The Karnataka Tamasha

H.D. Deve Gowda is probably the most shameless politician I have ever seen. I was in fact shocked when I got a glance of news headlines today which said H.D. Deve Gowda had asked his party legislatures against voting for the BJP government in the confidence vote. He wants BJP to abide by the 12-points formulated by him, what rubbish ! It is clear that Deve Gowda doesn't like BJP but he should have given up when his partymen ditched him when they pulled out of the Congress government and supported the BJP. It is not at all clear why his party legislatures are giving weight to him now, and why all of a sudden his word is being given importance. Also, it is not clear if Kumaraswamy is happy with his dad or is against him. It is definitely the tamasha that I have got vexed with.

http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/nov/19kgovt.htm
http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/nov/19kgovt2.htm

The ever-glowing Deepavali

Diwali is one festival that can never be uninteresting. In the daytime, It was great fun going to relatives house and devouring sweets and other special food, and seeing everyone dressed in their new clothes. Later, we returned home in the evening. The evening celebrations began by giving Aarti to all the gods and godesses in the house and praying for the well-being of all your loved ones. It was such a "cute" experience lighting the deepaalu and placing them all around your house along with my parents.

The best part of diwali is always the crackers. Even though I missed my brother, cousins and friends while bursting crackers on this diwali, I had a really nice time with my parents. I had initially felt I might not enjoy crackers that much this time as I had become too old for it, but maaan, that's so not true. I had an amazing time. This whole episode also had a strong nostalgic feel to it which made the whole experience better. Then, I made calls to all my friends, and caught up with them.

It was an happy ending to diwali as well with the reviews that said Om Shanti Om is good, and even better than Main Hoon Na. As, I liked Main Hoon Na pretty well, i might like this one too. So, would have a nice movie to watch this week ! And, I pity Saawariya for the reviews that it got :).

More on Balamuralikrishna's songs

So, I have started listening a bit more of Balamuralikrishna's
songs. The second song that I heard was amazing. It relaxed
me soo much that I felt really good. Like a medicine that works
in minutes, it has elevated my concentration on my work
greatly.

Song: Thandanana
Artist: Balamuralikrishna
Composer : Annamacharya
Album : Balaji Bhajans

As of now, I have realized that I am liking those songs better
which have lyrics which are tangible, rather than those which
are more 'saa ree gaa maa' based. Also, the songs which repeat
the name of gods (Lord Balaji in the case of the song that I refered)
seem to appeal as of now. I shall update more on the songs that
I like as I listen further.

Visit by Mangalampalli Balamuralikrishna to our campus


What makes me feel much more lucky is that I almost didn't go to the distinguished lecture that was organized at our campus. Because of my lack of background in Carnatic music, I had no idea of what I was about to encounter. I had heard about Balamuralikrishna and I had heard and appreciated his music without knowing that they was his compositions or that he had sung them.

Balamuralikrishna entered the seminar hall and with great humility greeted everyone. His greatness radiated from his eyes, and his gentle smile makes you instantly respectful of him. The event began with Prof. PJN introducing Balamuralikrishna, and he almost got emotional while doing so. One of the striking points in Prof. PJN's introduction was that neither Balamuralikrishnan nor his music carry a single identity. Also, in the field where the jealousy is prevalent, he admired his fellow musicians too.

His lecture was on "How to appreciate music". He said that any music anywhere can be appreciated if one goes with a blank mind. Some of the other striking features of his talk were

1. Anyone can appreciate any form of music. All one needs is to listen to a blank mind, and with the sole intention of enjoying the music. A person with some knowledge will start dissecting the song being sung and by them time they analyze it fully, the song would have been over. If a person goes without too much baggage on him and if the singer is good, then the listener is surely going to enjoy it. He gave a humorous example of a concert he gave in Italy where no one knew what kind of music he plays. And, the people there were spell-bound and even started dancing towards the end.
   
2. The responsibility of a song/concert being appreciated lies solely with the musician. The musician should compose or sing something that would touch the audience, and he should definitely not leave the responsibility of appreciation to the audience. He likened good music to sweet. If there is sweet around, the ants would surely flock to it.
   
3. The musician should change according to the times, in order to preserve a particular form of music . For the Indian classical musicians, one way of doing that was composing poetry that made sense in the modern times. He then sang some amazingly humorous songs, which left the audience in splits.
   

I recall only these points from his speech. But what made the session special were some pieces that he sang. There was magic in his voice. Even though, the songs that he had sung in this session were in classical telugu, whose meaning I didn't understand unless he explained the meaning later, they were heart touching. For the songs, whose meaning he explained, one could feel the depth of the words. And, these words were non-philosophical. Instead, they were humorous, contemporary, some of them were full of bhakti, some were satirical. I could see purest form of joy in most of the people sitting around me. Even to me, who is a novice to classical music, this was an experience worth preserving and motivating enough to resume writing my blog !

Gym and C1002


There is a gym in our apartment which was once very lonely. There were no regular visitors to the Gym and it lay there with atleast a couple of its parts broken. Then, one day everything changed in its life, someone had decided to give it a regular company. Yes, Vikranth had decided to be a regular visitor to the Gym.

For Vikranth, it all started when he went to the bodyworlds exhibition here in Philadelphia. This exhibition displays the anatomy of real human bodies (http://www.bodyworlds.com/). As he was looking at the amazing exhibits there, his attention specifically fell on a particular group of exhibits. These sections highlighted the exhibits which showed the contrast between the bodies which excercised and the bodies which did not. Vikranth observed that muscles of bodies which did not excercise seemed to grow randomly while the bodies which exercised had this definate and pleasing shape. For Vikranth, as he is, it was not hard to resolve that he would not let his muscles grow randomly.

From that day on, he started going to Gym daily. At that point, he would be the only regular visitor to the Gym. By the time the rest of the house woke up, he would have returned from the Gym. And, he would have left the house even before any of us really came to our senses. The energetic Vikranth had suddenly become overly energetic, the "kid" with a load full of strength. He would pay even more care about what actually went down his food pipe. He would also work late into the night and come back home by taking the last city bus. I guess the bus driver recognizes him as the only guy in the city of Philadelphia who takes his bus at that time. Most of his pants were beginning to become lose and all this definately gave an impression that things were working out wonderfully well for him. So inspiring was the routine of Vikranth now that even I decided to try out going regularly to the Gym.
















Now, I was a person who would most certainly need company to do any activity for a long period of time. At IIIT, i had tried to be a regular at Gym but it would generally mean a maximum of 6 days and then a break of 1-2 years :). Well, now was my chance to actually make it happen, by tagging along with unfailing Vikranth . I resolved to start going as soon as i got a little free from my work. So, as soon as i was free, it had started for me too.

Everyday, i would wake up at 7:00 and go to Gym with Vikranth. We would come back in 40 minutes and then go to school. I started becoming unbelievably regular with my daily routine. No longer would i wake up at 8:00 and think whether my presence in my office was really needed that day :). Vikranth and I would be discussing various workout routines and for some reason, everything that we talked during my first few days at Gym revolved around the concept of a healthy life, Ufff !

















So, Gym had become an integral part of the lives of people at C1002. Santi has also started coming to Gym ""quite"" regularly. Shravan is more into Yoga and Outdoor sports, so doesn't
think going to gym is a great idea. He is also probably the most fit guy around. He compares going daily to Gym to the 'daily wage labour' :)). Raja isn't much interested. He believes Vikranth, me and Santi are trying to build ours like his :). Well, nobody can definately deny that.


Getting inspired by Vikranth's energy, Sandhya and Yashwanth have also started coming. So, it nows looks as if the Indian (specifically gult) gang has occupied the Gym. Well, so it is mostly us during the mornings baring a few guest visitors. Thanks to Yashwanth's cell, we now also have telugu songs playing out loud.

















(to be edited and continued)

Well, now after 3 months. Things are back to square one. Gym is back to the way it was before. Atleast, it has had a few really good months !