The Kaladham Diaries - Day 6

We shook off the effects of the day before and headed back to Kaladham to get back to the job. We spent the entire day at Kaladham.

I approached the boys who were playing cricket on a turf net and asked them if I could bowl. They kind of waited until they regular bowlers bowled themselves out and then when they ran out of bowlers asked me to bowl. I must have impressed them because shortly one of the other bowlers gave me a better ball and when I started hitting the right line and length and started beating the outside edge and finding the edge, there was a change in their approach to me.

Bowling at the JSW nets (courtesy Piyush)

 By the end I got their better batsman out four times and they all shook hands and asked me to come back. But when I went again, I found only one person there - Srinivas, their coach. Srinivas is a player-coach for the JSW team which recently won a prestigious All India Steel Manufacturers tournament, only the second time in close to twenty years. Hmm, there's a story here I thought. I invited him to Kaladham but he did not make it that day. The other times I got to bowl there was on the day before last evening and on the final morning. Piyush was there to get some pictures of me bowling.

Rajsekhar organised a lunch at a popular Mangalore joint on the campus. We went there for lunch - Piyush (the organiser), Shireen, Hash, Raj. Lovely vegetarian food. The owner served us.

Mangalore lunch - Harish hotel (courtesy Piyush)

Back to Kaladham. I fixed up a meeting with Rushdee Warley, the CEO of Inspire Institute of Sports, to get his perspective. The meeting was scheduled for the next day at 10 am. However we were scheduled to visit the Hanuman temple which is also known to be a sunrise spot. The temple needed us to climb 570 steps and get off the other side. A visit to the Pampa sarovar was also scheduled. This was where Rama met Shabari.

 Rajsekharan asked me to postpone my meeting and I fixed it for 2 pm. Antony Yaich also wanted to make some corrections in my draft which I shared with him so I was to meet him at 130. I asked Vishakha if she wanted to come with me to click some pics of Antony, Elakkiya and others. She was game and so was Shireen who had not seen IIS yet.

Reading in the evening. Then we headed off to the bar to get ourselves some beer. These days the evenings are generally filled with beer, stories from the great storytellers and then dinner.

Writer Profile No 7 - Nimmi Raphel, Actor, Dancer, Musician
Nimmi is a resident actor, dancer, musician, and puppeteer at Adishakti - a laboratory for theatre arts based in Pondicherry. She has been studying theatre since 2001; prior to that she studied Mohiniyattam and Kuchipudi in Kerala Kalamandalam (1995-2001). In Adishakti she has performed in plays Brihannala and Ganapati at national and international shows as well as The Hare and the Tortoise. From 2008 she has been operating lights and had recently turned director with the play Bali. Nimmi does interesting work at Adishakti - such as relating tantric centres in the body to movement behavior - and conducts workshops about it. She received the APPEX fellowship in Bali, went to an exhange program in Korea. She wrote, directed and performed in a play Nidrawatham, received junior fellowship. All this from the Adishakti website.

Nimmi was one of the big energy sources in the group, easily approachable, always with a smile and upto some mischief. She'd head off for her morning jogs, do some diets of hers very religiously, do her yoga certainly. At the Kaladham she found a tree and settled down under it, overlooking the amphitheater. Inside the Board room we found pictures of her - she was pleasantly surprised to find herself there. Nimmi acts in movies - she acted in 'October' and am sure she gets more movie offers than she reveals. She told us of how tomboyish she was when she was a child and we can totally get it.

I told Nimmi if I could ask my students at the Department of Dance, University of Hyderabad, to apply for an internship at Adishakti and she said they could. I told her to come sometime to Hyderabad and give a lecture to my students. Plans, plans, plans. George and I went and saw her play Bali in Bangalore. I loved it.

There's something about Nimmi. Nimmi, hopefully see you in Pondicherry, if not in Hyd.

The Kaladham Diaries - Day 5

We had a full day trip to Hampi. Hopefully, it will inspire some stories. We left at 8 in the morning. George had some work in Bangalore so he left for the day while the rest of us geared up for a day long trip. Caps, shoes, comfortable clothes, water. Rajsekharan and Geeta to help us along.  We piled into our minivan and headed Hampi-ward. It was 30 km away from the Vidyanagar township.

First stop was the Queen's bath. It was a place where the queens bathed.

Sathya (Pic. Sharon)

Onward to some place where the guide told us was a place where the kings of the Vijayanagara empire entertained their royal guests.

The court/ pavilion

While the others climbed up the steep steps which looked very uninviting to me, Sathya heard a puppy wailing someplace and followed her instinct. In one corner of this large field was this little puppy stuck between a rock and crying its heart out.  Sharon, who seemed to have a tender hand with animals, helped. I hung around a bit, lifting a stone etc. Pup owes its life to Sathya.

Sharon with the rescued pup, giving water

Then there was a step well which was supposedly shifted stone by stone from another location. No stepping into the step well.

Piyush inspecting the stepwell

Past a few ruins, into some secret dungeon which was pitch dark where secret plans were made.

Sathya heading out into the large expanse

Me, Brandon, Nimmi and Vishakha (Pic. Vishakha)

Past that into the lovely Hazara Rama temple. I met Razia who has been sweeping the place for the last twenty years. The temple is not functional but lovely sculptures from the time of Ramayana exist.

Hazara Rama temple

Milling about

Sandwiches and juice in the minivan

Sharon and Brandon in an inspired pose (Pic. possibly Vishakha)

Some sandwiches and stuff and we headed off to the elephant stables. This enclosure had the zenana mahal or the Queen's lotus palace.

Lotus mahal

Another pool

Then the elephant's stables.

Sharon's green parrot moment which found its way into her poem

Elephant's stables

Then the mahout's place.

Brandon, Piyush, Sathya and Nimmi - and the coconut seller

Some nice coconut water.

We had a darshan of Lord Virupaksha, came out and most of us got blessed by Laksmi the temple elephant which is in penitence after killing its mahout some years ago. I did not have a good feeling about it and abstained and so did Brandon who said he has this thing about animals in captivity. I joined for the picture with Lakshmi the elephant but Brandoon did not join the picture too.

A rare sight - cops lined up on their bikes

Virupaksha temple

Rajsekhar being blessed by Lakshmi the elephant

Piyush showing Sharon how she looks with her tiara of flowers

The Ugra Narasimha temple.

Ugranarasimha temple

The mustard Vinayaka temple. We got into a scrap with the cops for wrong parking and that delayed our next plan so we headed to the Mango tree restaurant for some fine lunch.

Mustard seed Ganesha

Nimmi posing with red chillies after lunch at Mango Tree restaurant

From there, a coracle ride.

Hash in the coracle

We stopped midway to see the koti lingas and met some swamis. They were on a pilgrimage to Srisailam which they hope to reach by Sivaratri. They asked me to take a picture and send it to them. I did - both.

Swamis and the koti lingas

Back in the coracle. This time he did some stunts like spinning it around very fast so it got us dizzy. We got off on the other side of the river. Here we saw the king's royal balance where he weighed himself in gold and stuff and distributed that among the public..

Royal balance

Then the Vittala temple, which houses several temples. There are the musical pillars which are now forbidden to touch, the famed chariot etc.

The chariot

Tired

At the chariot - Sathya and me trying to push it along

Piyush, the photographer, and I, walked the 1.5 km to the cars. The others waited for the golf carts to transport them. The stones along both sides of the road was where the market was located - piles of pearls and precious stones they say. On the way we saw a stepwell, a place where we build houses by putting small rocks on top of one another. Piyush and I had the most satisfying glass of refreshing, fresh sugarcane juice at the end of it.

The long walk to the minivan

The house I built

Onwards to the sunset point.

A rock formation

Moonrise on the other side

Sharon, Vishakha, Shireen and Shubra - moonrise behind them

The journey back to Hampi House was pretty much the Great Piyush show as he reeled off song after song from Neil Diamond to Kishore Kumar to the Beatles and sang so well and with great energy. His energy was so infectious that he dragged everyone, especially Brandon into singing. Brandon was feeling pretty unwell until then but he broke into a couple of his songs - 'The dark side of beautiful' remaining with me forever and another one. Both own compositions, beautiful and he sings so well. Sharon (sings well and knows all the lyrics), Shireen, Shubra, Sathya all pitched in. I asked Piyush how he sang so well and he said he once sang for a band in college - what does he not do? Sing, write, direct.

End of the day, we dragged ourselves into Hampi House. I am sure we all went and got ourselves a drink or two at the bar after that.

The trip was well-organised thanks to Raj and Geeta who took care of all our needs. It was beautiful and will certainly inspire creative stuff.

(For all those who are interested, the guide Chandrasekhar Gutti was excellent. He said he charges 1500 rupees for 6 hours (approx). His number 94496 54527.)

Writer Profile No 6 - Chandrahas Choudhury, Novelist
Hash is the most literary of the lot - if you know what I mean. He has written three novels 'Arzee the Dwarf', 'Clouds', and an upcoming one on a Chinese restaurant which appears quite funny. He edited an anthology India: A Traveller's Literary Companion. He reviews books on the National, WSJ and the NYT.

Hash worked for a while as a cricket reporter with Cricinfo and remembered fondly the days when he bowled to Gilchrist and interviewed Sehwag. His books are critically acclaimed and when we listen to him read from his works it is evident he enjoys his work immensely. I wish I could be like that too. It is very evident when he reads and speaks that he knows his craft far better than most of us. He takes it very seriously and has his notebook where he makes notes. He is very focussed and sticks to his writing schedules.

Hash lives in Delhi and Mumbai. He plays football with a club. Pretty fit. Goes for mid-afternoon runs. Enjoys his beer and was the prime mover for beer sessions in the evenings. Also very thoughtful - keeps an eye out for the little things that most miss out and quietly takes care of that. There's much to learn from him in the writing part and I hope I will get some time to spend with him and get a peek into his writerly mind.

For those who have not read his stuff, check his books out. They are worth reading. And hopefully Hash should be coming to Hyderabad sometime so we can meet over Irani chai someplace.

The Kaladham Diaries - Day 4

Mornings seem kind of following a particular trend. I head out for a walk and if Piyush is around we go together. One day we met Nimmi who was jogging around the campus. George works at night so he jogs also in the late evening. George also played junior level cricket for Kerala and even led his state side! Vishakha heads off for a run or a walk in the mornings and so does Shubra. Hash, who also plays soccer (and also worked with Cricinfo in an earlier avatar as a cricket journalist) runs in the afternoon. I decided to check out the cricket nets one day. I had seen some boys playing on a turf net at a corner. On one of my walks, I discovered a full-fledged football ground. The JSW owns or co-owns Bengaluru FC, Haryana Steelers of the Pro Kabaddi League and owns 50% of the Delhi Daredevils team in the IPL. The sporting connection is just too strong.

We would normally hit the Convertor for breakfast by 815 or so and hang around there chatting about this and that until it was either time to go back for a shower or head to Kaladham. Breakfast would go all the way from South Indian (no Besibele bath though) to the bread omelette, puri bhaji, fruit fare.

Typical breakfast scene - Sharon, George, me, Brandon, Piyush, Shireen and Vishakha (right to left)

I decided to go back to the Inspire Institute of Sports because I found the idea really interesting. I asked Pratik, the Manager of the facility if I could meet any of the coaches. He said I could meet Antony Yaich, the Track and Field coach from France who has a record of coaching Olympians and World Champions. It was a fine afternoon spent with him, finding out how Olympians are made and the challenges they face.

Me, Elakkiya and Elisabeth

I also had a chat with Bala, his assistant coach who hails from Andhra. But more importantly, I also met Elakkiya Dasan, a 24 year old athlete who is a medal hopeful in the sprints. It was an insightful experience and my understanding of the entire enterprise improved.

Nimmi arm wrestling the Hampi House man

We had a reading session. I had so far read a piece I wrote about my feelings about the Unfestival,  a chapter from 50 Not out! Sharon read poetry. Sathya wrote diligently everyday and completed a story or a poem by end of day. Piyush came up with short story ideas. Hash read beautifully from his past work, enjoying it as he read. Brandon read a short piece he wrote - poetic. George showed us a sample of his work. Vishakha showed a couple of paintings she had worked on. Elisabeth showed a wonderful animated documentary of her work - it was really fine work. Her current theme is that of the radicalisation of young people in Germany into joining the ISIS.

Piyush with another of his funny T shirts - post reading. George ignoring us in the rear..

Today I read a bit from my main piece - the one on Inspire Institute of Sports and then headed off to meet Sarita, my classmate who lives in Hospet, 40 kms from Vidyanagar. It was a nice ride and the driver told me that he had come to Vidyanagar from Uttar Pradesh 15 years ago. His relative is the priest in the temple. His family lives there in UP, his sons tend to their farms, and he earns money here. He had got his four sisters married off and saved a bit for himself. Now he says 300 of his people are working in and around Vidyanagar. He goes home once, or twice a year. His sons are now grown up.

Sarita was looking just the same. Shailesh her husband has been working in the steel sector for the past 30 years and has now turned a consultant. Their son, now 28, works in Chennai. They have a lovely house from where we can see the dam on the Tungabhadra. After spending an hour chatting with them and eating some lovely paani puris, I headed back.

Somewhere now my dates are getting mixed up so I will go with a general feel. One of the evenings we hit the bhel factory behind the Hampi House after the reading session and ate of lot of bhel, vada pav and stuff like that. One other evening we headed off to watch 'Gully Boy' at the JMax. It was fun. Of course, we still headed back to the Convertor for a spot of dessert. Piyush and George would tell me stuff about their wilder days before we headed back to our rooms.

We seem to have found some rhythm by now.

Writer Profile 5 - Brandon Damien Ingram, Author, Actor, Songwriter
Brandon is from Colombo, Sri Lanka. He is an author, actor, songwriter and singer. His first two novels deal with child sex tourism, sexual identity. His themes generally are dark. He is spiritually oriented and explores his spiritual boundaries as a practitioner - not for the sake of 'knowing'. He was a former ad man who is now just 'being'.

Brandon is very good looking, sensitive and smart. He is super comfortable in his own skin, laughs easily and genuinely. He is incredibly talented - tells a story and keeps us all spellbound. He wrote his own songs and sang them so beautifully. He knows more Bollywood songs from the 90s than any of us do. He has these wonderful insights into spirituality and energy work and I enjoyed the walk down the Hanuman hill with him discussing it all. He sits meditatively and writes deep, insightful and powerful stuff. He showed us a small clip of immersive theatre of which he was part of - it was so intense and he had transformed so much into a villain for the role that it was amazing to watch. It definitely left us all disturbed. And we cannot forget the way he would say Oh my God!

Brandon is heading back to Colombo for a role in a feature film. After seeing that clip I realised what he is capable of. I saw another video of his where he talks about sexuality - and I cannot help but wonder how well he articulates and how well he holds the audience. And if I forgot to mention - he is high on fashion. Hair changes, clothes change - complete transformation - and you wonder if he is the same person. Brandon blended so easily with the group and the beer sessions were great fun with his stories. In fact everything was fun with him around - you can be comfortable with him in silence and in a riot.

A sample of his writing, from his blog. It's very good.
https://brandoningramsblog.wordpress.com/2017/03/08/happy-8th-of-march/

Brandon - hope to see you soon man. And do send me that recording of your 'Dark side of beautiful', It has such a haunting feel to it.

The Kaladham Diaries - Day 3

An early morning walk and then we hit breakfast. Then the 10 am trudge to Kaladham to find our spaces between words and words between spaces and write and compose. We found ourselves places all over the campus at Kaladham, ignoring the classroom like setting that Rajsekharan had organised for us on top of one of the spaces.

Entrance to Kaladham

The stone corridor that leads to the restaurant and store and other spaces

Sathya settled down at the restaurant,

The restaurant and store

Nimmi found a tree,

The amphitheatre's backside, Nimmi's tree on the left

George found a theatre,

This is another theatre for stand up performances

Chandrahas took the classroom,

Vishakha another high place,

Above the Board room - I can't believe I never climbed up

Sharon found the stream,

Sharon picked the stream

Shubra hit the restaurant,

Shubra in the restaurant, fully color coded

Piyush, Brandon and I hit the Board room with its comfortable chairs and air conditioning.

The Board Room where Piyush would play music - the noisiest place (well insulated)

The day spanned out this way - get to Kaladham at 10, work till 1, split for lunch, head back, work till 5 pm.  At 5 we would all congregate and read from what we wrote that day or perhaps read from earlier published works. There was no compulsion to write in Kaladham - we were free to go wherever and write, including our rooms.

Reading over tea and banana cake and samosa

The only structured part was to meet every evening to read which was an interesting experience because in some way it made us all conscious of ourselves and our work.

Writer Profile 4 - Shubra Krishan, Travel and Cook Book writer
Shubra is the editor of Travel Secrets magazine and has in the past worked with Femina, Cosmopolitan, Conde Nast Traveller, The Sunday Standard, Asian Age etc. She authored five books about fine living and fine cuisine - Essential Ayurveda, Radiant Body, Restful Mind, The 9 to 5 Yogi, Thinner Dinner and Top Secret!! Superhit Recipes from Delhi's Hottest Restaurants. She conducts writing workshops and mentors youngsters to help them get published.

Shubra is really cool. She just does things her own way - mostly in a hurry. Be it her walk or a drink (or even her writing) she gets done with it in a flash. Always good for a laugh and a lark, she is very approachable and a good sport. She speaks her mind - in a good and vulnerable way. She loves good writing and obviously knows her craft very well. I am looking forward to reading her stuff and finding out about how she approaches writing and editing. Currently, she is doing a workshop in March of Travel Writing Secrets in Mumbai. We did plan one in Hyderabad together - hopefully, it will happen soon.