I learned portrait is not just about taking the persons face, you have to go beyond the face and capture the person’s story. Some of the frames that were submitted in a competition by this mag which were not great if I look at them without the story, but with the story it becomes much meaningful”

Vivek gave some food for thought on the role of Flickr in photographer’s pursuit. “Many of us take Flickr to be a very serious thing. Even I used to post the best of my pics in flickr. What I am trying to say is a lot of great photography happening outside flickr. So if you are serious about photography go out pick books some grt guys out there dont even hav a website.

So how many of us are taking Flickr too seriously. Personally I think Flickr is like a mutual admiration society, where everybody mostly say good things about your pics, and the number of comments are a major criteria to judge. I also think flickr made a lot of us amateur photographers take interest in photography to begin with because we could share our work with others and get feedback. 5 years back I myself probably wouldn’t have been taking interesting in learning about photography had it not been for flickr. Because I clicked some and shared and got nice feedback that’s when I realise may be if I learn more I can become better.

But Vivek’s point is that while Flickr is a great place to learn photography techniques from seeing each other’s photostream and by the comments and suggestion that users leave for you, one shouldn’t take it all too seriously and not let those me the only deciding factor to judge one’s photography skills. One should not end there but take it one step ahead of Flickr in the real world. Some discussion were also done on few other sharing sites like Trek Earth which is a bit more serious forum.

I had a great learning experience with this workshop. Good work done by BWS and thanks to Snigdha for coming up with the idea of this even. It was a great way to give more meaning to this hobby that we are pursuing. Let us have more of such workshops, may be on a monthly basis.

 

Happy Birthday Aamir

You are the best thing that happened to modern day Bollywood and I simply Love you.

All, watch out this space I am going to write a long post dedicated to this man by the end of the day today. Meanwhile, you could revisit my review rip off posts first and second. The two being some of my most popular posts on this blog.

You might also want to read this nice piece by Lata Khubchandani, the author of Aamir’s biography, Aamir Khan an Actor and a Gentleman.  

I remember I used to throw treats to my friends on Aamir’s birthday when were in school… In this regard am still that same kid in love with Aamir. But now I admire the professional in him, the winner in him, if I have any Icon that is him.

Interestingly, I happen to have lost my virginity to a man who shares birthday with Aamir, that was just a coincidence though 

 

Victim of Dowry Demands?

Priya Aggarwal daughter-in-law of rich and powerful Aggarwal family of Pune has filed a case of dowry harassment against her in laws and also accused her father-in-law Ram Kumar Aggarwal of trying to Rape her. Read about the news in details here.

I saw it on Headlines Today. According to Headlines Today Priya and Ajay Aggarwal’s wedding was a fairy tail wedding between two very rich and influential family which has now turned sour, the families are engaging into all sorts of mudslinging. Priya’s family has alleged, that an amount of 21 lacs was paid to the groom Ajay on Shagun and an additional amoun of 31 Lacs was paid during engagement, in addition to that the groom has raised a demand of another 5 crore.

Well, Priya if all that regarding your father-in-law’s attempt to molest you is true, then, may the force be with you for there is a long battle ahead and my sympathies are with you for having to call such disgusting people as your family members, but accuse them for dowry harrasment? I didn’t quite get that.

Harassment? Really? My dear, the word ‘harassment’ don’t quite go down well with a family which has already paid, as self proclaimed, a sum of 54 lacs in dowry.

Having paid that staggering amount you have really lost the weak ground where dowry victims are usaully found to be standing. A family which has already paid that amount can no longer claim to say, there have been ‘demands‘ of dowry, because you know what? No one has to ‘demand’ money from this family which likes to flaunt it anyway, one would just think money will simply flow.

Such filthy rich people like Priya’s parents who are based out of Netherlands have religiously ensured that the tradition of giving and taking dowry stays right there at the top so that more familes continues to demand it and more brides family contine to suck up to it. These people have turned dowry into a high society fashion from being being a patriarchal tradition. In a country like ours the former is worse than latter.

It might sound very strange to come from a feminist but my message to Priya and her parents, is that instead of accusing the Aggarwals of demanding dowry, they should rather accuse themselves of giving dowry.” Personally, I have no sympathy for such rich educated dowry victims.

Why did we forget giving dowry is as much a crime as asking for it. And it is a crime of the highest order if you are rich and affluent, if your daughter is educated and financially independent because then you are no longer giving dowry to secure your child future, which was known to be the original reason why dowry became a tradition. You are simply indulging in extravaganza, showing off your wealth and adding fuel to a wrong tradition.

As one of the frequent commentators on Mutiny rightly said, “Why can’t the girls simply walk out of a marriage that demands dowry.“

 

Did you read the Morung Express

Posted yesterday on Mutiny.In, have recieved 30 comments so far…Read on… 

I was doing some random search on Google when I stumbled upon this website called The Morung Express. The name itself suggested it’s a news site. It looked like something to do with India, but not really. I moved the mouse around the home page only to come across names, issues, events, I have never heard of.

• Legislative Assembly elections in Dimapur.
• Bomb attack at residence of former Opposition Leader, I Imkong at Sangtemla ward in Mokokchung district.

Strange, how come I didn’t hear anything about this election or attack. May be I didn’t follow the news properly. Although 7-8 times a day I pass by the office cafeteria and take a look at the TV news and all I see is Indian Cricket team. As if they have not only conquered planet Mars but also have gift wrapped it with nice shiney glossy paper with bow strings attached to be presented to the people of India.

I logged on to NDTV.com to see if I can find similar news. Nothing on the home page. Then I clicked on Nation: Headlines still nothing about Dimapur elections.

I went back to Morung to try looking at the date thinking, may be the reason I don’t know about these people or events is because these news are outdated. But that was not the case. I was looking at a current page on Morung which looked foreign to me.

I moved to Times of India website. Here, I did find a story on the election but only after going through Home >> India >> More news >> Other news.

Where am I going with this? To the question, “Is Nagaland and the other far north-eastern states not a part of India?” How much do we know about these states. True, the news on Morung is regional news but don’t the regional activity affect the whole nation. Particularly the news related to Legislative Assemby elections. As I write this I am trying to recollect when was the last time I heard any news related to the 6-7 states that’s around that belt. You know what, I just realised, I don’t even remember how many states are there and what are their names, all I remember is that there was something like the 7 sisters.

But is it my fault that I don’t know enough about the north-east? Or is it a problem with north-eastern states that they mostly remain invisible when we talk about India? Or is it Centre which failed to pay attention to smaller and far off regions? Or is it a failure, on the part of popular Media, to cover India in its entirety? Or is it a problem about the size of our country and the geographical limitations? Just why do we have this gap.

I have always heard this argument that it is them who don’t consider themselves as true Indians. This is not entirely wrong. Even I have come across north-eastern people who don’t identify much with the Indian tradition or Hindu Rashtra that we keep hearing about. Like, there was this girl who in a college function, where the dress code was traditional, refused to wear a saree as a saree was never her traditional dress. But again is not this isolation caused by the continued failure on the part of Central agencies to reach out to these far regions, are they not more and more segregated because the other part of India didn’t make enough efforts?

In one of the comments here on mutiny, I asked, if the RSS brigade considers north-east states, a part of their Hindu Rashtra but I didn’t get any response from the Hindutva flag bearers.

I also blame the popular Media for this unequal representation of India. Media anyway is busy reporting frivolous news. The first page of Times of India, news in boldest and largest font “Team India arrives in Delhi”. Shouldn’t sports news be only in sports section. The third most important news of the day, “Facebook founder is world’s youngest billionaire.”

Thanks to new media at least now, those of us who are really interested can catch up with all the nook and corners of India and world. My personal request to readers here, please do visit the Morung site to know about another part of India about which no body ever informed you. As a website it has created a nice blend of regional and national news. It doesn’t look like they are only reporting Nagaland. The web interface is also very neat. Worth a visit.

 

Holi: Then & Now

I, Snig and the gang are planning to celebrate the coming holi with lots of fun and frolic. One of the main item on the celebration agenda is to prepare the traditional Gujia for all. Gujia reminded me of writing this post.

Holi, is the festival of colors, some blue (sad) some green (envy) and some purple (melancholy), not all colors are happy colors you see. 

This is a piece I actually wrote last year on the day of Holi, late at night when all the colors were over. Last year also I and Snig made Gujia and this piece is about that experience which I had gone through at a time when my state of mind was garnished by the following factors:

• I had just moved out of the comfort of my home where I had spent 29 great years of my life
• moved to a city which, at first sight, looked weird and disillusioning to me
• a new job which I took after being job less for 3 months (excuse me, I was on a sabbatical not jobless)
• a company which didn’t pay me any salary for the month of Feb because I joined after the pay rolls were already prepared.

Needless to say how nice my state of mind was and there I had this over enthusiastic friend, who, with her undying energy and positivity, will flash her charm (read bright white teeth) every now and then, clap her hands and say “Yaar lets do something” and serve yet another delicacy from her idea factory. No prize for guessing who is this friend.

I refrained from publishing this piece for a whole year because I never wanted to discourage her from her enthusiasm, but now I realise, who am I kidding, discourage? and her? Huh, as if…!!

Read on (Snigs, a little bit of sarcasm, humor and lots of love :P)
—
I often find myself doing the things that Snigs wants to do, not often, all the time. I find myself saying yes to all her pursuits…may be because I don’t have anything better to do, or may be, I just can’t say ‘no’ to her.

She wanted to make gujia for her PG mates, my PG mates and our office colleagues on the occasion of Holi. A very bad idea to me. I would rather sit at home laze around, sleep till late, watch some TV and write. But she wanted to party and I gave in. I tried telling her once, “I don’t like your PG much”. But that didn’t work.

So, my holi today was spent in utter boredom. First we made the Gujias. She made, I only gave moral support because I didn’t have a choice. Imagine the enthu, it’s a PG one kitchen 2 gas burners shared by 9 girls, amidst all that she made Gujias, enough for about 20 people. For what gain? I don’t know!

Anyway, we then packed the Gujias and went to her PG. She and the other girls in her PG played with water and colors and did a lot of dirty dancing amounting to lesbian eroticism.  I strictly told them to not put those disgusting stuffs on me coz I don’t like this festival much. Also, as much as I love dancing, dancing with these girls on a weak frequency radio is just not my thing. 

After all these crazy exhibits of fun we decided to eat out.

Now eating out again is not my idea of fun. I am not a foodie to begin with. I can’t tell you what restaurant is good for what cuisine, I won’t be able to tell, “oh this shammi kabab is not as good as the one we had in xyz place” or “this shahi paneer has too much of xyz spice in it”…blah blah. And that goes true for most food. Except for a few things like sizzlers, biryani, pizza, nachos, I am extremely unenthusiastic and inattentive about food or eating out.  I love my own cooking much more on any given day and then of course mom’s cooking is to be blamed for this apathy towards eating out. She just about brought the best of the whole world’s  cuisine to her kitchen so we never had this excitement about eating out.

So we went to Sigma Mall food court. A freaking costly place it is. I ended up spending Rs. 250/-  on a Mexican dish, taste of which I have forgotten even before I begin to write this piece.  What a point less way of spending money. After eating the ‘girls’ went for shopping. And as I waited outside the food bazaar where all the ‘girls’ were busy shopping I thought “I could have got a music CD with that money. In fact I could have simply saved Rs. 270/- if I would have just stayed at home today.”
—
So that was the year that was. But things have changed a lot. Life is much relaxed and at peace now. I like it in Bangalore, as some of my friends said back then, Bangalore grows over you with time. I have also learnt to find the positive side to this over enthusiasm, the great toothy friends that we make in the process.

I love my life

 

Dowry Free Catalogue

Catalogue for wedding cards. That’s right I came across this awesome series of wedding card designs on India Together. 

Are you getting married soon or are arranging a marriage for your siblings or children and want to say no to dowry in an elegant and noticeable way? India Together has a simple and no-cost solution for you. Our D-Free wedding card catalogue. Wedding invitations that inform people far and near can be a powerful tool to give prominence to one’s concerns against dowry. A D-Free wedding card can be used in weddings that do not involve any dowry.

Launch the entire catalogue here.  

There are a couple of cool designs there which is a mix of tradition and modernity however if you don’t want to pick the cards in the catalogue you can chose one of the logos from the range of multiple colors Dowery Free Logo which can be put on any card of your choice.

I wonder how many people know about it and even if they know will they ever have the good sense to actually say NO to dowry. I have noticed the affluent educated class in India have been inventing new ways to give and take dowry. True they don’t call it a ‘dowry’. For eg. the other day I heard, the groom’s family did all the arrangements of the wedding and asked the bride’s parents to simply pay up their share in cash. Not a dowry, since you are not spending anything in the wedding its just your share of the usual wedding expenses, fair play eh? 

I don’t think so, any cash transaction looks like dowry to me. Personally the extravganza around wedding and other ceremonies annoys me. I a follower of a socialist mindset in this regard. It’s a crime to spend anymore than the minimum required in a country where people commit suicide because they don’t have enough to eat.

Am reminded of a song by Kabir Suman, title of the track is Dha dhin dhin na and the lines I am particularly reminded of talks about the socialist ideology, don’t accumulate any more wealth  than what you need for the basic survival, and least of all, don’t flaunt your wealth infront of the millions which sleep hungry. .

Aami khaai tumi kaaho,
sakkale khak na.

Keu jodi beshi khaao,
khabar hisheb naao,
jaano na anekeyi bhalo kore khaaye na.

khaoa na khaoar khela,
jodi chale sara bela,
kakhon ki ghate jaaye kicchu bala jaaye na.  

Translated:

I eat you eat, may everybody eat.
If you eat more, keep a score, coz
don’t you know, many
don’t eat any.

If you play this game,
of having to eat, and not eat
for all day long
you would never know
when would what go wrong.

 

Filmfare Awards 2008

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— —

So this is the end of this live blog. Nice show, better than previous years because not for once did I feel that some one deserving didn’t get an award. A feeling I have had in every Filmfare awards before this day. One of the simple reason probably is that when you have Aamir nominated in the best actor category, and the awards goes to some one else who is not an actor but a star I cease to respect that award ceremony. But things have changed over the years. AK and SRK are no longer in competition so I don’t frown so much any more. Also, this year Bollywood has made more quality movies than before.

In the same year you have box office hits like Om Shanti Om which is utterly ridiculous yet immensely honest, which commands respect. Respect to Farah Khan for being the only female director, in this very male dominated industry, who manages to pull of such huge star cast with such huge budget. One woman who made a mark and what a thumping mark by not making an art cinema but a huge box office hit.

We have Jab We Met which is so fresh and effortless and which gives us an all new Kareena and Shahid. Respect to both of them for their great work. The movie reflects the efforts put in by both of them.

We have a movie which is about girl power, which gives out the message that girls are not all about Kitchen, which probably has the first queer icon in the butch Komal Chautala of Chak De India team. And this movie is from a banner which is known for its patriarchal and traditional movies, the Yash Raj Films. Commendable. This movie also proved SRK can act. Something even SRK confessed while taking the award, he thanked Shimit for thinking he could do this role and his kids and wife for finally realising he can act although he have 13 of them on his shelf.

We have a Namaste London which inspite of being a mediocre film with a very weak story line managed to be worth a watch and walked the path from Box office to the success window on the sole shoulders of one star the honest, hardworking, disciplined Akshay Kumar. This star deserves so much more than what he have got. He have come such a long way.

Finally we have Taare Zameen Par. I’ll simply let my review rip off posts speak for it.

Every person nominated in each category was equally deserving this year. So I have no complaints against the judgment. Although one would really find it surprising that Aamir didn’t get the best supporting actor, because Nikumbh was one of the best performance of Aamir the actor, but Irfaan is a very talented actor and given the differences Aamir and Filmfare have its ok.

11.33 pm

And akki is here. My fav performer.

11.23 pm

Best Film and Best Director Aamir Khan. What a day of achievement for Aamir. What an amazing winner. For years Filmfare ignored him, Aamir and Filmfare’s differences goes so long back, aamir has banned FF in using his name or pic in any of their activity, TZP clippings are not available for the nominations, but FF couldn’t ingore aamir any more. They had to give in they could no longer play the game in their terms..they had to come terms with AK. I respect FF for giving Aamir these two awards even though the differences are so obvious. I would really want to know what went so wrong between these two giants. I once was reading something written on Rang De Basanti and Aamir was being addressed as “the lead actor” but his name was not used anywhere. Few weeks later a fan wrote a letter why did FF not use Aamir’s name. The editor replied Aamir specifically told them not to.

11.00

LOL Again. SRK accused Saif of having Kareena tatooed on his arm, (they are supposed to be a gay couple) saif said, that’s not true, and then he took of his coat and showed the tatoo is actually “Karan”. This whole gay joke thing that they started pulling off since Kal ho na ho really cool. They were also joined by Karan Johar, he came and took his coat and revealed that he has tatooed Saif in one hand and Shahrukh in the other. I like these people who are so comfortable using their image in a humorous way. Also part of this team is Akshay. I remember one of his shows where he did a spoof on himself on the controversy of him editing his co stars roles.

I also totally love the way people like Kareena and Saif, or John and Bipahsa are open about their relationship. Commendable to see Kareena thanking Shahid Kapoor when she gets the best actress actress awards.

10.55 pm

Time for the critic awards and the introduction given by SRK and Saif is the best part of this year’s Filmfare show. Don’t know where can I get the script, I would want to keep the lines as quotes. SRK and Saif says some double meaning suggestive statements about the critics and I love it because I don’t like the critics much myself. Although this critic award and what I mean when I say I don’t like critic but that’s a different topic.

10.48 pm

Saif and SRK being really mean but really funny. First they gave applaud to Darsheel. Then they say, the little kid from Hey baby called said how could you not nominate me. And then SRK expresses concern that if this continues tomorrow we’d have to nominate Farah’s triplets.

LOL they giving Na-real award for bravery to Ramesh Sippy for sitting through Ram Gopal Verma’s Aag. They actually nominated Ramu but said no the award don’t go to Ramu, not even this one.” Very funny.

10.40 pm

Rishi Kapoor gets the life time achivement award. Karan Johars goes on and on and on and on in praise of Rishi. Uff this man is one manipulative liar. Like Saif just said a while ago, agar sabke liye accha bolna hota to Karan Johan ko bula lete.”

10.25 pm

See this is what I was saying.. they all have to sing and dance. Vivek Oberoi dancing to the tunes of “we are the bhaais” although the choreography is not that hopeless. Vivek is a great dancer but we don’t want to see him dancing in this song. can’t there be some sort of skit or something, like you have stand up comedy, some sort of stand up scene from the film. I mean they should be creative. It’s not really fun anymore. They are doing this for the past 50 years. Artist dance to the same songs from their movies in the same manner, something we already saw in the movie.

10.05 pm

Best supporting male goes to Irfaan. Aamir was in nominations. But I can’t complaint cos I love Irfaan. And then I don’t expect FF to give an award to Aamir, they already made me enough happy by nominating aamir and by giving TZP so many awards. Interestingly while the nominations were being announced there was no clipping of TZP. There was a note, “no clipping made available by the producer.” Well that’s Aamir what can I say.

9.55 pm

SRK made a grand announcement, “for the first time song and dance performance by this artist as in first stage show” So? What is the big deal. Anyway Deepika Padukone arrives and does a medely of the songs from OSO. Nothing special about the choreography. The same as we have in the movie and in that she is forgetting her steps.

The only real performer we have is Akshay and Salmaan. And Govinda too. Can’t wait to see Akki performing.

9.40 pm

Loking at the nominations for best male and female playback singer makes you realise there is so much of talent in bollywood music industry. Just how do you make a choice between Shreya and Sunidhi or KK and Shaan. It went to Shreya and Shaan finally. I won’t complain though Sunidhi is any day a much more talented artist and so is KK.

The lyrics awards befittingly went to Prasson Joshi for TZP Maa.

The best music however was very predicatable and very cliched. I am not such a fan of AR Rehman. He is getting repetative really.

I just realised it’s more fun to twitter my reaction than to blog it here but the 140 character limitation is annoying.

Power awards to Yash Chopra and Aditya Chopra. Power List?? What crap is that..Filmfare is such a sucker and LOL this guy while presenting the award said this is a power presentation… as in a Power point presentation

Up next we have Himesh Reshamiya without his cap, that’s right WITHOUT the cap. Oh no no no.. the cap is there…and yeah it is red.

9.05 pm

SRK and Saif are giving away awards to crappy contributions to cinema. Vidya Balan gets award for best wardrobe malfunction. The award is called Na-real award and it resembles a coconut.

This was NOT funny, vidya was definately embarrassed. I wonder the response she gave to SRK was scripted or not.

8.58 pm

In both female and male debutant category I have not even heard of the other nominations but Ranbir Deepika and Neil. I can’t believe they nominated that guy from Mera pehla pehla pyaar and what…who was it Himesh…!!!

8.54 pm

- SRK mentions the writers strike in America and Saif cracks a joke that in India our story writers are on strike for the last 40 years.

- SRK says to the audience please be relaxed on your seats, we gonna be mean to you, we going to make a lot of fun of everybody present here but please keep it within the family don’t take it outside this home.

8.40 pm

Best sound - Johnny Gaddar,
Best Costume - Gandhi My Father
Best Sound editing - Guru

…and some more there. Ecellent choices.

Ok now we have the real hosts of the show. SRK and Saif. I love Saif but am not so much of a SRK fan, well I hated him all my life too, but now that Aamir has left him way behind in terms of commanding respect in Bollywood I don’t care much about him anymore.

But I am really looking forward to these guys hosting the show and I am sure I’d love the bit where they rip off the critics.

8.20 pm

I am watching the Filmfare awards ceremony right now on Sony TV. I specially earmarked this evening for this show. Have got some popcorns that I made in the microwave and some apple juice. Well Juice because I’ve already have had enough of beer in the afternoon.

Am I a big fan of Filmfare. Hell No. All my life I have hated filmfare, but could never ignore this necessary evil.

So what I am doing is live blogging my reaction to the biggest show in Bollywood.

The show begin with Father-daughter Kabir and Pooja Bedi presenting the technical awards.

Best choreography - Saroj Khan for Barso re from Guru, Best art direction to Guru, best special effects to Om Shanti Om (OSO) and some more I can’t remember. No personal comments on these awards.

Up next we have neil nitin mukesh performing on stage on the awesome edgy tunes of Johnny Gaddar. Now here’s a problem. Why do we always have to dance in bollywood. I mean cmon this whole dancing with girls thing so does not suits Neil’s image. The reason why i loved him in Johnny Gaddar. Can’t we have a different kind of performance.

 

This Weekend

Being talented is not that fun always. At times you have to pay dearly for it.

Now when you know there are about 54 lease documents that you’d have to go through. Read them, understand them and check if what your client is paying to the Landlord in terms of rent is exactly what he is supposed to pay as per the Lease. You know you have to finish this sample audit by 25th of Feb. And on 15th of Feb if you have to email your client, that the Audit is going great guns you gotta be talented to do that.

Immensely talented at the art of procrastination, that’s what you have to be. But then you have to work your ass off on a weekend to save your ass. So I did today. Cursed myself for delaying the work all these days. After all that cursing and working on a Sunday, to make myself feel good I decided to indulge, in the one thing I never mind indulging to any possible extent.

Shop for music. No matter how much you say you can download any track from the internet I find an immense pleasure buying original CDs from Planet M. I do this every 2 - 3 months. Today I bought music worth Rs. 1800/- In January I shopped out of the excitement of having an appraisal. Imagine.

 

And those are some of the new addition to my collection

I picked up one of my all time favs INXS. Next time may be April I’ll pick up this set of 5 CDs pack of Alternative Rock hits for Rs. 900/- It would be an ultimate collection. Also if anybody can help me get any of the 3 studio albums by Manic Street Preachers I’ll be forever grateful. It’s been some 5-6 years I am looking for them.

EMI has come out with a collection range “Pure”. Each Pure is a set of 3 CDs belonging to a particular. Liked I picked up the “Pure 60s.” Another good collection I picked today was the “Modern Rock Album - Definitive” by Sony BMG music. Prior to this they had released “Modern Rock I and II” both collector issues. Unfortunately when they were released I bought the Cassettes and been looking for the CDs for so long but can’t find it. This present one have mostly new tracks.

 

Nice weekend I had which finally concluded with a 2 hour long conference call with the Blogathonners.

 

 

 

 

 

Valentine Thought

 

Even if I have accomplished everything in life,

even if every reason to exist in this world ceases,

I would still live,

to see,

how does it feels

to get those roses, chocolates, gifts

and wine from a valentine.

wonder

Just how long would that be.

 

Floating colors

Originally uploaded by samyukta_basu

Just there,
where I want to be,
is where I want to go
Is what I can see.

 

Sunset

Sunset

Originally uploaded by samyukta_basu

Faint is the light
Dim is the hope
Cold is my love
Dead is my dream

Yet

I would stand
For so long as river flows
I would stand to see
where do all the lovers go

 

Hampi Hampered by Ms. President

A friend called me up and said, “I want you to write about something. You said you write for mutiny, please write about this issue.”

Wow! I thought. People call me up to write about important issues.

So I asked him what was the issue. He said,

President of India visited Hampi last week. For security reasons, the entire city was shut down for the whole week, it was evacuated of all tourists and monkeys. All shops were closed and no hotels lodges were allowed to keep visitors.

His concern was that Hampi is a small place, the only source of income that people have there is the tourism industry. If for an entire week tourism and other related business would be shut down, won’t the businessmen face losses? Who would compensate for that loss?

I heard him and in absolute Bollywood style said, “my friend you have knocked the right door, let me do a quick google on the issue and see if I can find some news piece to link to I’ll write about it. After all that is what blogging is, what mainstream media may not report due to political reasons we bloggers would.” Eventually it was him who forwarded the links.

Although I can’t really claim the authenticity of this issue because I couldn’t find any news / article which exactly raised this concern but that doesn’t mean it can’t be there. If only I could interview somebody who actually went Hampi during this time. One such person has written on this discussion thread on Lonely Planet where a certain tourist says he / she couldn’t enter Hampi during that day and that this decision to paralyse Hampi for a week was not announced on any major English daily.

Also, Times of India reported there was a major drive to drive away all the monkeys from Hampi which faced protest by the localites since they worship the Monkey God.

Had I been a journalist I probably would have gone to Hampi to dig more but since I am only a blogger, so I blogged. If any of the readers here have friends or family living in Hampi they can find out more.

———————-

Addendum: For more on this read this comment on Mutiny where this piece is crossposted.

 

Future of New Media

The writer’s strike might end by Sunday. A bright future of new media ahead. Apparently, the new tentative agreement assures writers that it “protects a future in which the Internet becomes the primary means of both content creation and delivery.” That’s a major victory for new media stake holders. The end of the strike will also bring relief to thousands of workers and support businesses idled by the strike.

In the new contract the heads under which new media / internet content is being recognized and paid for are as follows:

• Creators of original new media material
• Internet Residuals
• The Writing for Made-for New Media
• Reuse in New Media
• Download Rentals
• Download Sales (Electronic Sell-Through)

And many more. Source: Hollywood Today

For those of you who don’t know which strike I am talking about read the following post I originally wrote for another blog on 19 Dec 2008

——————-

The Writer’s Guild of America is on strike. Hollywood is in trouble. The strike is against AMPTP, a trade organisation that represents the interests of American film and television producers. Over 12,000 members of WGA are on strike. The writers wouldn’t write any new script or screenplay, won’t modify the existing ones, its an absolute pen down.

Now this news is extremely significant for new media / web2.0 stake holders. Why?

Because, of the many conflicting issues, one pertinent issue is the compensation for ‘new media’ content written for (and/or distributed through) emerging digital technology. AMPTP is not ready to give the writers any percentage on new media content namely, through delivery channels such as Internet downloads, IPTV, streaming, smart phone programming, straight-to-Internet content, and other “on-demand” online distribution methods, along with video on demand on cable and satellite television.

A lot of speculations over the bright future of new media have already been taking rounds over the past couple of years. The buzz is huge, money is enormous, possibilities are endless, User is the King, open source is justice. But I think the writer’s strike, by far, is an issue with the greatest implications ever on future of new media. Questions both AMPTP and WGA pondering upon being “what is the future of new media, how far is it going to go, what revenue it might yield in next 3 years.”

AMPTP contends ‘there is no money in new media’. Is it? I thought there is just no end to money in new media.

Nora Cletter writes,

As it stands on television, WGA members get 2.5 percent of a film or television series gross revenue. That means for every buck networks make in ad revenues on television, writers get 2.5 cents. Networks also collect ad revenues for episodes they air online. Of that revenue writers see exactly zero, zilch, nada. The AMPTP insists that they shouldn’t have to pay writers because the online episodes serve as “promotional material.” They also insist that there isn’t enough money in new media to pay writers what they make on television, and they’re right, there isn’t … yet.

However, in the not too distant future, television and the Internet will merge and new media will become the dominant media. Where media conglomerates stand will make billions off this merger, writers will lose their shirts. Without a percentage deal in place that guarantees writers will continue to receive their 2.5 percent of revenue, the AMPTP will have no obligation to pay writers any residuals.

The only formula for new media that makes sense is one based on revenues where if they make money, we make money — that’s what we’re proposing. If, as they claim, there really is no money in new media, we can do the math; 2.5 percent of zero is zero. So why can’t we just take $250 per episode now and renegotiate when this fateful merger occurs, so you can get back to watching “The Office”? Because the AMPTP doesn’t play nice.

While Googling more about this issue I came across an article by Froma Harrop where he / she has highly criticized the business intentions of the founders of Huffington Post, a popular liberal blog written by Hollywood fellas. The article exposes how few people are making money out of the blog which is being written by 100 others who are not being paid for the content.

This is an issue about which I too have pondered some time or the other. The question is when a blogger creates a content who should have the right to make money out of that content, the blogger or the platform where he blogged. Where a blog is a collaborative blog who all would get copyright over the content, how will you decide the share?

Throwing more light upon the strike and new media connection is this series of interesting debate published last week, under the opinion section on L.A. Times weekly “dust up” feature, between writer-producer Craig Mazin (representing WAG) and web entrepreneur Matt Edelman (representing AMPTP). On Thursday they debated upon questions like, “What will new media look like in five years? Will writers and producers have to negotiate every time technology changes?”

Matt says,

We’re barely five minutes into the digital media marketplace movie. So much will change in the next three years. Every supposition being made by the studios and the writers about where their revenue will be generated will be challenged, and most will yield as many surprises as classic films such as “The Sting” (or, for TV fans, like the good seasons of “24″).

Technology is advancing at a staggering rate. High-definition video soon will be more efficiently delivered via broadband than any other distribution platform…

…

The question really should be, how far into the future will this vision become a reality? Three years? Five years? Ten years?

…

So why all the fuss right now?

…they (writers) are fighting over relative peanuts compared with what will come out of even a slightly better DVD deal. Home video, as increasingly represented by video-on-demand and other subscription services in addition to rentals, will remain a much more lucrative business for the studios (and therefore the writers) than the Internet in the near term.

To which Craig replies,

Getting a fair rate on Internet distribution isn’t about avenging the bad home video deal. It’s about not repeating it. You suggest that attempting to figure out the future of the Internet is akin to palmistry.

It’s not. Here’s how this works.

From now until the end of time, any work distributed over the platform known as “the Internet” (defined as the worldwide, publicly accessible series of interconnected computer networks that transmit data by packet switching using the standard Internet protocol) should be subject to a fair and decent residual rate for the artists who make those works possible.

I don’t need to concern myself with your idea of ratios of Internet revenue to total revenue, because I have this nifty bit of advanced mathematical technology called “the percentage.” If you make very little money, so will I. If you make a lot of money, so will I.

Simple as that.

In another debate, Matt said,

“The future of new media is that it will be mainstream media….Between now and the time of the tipping point that represents the arrival of that future, the economics of the enterta