Illumination and Rangoli, IIT Kharagpur

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Note 1: Every time I write a post, I think quite a lot about what the heading should be. It is pretty straight-forward in this one.

Note 2: Happy Diwali!
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Every year, some 4000-odd bright and smart students, tucked away in a tiny village/town in India, create Magic. Every year. Students, who are known to be brilliant in "The Sciences", create Magic in Art, beyond imagination, and it comes from a place so unlikely for something like this. A spectacle seen at no-place else, a spectacle a lot of people don't know about. A spectacle the world needs to know about.

Which is why I want to write about it. And I will, knowing that my blog's reach isn't too great, but hoping that I am able to make this grand event reach a few more people than it would have otherwise, and do my (tiny) bit in spreading the word about something that deserves to be known.

I am talking about 'Illumination and Rangoli', popularly called 'Illu' by the students, organised every year at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur. It is a "competition", among the various halls of residences inside the campus. It involves two events, 'Illumination', and 'Rangoli', fiercely contested among the participating halls. Winning the event goes beyond the pots and pots of Rasgullas given to the winners, it's about pride, honor, the sense of togetherness, accomplishment, the rush of adrenalin, and more...

As someone who had the privilege of going to IIT Kharagpur, I would like to share what I have seen over the years as a student there, as someone who has seen the emotions and the feelings, felt it, and feels the need to shout it out for the world to hear, and can only attempt to describe it in words.

Illumination:

Diwali is the biggest Indian festival, meant to be celebrated with friends and family. For most of the four/five years that the students spend at IIT Kharagpur, it is celebrated with only friends, without the family. For Illu.

So, the preparations begin a month in advance. Huge chatai's, or grids made of bamboo, are used to tie diyas to. Several days are spent in tying up the diyas to wires, which would be used to keep the diya in place on the Chatai. No electronic lights of any sort are used in the whole setup. The diyas are tied to the Chatais to make patterns. Popular scenes chosen are straight out of Indian mythology, like 'The Mahabharat', or 'The Ramayan'.

There is madness on the final day. The atmosphere is enveloped in rush and urgency. The halls are decorated. Huge containers are filled with oil. Pichkaris would be used to fill the diyas with oil. The oil is preheated so that it burns effectively. Wicks are put in place in the diyas. When the moment comes, thousands of diyas are lighted simultaneously by hundreds of students, mounted on tables and chairs, placed one over the other, to reach Chatais sometimes as high as 20 ft. And in that one moment, when the hard work of the past one month comes together to create magic, which will last for a few minutes before it goes out, every KGPian is proud and happy. Once the lighting is done, the tables (one over the other) are removed from in front of the structures in a mad rush in a matter of seconds, for the judges to see. The judges come and do their bit, and it all comes to an end. Ah, and yes, the halls that won't win, will go to sleep feeling sad and hungry  (because most of the eating joints are closed due to the festival) after the month-long sweat and toil they put in. On Diwali.

Tying of diyas in progress

Scene out of the Ramayana

Scene out of the Mahabharat

The Taj Mahal

Gautam Buddha

Lanka Dehan

A video of one of the Illu from '09 is embedded below:

RK Hall Illumination 2009

Rangoli:


If you read the Rangoli article on wikipedia, you will come to know what a Rangoli typically looks like. Rangoli at IIT Kharagpur is in no way like that. You can easily mistake a Rangoli here for a painting, when in fact, it's all just coloured powder. Work for the Rangoli begins days in advance, on a huge canvas (the floor), often as big as 15 ft X 10 ft. The work is done in sealed rooms, so that a crawling insect or the slightest wind doesn't ruin the design. And if that was not enough, we have out-of-the-box ingenuity coming every year, like a Rangoli which looks different in red ambient light, and different in green ambient light (also featured in 'Ripley's believe it or not'.), or one which is meant to be seen in a convex mirror. I know it will not make much sense, so I will let the pictures speak for themselves. 

Rangoli-making in progress

Different in Green...

...and different in red. (Video of transition at this link)

Final image seen on the convex mirror in the center

THAT's how KGPians celebrate diwali, and they wouldn't any other way. :)


Now, coming to the intent of this post. Nothing I have said in this post would be new to anyone who has been associated with IIT Kharagpur in any way. I feel that the quality of the illumination and rangoli is of such a standard that it deserves to be covered at least by the national media. If this post is able to give even a little idea about this tradition and culture of IIT Kharagpur to even a random visitor to this blog, I will be happy. Illu and Rangoli is something EVERY KGPian is proud of.


Public album on Facebook - Illumination and Rangoli, IIT KGP, 2010

Public album on Facebook - Illumination and Rangoli, IIT KGP, 2011

Illumination and Rangoli, IIT Kharagpur...

faceless

Right from the day we were born, when we entered the world, we have been trying to tell people, to show those around us, that we have arrived. Here we are, notice us, respect us, admire us, and love us.

The feeling of faceless-ness first hit me when I was a senior student in school. Students, and teachers, knew us. We had a face. One day, I was asked to go to the nursery section, to "mind the class" for an hour, as the teacher was not present, and substitutions, unavailable. As I entered the nursery section, I saw crowd. Little, teeny-tiny kids all over the place, and they all looked the same. Annoying. And faceless. I realized that, these kids, these faceless kids, this exact set of kids would one day go on to become senior students of the school. They would be differentiated by their skills and talents, and would be known throughout the school. They would have a face. People would notice them, respect them, admire them, and love them.

People who have studied through high-school and senior-secondary in the same school would know how awesome it feels when, suddenly, we transition to being the senior-most students around. Teachers, who often gave us a hard-time became friends, really. Junior students looked up to us with awe and respect, hoping one day they would emulate what we did. It felt special, and it felt like we knew the world. Then, I entered college, and entered the world.


In essence, it was a rehash of the earlier cycle, only more invigorating. Our faceless new batch, freshers, each one trying to find our own place in the crowd. We stumbled, we struggled, eventually coming to terms with who we are, and what we are good at. As we marched ahead in the system, we gained balance. We had a face. A new face. This time, we had discovered ourselves in a surer way than before. It felt special, and it felt like we knew the world. Then, I graduated, and entered the world. This time, for real.

Again, we were just one face in the crowd, faceless, and the crowd, mightier and larger than before. It was overwhelming. But this time, there was a little voice inside me that told me, "It will be okay. You will find yourself, again." I now know that it is a cycle, bound to repeat, and that if we are faceless today, we will have a face one day. I now know that whenever you become a part of something, you begin as being faceless, and eventually find a place for yourself, except...

...except when you were born, and entered the world. When you were born, the instant, right from that very moment, you had a face, in your mother's eyes. You never were, or will be, faceless in her eyes. If you know this, then no matter where you end up being, you will find yourself. :)

ExcelSocial: Use facebook from Excel spreadsheet

The inspiration for building this app comes from this article on Lifehacker (this article on Mashable) about this site.

Introducing ExcelSocial, using which, from right within Excel, you can:

• Check facebook newsfeed and friends' wall
• Like/comment on newsfeed stories/friends' wall stories
• Update status/post to friends' wall

This is the first version of this app, so their might be bugs.

Use the button below to download ExcelSocial:

Feel free to send me your suggestions/feedback through the contact page.

Enjoy!


Note 1: You have to enable Macros to be able to use ExcelSocial.

Note 2: Special thanks to loneranger for helping build this app.

Shaitan

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Note 1: I failed to see what the audiences and the reviewers are so excited about for this movie. I usually avoid negative reviews, but again, like 'Raajneeti', I just had to write this one.

Note 2: I am sure a lot of people would disagree with me. If you are willing to spend your time, I would love to hear your opinion in the comments.
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When you come to know about a movie that will be releasing shortly, and you scrutinize the promotional poster carefully, and see the name 'Anurag Kashyap' printed on the poster, you get excited about it. You eagerly wait for the movie. You are excited for you don't know how the maestro will surprise you this time. It doesn't matter in what capacity is he associated with the movie, his name is enough for creating the buzz. So far so good.

Now, I came to know about 'Shaitan' a couple of months back, and naturally, I was excited about it. I saw the poster, and truly, the poster was remarkable. Then, something happened. Something ominous. Now, I haven't seen the movie 'Kaboom', and have no idea what that movie is about, but the striking resemblance of the posters seriously pissed me off.




Now, there is a specific genre of movies called "Mindfuck". In a good way. [define:Mindfuck - An idea or concept that shakes one's previously held beliefs or assumptions about the nature of reality. (Urban Dictionary)]. When an Anurag Kashyap production has this tagline - "Face your Inner Shaitan", that is precisely what you expect. You know, like 'Black Swan'. Or even 'Gulaal', Anurag's last directorial venture. NOT, to get your mind fucked by an amateurish attempt.

There is no underlying prominent theme in the movie. That should have been there. There is NO power-packed acting performance. That should have been there. There is no empathy (or sympathy, for that matter) the audience feels for any of the characters. That should have been there. There is little or no surprise element in the movie. That should have been there. The only thing that should have been there and is there in the movie is the excellent cinematography.

When dealing with a subject as complex as 'inner conflict' and the dilemma, the characterization should be spot-on. We should be able to understand a character. What it does, and why it does what it does. It should come down to two simple things - reason, and purpose. And that is where this movie fails so spectacularly.

The movie is only brilliant in parts, and those parts are very few and far apart in the movie. I really really expected a lot more out of this venture, and probably that is the reason I am so disappointed. What pains me is that the intended idea was so powerful, that they could have made a masterpiece out of it. But they ended up making it one big mess. Towards the end, the movie is just noise. Annoying, disappointing, noise. The plot holes in the movie are so many that I can't find the patience to sit and write about each one of them, and tear it apart one at a time.

Watch this one only to see how even a genius can make a bad bet.

Shaitan...

Chance

When I was in school, I used to particularly enjoy my English classes, only because of the teachers we had. Incidentally, they were probably one of the best teachers I have ever had. One of our teachers kept on reminding us, "You come here to study the King's English. Don't ruin it with your Hin-glish and all the other nonsense you people blabber all day. At least not here inside the classroom." And it was the teaching which got us all interested in grammar. We came to appreciate the beauty of language.

There was a particular section of grammar which interested me a lot. Homonyms. A Homonym, according to the Wikipedia, is "one of a group of words that share the same spelling and the same pronunciation but have different meanings." Now, in a typical class on Homonyms, our teacher would fire words at the class, and the students had to come up with sentences to bring out multiple meanings of the words. This exercise, you know, really made us think of all the different possibilities with the word. We used common words in ways that surprised us. When I think about it now, it is amazing how our teacher made us get kicks from language, similar to how we would later get when we solved a complex differential equation. Over time, this developed into a deep sense of appreciation for puns, play on words, and probably an improved sense of humour. Like, you know, it made you appreciate sentences like - "Whoever came up with 'The grapes are sour.' probably had a lot of whine.", or, a comic like this:

So, I remember this particular English class on Homonyms from when I was in class 7. Our teacher fired words at us and we shot back with crisp sentences. 'Scale', came the word. "I used my scale to measure the width of the table.", came a prompt response. Then, the class was lost for another meaning. I saw my opportunity, and blurted, "I want to scale the Mt. Everest." You know that smug feeling you get, when you get extra credit for doing something others couldn't. My face shone! When the feeling had subsided, I got thinking about how brilliant my answer was, and realized, although my answer had been deemed "correct", it wasn't really correct in the truest sense. If you think about it from a broad perspective, scaling the Mt. Everest is as good as measuring its height, as if with an actual scale! Soon, I found myself trying more and more to unify the meanings of Homonyms I came across.

It makes perfect sense, you know. When you witness a live concert, you are actually living it (different pronunciations, I know). Or, that a minute is really a minute unit of time (again, pronunciation). Or, that a project is a project-ion of ideas. And that refuse is something which you refuse to have inside your house. There is an interesting anecdote about how the expression "breaking the record" came into use (the Homonym here being, of course, record). In olden days, people used to literally "break" the records engraved on stone tablets when someone bettered it...

... all of which brings me to chance. When we look back on our lives, we find how much of it was really based on chance. Chances we took, chances we got. Chances we gave, taking chances on something. On how many times we took chances on all the chances life gave us. On how we messed up some of the chances we got by taking an unreasonable chance. And that there was always a chance for the things that went right for us to go equally wrong. And when we look ahead into the future of our lives, and try to "plan" it, how we want one chance, just one chance, to turn our lives around! Or get another chance to make things right, which, it so chanced that it didn't go well the last time. You know, given a set of circumstances and understanding, we take a chance on the best possible chance we get, even when chances of success look grim.

Chances are, Life will give you another chance, you just have to wait long enough, you will know when you get it. Or, if you have waited long enough, you'll know how to create one for yourself. Aur jab tak mauka naa mile, tab tak mocha se kaam chalaa lenge!

Shor in the City

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Note 1: I haven't blogged recently. Either because I did not come across something inspiring to write about. OR, because I have been writing for a very (very) small audience lately. Not that anyone missed it, so that's alright.

Note 2: I have wasted atleast 1500-2000 bucks watching a load of crap lately. Dum Maaro Dum, No-one killed Jessica, 7 Khoon Maaf, Yeh Saali Zindagi. ALL bakvaas. Different degrees of bakvaas-ness, I agree, but bakvaas. Kya bakvaas! 'Shor in the City' is surprisingly fresh!
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I had almost decided to NOT blog about this movie, until the end credits of 'Shor in the City' started rolling. And then, what I saw on-screen made me want to blog about it. Why? I am sure I am not letting out a major spoiler by telling you what that is, and I'll tell you what it is in this post. We'll come to that later.

With bollywood on a we'll-dish-out-whatever-nonsense-and-people-will-pay-to-watch-it spree lately, I was about to skip this one, had it not been for my listening to the movie's soundtrack, which is stunning!

...Nainaa nawaabi ji, dekhe hai sab ji;

Phir bhi na samjhe ishaare

Dheere dheere, naino mai dheere dheere;

Apna sa dheere dheere, laage re saibo...

When people ask me how I found a particular hindi movie, I try to think about the movie till the interval, and if the movie is watchable till the interval, I recommend the movie as watchable. Because mostly thats what you get here. At best, a watchable first-half. 'Shor in the city', surprisingly, doesn't lose its charm even in the second half of the movie, and full points to the directors for not letting the movie lose its pace throughout.

The characters are engaging, and the actors have been very balanced in their portrayal of their characters. Sendhil Ramamurthy (of Heroes fame), Nikhil Dwivedi, Sundeep Kishan have all done very good work. I was charmed by Girija Oak after 'Taare Zameen Par'. She does well, but the new find of this movie is definitely the charming Radhika Apte.

All said and done, the show-stealer is Pitobash Tripathi. Wow! That guy! I haven't had my tummy hurting laughing my ass off to some scene in an Indian movie in a very very long time, and this guy doesn't deliver just one scene, he delivers it again, and again, and again. Especially the scene where the trio go out to "try and see" if the bomb they found makes some noise and damage because it won't "sell" in the market. Superb!

I find a major flaw in the way movie-making is done in India. Indians want a story. It has to have a beginning, it has to have an end, and it has to have some events in between. That Indian movies often end up without a story and always in ways the director did not intend is a different story altogether. Where is the slice-of-life film-making in India?

Several minutes into the movie, I got wondering - "There is no clear-cut story, and I am engrossed!" THAT is the power of writing. And although you may find the movie in bits and pieces scattered here and there, with outrageously hilarious writing, the writer does well to knit it all in the end. And let me reveal what I saw on-screen which made me want to stand up and applaud for the directors and the writers of this movie.

"Every incident depicted in this movie has been inspired by a real newspaper story."

Watch it!

Shor in the City...

Black Swan

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Note 1: Finally! :) Watch it on the big screen. Please.

Note 2: I write this post for princess!
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Black Swan. I can talk about this extra-ordinary piece of cinema on so many different levels. Let me begin with my agonizing wait, anticipation, excitement, temptation to watch it on the small screen, some more agonizing wait, and finally, it hitting Indian theaters in March, after it had been going on around the world for almost 6 months. Was the wait to watch this movie in its full glory and magnificence on a larger-than-life silver screen worth it? Hell yeah!

Natalie Portman has managed to blow my mind and overwhelm me on more than one occasions - V for Vendetta, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Leon: The Professional. With Black Swan, she took it to a whole new level. This year's Oscar nominee list for the Best Actress should have had just one name on the list. Natalie Portman. If not the greatest, her surreal performance is definitely among the greatest performances by any actress, ever. Natalie! ♥

Nina: I just want to be perfect.

Requiem for a Dream was about obsession. Black Swan is about obsession for perfection. We have all experienced it at some level, in some form or other. And have felt it destroying us, slowly, from inside. And this destruction is not destructive, its an exploration, of you. You cannot stop it, you eventually let go, and maybe achieve (perfection), but at what price? Perhaps, the pursuit of perfection is meant to persist, and people, persistent. Perhaps.

The hand-held camera work gives an ethereal quality to the footage. The scenes are picturised perfectly. The use of mirrors is overwhelming. The climax, when Nina is dominated by her dark side, and she transformed into a (black) swan is absolutely brilliant!

Thomas Leroy: Perfection is not just about control. It's also about letting go. Surprise yourself, so you can surprise the audience. The only person standing in your way is you. You could be brilliant, but you're a coward.

Natalie shines playing Nina's quest for perfection as a ballerina. To be truly complete. The frustration, in being the perfect white swan, but a frigid and stiff black swan.

Thomas Leroy: We all know the story. Virginal girl, pure and sweet, trapped in the body of a swan. She desires freedom but only true love can break the spell. Her wish is nearly granted in the form of a prince, but before he can declare his love, her lustful twin, the black swan, tricks and seduces him. Devastated the white swan leaps of a cliff killing herself and, in death, finds freedom.

The Perseverance. To let go. The Greed. To be perfect. The Envy. Of another flawless black swan in front of her eyes. The Wrath. Of failing. The Lust. Of the enemy. The Sloth. In her performance. and The Pride. Of perfection.

Thomas Leroy: Little princess...

Nina: I felt it. Perfect. I was perfect.

Black Swan...