Musical Moorings

Daughter to one of the most highly acclaimed Indian classical musicians of all times, and half-sister to a leading Hollywood actress and singer, Anoushka Shankar is a stunner herself. One would think the talent runs in the family, but I think it takes something else to create magic with the cords the way Anoushka does.

I’ve been hooked on to her music since the past few days. If anything, it’s purely enchanting! She creates magic, pure magic with the Sitar. I was never into Indian classical music a lot before this, but her melodies have made me fall in love with this music genre like never before. I can’t believe I’ve been listening and loving Pandit Ravi Shankar’s ragas since years now, but missed listening to his daughter’s tunes. For that matter, I even watched Norah Jones’ Blueberry Nights (cinematography-nothing like I’ve ever seen before!) a few months back, and loved it. Of course, I’m a die-hard movie buff and ragas too have their own sense of enchantment. Yet, Anoushka’s music captivates me like nothing else. And it has everything to do with the Sitar. That instrument just produces a sort of Indianness—the melodies, the compositions are so beautiful and Indian.

While downloading one of Pt. Ravi Sahnkar’s songs the other day, I accidentally downloaded Anoushka’s Slither with Karsh Kale. Just hearing that song got me so entranced, I automatically starting bobbing my head along with the music. I was so hypnotized into it, I could imagine it all in my head and almost feel the tinge on each and every sitar cord as it resonated into a rapturous melody.

You know how usually in the case of music we divide songs into happy and sad? I also categorise some into ‘inspiring songs’ though. But this one, it’s not happy, not sad, not inspiring…it’s just…wonderful music. You feel like listening to it again and again. I listen to it all the time these days. And even if you’re no pro in Indian classical music, you’ll still be able to identify the brilliance with which she plays the Sitar in this one.

I’ve listened to so many songs till date with wonderful lyrics. Lyrics are important to me. I usually like songs depending on the kind of lyrics they have--one of the reasons I'm not a huge fan of Rap music. But after listening to Anoushka Shankar I realise that only music like this can substitute for lyrics in the best possible way.

I’ve watched so many of her YouTube videos by now, I just wish I get to watch her perform live. That’ll be the best thing!

If you’re listening to her for the first time, you must listen to:

Slither

Crash & Burn

Charukeshi

Prayer In Passing

Books I MUST Read

Below is a list of books I've been wanting to read since I-dunno-how-many months now. Not because I didn't have time to, just because...well, I kept procrastinating. But I swear I'll read all of these in the upcoming October vacations and then review them up here too! I will! Watch me. >_<

(In order of importance)

• Manufacturing Consent by Naom Chomsky
• To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• War & Peace by Leo Tolstoy
• Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
• Bunker 13 by Aniruddha Bahal
• There is a Pleasure in the Pathless Woods by Lord Byron
•  Walden by Henry David Thoreau
• A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn
• Fear & Forgiveness by Harsh Mander

If you've got any non-fictional favorites, do suggest!

Penning A Dream...

I've had a habit of writing diaries since I was very young. I have a whole stack of them now. Back in 2004, when I was only 15, there was this brief phase when I used to dream...a LOT. I used to have a lot of crazy, stupid, even ludicrous dreams. In the tenth grade, during my board exams, I was so into studying Algebra, that my sister swears she saw me chanting an algorithm one night. All that's subsided a lot now. The funny thing about dreams is, the more you try to remember them, the more they fade away from your memory. So, since I'd been having rather interesting dreams back then, I decided to start penning them all in my diary. The moment I wake up from a dream now, (if I'm not feeling too lazy), I write it down. I go back to them from time to time now, and believe me, they make for such an interesting read! Some of them are so ridiculously illogical. And sometimes I'm amazed when I am actually able to remember having a particular dream. Even the ones four-five years old. Writing down your dreams is awesome. You should totally try it too.

Here's an excerpt from my diary.
Dated: 19th September, 2005.

P.S: All you proof readers. Peace out! I was only fifteen then. Excuse my English (and the short forms) alright!

It's 8 O'clock in the morning. I just woke up and got fresh. I just had a very unusual dream. It was like, I, a spectacled boy and Kim Sharma used to attend some kind of class and were sitting one one bench together. The boy used to sit in the middle. I remember everyday I used to attend the class. Then everything changed and the scene was different. All three of us were on the terrace of my old building sitting on those water pipes. It was somewhere at the end of the afternoon but it was still quite sunny. Kim was telling us about something ad we were listening. 


Then a huge Air India plane passed by very down and we all stood up and looked @ it. Kim yelled, "Hey, a plane!", and then she looked aside. I and the boy were still looking and the speed of the plane became slower and slower and till I could reach to a decision through my mixed thoughts, I saw the plane stop, turn 180 degrees and slide down. It slided and fell into a huge sea kinda landlocked lake which we could see from the back of our terrace. I was shocked and to add to it we heard some great and terrible firing noises and gun souncs, As we stood up and started running, I saw a huge dragon-head rising up into the sky and stop and fire came out of its mouth which went long into the sky. Although I could make out it was a plastic-unreal dragon but it fired bullets from all it's body and we ran out. We pulled open the terrace door and yelling, we ran down the stairs. I couldn't understand what was happening until Kim and the boy started yelling about a terrorist attack. I was absolutely terrified and wanted to run and hide with my family at a safe place, I wished we were out of the country. I thought my life was ending and we were all going to die, God was calling us. I was going to get punishment for all that I had done wrong, for all my sins....., I wished this was a dream through which I would wake up and suddenly I got up on my bed and looked here and there shaking my head. It was paining, I realised it was a dream, not the reality. And I thanked God! ThankYou so much!!!

The Third-Year Crisis

For once I want to chuck all preliminaries and get on with something that I really need to do, and there's no better place to do it than here--vent out my FRUSTRATION! It's ridiculous how I was so sure about what I wanted to do...since like, FOREVER now; and it took just one serious discussion about my future career plans with my parents to get me more confused than EVER!

The last time I was this confused about what I wanted to 'become' in life, was maybe in the 7th grade or something when I was interested in a little bit of everything from sketching to cartooning and astronomy and had such sky-high opinions about myself that the only reason to be worried about seemed that I would end up being spoilt for choice as to what career path to choose as I thought I was excellent at everything. I think I thought of myself as a 'gifted' child. (Blame those darned Value Education lectures in school where every story had a 'gifted' child.).

But I thought I'd passed out from that delinquent-teenager phase of being confused long back. I mean, it's perfectly normal to be confused in the 7th grade. But it's absolutely NOT normal when you're in the third year of your Bachelor's and are about to (for heaven's sakes) GRADUATE next year and still don't know what you want to do with your life!!!

I have been pretty sure I want to become a journalist since many years now and have been working pretty diligently towards achieving that. Heck, I'm doing BMM solely because it offers me a chance to specialise into journalism. My plan was that after graduation, I'd go to the U.K. to do a postgrad in Journalism and then pursue my passion of travelling and writing. I know it's hard to find permanent travel writing jobs, but surely, I will have better prospects if I'm outside India, right? Because travel writing isn't very popular here nor is it recognised as a proper occupation. It's more of a freelancing thing.

Besides,  I LOVE travelling and UK has some really profound journalism courses, so why not? I would also get to meet people from other cultures and interact with them and sort of, gain a global mindset. And I've always wanted to live alone and independently, and believe me, I really NEED it. When you have a family of six, with an elder brother and an elder sister AND a younger sister, you are never alone at anything. I know it's a good thing, but I sometimes just wish I was an only child, so that I could do everything myself, without any elder brother to guide me through everything or an elder sister to give valuable advice. I still try to be  independent in my lifestyle by taking my own decisions, not banking on my brother to do things for me all the time, or talking about any personal stuff with my sister to get advice...but I would feel much more proud of myself if I knew I had achieved something entirely on my own and without anyone's help at all.

And this is something I don't think my parents will ever be able to understand--living alone, being independent.

Seriously, I sometimes really doubt if I even belong to the family I do. I mean, everyone in my family is so practical with life, always planning everything beforehand and always doing 'the right thing'. And here, all I want to do in life is travel.

Why?--Just for the fun of it. For the beautiful feeling of being 'free' that it gives.

How will I get the money?--I don't know. Maybe I don't need any.

For how long?--Forever and ever.

What about marriage?--Who the hell wants to get married? I'll make do with flings.

I want to shout out all of this to my parents, but my mom will freak out if I do. Living with 4 other progressive minds has had it's share of influence on my formerly-very-orthodox mom, but not enough as yet to allow her daughter to wander away all alone wherever she wants to just because she's always 'dreamt' of doing that. She already freaks me out with her elaborate plans for the wedding of her three daughters. And I have a feeling she wants me to go first because she knows I'm the rebellious type. (>_<)

That's why she isn't exactly exhilarated with the idea of me planning to go to the U.K. She's already slowly and consistently started to deter me from my plans by pointing out to news articles, friend's daughter's examples (about how they've become 'spoilt' after going abroad), and even examples of NRIs from those lame tele-serials (Grrrr...). When I spoke to them about going abroad, my dad (who thankfully, happens to be the most broad-minded person in the family) was quite okay with the idea of studying in the U.K., but very opposed to pursuing travel writing, my brother (who's just returned from Texas himself after his aviation training) acted like the typical protective elder brother and kept scaring me and mum & dad about instances of racism (I HATE BIG BROTHERS!!!), while my mum did the whole 'Mera Bharat Mahaan' thingy and kept saying there's no better place than India to study anything. Of course, I know better. She's probably just scared if she let me go as far as the UK, I might just run away to somewhere from there itself and never come back and her elaborate wedding plans will all go down the drain.

I know I may not be acting very rational with this whole thing, but there are these wonderful words that someone told me few days back-"Follow your dream. You know what you want to do, and that's a true privilege. If you follow your dream, your happiness and your smile will make the world a happier place to live in."

That's just how I've always thought about life. Living your dream. I know if I follow my dream, wherever I am, ten years down the line, I will be happy.