Another rehearsal

Today Rekha and me went to meet Vinod and we had another of our rehearsals.. The joke is .. Rekha is now my lead actress ( rolling my eyes round and round ) :).. she is playing the role of the stranger .. until i find another lead actress.. The challenge is how to make a lady of this child woman.. :) .. And that too a dignified , mature one at that:)



But hell ! she and Vinod jell really well together.. that boy picks up our instructions well.. If only , I had the other lead actress, .. to play the Satish's mother .. the movie will go on with a new velocity .. So for today, I played the role of Satish's mother ( she is a really bugging character in this story - and when I told RAghav that I played that part .. he said .. wow ! I knew you would fit the part ! : .. I am still seething with anger on that comment ) ..

Jokes apart, we had a good rehearsal today.. and I am excited again..



Post script :

We also have an option for the other lead actress .. Need to check her out, since she is too young to play this role.. lets see..



I had a conversation with Vinod on what he wanted to be when he grew up . This boy is extremely brilliant. He is a first ranker in his class and is good at painting and dramatics too. At first he had no clue what he wanted to be .. Then he realized that being a teacher ( a maths teacher ) inspired him.. He has promised me that he will do well in his life and at that time, no matter where he is , he will let me know .

Nrityagram - A dance village !

Last sunday Raghav , me , D and J ( my cousins ) went for a visit to Nrityagram . The concept of Nrityagram has always inspired me . And I had been wanting to visit it for a long time..

Nrityagram is a "dance village" started by Protima Bedi with a dream as mentioned below -

"I dream of building a community of dancers in a forsaken place amidst nature. A place where nothing exists, except dance. A place where you breathe, eat, sleep, dream, talk, imagine - dance.
A place where all the five senses can be refined to perfection. A place where dancers drop negative qualities such as jealousy, small-mindedness, greed and malice to embrace their colleagues as sisters and support each other in their journey towards becoming dancers of merit."

"A place called Nrityagram."

– Protima Gauri (October 12,1948 - August 18, 1998)

A visit to this dance village revealed how well the dream had been translated in to reality.. For the rest part of this post , I am just going to show the pictures we captured - coz a picture is worth a thousand words..

So, we reached Nrityagram at around 10 am in the morning - only to be invited by a closed gate that said the school is closed for the vacations from march to may 19. Oops ! we came so far for nothing ! But not the ones to give up so easily, we hung around the gate, when a car with a lady with a big round dark red bindi came out ( Later we found out that her name is June ) and she was the caretaker of the place .



After getting reprimanded by her for coming on a non working day, she asked us to hang around till the manager of the place would come - she asked us to request him to let us in . Yes !

After hanging around for about 1 1/2 hrs ( we spent time at the TAj kuteeram , a hotel by the Taj group , which is right opposite to the nrityagram gate) , we finally entered the Nrityagram ..

One of the first things you notice as you enter the earth colours with which the structures at Nrityagram are made and the presence of trees and nature.





And the first place you come to, as you enter is the office, where you pay a minimal Rs 20 charge for the tour visit..



( Thats the entrance for the office )





The next place that you come to is the dance hall . Below are few pictures of the dancing hall and the structures around it

Further down is the pathway that leads to the student and teachers quarters .. Extremely beautiful huts admist of gulmohars and other flowering plants .

And the amphiteater itself.. beautiful !

As we were returning back, we noticed the open air dance floor and the shade areas and the mangoes that make up the Nrityagram..

These were just a few glimpses of the place.. The actual place is much more beautiful than what I have described here.. So if you are in bangalore for a vacation, a visit to Nrityagram will really rejuvenate you .. !

Check out their website ( http://www.nrityagram.org/ )- it gives us a complete picture of the vision , activities, public programs of Nrityagram .

( If you are planning for a visit, call up their office and check out the timings before you land up here ).