Orientation Workshop AOA 2009-10

Things which probably all forgot. Some beautiful drawings of students from my archives. We did an orientation programme  at our own humble scale for students who joined AOA in 2009-10. We showed them films, read a book and deconstructed and married objects to open up ideas then...
These never got published, never got recognized and  were never spoken about again...I don't even know it students cared! I mailed them a copy, and got no response!

Arrangements

Every morning when I see the fruit sellers on the D'silva street at Dadar, I go crazy with the amount of things I imagine. Edging the pavement on both sides, they all sit arranging various kinds of fruits in their baskets. The round basket sets the meta-geometry for the arrangement of their fruits. They try to line the edge of the basket through the geometry of each fruit. I think it's like playing or solving a jigsaw puzzle. Although each piece of this puzzle seems same, their smaller variations need to be manipulated for a crisp arrangement all the time. This probably must be a meditating exercise in itself.

Can I, for the sake of generalizing these shapes of various vegetables and fruits, call them objects? Let us treat them as objects for my discussion here.

The various parameters that dictate the arrangements are the shape, size and the material of the object. The size that the arrangement can achieve is also dictated by the above three parameters.

most of these objects are spherical and therefore are stacked into concentric rings over each other. Each following ring in smaller than the previous to keep the centre of gravity within the basket. Objects like mangoes, apples, etc. are treated as eggs and one can find papier mache crates these days to accommodate them. Apples have the luxury of having styrofoam jackets also.

Probably the most careful handling amongst all the fruits would be that of the black berries (kala jamuns). In my childhood days, I have thrown a lot of stones at jamun trees to have the pleasurable fruit. Jamuns are very delicate and much of them are destroyed by crows and rodents. They shake them off the trees, and the fruit is destroyed due to the impact of the fall. Ripe jamuns are very delicate. And one can see with how much care the vendors treat it. It must also be a very delicate process to pluck them off the tree such that we can enjoy the beauty of the smooth skin of the fruit with our tongues! The vendors carry and arrange each fruit with so much care...like a jewel. Further, I am fascinated by their arrangements.

Depending on the size of the fruit, the arrangements look like fort walls, pyramids, stone walls, etc. I enjoy looking at these compositions and keep wondering if these can be used a building blocks! Even otherwise, they look beautifully composed objects. The order is functional, completely.  Probably the most interesting arrangements are those of flatter objects like leaves, of different plants. The colocasia, or the lotus or beetle leaves. They actually give more cues for arrangement of objects. The dynamic shapes that their configuration eventually takes is worth watching. They are like giving an array command to a shape. Also like scripting. One module multiplied and arranged just by displacing its position.

Forms, surfaces, voids - all of them create beautifully. I wonder if this craft of arrangement can be pulled into some kind of knowledge? Meanwhile, they remain interesting engagements.

Being cynical

Some people had told me important things which either I have not succeeded to implement yet, or probably I have developed habits which will take time to wash off. One of these was to accept people as they are. To accept human nature. To accept that the way people are behaving is natural. That the difference we see in people and activities around us is a matter of our own conditioning. Does everyone believe equally strongly in they own conditioning? I think I do. And I may be completely unreasonable.

In the course of life, conditioning stops at a certain stage. Till a certain age, one and one's actions are conditioned by the institutions that one engages in. We completely submit in these institutions and construct our values through their learning. Once you are outside the aura of the institutions, you meet a new world. This world is completely different from that of rules, codes and values. Those conditionings that the institutions taught you make you uncomfortable now, since now, you are not operating in a group (either the family as a groups, or the school as a group or the neighbourhood as a group - all are governed by certain rules - said or unsaid). I think it is here where the process of judgment starts. 

Which of these institutions is strongest I dont know. But our constructs take on values filtering through the strength of these institutions. To make it simpler, an example would be that if your school teaches you not to lie and the family teaches you that lying for someone else's good is okay, then the way you act in a situation where you have to make a lying-based decision will be filtered through the ideal school principle, then the family - since it encompasses the lie. So you will end up accepting to lie.

I think the above is slightly complex and I can not even begin to explain it. But I am just trying to understand if there is any ONE single way of behaviour which satisfies all groups. Can there really be an ideal human being?

Ah Plato!

At this stage in life, i am beginning to be extremely cynical. I am whining far too much. I think it is the difference of conditioning that I was talking about. Things are not as we were taught by the institutions. And the institutions didnot tell us how to handle this situation. How do you handle oneself being cynical? Being too critical - is it what I just enjoy for the heck of it? I have to find why am I being critical? Is it even helping? What is it doing? It's irritating me. 

Who is a Marxist?

What is it to be a Marxist?
Shubhalakshmi explained me in a very simple manner.
To  believe that all conditions that we experience and that the way in which society is organized / structured; is due to a certain kind of means of production is a Marxist thought. The Marxist locates entire history in the materiality of life and the means of production. It is an ideology which bases values like morals, ethics and other social relations also on the material world. Thus, the thought is an extreme version of rationality which locates the cause and effect of all situations in the real physical world. To also understand every one as equal (the socialist thought) and to regard every one to have equal stake over every resource is another characteristic of a Marxist.

Thus a Marxist may not believe in the existence of God, since God is non-physical. God is an idea, would say a Marxist. That irrationalities are also a part of the modern world is still not a reason to believe in something extra-real. The Marxist theory probably doesnot regard the spiritual grounding of certain systems of thought. A majority of India still operates through its belief in rituals, customs, traditions and spiritual thoughts. Such systems of thought believe that life is not so much about the material, but the non-material. It emphasizes on the ideas of space, void, tantra, etc. - things that can not be explained simply.

***

Why did the prehistoric people paint in the deep dark recesses of the caves? (referring to a hunting act painting in the Lascaux caves)
She said:
It is a belief that the practice of drawing was an exercise in practicing the act of hunting. The pre historic people probably thought that the spirit of the animal is trapped in its image. So the production of the image was like rehearsing the act of hunting through the image. In deep recesses, one has to focus light on the painting. The darkness gave an opportunity to focus on the animal and the act (specific parts of the painting). The painting thus became a knowledge to be passed on. It became a cultural object of preserve.

(Now perhaps this won't be a marxist explanation for the cave painting...)

***

When a dot walks, it becomes a line
When a line walks, it becomes a plane.

-Paul Klee.

What's in a Name?

I have been recently receiving lots of gifts from friends, students - and it is overwhelming and embarrassing! I am not used to accepting gifts now and especially when I don't feel to have done any thing for any one...
the first one above is a thank you card from Nandita Rebello, who expressed her thanks for our discussions on her thesis.

The second one is by Areeba, my student who visited Istanbul during this summer vacation...Probably this could have been the best essence of the place she could have got back for anyone! I can still feel the artist curving his fingers carefully to shape my name - the script reminds me very strongly of Urdu, yet it's english.

In both the above, I kept looking at the lines for some time, only to realize later that they were my names!! I never thought someone could engage with a name so passionately...
But these are probably things which I shall cherish for a life time...

Thank you all!

Symbology / The Cosmic Sexuality

Mazgaon

I keep thinking if i could gaze at a city like this forever. From this viewpoint, or probably higher, it would almost seem that buildings are shooting up like wild grass...

However, they look seductive - the picture perfect city...and when you move into these lanes, you feel they are almost going to fall over you - it hurts your neck to turn obtuse to look at tall towers...but from here it was comfortable. Skylines like that of Mumbai are a pleasure. For most, they become logos that mean different things: the architect will put it in the visiting card (as something that he/she shapes), the economist will use it in maps of the economy, the real estate in planning their next tall tower, children in their memory drawing of the city - only a distanced view is seductive. Lines that only go up and come down...is the city as easy as that?

Mumbai Central

Things I don't understand!

Corruption in India?

I stepped down the staircase of the railway station only to be stopped by the ticket examiner. I confidently took out my wallet, pulled out my pass. He indicated, it's the old one. I started re-searching my wallet for the new one (I have this old habit of keeping old passes for some time, but this time I was quite sure I didn't keep them to confuse myself at a later date). And after finding no trace of a new pass, I reverted to the TTE to ask for the date.

It was 22-6-2011. The present was already 25-6-11.

I realized that I had mis-read the date 22 as 29; only due to a printing error (see picture).

Without arguing with the TTE, I offered him to pay the fine. I didnot want to make a scene out of myself  and neither did I want the TTE to boss over me. He took me along and I wondered why. The fact was that he didnot want to give me a receipt.

On the way to the TTE room, he asked me, where are you coming from? I answered, Goregaon. Will you go back? I answered - what have you got to do with it anyway? He thought I would argue with him to reduce the fine, which ultimately would go in his pocket. I remained terse. I refused to answer to his questions because I didnot want to waste time and I was already willing to pay the fine.

"Will you do this mistake again?" he asked. I told him, "Look: I have been travelling by the train since the last 10 years of my life and this is one of those occasions where I forgot to check the date of renewal of my ticket!" He remained quiet. They hushed each other - "Let's help him...(demanding from me) give us 160 rupees." I said, fine, give me a receipt. They said, ok, how much money do you have? 

I said, "I am ready to pay the fine, give me the receipt..."

Finally feeling guilt, he pulled out the receipt booklet and tore a bill of 260 Rs. for me.

I paid Rs. 500/- and collected the receipt to move. Only as I moved out, I realized that I hadn't collected the change back. I went back and demanded the remaining money. He pulled out plenty of Rs. 500/- ; Rs. 100/- notes and gave me my change back.

I wondered how much they would be earning per day. Apart from exercising my morals here, I think it showed the state of affairs of the country. On one hand we have the likes of Anna Hazare going on fasts for eradicating corruption and on the other are these shameless bunch of idiots absolutely non-interrupted or aroused by the movement. 

I just felt later, "How else do you support Anna Hazare?"

Of those hundreds of young people who go and shout or join hands and make rallies, would they stop bribing the traffic police on their faults, or for ticket-less traveling or  to save an inch of their pocket money? Would they stop succumbing to such situations where the system offers you to let go? And we as a civil society suck up to corruption all the time...Youngsters have no option but to save up! It's the guilt at home that they want to avoid. Moreso, it's our parental pressure that we want to avoid! Break a rule and you will be disallowed from an activity. Pass a red signal and you will be disallowed to use the bike....

Fear.
This is how we avoid or cover it up! 

I wonder, how it didnot pinch me to pay Rs. 260/-. Probably I was capable of paying the fine, I wasn't answerable to my parents (because I am financially independent now), and above all, there is a general mood of anti-corruption drive and I thought I had done nothing for it.

At the end, 3 lessons to learn:

1. Read the ticket date properly.

2. You can choose the way others would/should behave.

3. You can support civil-drives by engaging actively in them rather than going for stand up performances (candle lights, processions, rallies, etc.). It begins in the gut. [And here, am I just counter-arguing the "mood of the drive" point that I made earlier? I guess no. ]

The mood is not an outward influence for me. One has to practise it from inside to be able to realize it. Then one has to live by it, however costly it may be. I think that's how you 'pay the price' for your ideals and morals...

I am happy to have made the TTE feel guilty! Although just for 5 seconds! If I could have read his mind, I would have loved to know if he could sleep that day...

(the questions are: we will change...but will they? would this money be still used for better purposes, in this case, the upkeep of the bloody printer which mis printed / ill-printed the date, which could have saved my money and avoided confusion? what happens to the system which is itself plagued, people are ready to change, but the system itself wants the people to be corrupt....where in this society are we talking about development? where no one is content, everyone is hungry for money, even that which is completely not theirs...maybe I am getting to moralistic here. But the point remains, we are in a system and we decide how it works.)


(now is it a good example of dagagiri?)