The paper-pen, Laptop or the smartphone?
Er....is there room for a typewriter in there?

So a few months ago I finally got myself a
cute little portable typewriter
i've been using it to write short stories
can't write my screenplays on it as yet
because typing on it takes time...
and that's the thing about it - time.
whilst typing away on it, it gives me
time to reflect and think. the words come
out better and i stay more disciplined
and focused -
one reason being there are no delete keys on it!
but i've noticed my writings come out far better
on my typewriter.
not something i find while tapping away
on my laptop.
time again is another thing going for such
instruments.
there are typewriters a hundred years old
doing perfectly well what is was meant to do
in the first place - generate written communication.
there's no technology today that would last that long.
this laptop that i'm writing on costs a thousand times more
than my typewriter and would probably last a tenth
of it's lifetime.
and then there's the thing about every typeface of a
typewriter being uniquely different from any other. it's like
a fingerprint. so what you type is uniquely your own.
not something that comes out of a laser printer.

but the most valuable instrument for me is my
pen and paper. actually my pencil and paper.
my very first ideas on my screenplays are always
in pencil and paper. it just seem very right for the
purpose, where i can scribble away and actually
'feel' what i'm writing. and of course there's always
the occasional doodle when i have a block.
then there's always some ideas popping up in
my brains when i'm rubbing off a part of the
paper with an eraser or simply sharpening my pencils.
i use the faber-castell set of pencils. and i mostly stick to
6b or 8b whilst writing. they're just the right amount
of soft and dark

but i do love the fountain pen. and i think the ball pen
is atrocious.except when camping outdoor and i'm keeping
a log so that the rain don't was away the letters on the page.
but fountain pen's are getting more and more expensive these
days. right now the most expensive in my collection is a
six thousand rupees waterman, which i think is too much,
but since it was a lovely gift from my wife i gladly took it. :)
the others are modest priced sheaffer and a parker.
there's is something about writing with a fountain pen
that you don't get with any other instrument. especially
if you are lucky to get one with a gold tip which slowly
gets rubbed in over time and shapes up according
to your writing style, so uniquely becoming your own
over time.
it's also the best gift i think you can gift your child.

now i've also begun writing away on my smartphone.
in fact my phone's becoming increasingly intrusive into
my life ever since i bought it despite my efforts. but
that's a whole different page.

TYPEWRITERS HERE!

If you are in Guwahati and want to buy typewriters
 that map above is where you need to go. they are a very
old shop and have some cute portable typewriters stored.
make sure to see a few before buying the best
one for you. they're all second ones though.
 typewriters aren't made anymore.

so just got myself the 'little black book' as i like to call it.

a very appropriate title i guess for this 

little book by Ai Weiwei.

to me it's a courageous shout of protest

against everything that represents

Mao's China and his 'little red book'

Shillong of my Dreams....

It doesn't take long for man to destroy what he loves.

The hill town I loved, where I spent my childhood walking on the footpaths and sitting on the soft grass amongst the pine trees is no longer there....

I wish I hadn't gone.

My only console was the Lily's at Wards Lake, as bright and beautiful as I remember...
so I took a few pictures....

The flowers it seem still haven't given up....

To go to bed and listen to soft songs while it rains outside.

To watch the sunset from a hill top.

To take Cold Shower on Hot days

To read books late nite when sleep is away.

To weep the way no one can understand.

To receive a call from someone, I don't see a lot, but one whom I want to see.

To play in the rain

To tlk 2 myslf looking at the mirror.

To get Calls at midnight from Loved ones that last for hours.

To get attention when I dont expect it.

To accidentally hear somebody say something good about ME.

To wake up and realize it is still possible to sleep for a couple of hours.

To hear a song that makes me remember a loved one.

To drink coffee alone and think for hours long about the past.

To See an old friend again and to realize that things have not changed.

To laugh .......laugh........and laugh ...... remembering stupid things done with stupid friends

To laugh out when something hurts in my heart..

CHINESE ARTIST SHOWS US HOW TO DISAPPEAR

Meet Liu Bolin, a Chinese artist who loves to get lost in his work—literally.
Bolin, who holds an M.F.A. from China’s Central Academy of Fine Arts, knows how to make himself disappear right in public. The secret? You just have to become part of the canvas.




Bolin’s “Hiding in the City” series is a creative set of photographs depicting the artist himself standing in various scenes, his fully-clothed body painted to match the background with an expert precision. Bolin is surprisingly hard to see in most of the images. Amazing what a solid ten hours of patient, artistic labor can accomplish for a person!




There’s a good reason for Bolin’s disappearing act. In 2005, when he was living in Beijing’s northeastern village of Suojiacun, the Chinese government decided to bulldoze the area and displace Bolin and a hundred or so other artists from their homes. “Hiding in the City” is a direct result of this experience and a creative reaction to the persecution of artists in China.




The project is also meant to portray the rebellion against society’s “system”—a system that left Bolin feeling like he didn’t really fit in anywhere.



These photographs may seem a little weird, but they do tell a very interesting story. It’s a story about a man fighting against the powers that be—with paint.

Liu Bolin trained in one of China’s finest art academies—under one of China’s most prominent artists—and four years later he was homeless. Under the pretext of Olympic redevelopment the Chinese government bulldozed the buildings of Suojiacun, a gritty artist village in northeastern Beijing, putting around a hundred artists on the streets. In protest Liu Bolin stood amongst the wreckage while two of his friends painted his entire body, camouflaging the artist into the scene. The work of art crystallized a decisive moment of destruction in China’s path towards cultural development. It also set Liu Bolin off on his first major series, Hiding in the City, which has been lauded by critics, embraced by the establishment, and exhibited in China, France, Italy, the United States and Korea.

(working)POSTERS FOR MY DIPLOMA FILM.

There used to be a nice little café in a corner of Shoppers Stop at the South City Mall.
BRIO.
It had the most amazing Blueberry Cheese cake.
I always made it a point to go there once every week and I always had the same pastry along with the wonderful Darjeeling tea they had.
The people who served had begun to recognise me and would ask as soon as I sat down ‘the same sir?’ I would nod yes and then spend the next half an hour in slowly enjoying my favourite tea and pastry.
It was like my own little café, something I’d discovered and kept coming back to, and the people always welcoming me.
So I couldn’t wait to go there after I’d returned.
But as I went there last Sunday with a friend I was shocked to see large signs of Café Coffee Day in the café. Everything was the same except the signs were changed as were the people who served there. So it initially didn’t register for a while.
The person who came to serve us explained – ‘BRIO is closed sir and this place is taken over by Café coffee day. In fact it’s closed all over the country.’
What!?
It’s like a nice little café with it’s own speciality is suddenly gone – POOF - and in it’s place is another one of those giant mass conglomerate which is popping up all over the country like mushrooms and which you see everywhere and you just can’t escape no matter how much u want to.
The worst part is that the people don’t seem to care or mind at all.
Aren’t people tired of Barista’s and café coffee day’s already…..? c’mon, I mean seriously?
The same tea and coffee, the same snacks, pastries, sandwiches….. the same bloody everything! (why the hell don’t they change the damn menu!?)
Even the people that come to these places look the same all over, young 20 something’s; each one conscious been ‘seen’ having a ‘good time’ in a ‘happening’ café.
Yaaawwnnnnnn……
The coffee? Well that’s just an afterthought. If they’d really been there for the coffee, they’d have thrown it in the bin after the first sip itself.
Give me the noise and crowd of the college street coffee house any day to the uniformity and pseudo ambience of the CCD’S and the Baristas.

Man I miss my BRIO! :-(

“ONLY AS HIGH AS I REACH CAN I GROW, ONLY AS FAR AS I SEEK CAN I GO, ONLY AS DEEP AS I LOOK CAN I SEE, ONLY AS MUCH AS I DREAM CAN I BE.”.


I sit out in the verandah and try to read. But it’s too warm and humid even at 11pm with no sign of any breeze, unlike other nights.
According to the Buddhist calendar this is suppose to be a very bad year. But my luck started to go bad even as I had wrapped up my film shoot on November last.
By the time I returned from Durgapur after the shoot I had begun to feel nauseous and uneasy. Three days later I had high fever and it wouldn’t abate even after medications. Blood test for typhoid proved negative and a week later I had a strong allergic reaction to the medicines.
A week of unrelenting fever had zapped me of all my energies. I was bed ridden and sweating, unable to eat. The allergic reaction over that almost knocked me off.
Sandeep rushed me to the hospital and I wasn’t sure if I was drifting in and out of consciousness or just sleeping.
Next thing I knew the doctor telling me I have hepatitis A. Jaundice. My blood sugar level has gone down dangerously, my white blood cell count has fallen way below normal and my blood pressure is low and fluctuating.
How the hell is all this even possible is all I’m thinking.
A day later my sister arrives. She’s a gynaecologist and she has a long discussion with the doctor. She decides to take me home immediately. Two days on dextrose and antibiotics and I’m able to take in some food. Just plain stale porridge. My menu for the next three months.
I puke outside the airport.
Then inside once again.
The airlines people are concerned if I can make the journey.
I stand up and walk and say I’m fine.
I immediately sit down on the floor as soon as they leave.
I feel sick to the stomach and a strange disgusting feeling inside.
My head spins and I just wanna sleep.
Back home I’m in bed all the time and there is saline given to me 24X7 along with a strong dose of antibiotics.
My bilurubin shows 4.3. OK. not too bad.
Treatment for normal Jaundice is usually plain food and lots of rest as the lever slowly heals itself and the body fights off the disease on it’s own.
I keep looking at myself in the mirror and over time I see my eyes beginning to go yellow. Yuks!
A couple of days later my bilurubin has gone up to 7, then suddenly a week it’s reached 11.
Not good. Not good at all.
Normal Jaundice usually doesn’t go beyond 10.
I’m admitted at the hospital.
A week later the bilurubin has gone down 7.
Rejoice!
Home for a week and again it’s climbed to 12.
What the fuck!!
Back to hospital again.
My skin and nails are all sickly yellow and I feel nauseating all the time.
Along with my normal treatment, my relatives suggest I try the local medicine.
And so I undergo local treatment where they put a cone of paper all over the body and light it up. A ring of yellow forms on the skin inside the cone as it burns up completely. This is suppose to ‘suck up’ the Jaundice through the skin.
Right whatever. I’m willing to do anything so long as I get out of the freaking hospital bed.
Also a band made of some local plants tied to a string is put on the head. This slowly expands on its own and goes down over the body, after which it’s thrown in the river.
My next blood test shows my bilurubin has touched 14.
Local medicines didn’t help I guess.
The doctor does a grave examination, with a grave face. Hehe.. he looked funny.
It could be Toxic Jaundice, he says.
Uh huh. So?
So nothing. Stay in hospital.
Great.
When my bilurubin touches 17, there is alarm in the family and I am immediately taken on the flight to Gauwhati, and admitted to a hospital under a lever specialist.
Blood test shows my bilurubin has shot to 30.
I feel angry and sick at the same time.
I undergo a battery of tests. Nothing. There is no reason why the Jaundice has gone toxic.
When that happenes the bilurubin keeps climbing with no telling when it’ll stop.
God damn! How the fuck did I end up like this?
Another blood test reveals my bilurubin has touched 33.
I give up.
The doctor discusses blood dialysis with my sister.
Even lever transplant, just in case.
Which is a difficult proposition as any transplant of the lever has to be done within 10 hrs. of the donor dying.
So basically someone has to die for me to get a liver.
Great.
No wonder there’s a long waiting list for receiver and most patients die just waiting.
At this point I’m scared and can’t sleep well at nights.
My bed is placed beside the window on the topmost floor of the hospital, the 10th floor. Through the window I see the street and the shops and the large crowd going on their daily business.
I feel a desperate urge to walk again.
Just walk.
I think of my family….
I should have spent more time with them
I should have gone on trips with them
I should have played more with my niece and nephew
God….
Two months in a hospital bed with constant medication and my body mass and muscles have shrunk and I’m beginning to go into depression.
I freaking do not want to go into depression. Not now.
I get suicidal tendencies when I’m depressed.
I feel more depressed as I see people celebrating Christmas and the New Year through the window.
I get calls from friends and relatives.
It makes it even worst.
My birthday on February passes in bed just watching TV.
I go to sleep late and wake up everyday before 4 am.
I hear my family member sleeping soundly beside me in the visitors bed.
I feel alone and angry and depressed and majorly fucked up and I cry.
Sleep eludes me.
At around five in the morning when my minds somewhere else reflecting on a lot of things, the mosque across the street starts their morning prayers.
The reading of the Namaz at such an early hour when most of the city is asleep is somehow very soothing, comforting.
I begin to look forward to it every morning.
I am put on steroids. It constantly makes me hungry.
I’m able to even finish off a large bowl of stale porridge three times a day due to the hunger.
Any other day and I wouldn’t even look at it.
The continuous dextrose however, is causing pain all over my hands.
The needle keeps getting blocked and has to be changed every two days and after a month there is no place in both my arms where the kenula hasn’t been pushed.
My arteries and muscles are almost undergoing trauma and as the nurse tries to push in the needle my arteries swell up and it starts to bleed.
They keep pushing the needle at different places in my arm for a good flow of blood, and at most places my hands swell up.
There are large red and blue marks under the skin of my arms due to internal bleeding, it pains and takes longer to heal the more the kenula is kept pushed in.
The pains is excruciating, and I want it to stop.
I fucking want the pain to stop.
I fucking want the dextrose to end.
The steroids has caused my face and neck to puff up.
I look like a stranger to myself in the mirror.
Who the fuck is this in the mirror every morning?
It’s like one of the worst phase of my life and I often keep awake late at nights thinking this might go all the way.
All the way……
I keep thinking about my family….
I keep thinking about the millions of things I should have done.
I keep thinking of missed opportunities.
Bloody damn!
A week later the test finally gives a positive result .
My bilurubin has dropped three points to 30.
Thank you!!!
I feel elated, surprised and relived at the same time.
From this point on it keeps dropping.
Ten days later I am discharged from the hospital and shift to a flat in the city. I keep undergoing tests and visit the doctor every week.
A month later I’m back home, able to walk and eat solid food.
And no dextrose.
It takes a month for the exhaustion and weakness to slowly go away. All I have at the end of it is the large box of medicines and a whole lot of medical bills and prescriptions.
As I go through the papers at home I find a piece of paper I’d written one night in the hospital bed. It is a good long list of all the things I should have done by now and the things I’d like to do before I say a final farewell.
Small things.
Like spending more time with mom and dad.
Walking in the rain
Climbing that tree in my village
Go on more trips and talk to strangers
Paint. Write.
Small things…...
I intend to do all of it now.

LOCATION SCOUTING....
looking around Durgapur for locations to shoot....
film making is actually manual labour....

DURGAPUR...
location for my diploma shoot starting this 24th.
cross u'r fingers 4 me.

MANIPUR...
I am amazed at the amount of talent this state has....
I stayed at the capital Imphal for just four days in my search for an actor for my Diploma film but the people i met and the interactions i had were an eye opener...
i am convinced that if ever there is an event close to a Renaissance in art and culture in the northeast, it will come from this state.

SATURDAY CINE CLUB



Mixing 5.1 surround sound with the Kolkata Cine Society can be an hilariously mix - as I found out Saturday last.

Almost every Saturday, the Kolkata Cine Society screens a couple of movies at our Main Theatre here at the institute.

This Motley group of people who come to watch the films are sometimes as interesting as the films they screen.

Our institute has recently installed the Dolby Surround sound. What this means is that – very simply put - film sound can be distributed or sent to any of the four corners of the room, giving a more ‘realistic’ sound experience.

So last Saturday, I am sitting in the back row watching a film by Fassbinder with these people when halfway through the film, the heroine’s mobile rings. This sound comes from the left side, the character being on the left side of the film frame - when suddenly one of the viewers in front shouts out in Bengali –

‘AY brother switch off your phone na!’ thinking it’s someone’s phone in the audience.

‘it’s in the film man, are you asleep or what’ pat comes the reply from someone else in the dark.

‘what’s happening! Why do u need to reply’ another gentleman shouts back from somewhere.

‘OH HO!… be silent all of you!’ a louder voice rings out

This sets off a chain reaction….

Arguments and counter arguments starts being throw back and forth from all over the place in the theatre.

Now let me tell you that an average Bengali loves four things – mach (fish) sandesh (sweets) adda (talk session) and a good argument. (not in order of preference)

The last one was in ample evidence at the theatre where the argument lasted for a good fifteen minutes.

And a good argument in the Bengali language is something to relish.

So anyway the film goes on and an hour later another mobile rings in the movie….

And everyone starts laughing.

i've picked up the paintbrush after ..... an eternity. the last complete paint was in highschool. that was another lifetime.....
was harder than i thought i'd be. i've forgotten the feel of a paintbrush, can't remember how colours mix, don't remember the way water behaves on paper..........

the end result of my first trial after many a years.....
nothing to write home about
but -
i've found out that i still love to paint
that's all that matters in the end

MONSOON clouds over the institute.....

had a hell of a time trying to find how to install windows on a mac through bootcamp.
although mac provides a manual but one needs to print it out to see it! since i don't have one n maybe there are others out there with similar problems ....
heres the link with the pdf file-

http://manuals.info.apple.com/en/Boot_Camp_Install-Setup.pdf

i got myself an imac! how cool is that!
so - i quickly got it home from the reseller at city centre, i set it up at my desk and then- well, i basically just stared at it for a couple of hours cause i have noooo idea how to operate a mac OSX. how dumb is that!
so i'm into learning a new OS mode for the past couple of days.
makes me feel technologically illiterate. hum, haha... strange!
an even stranger thing though-
a small family had come over to the shop whilst i was waiting to get my mac packed. a cute teen and her parents. she wanted an ipod and wasn't sure which one to buy. the parents - typically- insted of letting the child make up her own mind kept giving her their own tastes and preferences 'i like this one, i like that one, no that is better etc etc. poor thing was so confused. but the golden liner came at the end from her mom - and i quote the exact words- ' what about the SHOW OFF factor, u need to show it off at school na?" EGAD!!!
when we talk soooo much about the ills of the new generations - i think it's the parents who should seriously start looking at themselves in the mirror.

11:30 pm. Hostel room.

Woke up at 10:30 am today.
There’s a sudden down feeling after almost a month of high.
I’m looking forward to going back home for some change of weather. The humid summer here is unbearable.

The Kolkata Metro, the South Park Street Cemetery, the Bantala Junkyard.

It’s a bit surprising the kind of 'unfilmable' locations we got to shoot around this time. Although it meant I had to take far more meetings to various govt. departments and really trying to convince the authorities on my work.

Never walked the streets of Kolkata this much before. Never travelled so much in a month within the city.

The Kolkata metro :
I had to make more trips to the head office than I’d like to recall.
The concerned official was an amiable sort of a person who would listen to me, but he had a collegue who I’d like to give a piece of my mind some day. To almost every request he’s immediate answer would be –‘NO’. and this in the middle of my sentence.
An overblown ‘babu’ from the past who should be given a few lessons by the general public.
He goes on give various security reasons at length for denying any shooting and then some time later promptly adds –‘otherwise you pay 3 lac rupees and shoot anywhere you want! I guess 3 lac rupees takes care of all security concerns.


It’s actually a big pleasant surprise that the police headquarters in Kolkata has a Films Section! Nice! The office coordinates with various police departments and stations in kolkata where you need prior police permissions. It really made things easier on my front. Just had to go there once to give an application for three locations, and I always got a good update whenever I called and finally even got the permissions without having to go back. It actually works. Always a shocker when that happens in a govt. department in India.

I didn’t really expect to get clearance to shoot in the old park street cemetery as it was undergoing renovations; turns out it was one of the reasons I got the permission! Talk of irony.
The Christian burial board under whom the cemetery runs had a madame whose concern seem to be most on ‘donation’
She’s adamant on her stand that we can’t film as restoration work is on full swing. Another round of convincing and smooth talking and she promises to talk to her superiors. I get back two days later and there’s a proposal.
We screen the film for the Board so that the senior bureaucrats can see the renovated work the cemetery has gone through.
I promptly say yes.

Finding location and getting permissions is one thing, finding actors in another.
Almost every small actor here has bangla looks. So searching for a non Bengali looking face is an adventure in itself. We naturally had to turn to non professionals.
I post adverts on the net and in front of college gates.
I get good responses on my mail. But opening them is one disappointment after another. Portfolios have ‘sunil shetty wannabe’ written all over them. No point serching for ‘normal’ looking actors.
I turn to my friends. It’s always through them that we get someone in the end. This time too is no different.
But the female actor hasn’t been found till the last moment. I make contacts, I call, I meet actors all over kolkata, but nothing.
At the last moment I call up my friend. She is like a lifesaver. She promptly says yes. She rescues the situation. Like my last short film when the female lead had a change of mind in the day of shoot and vanished! She was there to fill in and save the day.
I later come to know she’s bunked her work to be at my shoot.
Wow.




Shoot happens on time. My crew works like they’r suppose to. Professionally. We have good locations and we make the most of it. Although it always seem the eight hour shift a day isn’t enough and whenever the production in charge reminds us that it’s pack up time, there’s always two or three shots more to take. Problems crop up at intervals n we try dealing with them as best we can.

The kolkata metro allows us to shoot on the condition that we do it at 7 am in the morning when the metro opens and the pilot train runs. For half an hour only. And no shooting with a 35mm film camera. We can take only a small digital camera. We’r fucked. This is a film camera project, not a digital one.
Meetings with the production manager. We decide to use a digital camera and screen it on the plasma tv and shoot that with the film camera.
They agree and we make preparations.
At the last moment the Metro officials again inform us that they can’t let us shoot on a weekday and we have to do it on a Sunday at noon. We already have a fixed schedule from Monday to Thursday. We’r fucked again.
I try convincing the official that we’ve fixed a schedule for Monday.
‘how can you fix anything? It’s upto us to give you time. You can’t demand anything.’
I feel like smashing the ******* daylights out of this ******.

Why not shoot on a Sunday and call a rest on Monday? The production manager agrees. Great. We call up all the locations that we were to shoot in Monday and tell them we wanna shoot on Sunday.
The Christian burial board denies us permission to shoot in Sunday.
We’r fucked all over again.
We go through out other locations and see if we can shift things around.
But all the other locations come under the police and we’ve already fixed location dates with them. Getting their permissions for a new shoot dates will take a week at least and our shoot is suppose to start the next day!
In a desperate call the production manager allows us an extra day of shoot with a digital camera.
So we go with five days of shoot instead of four.

The last day of shoot and the ‘honourable band madam’ Mamata Banerjee decides to call an impromptu band (again) after six.
We are shooting at the junkyard and have to shift base to park street exactly at six o’clock. I suddenly get desperate and call up our production manager. He calls back saying it’s a one hour band only. We can have an extra hour to shoot. Whew.
But we have to get to park street in an hour or the shop closes where we are to shoot. As we ride towards park street the rain falls and it’s the worst traffic jam ever. The IPL is being played at the stadium nearby.
I’m almost chewing my nails and thinking things couldn’t get worst when all of a sudden a crowd of Trinamool congress supporters jump on the road shouting slogans and raising flags. They further slow down the already dead traffic. I almost give up.
The shop is closing it’s shutters and is switching off it’s lights. I run to the propertier and request 10 minutes. We just get two shots inside the store and that’s it. Not good.
Shift location. Griahat overbridge. We need traffic below overbridge but by the time we arrive it's late and the traffic has begun to thin. by the time we'r ready for our first shot it's past ten at night and there's just a token traffic plying around. we go ahead anyway n try to make the best of it. Three more hour of shoot at the Gariahat pathway and we’r finally done past midnight.

I need that plane ticket home.

my favourate spot out there...
thank god for star mark!!!

Shoot date for my Diploma Film is fast approaching and I’m not ready with my script.
Can’t be in a worst time to go through a block! Argh!