Saturday, January 12, 2013

The Mirror of Strangeness

Sometimes, a stranger allows you to open up much more than you generally would to a known person. In introducing yourself to a new person, you think, rethink  and construct and consolidate yourself.

In this strangeness, I find doing so many things that I would otherwise not do...I realize now what it would mean to be alone, to be detached from others, to not talk to any one, to not have a feeling of belonging...In an absolutely alien world, one constantly searches for familiarity - and even the slightest of it is so valuable that you cherish it, and in order to preserve it, do what ever you can. You are ready to change yourself, and mould yourself to be known and to feel belonged.

There is a general sense to be liked and therefore to go beyond yourself to experiment.  Isolation, although someone may consider essential, can not be sustained for a long time. To a stranger you may reveal a new self. To a stranger you can redefine your characteristics. And in order to test them, you can behave in new ways.

And a stranger thus allows you a canvas, that is a semi-mirror. A mirror through which you look, reflect and rediscover. A mirror that only gets as deep as you want it to be. When you don't accept it, it becomes a painting, and when you accept it, you wonder which side is real...


One's own World

I always feel at loss of words when I attempt to talk about America. I wonder if there is not enough I know to say, or there is not enough the country has to offer to speak about itself. Perhaps neither. I think they have documented their country so intensively that every brick and stone has been written about. In such a scenario, one wonders if there is any thing new one could contribute. Their lifestyle, pace and developed conditions offer them ample time to engage in intellectual activities. I believe most of us in the developing countries work too hard to just makes the ends meet for the day. Our race is for survival. Most Americans have a dream beyond survival, and they can get pretty aggressive in order to fulfill it. America maintains high energy and enthusiasm all the time.

But this is not something that I wanted to talk about at all. And I wonder if what I want to talk about is really related to the above. Or it's just to do with the first line I wrote. I generally am at loss of words to express myself. Am I becoming more and more neutral about things? Am I losing my sense of opinion? Am I maturing to be more accepting of things and to be less "judgmental" (as many people often used to tell me) - I wonder if any of this can be called a change? Have I changed? Did I want to change? I don't know...

Many people here call me "funny" and it's not a new adjective that has been used for me. I have never understood my description as "funny" completely, just like another which people tag along - "cute". It's funny! When I asked one of my friends here about why would she call me so, she thought and answered: "because you say strange things". I asked her to clarify further. And she said - "because you say things which people won't otherwise say..." I did not know what to make of it. But I immediately connected it to what my mother used to tell me all the time - "You live in your own world!" - I think she was disgusted about the fact that I never lived in the real, present world. She would give me instructions while leaving home and I would completely forget to execute them - all the time. I would try hard to be attentive and still overhear. I don't know what happens in my head.

I register words, things, places, actions and completely mix them up? Is it? After the new year hangover, I had an interesting discussion with my friends at Rohit's house. It was about my general weak sense of geography. It all started with me confusing the capitals of states in south India, as well as mixing up the languages. Over a general confusion between the relationships between Hyderabad, Tamil Nadu, Odisi, Bangalore and Andhra Pradesh, Karthik brought up a key question - about how could it be possible for a person to remember quotes from French theorists and not know of one's own geography. This was the first time any one considered it to be a legitimate issue for discussion. I have had similar problems figuring out relationships between Paris, Italy, France and Rome - Generally when I mix up capitals and states, people get disappointed and disgusted very quickly. (I am inclined to believe that they also judge my achievements through this lens). However I tried to decipher if this was because of my attitude to understand my own associations and trajectories with places and knowledge?

Karthik went on to share that his knowledge was a product of the general talks around his social space as well as his interest in current affairs. In the same way, Debashree said that her mother was a key figure in making her realize these small associations like cuisines and places, geographies and states, etc on her travels. We soon tried to trace the logic in which my memory worked - and I realized that I slip into my imaginative world too soon to be able to hold on to a tangible fact like the Capital of a state or the language of a place. I can still broadly compartment ideas into geographic zones, but it could be very difficult for me to talk about such ideas using facts. 

I stay with a playwright in America currently. through him I have come to know of a lot of humanities. We often engage in conversations, but lately, he has started playing with me a game: he puts on a piece of music and asks me to identify the style, and thus the composer and place. I must mention here that it was only recently that I gradually started to understand the principle behind Western classical music (over a night dream, literally) and now I appreciate it much better than I did before. I interpret the music, and my landlord, playwright (Lazarre) builds it up. We paint a scene together through the interpretation of the music, which we then situate in a geography. When the music ends, we eagerly wait for the announcement of the composer - most of the times he is right. I am getting better.

But that is not all, he recently visited the newely extended and opened Yale Art Gallery only to notice that he didnot like the way in which it was curated. I immediately picked up to say my ideas of how the objects must  have been kept - and he, agreeing completely, was almost completing my unfinished sentences. The idea of telling stories in space connected both of us.

But what have these two experiences to tell of? Perhaps we live in our own world. Yes. I do. And it is important to have a world of one's own. This world is not factual, it finds space in the imaginary, more specifically the semi-fictitious. And ironically if I was to bring in Derrida and say that my world is stuck between the multiple layers of representations (sound, visuals, language, word, object, etc.); I would only talk of a world which is filled with infinity. Hence I feel lost. 

Occasionally I have pulled some strings off it, and there remain many ideas to be re-strung together. Why re-strung? Because all reality is perhaps an idea, and so the real is an imagination. Imaginations have already been structured. Like our knowledge systems - in the discourses of factual histories and geographies, where is the discussion for place and phenomena - that resonate across cultures and humanity? Often our parameters for understanding the world around us have become strictly structured through these external knowledge systems. I do not think it is fair to evaluate every one through these systems. Where is other wise the place for a person to think of a falling apple and discover gravity or to believe in the whole universe to be understood through energy and mass?

But given all that, I remain concerned of my world and being able to decipher it. My mother pointed at this world and I must be able to convince of her of its merit. Meanwhile, Lazarre (my playwright landlord) too calls me funny!


Sunday, January 06, 2013

New Year 2013 Celebrations

My first New Year in USA was made completely memorable by my friends at New York: Rohit, Karthik, Vinit along with two new friends - Debashree and Jasdeep, joined by Neelima straight from San Francisco on the New Year! We went around the Times Square looking at the craziness of people to see the ball dropping event. It was for the first time after coming to USA that I saw a density as huge as something I would see in Mumbai everyday! Immense security and pretty organized New York streets allowed us to cut across the avenues to move to less crowded areas. The bars were full, the pubs shouted loud, the streets were lit up - New Year celebration was all around.




























Strolling around the Rockefeller center whose courtyard was turned into a skating rink, and looking around the beautifully lit Christmas tree, we went towards another part of the city, quieter and as merrier as the above. We chose a beautiful cafe to hang out, where we went insane at our table - actually a blackboard! We architects and lawyers from Harvard, Cornell and Yale took over our drawing skills drafting out a construction sheet on the table. Occasionally we corrected each other to show guidelines, formatting and essential details! We soon had to order extra chalk exhausting that kept on our table.

Our next session at the night was a long game of Pictionary with Bollywood movies. And let me see if anyone of you can guess the drawings below. Some were so funny and obvious that mere 4 blanks did the job. Others were quite intellectual. Debashree proved to be the most prolific drawing out iconic scenes from movies, while Jasdeep did a good job of guessing some despite not being good at drawing!

We went home late, by around 1 30 am when we started a 6-player Ludo - something retrofitted with the old Ludo version, that Rohit had! The game went on non stop for 4 hours, when we finally decided to retire leaving the game unfinished!

On a round of New Year Resolutions on the next day in a south Indian Restaurant, where everyone decided some, I had none. In the meanwhile, Karthik asked me to visit Boston instead of returning back to New Haven. While I went into my grey zone, Neelima made me go for it, asking me to be more instinctive this year. I thought for a while and dived in. And I think that was one of the better decisions I made. I thoroughly enjoyed Boston - a great city, with great friends, great buildings, and absolutely unforgettable moments.

Boston Story next.















Thursday, December 27, 2012

New Societies

These days I have suddenly started to take a lot of interest in things in process. Primarily this is in relation to music production and film production. My interest has geared towards, and gearing towards "how" things are made and can be made. In what ways can ideas be realized. I discovered some really interesting projects documented on Youtube and some such places. If any one is interested, one must look at:
  • The Music Project by Tehelka
  • Sneha Khanwalkar's show Sound Tripping
  • Making of various films
  • to some extent Dewarists
  • A Capella Groups
  • Short film and Animation groups
  • Comic and graphic novel artists
  • Writers, poets, painters, artists etc
Technology has enabled every one in large capacities eliminating the need for any partners in the production of a sale-able commodity in today's world. But there is some really cool stuff happening out there which is completely overshadowed by mainstream and popular things that we are overtly masked by. There is a rich repository of music, films, interviews, rough cuts, recordings - a lot of material yet unexplored. If only one had the time to look at the immense amount of energy put into such things, there is so much that one could do.

The digital revolution can inverse the notion of the capitalistic way in which most societies are ordered, because it empowers a seemingly insignificant entity to an unbelievable audience. It allows filtration of choice and gets you an appropriate outreach. Although this process happens subtextually, many of us are not still exposed to so much that may interest us. While this may not always get media covering, I am sure it helps these individuals their survival.

The fast changing ways in which culture mutates and creates "new" identities for peoples are regrouped through the channel of the Internet. Internet thus creates completely new societies, sometimes although virtual, through the thread of "common interest". So get there and reach out to the person/group/activity that you like doing. It's just a matter of typing vague phrases on Google and the gaps will be prompted to you by the Internet itself.

***

But I am a bit scared of the universalizing tendencies due to the medium through which such ideas route themselves and proliferate. The English language, the digital media and the computer screen (image) leave out a lot many things that are essential for the receptivity of any kind of art form. Art forms are not only rooted in their visual cultures, the way in which they are primarily mediated and projected. They are often more rooted in their places through their environmental conditions and settings. For example, the seas and storms reflect the Western Classical music forms, the bountifulness of the Bengali countryside reflects in the Rabindrasangeet, the tragedies (the theatre) echo the evolving morals of the European societies, the African masquerades are absolutely ritualistic,  the clothings of various places is a direct response to the climates people grow up in. As all such forms are channeled through the Internet - through medium of image, music and text - much is flattened, much is circulating, mixing and pairing up - not that this hasn't happened in the past. But the time over which such fusion occurs has relatively changed and hence these new formations are very shortlived. It is the time-space relationship that configures the life-span of these forms. We live in a world of moments and momentariness. We like momentary pleasures, momentary joys, momentary gossips, news, events...We consume moments for moments to pass moments. Every moment is a new moment. These moments make up momentum of an event, which to is momentary when considered in historical time.

I conclude remembering Heidegger whose philosophical thoughts summarize that one needs to ground oneself hard on the roads of the countryside to get one's foot print, an impression.

(Hence it is very laborious to define and trace the self.)

Impressions are not momentary, impressions last longer, stay firmer and require some strength and work, only to be revealed by some archaeologist of the future to be able to give meaning to our otherwise fleeting present.

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Kiss

"An art professor once told me that in composition, elements should either overlap or there should be some space between them; that it produecs discomfort when things where tangential. he called this phenomenon kissing..."
John Baldessari, Kissing Series: Simone Palm Trees (Bear), 1975. 

"The basic concept was not try to destroy or be provocative to the architecture, but to melt in. As if I would kiss Taniguchi. Mmmmm." (said with closed eyes and elaborate flourish, a bright yellow down vest,. and a heavy Swiss accent).
"Behind the scenes with Pipilotti Rist, Pour Your Body out (7354 cubic Metres)"
-Kissing Architecture, Sylvia Lavin

Kissing may mirror suckling, turn into grooming, generate oral fixations , find sublimated means of expression, and even be erotic. Kissing may be self soothing and appeasing. But ultimately kissing is something you cannot do on your own. Kissing always involves the surprise of the difference of another mouth that is like yours but not yours. kissing is not a collaboration between two that aims to make one unified thing it is the intimate friction between two mediums that produces twoness --- reciprocity without identity - which opens new epistemological and formal models for redefining architecture's relation to other mediums and hence to itself.
-Kissing Architecture, Sylvia Lavin, p.54-55


A world that has just been turned around

I told them: "I miss dirtyness - I miss the dirt around, the bottles lying, the pan masala packets, the spit, the dead mice, the crushed pigeons, the rotting flowers, the smells, the leaves, the sweat, the closeness, the density, the air, the smog, the dust, the stains, the layers of peeled posters..."

They just made faces.

I now live in a place where colourful fall leaves are blown away from the pavements using diesel operated blowers. Dried leaves are removed using small vans which blow them and collect them. Clearing off tree leaves is a cultural activity. Skeletal remains of leaves outside their houses are collected by families and pushed into large paper bags which are bought from supermarkets!Similarly, snow shoveling is also a ritualistic activity. Although every thing looks perfect all the time, I wonder how people strive towards making it more perfect. The constantly work towards clarifying the lines they have drawn on earth - including those between road and the pavement, pavement and building porch, porch and house, rooms within house...

These spaces are maps personified. Every line on the map is a real manifest. All representations of their space work towards leveling themselves out - they try to match each other to an extent where everything is real.

I simply ask - "Is this really real?" A place I imagined through greeting cards, paintings - which I always thought were only drawings, only representations! I now live in a world that was never alive to me. A strange predicament between the real and the unreal hits me.

---

All views eyes frame are photogenic
All mind is turning schizophrenic


Of notions that have turned reverse
Spaces that strongly feel averse


Searching my filthy beauty on the street
Was present right under my seat

In search of real I struggle around
A cobweb under my chair I found

Reality finally hits the ground
My world has just been turned around.

---

Sunday, November 11, 2012

Random Thoughts

How do you feel when someone who you seemingly respect does not reciprocate in the same way?
Was just wondering!


Thursday, October 25, 2012

Being an Alien

Most of my friends here in the US say that they were / are immediately subsumed by the Indian crowd as soon as they arrive here. The Indians take them to places, introduce them to culture, help them place gradually in this new time-space. This makes the transition a lot more comfortable - smooth.

On the other hand, they say that Yale has a very low international admittance. Statistics say it's only 8%. There is no 'Indian community' here at Yale, except the Hindu Society and the South Asian Students Association. The latter is more heavy with Koreans and Chinese. One hardly finds Indians for traditional gatherings.

But what after all is the need to meet, know and be around Indians here? At the American Alumni Association award ceremony, the Director said "try not to be around Indians, make friends from other countries - you are going there for exposure."

Having spent about two-and-a-half months here, I constantly get pulled by the two thoughts above. Where on one hand, I have the opportunity of being away from Indians and Indian culture (and being within a foreign crowd), I feel a strong pull gravitating me towards my community. I shall go towards describing what this whole phenomena is!

There are several issues that operate under above attitudes that various people promote back in India. And through my discussion with various friends here, and who have been here, I have come to realize several aspects. I shall try and enlist them one by one.

The first, which my friend Prashant (Prabhu) told me was that it makes a difference at what age you go to the US. Generally people visiting the US at the age of 22-23 do not find it so hard to mingle up and adopt to change. Those are still the years in which you are moulding your personality and have not seen the world outside the cushioned space of academics. Secondly, it makes a difference if you have been a visitor to the US before actually spending a longer time there. You have a brief exposure of the bests that can happen to you / you can experience in your formal US life.

Coming to what the life in US is: US is a land of young people. The country attracts a lot of youth and likes to invest in youth. The average age of people who drive this country would be around 25-40. This age-group, absolutely free, independent, with very little family connections, away from parents, with hardly any culture of savings, sometimes spendthrift - generate a different kind of socio-economic dynamic. Either you need to attune yourself to it at the right moment or you distinguish yourself from them if it's late!

In universities like Yale, as I said before, since most of the population is American, they get along well within themselves. They have their own circles, own things to do. For them, it does not matter whether or not they indulge in new friends from other places. They know their system, they have their priorities and they hardly have time to indulge with you. In a program like mine - an independent research program, our interactions become further rarefied. Our ages are disparate and we are only 4 of us in this program. It is hard to initiate or enter into the space of Americans. Or rather, I still do not know how. They are not as sociable as us (Indians) and I have yet not seen any American who approaches an outsider for friendship. One wonders why it has to be only us to take the first step, and constantly keep on trying hard to maintain it?

The answer is simple: We came here. We decided to leave our country and study in another. And the above process is what is called the condition of alienation. With no cultural ties to this place, a completely new social dynamic and constraints of geography and time-space, the sense of alienation is completely encompassing.

You realize that when you want to talk back home or a friend, the time zones clash. The facilities of communication clash. And since you can not afford luxury, everything becomes confined. Thus there are two forces acting towards a single condition - an externalized social space that does not absorb you and an internal constraint that restricts you and makes you realize of your limitations - both making you more and more inward.

And well, this inward reflection makes one aware of oneself. In this condition, you are your best friend and you are your worst enemy. All decisions affect you and you are under your full control. All thoughts are self generated, all moods are self controlled. It's futile to expect anything from any one. History and geography play a game.

And this is just something I wanted to write since a long time. This shall pass too.