Grandma's lullaby, now world music

The mobile recording studio of the Playing For Change music project has a charming version of this melodic Telugu folksong, chanda mama. See the finely enmeshed video with an international ensemble of musicians.

The interesting project recently started its fourth music school in Africa. The school is located a village of Kirina in Mali with a rich oral tradition of music and poetry (but without electicity).

Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Maps by the garage-indie-rock band has been my earworm this morning.

Their beautiful frontwoman Karen O with her many on and off-stage guises, along with the monk in comparison drummer Brian Chase and the guitarist Nick Zinner are clean strokes of fresh paint on the contemporary music collage.

Karen O is a stylist's delight. Enjoy the figurine diva perform Maps, on vevo.

language of sand

Kseniya Simonova gushes our emotions with just a handful of sand.

Here is her sand animation of the great patriotic war, courtesy youtube.

language of stone

the ah-ha moment for me the last visit to Orissa was not when i was jostled by thousands of rapturous devotees at the rath yatra. it was fortuitous indeed to have a two week field-trip right when caged gods were given their annual day out.

it was not my four hour long bonding with my rickshaw driver, which ended at midnight, us staring at burning bodies in the crematorium, chugging old monk rum from a bottle. the living and the dead burning.

it was when i saw this face of the konark sun temple, where as Tagore puts it, "here the language of stone surpasses the language of man". this 13th century temple is evidence for trade links with africa. can you locate the giraffe? stop staring at amorous poses and see middle panel.

ah-ha revelations aside. that night at puri burial ground, the dead in flames, the quiet, mutual inebriation and the spontaneous friendships we make, will remain unforgettable.

Feet (feats) that stomped Hitler

Any talk of the 1936 Berlin Olympics will be supine without honors to the man of the hour, Jesse Owens. His feet spent very little time on the track-field and mostly rested on the highest step on the podium with four golds. Hitler refusing to shake the black man's hand is a moving tribute to the significance of his feat. Nonetheless, his was not the only feet that should be credited for spiting Hitler. Hitler's idea of supremacy took another blow on the footballing arena. These feet belonged to Teodoro "Lolo" Fernandez.

Germany had an early exit in the first round games and Hitler had to rely on his birthplace Austria to salvage any pride. In the play-offs, Austria lead 2 - 0 against Peru in the first half. Peru equalized in the next half and slammed two more goals in extra time. Lolo sealed the fate with a goal in the last minute.

The political repercussions of these events are noted in history, and debatable. The immediate reaction was the `Fuhrer' forcing a rematch for foul play. The Peruvian team refused and the whole contingent of the country's athletes withdrew in protest. The event may not be invoked as often as Owen's track blitzkrieg but Lolo is fondly remembered in his homeland Peru. Outside his club team Universitario de Deportes, his statue stands in testimony.

intensity

I cannot stand another afternoon ennui. Give me back my acuity. My thirst.

Would Wagner have borne such weariness and yet written those epic operas? Would the prototypical renaissance man Michelangelo been all that he was and still managed to go through the drudgery of days like this?

Pray, get me out of this.

Self-medication: Three shots of espresso and Baroque music.

Superheroes: The incorruptible Sainath

I respect Orwell. Almost everything about that man is compelling. I side step his works of fiction for the moment and only take up his journalism. The compassion, clarity and reflection in his writing is of high order. He faced the unpleasant facts, before he wrote about them. One has to only read Down and Out to appreciate the keen intelligence, energy, articulation and artistry in one man.

The rural reporter P Sainath belongs to that sparsely populated order. He is the voice of India. Of the real India, the poor India, the starving India. The passionate dinner talk titled "Mass Media, Mass Reality" he delivered a few years ago when I was a graduate student in JNU, remains unforgettable.

Let us celebrate the rock star of Indian journalism. A man with no fear and only loathing for the hypocrisy of the India-only-shining mirage.

Thunder

Woke up at a bolt from the blue. Loud.

2.51 am.

I wonder what causes a thunderstorm?

Are the gods playing with a mortar and pestle.

Heat

All in all, a dog day. The dehydration began early. On my second milestone biking to school my tees were soaked and stuck to the back like plastic on hot metal. I had 3 more miles on this burning road.

When you begin a school-day by collapsing on the lounge attempting to channel fluids over a parched tongue, 'listless' is a safe prognosis. Today, prediction bang on.

The demolition of every ounce of morale was complete with a two hour soccer stint. The humidity and heat seem to hack the insides of my soul while the wise choice of wearing no socks under the brace lacerated my right foot.

Now, this minute, the rains are coming down outside. Some mercy.

I should check on arugula and spinach in the garden, first thing tomorrow. I fear fatality from the heat today.

el cambio loco el mundo

What would you expect from a man who turns around and pulls his pants down on an audience?

Nothing less than the turn around of drug war-torn Bogotá to the "Athens of South America".

That man is Anatanas Mockus, two time Mayor of Bogotá and now front runner for the Colombian Presidential elections 2010.

A brief article on his scorching life.

Highly recommend watching this one-hour documentary, courtesy youtube.

"Here's to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes... the ones who see things differently -- they're not fond of rules... You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can't do is ignore them because they change things... they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do."

-- Steve Jobs

an old sore

a long-time friend, did something only long-time, interwoven yet impaling congeniality can do... sent me a link to this musty blog. she could instead have summoned brutus.

dog (y)eared link

i abashedly revive an old sore with honest incisions. i revive the feeling of eviscerating discontent when i am at the writing desk. only equaled in pain from the poverty of what i write. i feel muggle-born in a world filled with magicians of prose.

i wish i was humpty-dumpty, who reminds alice in this fondest work of fiction Alice in Wonderland,

"When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean, nothing more and nothing less "

in the least, the surgical incisions will lay me bare. towards that unbearable lightness of being.