Angry Kya ?!

‘There’s been a bomb blast in Koregaon Park’ informed my flat mate as soon as I reached home after a day of gallivanting with friends on February 13th.

After a moment of shocked disbelief, I frantically called my sister and a few friends to make sure they were okay. After quelling my fears, I sat down to watch the news on CNN-IBN. Watched the mangled bodies being ambulanced away, heard the groans of the injured, observed the damage, listened to the news reporters give an update and wondered …

Wondered... Not the usual question on everybody’s mind- “what do these terrorists get out of murdering innocent people?” No, I had long passed that one. What I wondered was, why is that after ensuring the safety of our dear ones ,a bomb blast invariably becomes a news item to be discussed at the lunch table the next day at work and then later archived as a ‘Oh yes, I know about that incident’?

The 9 people who died in the blast were loved and cherished by someone. We look at them as some foreigners who died in a faraway land, but there were some people halfway across the world that were waiting for their return anxiously.

I believe, we are as much to blame about such incidents as those brain-washed violence loving terrorists.

In my MBA course, we had a subject called ‘Business Ethics’ taught by a very old but very flamboyant professor. During one class he remarked, ‘there is too much anger in the world.’ And I begged to differ. I believe there is too less righteous anger in the world and that’s the reason we have to deal with such problems. What we have instead is half-baked, self–centered, selfish disapproval that passes off as anger.

I’d like to think it was Mahatma Gandhi’s righteous anger that made him resent the unfair treatment meted out to Indians in South Africa. It was Mandela’s righteous anger that made him protest against apartheid. Martin Luther king was angry enough to dream about a world where people will not be judged by their color but by their character.

And one thing I am sure of - when Righteous Anger rises, it purges out evil...bomb blasts included... Time to get a little angry... ? !

The Road Less Travelled….( My Yours Truly Theater workshop experience)

Wrote this bit for my theater workshop testimony ..Since my blog was not updated since ages decided to break the silence with this one... Yours Truly theater is a great place to be .... check out the link to know more (http://www.yourstruly-theatre.com/)

How do you answer the audition question, ‘What’s the most unconventional thing you have done?’
I scan my brain and wonder if ‘sleep walking through my weekly review meetings ‘made a suitable answer, then realized they meant unconventional not regular.

Finally I mumble,’ I am in a choir’

I get a few blank looks (accompanied by some furious thinking behind that blank look that said ‘Huh? ‘)

Surprisingly I made it through .I should have known better….

YT is all about being unconventional!

So, whether it’s a dignified IT professional depicting a cow dung or a bank employee exploring the evolution of a bird or an engineering student acting as a jewel thief (no, not the Dev Anand variety- Just FYI, film references are frowned upon here. This is pure unadulterated THEATER), there is eccentricity in everything.

I have always wondered, what’s it about theater performers that makes them different from the zillion other actors we see on TV or the silver screen. At YT, I found my answer in a single word ‘Passion’.

It’s great to see people with undiluted passion for acting combined with a desire to do something different.

At YT, I learnt it’s not about ability but availability and humility, which is a great way for any workshop to function. So, even if I were the worst actor on stage, (A poll across the batch might just confirm my claims), I still had folks telling me I did great.

It’s about having fun, about quelling your embarrassment of looking silly and most importantly about unlocking yourself. It’s about getting back to that place where making funny noises and faces was still cool.

It’s about being yourself!

When great ideas, great people and unparalleled passion cross roads – something’s bound to happen!

And like Robert Frost my favorite poet one said I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference!