Reflects on us!

 Do actors matter much in a film? What a question, you would say! In an India where there are temples to actors, how can such a question even emerge? Is not that your query?

Well, I would not know. Undoubtedly, actors do give a face and a figure to the character conceived by the author, and presented by the director. Yet cinema is basically a director's medium. Do not you believe me? Take the trajectory of any one actor/actress, and see his/her performance under different directors. Sure a talented actor is given a certain leeway, and can add contours, fill in details, give absolute credibility to the character (s)he is depicting.

Unfortunately, however, in the glamorous and glitzy world of pop cinema, there is often an obsession with the larger-than-life persona of an actor/actress. Hence the craze, nay, an obsession for their often disgusting, dishy life which, in my opinion, also has a hidden strain of jealousy and anger, given the ordinary lives led by most spectators.

Sure, there is another side to this coin. Recently, given certain actors' askew statements which confessed and conveyed their actually (ill-)liberal attitude towards the image of India, they faced not only trolling but also genuine flak. Of course, there were a few sniggering snickers and smirks suggesting that such shenanigans were part of promotion of the impending film! Possible! 

A film, a director's medium basically, is, moreover, a team performance. Inclusive is this process that comprises both technology and personal traits-n-techniques. In other words, to design your favourite's look, the hard work of the make-up artist, of the hair dresser, the research of the costume designer, the cinematographer's lights, the camerman's angles and the editor's cuts are inevitable. And we have not even mentioned the dialogue writer and the music director, not to forget the singers!

 There are, to put it most succinctly, many unsung (and under-paid) heroes who make (up) the hero(ine) so adored in a cinema hall or on your device these days. If we forget them in our obsession with the glitz and glamour of the silver screen, it reflects (in all possible implications of this term) on us, right?

Pratima@ All that glitters is indeed not gold!

Respect

 Respect is priceless. Sure it cannot be demanded. Yes, absolutely, it is commanded. But how? Let us explore the process a little in our blog today.

In my opinion, the real plinth on which can be built the unique monument of respect is transparency. If your words, and works, are clean, transparent, and hence belief-worthy, respect follows you like a doting puppy. 

They say, give respect and take respect. Well, I do not believe in such a business like barter. I think, respect requires something much more than convenient commerce or trading. Rather, it is born when you meet a person who genuinely makes you a better person. 

Empathy engenders respect, I think. When someone is ready to listen to you without judging you in a biased and partisan way, it is but natural that you would hold the person in high regards.

Accountability, too,  is the base of respect in my opinion. When.you are responsible regarding the consequences of your actions and words, worlds open up.

Not taking oneself too seriously matters much to me. If you have self-doubts, you are self-reflexive. You would hence think thrice before pointing fingers at others as "proudy" because you would realise that at least three fingers are pointing back at you!

A person who has a subtle and self-deprecating sense of humour may not crack pj's, but would en-light-en (in all possible senses of the term) the ambience around. No wonder, respect would follow like Mary's little lamb!

Pratima@Respect can never be bought, however rich you may consider yourself to be!

Once More Madan Mohan

 Once more! Once more! Encore! That is the only response possible when we hear the unbelievably melodious Madan Mohan songs. This master of mood music, be it the soul-searing "aaj socha to ansu bhar aaye" or the jolly-n-naughty " zaroorat hai", has to his credit songs that enrich our aural abilities.

Like a comet that dazzles the firmament was his brief career of hardly twenty five years, and the post-humous "Veer Zara". The star dust, however, continues to glow and enchant even in his centenary year, and across generations. Honestly, his intensely lyrical songs granted a soul to the silver screen.

Adored alike by the greats such as Naushad, Begum Akhtar, Lata Mangeshkar, and the ordinary Hindi film music buffs, he added to the three-minutes long film music the gravitas of a classical mehfil. Extremely difficult to sing or to play on the musical instrument, his songs, melody incarnate, are manna to ears. 

The loveliest words of great poets such as Raja Mehdi Ali Khan, Kaifi Azmi, Rajinder Kishan, Sahir Ludhiyanwi and Majruh Sultanpuri, them he encased in such sweetest sur's sung by the softest and gentlest voices of the likes of Lata Mangeshkar, Mohammed Rafi and Talat Mehmood that the charm continues to enchant to a forever encore.

Simply superb hence it is to watch-n-listen to a tribute by his adoring son, Sanjeev Kohli. Titled "Dil Dhoondta Hai",  it is indeed a wondrous audio-visual treat. I attended its Pune version for the second time yesterday. Ever anew it appeared, entitled to countless encores.

Sanjeevji deserves the utmost gratitude of every Madan Mohan fan for the priceless visuals he shares. Divided into two parts, first we get to hear a medley of hundred Madan Mohan songs that include his entire range, ghazals to Kishore Kumar yodelling most musically. 

In the most touchingly endearing second part, Sanjeevji introduces us to the man behind the musical genius who could compose a great mukhada/antara literally in a jiffy. What is most remarkable about the programme is that there is absolutely no hagiography despite the reverence. With gentle humour, Sanjeevji opens up the life of a passionate artist and a genuine and principled human being,  who never, except for the National Award for "Dastak", got in his lifetime the recognition he richly deserved.

The programme is, moreover, a throwback to an era of music making wherein reigned supreme dedication to the art. Such, such were the times wherein there was healthy competition amongst the very many talented masters of music who would even collaborate creatively. 

The programme, moreover,  describes the long journey of the fulfilment of the adolescent dream Sanjeevji cherished to grant his father's unfulfilled wish for the celebration typically associated with the film world, be it a well-known camp, a great run of the film, et al. The "Veer Zara" songs sound sweeter once we get to know such intimate inputs.

A dedicated work of research whereby Sanjeevji continues to add a few more tidbits of informative details in each edition of the DDH, especially in the 'Madan Mohan influence' segment, the programme literally makes us forget time which flies away on the wings of melody.

Sanjeevji's fabulous presentation is ably supported by the non-obtrusive but effective compering by Rajeshree Gokhale. Indeed, Mitra Foundation wins our thousand encores for a beautiful and sensitive tribute to the Madan Mohan music for which any number of once more's are too less! 

Pratima@ Wo dastan jo kabhi na bhulayi jayegi/jo phir yad ayegi eternally once more!

Pratima Agnihotri is a devoted Madan Mohan fan from Pune.

Can the AI replace teachers?

 The AI, they say, is the buzz word. For many, however, it is the cuss/curse word. Yes, you read it right. It is a cuss and/or curse word because it seems to take away any number of jobs. In fact, mention any field, and the AI seems to encroach it!

You may be an LLM or a CA. You have spent some six years to be so qualified. The AI, however, even when it is hardly three years old, already has very many tools that finish faster and better the jobs that need routine professional expertise! This, moreover, is true of most fields. Why, the AI can make music and/or literature, it seems!

In such a scenario, how about teaching and learning? Does the AI help it or hinder it? May be, it may help visualise and hence explicate better the theory/concepts. Let me give you an example. SR/simulated reality may teach you the subtle functions of the human brain, the delicate most organ that governs life itself, if you are specialising in brain studies, for example.

Sure SR/AI/4D can be tools that help facilitate learning and teaching. Can they, however, replace teachers? Well, I do NOT think so. Not at all. Let me give you examples to prove my point.  Sure, the 3D/4D technology may mimic reality. It sure can be used to enliven information. 

Such technologies can never, however, replace the teacher though. I should know, especially as a teacher of foreign languages. See, already there are any number of apps that can help you learn a language. A good teacher would ask her students to use them as supplementary material. But no app, forget the costly "(3/4/5)d" technologies, or even the AI can replace a teacher.

I should know. I had a student who was studying German with me. He was very sure, and some high-funda(!?!) colleagues had convinced him that the famous language app is much better than any book. This Ratnagiri boy admitted within a fortnight of actual language learning in the classroom that no bot, no app can teach like the teacher! He never ever bunked lectures thereafter.

Yet another of my Spanish students told me on the very first day that she has completed some six/seven levels of the app. Well, I asked her to answer the A1 level exam, the basic most, question paper. I forwarded the question paper to her, and told her that if she is comfortable answering it, we might accordingly decide. Within an hour, she called back to say that she, as I was soon to find out, a sincere and committed student, could not even manage one-tenth of the test. Why, she could not even understand most of it!

Yes, nothing can ever replace a genuine teacher who shares not merely information but a way of learning. One always meets students who remember one's lectures (either very early morning at 7.30 or the very last one)  some fifteen years ago! Sure, as a concerned teacher, you, too, accomodate the new technologies as intelligent assistants. In brief, just as a smart compounder or even a good chemist cannot replace a doctor, no technology can replace a genuine teacher!

Pratima@ Teachers who love teaching help learners to love learning.

Think Positive

 "Think positive!" That is the eternal advice each and everyone hurls at you. Often the example that would go with it is that of Shahrukh Khan who, it seems, always thinks only positively. It seems, he always tells himself, "I am the best"!

Well, surely there is some sense in this feel. After all, Rene Descartes, one of the greatest philosophers ever, too, argued, though in a totally different vein, "I think, therefore I am"! By that logic, think positive, be positive, right?

Undoubtedly, optimism, hope, positivity are any day any time much better than a defeatist mindset. At least, we are thus forced in to some action which is sure to get some reaction which is far far better than lazy inertia, ugly lethargy.

Yet constant positivity! Is it possible, forget, desirable? Constant positivity may dry the flow of serotonin, I would say! Okay, let me not be flippant. But I do dread such shallow formulae. 

Rather, I would tell myself the goal, next think of my lacunae, then chalk out a rough action plan that has all sorts of shock absorbers, and then take the first baby step which slowly but surely leads to strides, I believe. May be, I  do not believe in self-aggrandising.

Rather I would think sensible! Sure, out there, there are any number of 'well-wishers' with draggers drawn to stab you every which way possible. In such a scenario, why add Enemy Number One? Why be one's own  grave-digger with excessive bravado? 

Instead, think through, think thorough, and act well. No, this is not defeatism. This is both self-preservation and self-amelioration. Honest self-talk, bettering the self in the process is, in my opinion, much better than a competitive superiority complex which mostly hides a complex of inferiorities! By thinking sensible, rather than 'thinking positive', I can be better than my own earlier worst or best or both, right? What say?

Pratima@ No, this is not a worldly weary clever practicality. Always dreaming big may lead to nightmares, I suppose. Instead a good REM sleep is much healthier!

Choice defines Character.

 Choice does define one's personality, right? What we choose shows up who/what we truly are. Let us look at a few concrete examples. Early in the morning, we may choose to drink hot water or tea or coffee, with or without sugar. Our choice immediately shows us up, lets know if we are a freakily health conscious person! 

The colour we love tells a story  about who we are. Blue, for instance, may indicate a brilliant creative personality ripe/rife with imagination and intuition, and with a philosophical bent of mind. Depression, however, is not very far away from such horizons!

If you like/prefer a noisy party to a quiet evening full of music and literature with your doggie at your side, you surely will not be the shallow, showy type, right? For a sojourn, what do you choose? The seaside? The snow capped mountain peaks? See, your choice would reveal your personality!

Classical music or the rap? Katthak or the folk? Bharat Natyam or the Bollywood 'zatkas'? Choose and show who you truly are! Why, what you wear tells a lot about you. The sober, traditional clothes would rarely conceal a jazzy, zany personality underneath. 

Choices have consequences, too. Do not you believe me? Well, the educational stream you choose sure does impact your life(-n-its)style, right? So, mistakenly though, people willy nilly choose science and/or commerce, without knowing the magic that Arts is.

In other words, choices often are assumptions, codified in to a paradigm over centuries, right? Why, our very language is such a codified choice. The same loving, kind, intelligent animal is "dog" in English, "chien" in French, "perrito" in Spanish and "Hund" in German. Our Marathi has a special childrenese "bhu bhu", too.

I would hence rather choose to assert that choices are less a right/wrong binary, and more a kline, may be. See, in a multi-disciplinary way, I may love literature, fine arts as well as sciences and management, right? I may love nature more, but society not less, right?

Involved herein would be the issue of excessive relativism which inevitably leads to infinite individualism which can be the breeding ground of anarchy! See how choices craft destinies not only of individuals, but of societies, and nations, too! Hence better always to choose wisely and with a foresight. Haste leads to waste, right?

Pratima@ A choice can be like the railway track at a juncture/junction, or the "road not taken" as Frost would say. Choose a path and choose an itinerary! Sure we can travel the road once over yet again. Hardly matters if the destination is the dream! 

Out of battle

 Now that safely we seem to be "out of battle" which we fought and won quite decisively, no discouragement at all in talking about poetry that talks of the pity of war. Undoubtedly, a soldier is a braveheart. Behind that armour though is a man who is someone's somebody, right?  He is a son, a brother, a friend, a husband, a father! Indeed we should be indebted to an entire family who entrusts their (often the sole breadwinner) soul to protect (one-n-) all!

 English literature has a wealth of such sensitive poems that shore up the sheer barbarity of war which destroys  the human(e) bonds. The World War I poetry, known as the 'shell-shocked' poetry, the World War II poetry, the poems of the inter-war years which actually saw the dismally disenchanting and hence truly traumatic Spanish Civil War (because it showed how hollow the so-called liberal, left rhetoric was), these genres of poems are truly moving. So are the essays (especially by George Orwell, the conscience of an era, actually of all times) and novels. Poems, however, crystallise the feel the best. So let us talk of poems.

Wilfred Owen's "Strange Meeting" (the title of our blog comes from that poem) , for example, shows the vacuity of war as the poem is a dramatic monologue wherein two dead soldiers meet in hell to underscore "truths that lie too deep for taint".

I shall discuss "Vergissmeinnicht" some other time. Right now, let me mention "Ultima Ratio Regum".  It talks of a civilian casualty, a man "too young and too silly" who had hardly any worth "in terms of employment, hotel ledgers, news files" as he was too much a commoner to be worthy of any special notice. 

In almost prosaic lines sipped in scathing sarcasm and satire, Stephen Spender concludes his searing poem. He questions "O World, O death". He asserts,"One bullet in ten thousand kills a man./Ask. Was so much expenditure justified/On the death of one so young and so silly".

Out of battle emerges nothing. All is wasted, best of resources, and worst of all, lives  valuable to the near and dear ones, but due to the war rendered valueless!

Pratima@True, a century later, realities have changed drastically, nay, critically.  Geopolitical scenarios are brutal. Terrorism constantly rears up its ugly hood. Yet the sophisticated weaponry, too, kills both, the innocent civilians and the army (wo)men! What, and where, is the solution to the barbarity that imposes a war on us??? Which alternatives to brutal battles?