Tag Archives: Performance

RECORD SHATTERED! THE WORLD HAS STOOD UP TO DEMAND AN END TO POVERTY! 17/10/2009

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To see the London Art of Living crew stand up go to http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=243393&id=500304440

GUINNESS WORLD RECORD SHATTERED BY CITIZENS ACROSS GLOBE DEMANDING THAT THEIR LEADERS END POVERTY

More than 173 Million People Gather at “Stand Up, Take Action, End Poverty Now!” events, setting new world record for largest mobilization in history
A Guinness World Record shattered this weekend when 173,045,325 citizens gathered at over 3,000 events in more than 120 countries, demanding that their governments eradicate extreme poverty and achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). “Stand Up, Take Action, End Poverty Now!”, now in its fourth year, has been certified by Guinness World Records as the largest mobilization of human beings in recorded history, an increase of about 57 million people over last year.
“The more than 173 million people who mobilized this weekend sent a clear message to world leaders that there is massive, universal, global demand for eradicating poverty and achieving the Millennium Development Goals,” said Salil Shetty, Director of the United Nations Millennium Campaign. “In particular, we have seen citizens determined to show their governments that they will hold them accountable for keeping their promises to end hunger, improve maternal health and abolish trade-distorting agricultural subsidies. They will not accept excuses for breaking promises to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people, who have already been hardest hit by the global food, economic and climate crises they had no role in causing.”
In Asia more than 100 million people participated (101,106,845); in Africa more than 37 million people participated (37,848,412); in the Arab region more than 31 million people participated (31,394,459); in Europe more than 2 million people participated (2,102,121); in Latin America more than 200,000 people participated (229,371); in North America nearly 200,000 people participated (191,535); and in Oceania more than 170,000 people participated (172,582).
“Stand Up is proven to be a growing global mobilization, as well as an ongoing grass roots movement from remote areas and cities in so many countries, both rich and poor,” said Sylvia Borren, Co-chair of the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP), who attended several “Stand Up” events across The Netherlands last weekend. “These are the voices of young people, women and men demanding the eradication of poverty, and new answers to the food, economic and climate crises. We will carry this overwhelming message forward in the weeks and months ahead to influence both the Copenhagen climate discussions and next year’s MDG review.”
Currently 1 billion people around the world are hungry and 500,000 women continue to die annually as the result of pregnancy and childbirth. The vast majority of these deaths are preventable.
The mobilization was organized globally by the United Nations Millennium Campaign, in partnership with a range of organizations including the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP).
The 3,000 events across every inhabited continent this weekend included:
In New York, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon lead schoolchildren in Standing Up on Friday.
In Bangladesh, civil society campaigners raised the call “National Unity Can Eradicate Poverty,” urging that a “Poverty and Hunger Free Bangladesh is Possible Now.” The Prime Minister led the nation in pledging to remain united to develop the country by 2020. At a rally in Dhaka, she called upon all political parties to jointly fight corruption and stabilize democracy.
Despite the typhoons that hit the Philippines just before “Stand Up,” 35.5 million people in the country Stood Up and the “I Vote for MDGs” campaign, a survey on the issues voters believe should be prioritized by the 2010 Presidential candidates, was launched.
In Nepal the President read a Stand Up Pledge with members of the Constituent assembly at an event broadcast live on national television, followed by a concert in a large open-air theatre in the heart of Kathmandu.
In the United States, the Irish band U2 brought 50,000 concertgoers to their feet for a “Stand Up” moment during their October 18 concert in Norman, Oklahoma.
From Cape Town to Cairo and from Accra to Kampala, millions of Africans stood up in churches, mosques, schools, markets, streets and work places to call on their leaders to end poverty and inequality. In Uganda, the Local Government Association joined “Stand Up” by launching a historic award to honor the best-performing local government. The inaugural award was presented to the Kasese District.
In South Africa, housemates on the hit television show “Big Brother” made passionate appeals to world leaders to end poverty and led the continent in reading the “Stand Up” pledge, collected food for disadvantaged children and wrote a song on poverty. They called on African leaders to stop maternal death, end hunger and address climate change.
In Nigeria, legendary African artist Femi Kuti led over 60,000 people attending the annual event commemorating the life of his late father Fela Kuti, in pledging their commitment to campaigning fervently against poverty and injustice. Femi urged participants at the festival to be bold when holding their governments accountable, noting that Africa has enough resources to end poverty. Accusing African leaders of mismanaging public resources through corruption and poor governance, he called on them to focus more attention on programs leading to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.
At Federation Square, Melbourne, a concert organized by Make Poverty History Australia and AusAID included a flash mob stunt and performances by entertainers including Diafrix, a musical group of African refugees.
Citizens of Papua New Guinea Stood Up for the first time this year, in churches and government buildings, with support from the government Department of Community Development.
In Halifax, Canada, citizens marched against poverty in a rally organized by Make Poverty History.
In Italy, more than 400,000 people participated in 200 sports events across the country. The people of L’Aquila, which was hit by a devastating earthquake in April, ran a marathon to show their support.
In Paris, the streets were invaded by 4,000 roller-bladers on Sunday proudly sporting ‘Stand Up, Take Action, End Poverty Now!’ t-shirts.
In Spain, coordinated marches nationwide included a rally in Madrid on October 16 which was followed by an outdoor concert featuring Spanish rock bands.
Peru was one of several countries which used “Stand Up” to start a process of climate justice hearings aimed at gathering the testimonies of people whose lives and livelihoods are being destroyed by global warming.
“Stand Up” was also supported by the entire United Nations system, with events organized by United Nations Information Centers (UNICs) across the globe. In Egypt, for example, 25 million worshippers Stood Up in mosques, more than 2 million worshippers Stood Up in Coptic Orthodox churches and thousands more Stood Up in schools across the country, in a mobilization organized by the UNIC in Egypt.
Hundreds of people gathered on October 16 at the International Labor Organisation (ILO) headquarters in Geneva to Stand Up Against Poverty in a joint action with UNDP and UN agencies, led by ILO Director-General Juan Somavia.
For more information, photos and b-roll contact:
Kara Alaimo
United Nations Millennium Campaign
Kara.Alaimo@undp.org
Telephone: +1 212-906-6399
Ciara O’Sullivan
Global Call to Action Against Poverty
Ciara.osullivan@whiteband.org
Telephone: +34 679 594 809
About the Campaigns:
The UN Millennium Campaign was established by the UN Secretary General in 2002. The Campaign supports citizens’ efforts to hold their governments to account for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. The Millennium Development Goals were adopted by 189 world leaders from rich and poor countries, as part of the Millennium Declaration which was signed in 2000. These leaders agreed to achieve the Goals by 2015. Our premise is simple: we are the first generation that can end poverty and we refuse to miss this opportunity. For more information, visit www.endpoverty2015.org.
The Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP) is a civil society alliance of social movements, international NGOs, trade unions, community groups, women’s organizations, faith and youth groups, local associations and campaigners working together across more than 100 national coalitions/platforms. GCAP is calling for action from the world’s leaders to meet their promises to end poverty and inequality. In particular, GCAP demands solutions that address the issues of public accountability, just governance and the fulfillment of human rights; trade justice; more and better aid; debt cancellation; climate justice; peace and security as well as gender equality and women’s rights. For more information, visit www.whiteband.org.
www.StandAgainstPoverty.org

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Aks Production’s Acting Workshop June-July 2010

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Aks Production’s Acting Workshop June-July 2010

Big up Ambarish for the pics

Since I’ve been extra busy I’ve not got down the dates.

First Workshop meeting – Meet with the Aks crew, introduce ourselves and chit chat. After that we did some exercises for stage awareness, voice projection, trust, etc. Quite a few of them were what we teach kids in Art of Living’s ART Excel course. I was excited about the trust one as I’ve always wanted to be the one in the middle being pushed around. So that was cool though for the first one I think there was more talk and lets just say it’s a good thing Ankur is funny.

Second meeting – Get an email assigning me to Team 1. Basically we were divided into 2 groups and each group would further be divided into 2 plays. So meet up at Sanket’s beautiful place facing the docks. Our director Charan had mailed us 2 scripts and we went through them. Get an email telling me I’ve been given the part of Paul in the Growth. I was like yay… I have to sleep most of the time lol. So I recorded my script and put it on my mp3 player to listen to throughout the day. I must say the bus rides got interesting as I’d pretend to be talking to someone on the empty seat next to me or an occupied seat opposite the isle. Most of the time I’d get away with it coz the folks would think I’m just on my handsfree or something. But then there are some lines e.g. did you book that seat or did the airline stick you way over there? And folks would have that expression like this guy looks totally sane but why is he talking like this and how should I react to it.

Third meeting – Get to Tina’s for rehearsals. She’ll be playing my wife Sue and Sejal would be the hallucination/angel Monica. We go through our bits and get direction from Charan. Voice was the main problem and would be in coming rehearsals. So far so good. Note: Charan was talking about the 4th wall and representational/presentational act and I was like… I WANNA KNOW MORE!

The rest of the meetings took place in Regent’s park at the bandstand. We finally realised why Charan kept telling us about volume. We couldn’t hear anything just a few steps away from each other. So now we had to work on voice AND talk to the audience when speaking and look at the person when they were speaking… difficult concept and we’ve come a long way but still need to work on that bit. As in it’s just habit to face the person you’re talking to right? Oh and Paul has been a bit too stiff for a caring husband and I was told to work on that. It was kinda difficult coz that ‘nice guy/lovey dovey guy’ is a part of my past and my ego was like you’re not gonna be needy… till Charan mentioned something about what is needy to me is called love to the rest. I was still beating myself up for not getting it coz it was just acting so after rehearsals it was time to calibrate. Asked myself when I felt that lovey dovey caring stuff. Only with 2 people and music of course. I thought I was gonna have to confide in Tina to feel that but I felt it… and confided anyway lol. But yeah… every emotion I linked to a song and either one of the two people that I used to show all my emotions to. It did help coz Sue has a tumor and I’m trying to be caring and all just like how I used to be with moms wheeling her around.

So every time we meet we work and build on something. After voices and looking at the audience came emoting the lines with all the lovey dovey stuff. Note: I think this is the first time I’ve held a skinny girls hand… and it’s not too bad ;o) Note 2: Was meant to design the poster and tickets for this production but its a not for profit thing and that means no income which aint happening since my seva time and resources are booked for Art of Living till end of August. Plus Aks was formed by folks wanting to get away from their work and I was spending enough time and money for the workshop. Hell by he time I get home I just have time to sleep… maybe change. And sleep was getting hard enough as it was as the Alam brothers seem to like rearranging their furniture every other midnight while my Bangla housemates in the living room next to me feel a song coming on every other minute.

Workshop 2 with Ankur’s parents and sister – Intros etc… right of the bat I was told to stretch the R and S in my name. Oh and thats the other thing… out of all the cast I thought I’d be the loudest and it turns out I was the softest. Let me reword that… I was the least loudest!? Shows you just how much your perception is not what is reality. But I’ll come to that in a bit. We do some more exercises and then do our plays right… now the parents give us tweaks and stuff. They were amazing… in a nutshell… try and express each and every word spoken and every space before, after and in between. Only bit I was heart broken was when I was told to tone down the anger and be more caring in a very emotional bit which I had to dig into my past to get out… and it’s still hard to show it but yeah Charan confirmed it’s all good and the emotion stays. Anyway so sacrificed a major fam reunion after ages for it but I had to do it… my been there done that reflex kicked in. By the time I joined the fam reunion it chilled out and I’ve been trying something different especially by staying away from the music but towards the end I ended up there. Teaching belly dance and farting around lol. That Polish beer was sooo strong I had to sleep it off the whole next day.

More meetings at Regents Park bandstand. More rehearsals and I totally forgot one crucial bit but we got to it… it was emoting and reacting to our partners lines. So we had to add to that and now I’m feeling comfortable with it coz it’s starting to flow. Sue and Paul are starting to feel like a couple. Funny bit: The director knows what he wants so he’s directing that way and sometimes the cast feel like they can word it better or help and ends up being a ‘too many cooks…’ situation. So yeah… the shouting lines at each other is starting to feel natural too. It’s getting there but at the same time lots of tweaks needed. Note: Usually I’d get to Regents Park extra early so either catch some sleep or chill by the lake/pond thing. This time round I was eating my carrots and feeding some of the ducks there and a gaggle of geese come uncomfortably close. One was right next to me and I’m like does this fool want a carrot or is he gonna bite me. He was saying something to me… if only I had subtitles. It was nice though… till a silly girl decided to chase them around. I think I took their spot coz they settled quite close to me. It felt like the main one was yelling cuss words my way. Note: Using that world, gaggle, just took me back to Std. 7. What were those books called again? First Aid in English or something?

Meet again at the Peacock theatre for proper rehearsals. Usually we’d say a few lines and Charan would panel beat it when needed… now it was time for us to do it fully. First time we were better. The other plays are so much more funny and have much more movement. Ours is just in a flight sitting and talking. And one of the plays has cuss words man! The cocksucker bit makes my day every time…. where was I? Oh the first time round Charan even recorded our bits and we watched it and realised that one of the biggest things we needed to bump up was our hand and body expressions as our facial expressions were lost in the distance. And this theatre is not that big even. Second time we were really crap… but louder so that was good. I personally thought that main bit where I lose it was good but no one else giving me props so I guess I gotta work on it. Yo, but Neha Jain said I was a cute husband… Paras felt a flashback when he used to be sweet and cute and all but just to clarify… I’M PLAYING A CHARACTER so she was talking about him OKAY! LMAO! My dear Sue was not happy with her part and I was feeling this need to be there for her. So I guess this acting stuff is helping me feel for stuff other than music. Anyway get home and I don’t have work the next day so I’mma sleep my ass off!

Yeah right… my body clock is programmed to wake up by 9 atleast and after the energy drinks last night for the play… I think I fell asleep when it was getting bright so say 4am in summer. Spend some quality time with the lappy… I ignored her for a whole week man.

After a weekend break we met again at the usual Regents Park Bandstand and Ankur joined the second performance. Dude gave us some pretty deep mindsets to think about especially for the emotions and how they transition. So now my lovey dovey-ness is good but my sarcasm is missing and I gotta work on the reaction while Sue is talking but yeah out of all the plays ours is ready to go. Can’t remember if I mentioned this but our play is the most static, sad and some other S word (I think slow) and it’s been slotted in to be the second one in the 4 short plays.

Rainy windy day… it was dry by the time we got to the bandstand and time we did something called gabble where we just blurt out our lines fast and try to do it without mistakes. Then did a straight run I was not at all pleased with… even the second straight run I was not happy with my execution. Charan asks us to take note of our props list. Get home and pack and go stay elsewhere to try get some decent sleep but that didn’t happen.

Friday (2 days to the play) – Just got named and shamed coz I didn’t pay the workshop balance lol. Ok so we meet for a proper dress rehearsal at The Cockpit. I was early as usual and it was closed so try out this minced lamb on a naan pizza like thing next door and I realised these guys on around Edgware road are either trying to be rude or don’t have it in them to look you in the eyes. Anyway, Tina tells me to meet her at the sheesha place we usually hang and get coffees from. Sejal joins us. Rija was there too and we didn’t even realise. Dude next to us leaves the sheesha for Sej and me. The waiter is not too pleased with that and tries to take it away. Then I ask for another glass for mint tea and he refuses to bring it! Oh well… back to the play… see now the crew has already beautiful women so when they came out dressed I was like that Boyz II Men song … if there could only be 3 more of me…. So our first rehearsal went ok and Charan let us go, from now on we’re on our own but we need to work on that volume. Do some more gabble and get a chance to rehearse once more which came out great… hell I was happy with my bit finally. But yeah it’s freaking me out a little as I start feeling my heartbeat and shakes and cotton mouth. We’re told alcohol would not help as it’ll interfere with our voices. Bit of a challenge but exciting too. All the plays are coming out well… you can see there is chemistry between the characters and now it’s basically fine tuning.

Thought I’d wake up early… go to the gym at 9 and meet with the crew to hang as we couldn’t do much without Sejal. Even skipped my workout and just did a run and still got there late. And on the bus a kid threw up on my Converse shoes which I rarely take out for a walk. It’s all good, it was more water than anything else and didn’t even smell the bus out or anything. I’d go into more detail about it but this one’s about Aks sooo… Charan had left The Rag Factory by then so I watched the other teams rehearsals. Man Sarah’s expression are soooo amazing even though her second character plays the perfect ‘kinda crazy about measurements’ partner. I don’t mean measurements in that way! I just realised the other plays have a kink… one has some psycho-ness, another has swearing and the other has sexual references.

The Big Day – Wake up early thinking I’ll squeeze in a run at the gym… worked out my vocal instead by singing and rapping after ages. Get there early and wait for the rest. Rehearse sound and light and curtain calls. During the curtain call Ankur calls me Paras Shah and my reaction was ‘thats not my surname mother f***er!’ as I walk on stage (in a funny way of course). Lol I was like if that happens during the main show I’m gonna replace it with most famous swear word in one of the plays. Find out the print outs have mine and Heteash’s surnames wrong on there but Charan nipped off too his office to fix that. Rehearsed a few times and the last minute changes were hard to incorporate especially pretending to sleep with my chin up so the audience can see my face. Make up time. Back stage was wicked… we thought the place was small but more rooms lead to more rooms and they have this speaker system where you can hear whats going on ‘on stage’ so clearly. Just hope nobody was bitching about anybody else. The guys dressing area had a piano and washing machines etc. Everyone’s starting to look fly… Neha Datta hooked up the older person look on Sanket and Sejal. Suddenly felt like prep with Blue Sky Films all over again.

The performance – First the musicians went on. Ali knew these guys separately and got them together for this show. They sounded crap on the backstage speaker thing but the crowd loved em. First short play goes on… sounds good. We’re next and I was trying to find a quiet place to go blank but didn’t and saw Sarah with her headphones on… BRILLIANT! Thats what I usually do to drown the rest of the noise anyway. Still end up getting advice and I can’t remember what anyone said coz it stitched through my ears. Our play had 2 screw ups… first one from yours truly of course saying the wrong line. The second screw up kinda covered up the first and the audience had no clue so it’s all good. After that my stomach turned into a washing machine. OH the whole day I don’t know what was up but before the play I had to go 5 times! Anyway so I suppress this feeling of Alien wanting to break out of my stomach with a whiskey and serious flirting in Albanian with the Kosovan barmaid. Feel better and get backstage again. Wait for the the plays to finish. Curtain calls. Meet my fam and friends at the bar again. It was pretty packed so we left for a shawarma at Helen’s. Can’t believe after all this time practicing it was over so quick. Everyone was full of nothing but compliments but I wanted to know which bits were off. I was told the bad words caught people off guard mostly since there were kids in the audience. Note: Gotta find out what that feeling in the stomach was coz it was BAD! Hell I took a day off work to recover.

So yeah… the Workshop was worth it … total £95 (mostly to sell tickets) plus lots of time rehearsing. We were told we’ll get more of a practical experience from it instead of learning stuff, but some acting for dummies advice now and then would have been good. The producers and directors were great, the crew was amazing… in a few weeks we were already like a family. Was hoping for some kinda drama but they were all too cool, full of jokes and they saved the drama for the stage. Cock suckers!

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Blaze at The Peacock Theatre

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Blaze at The Peacock Theatre
One of the first things I learnt from my first breakdance video is there are 2 kinds of props/respect. One is from the crowd or you could also say newbies and the other is from your opponent or you could also say people who’ve been in the scene longer. So while newbies will give props to a b-boy/b-girl for the quantity of moves e.g. lots more spins, the experienced will give props to the quality of combos and different styles. This is where Viv, Kim and Debra agreed that it was more for newbies and lacked story… and I concur. Even when reviewing the whole thing I was like I can’t really call this breakdance… it was more street dance and watered down breakdance.

So it’s not that bad of a downer as the target market was a family audience anyway. The bits that impressed me was the tap dancing and belle they threw in. They played with fairytale music which was pretty entertaining. Lots of street dance, popping locking, glides and slides. So all that was impressive. What was really astounding was the backdrop of wall to wall and ceiling to floor drawers. And it was amplified with some brilliant lighting. Major props go to the lighting… making the drawers look 3D then lit up tiles like the Billie Jean vid. And it was a high wall! Bits of comedy here and there and a song and dance about vegetables. Some battles to ‘keep it real’ lol. And some beatboxing.

I took detailed notes about the performances but unfortunately it’s not earned it’s place in the review. In fact the outro was really long too and I aint trying to be clapping so much till you earn it!!! So yeah… it’s worth seeing the show for the lighting, but sadly that’s about it. Big up Viv for the ticks.

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Collabo ’10 at East London Dance Stratford Circus

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Collabo ’10 at East London Dance Stratford Circus
Been there and done it last year so I’ll stick to the the changes and interesting bits. The 3rd performance was pretty busy coz it was a collabo with Velocity, Laban Youth Dance Comany, Sense of Sound and Greenwich’s Youth Choir. It stood out coz the choir gave the whole performance a Motown feel to it with the acapella and beatboxing. Some dude called Botis Seva did a crazy solo performance… bit freaky but thats why we like Collabo. The best performer out of all of them were Trilogy for sure… I mean the other groups and crews looked like they were still counting the moves or not smiling while Trilogy not only looked like they were enjoying themselves they also pulled off some wild moves and made it look easy. Always a plus in my books. Now before Avant Garde performed the presenter (Ricky) gave out ‘freeness’. Basically some t-shirts. He picked 2 kids from the audience, Clinton and Claire. Man Clinton was so jokes he was meant to be on stage. Looked like a baby Eddie Murphy… and he had the purple jacket too! By the way Ricky the presenter himself is very captivating as a presenter… dude got jokes. Anyway so then Avant Garde performed and boy have they grown in number. Some kiddos in the mix too so big up Avant Garde Dance, ay’bady that played a part in it and Viv for the reminder.

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Jump by Ye Gam Theatre at Peacock Theatre 2009

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GO! If you hear about it just go, don’t think. Till now I used to tell everyone Lion King was the best musical/play ever… now it’s Jump and they’ve set the bar very very high now. You know when you love something so much you wanna tell your peeps about it in detail… I wanna tell you every joke, sequence and sound effect… don’t worry I wont spoil too much.

Started of with this old man struggling to walk around in the audience. He gets crowd participation as he gets a girl to help him up the stairs so the jokes and laughs had already started. The stage and back drop was the same throughout, like a veranda and facade of a building… well Chinese tracing paper material stuff you know. The family is introduced with pimping Grand dad, Dad, crazy Mom, very Flexible daughter, geek boyfriend that turns into gangsta hunk when his glasses are taken off and party boy son. Mix Kung Fu Hustle with Matrix and as Viv said… cartoons… only their martial art is Tae-Kwon-Do. We laughed so much, hell it was so funny we were laughing like black folks jerking in their seats and all. I wanna go again and again man… like these guys had fighting skills, acrobatics, coordination and to go with it all they had the perfect sound fx. Sometimes there was no joke just sound fx and the crowd went in a fit. What else did they do…. oh yeah rewinding and replaying slow motion movie style. Got more crowd participation as they get this guy in a suit to fight and then a hottie. The son did some Jacky Chan drunken martial arts. And to end the first part the young couple get into a dance/acrobatic sequence and then the mom and dad get into a sequence too only the mom wants some, dad doesn’t so they end up doing their own version of the tango.

Also the story was very much like a situational comedy where there is a main dilemma/story, in this case trying to get girl and geek boy together. And then sub dilemmas like for the first part it was getting the place clean? And introducing the main dilemma. The second part was them getting robbed and of course getting the young lovers together. The thieves were so funny, especially the bigger guy with the afro. All of them worked the props just like Jacky Chan would. The music was interesting from hero like guitar that reminded me of Saber Rider, to songs with that twang you hear in Shafts music. Some excellent Matrix effects especially the wind one where one of them runs so fast all the rest actually follow. I was very impressed with the continuity especially when the old man was knocked out behind the couch but you gotta see it to know. They were pretty long with the outro through but it was still great, some swords and glowing fighting stick performance, then individual acrobatics where that big afro guy was too funny coz you think he’d do the same thing like the rest and use the walls to do a flip or something but … he’d surprise you ;o)

Notes: 1- One thing I loved about their jokes was they milked it just right. They’d do it once for the shock value, then again for familiarity value and finally a third one to milk out any laughs left in our funny bones or funny teats. 2 – During the break I went to the sound booth to ask what software they use for their sound fx. They were being evasive so I’m like you have a sound machine? Yes thats it, whatever you say. Lol forgot Indians and Chinese like stealing ideas to make money so don’t ask trade secrets lol.

Mega big up Viv for this one man, fo sho!

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ART Excel – Caterham 2009 (Art of Living)

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ART Excel – Caterham 2009 (Art of Living)
12/08/13 Wednesday – Note: ART Excel stands for All Round Training in Excellence. It’s mostly fun and games for the kids that help them build themselves. 21 kids, 1 teach, 4 assistants. Funking recycling truck wakes me up making noise early in the morning. Get to Sailesh’s but he’s not gonna be around till later so kill time around Greenwich and Peckham. Ride to Caterham. Register. Reminisce. Etc. Welcome folks and register them. Meet with fellow assistants and Su (head teach for ART Excel). BTW I always wanted to do ART Excel it’s a kids course and since I’m on major budget they let me do seva helping out Su. Fellow assistants were Debbie, Malindi and Tina. First time they had a guy in as an assistant. Kinda good coz the kids need some male energy. Play a game with the kids so they know each others names. Fill out questionnaire, etc. Back to Su’s room for a debriefing. Didn’t realize how teachers have to sacrifice time and so much more coz last year I was making friends with all the other different course members. Got to this time too but not during eating and chilling times. Had to take some blankets to the ART Excel class and it’s way far in the dark past the gym, courts, cricket grounds, horses and ‘doggy area??’. Scary in the dark man! Censored: Had to sleep on the toilet window sill for a sec ;o) Oh yeah… I had a flower in my ear so some girl was asking Sanjib why I have it so I told him to tell her it was for her wink wink. Lol can’t help flirting you know! Anyway find out she’s one of the main AOL family members… um… family member. So from then on she got a flower everyday.

13/08/14 Thursday – Now the adults woke up early to join the folks doing the Part 2 silence course for long kriya in the mornings. First it was a new long kriya and second… it K.O. me in style! It’d been so long I loved it. Kids learn some breathing techniques. Do the grape exercise where we pay attention to the form and and feel it in our mouths and then slowly take a bite but don’t swallow the juice and then eat it. And appreciate that it took like months to become a grape and how that energy is transfered to us and how we should pay attention and take time to eat and appreciate the food. I was assigned to do the day one chart with the girls so we hooked that up. One of the kids found glucose in his bag and that was a no no. Then I was caught eating a pain au chocolat in front of the kids when we’re trying to teach them not to kinda thing. Didn’t set a good example… my bad. Walk in the woods… kids make a fort. Danny was in his own world knocking out some dead decomposing tree. Then there was this big ass branch that needed to be taken down and I kinda bumped myself and had a funny fall. Mansi was feeling bollywood… talking about pushing her up the tree and then falling in my arms. How romantic lol. Man the kids were so cool… but this is still the start ;o) Then Mansi had a fall somewhere so was gonna piggyback her but she’s like I stick big time. Made me paranoid! Stuff and stuff… briefing. Note: I don’t know… these days the food has kinda taken a downward turn… through out I had to put extra cheese on my stuff to make it taste better. And what what was the deal with making yogurt look like a dessert! Had to add extra sugar to that too. We all get into satsang mode and Su and Samuel got the instruments over… I kinda felt for the Part 1 and 2 people coz we made lots of uncoordinated noise. And they were gonna go into silence soon. Soham was my main man from last year… chocolate and food dealer lol. Now some lady had made jalebis coz it was her birthday but see while the parents were doing their courses the kids were getting buck wild and by the time Soham and I got back to the Part 2 area some of these kids nearly finished a huge tin of jalebis. Danny was definitely hopped up on all that sugar running around. Jasmine was on my case and she loves to cry even just for fun. Sidhant was cool too and Mansi wanted to me become a girl. I told her I already have half. Now there’s always a kid that steals everyones heart and Anabell’s son Krishan has been the main chittachor at Caterham… even last year. Since Anabell’s really busy with leading yoga, organizing stuff…. she does lottttsssss! So I had mind the lil tyke and he disappeared for a sec. Turns out he was in the loo… this was so cute coz first the loo is well hidden and he’d run out of loo paper so I had to hook him up. Poor kids they’re so small and loos are so big they have to balance with their hands. Censored: Sam kick, Ryan football.

14/08/15 Friday – Timin hooks me up with M&Ms for pulling down that huge branch. Trust me… it was nearly a lil tree itself. The girls present the day chart. Kids learn the Happy Breath. I kinda know what cracked Lucy up so much about the breath. Too bad I can’t tell :oP DJ and dance… all kids had to make their own move. Saranka’s kinda coming out of her shell but it’ll be a while… I’m kinda worried it might be anorexia coz I had a friend just like that but I have too much faith in AOL. After that kids are meant to act out some drama/issue they have with someone in their life and be in their shoes kinda thing. We go swimming. Oh man it was sooooo fun! I did a bomb splash in the shallow end and bust my right butt cheek :o( Satsang with adults. Then we were meant to go sort out our play but we passed the YES! crew (teens course). And they made us satsang with them. It was good coz this year they didn’t have time so I didn’t get to chill with Alex, Nikita, Dhru, Aditi, Darshan, Gayatri etc. We didn’t link for any satsang this time so that was a bummer. Oh and no jam sessions like last year. But anyway, get to our class… decide on doing Wizard of Oz. It was pretty chaotic but the way Su just hooked it up… nuff respeck! Then we had to make due with paper hats, masks, props that were around and what the parents brought and what clothes and stuff everyone could exchange. And boy oh boy it really makes you realize you can be so creative with the littlest of supplies. Soham and Malindi hooked up the script and scenes. Soham was already in a main role last year so this year he was chosen to be Dorothy. I was kinda happy to hear about kids doing drag coz if you don’t know already I support transgender issues when I get the time. But yeah Soham was kinda concerned so I’s like whatever you do… do you! If you aint cool with it… put your hands up in the air.

15/08/09 Saturday – Play more games. Bottle thing. I kinda want to reach out to some of the kids coz I know exactly where they’re at but at the same time they’re at that point they can only find out themselves and through avenues like these games we play with them. Play the trust game with blindfolds. I wanted to put ickyier stuff in Lucy’s hand but we wont allowed! And when I was blindfolded I was bumped into a fence… nice! Today I get Jasmin to give my flower girl the best flower I’ll give her but the most fragile one. Lol she was like after her meditation she work up to find it dead. I guess symbolism here is … beauty dunt last kinda thing. Oh man… we went to the old peoples home to do the Wizard of Oz for them. Most of them were so happy but this lady next to me was extra senile and started talking loud while the kids were performing. At one point she’s like ok I’ve had it I want you to go away. Freaked out the kids but it was cool. I just love the fact that I end up in close proximity to such situations. Her name was Winnie (spelling) and she couldn’t hold her tea so I held if for her and when she’s start talking to much I’d hand her the tea… that’d shut her up for a while. Then the kids sang this satsong ‘whether I’m happy, whether I’m blue, my mind keeps coming/running back to you’. So I was facing her and singing it to give her some good energy. Man then they hooked us up with some wicked cake… yum yum. Censored: Some private sleep over issue. Some of the older kids weren’t feeling the course in the start and it’s understandable coz they’re more or less meant to be between the ART Excel and YES! course. (YES! stands for Youth Empowerment Seminar) Get back and do the usual… then did this really boring meditation. Lol I know it’s not nice but like the kids where nowhere in the zone especially after all that cake and I was looking it. Like I could hear it being led but … are we there yet? It is over now? Kinda thing. Over to sorting out costumes to perform Oz at the satsang. This is where I started losing it coz kids were getting more rowdy and disobedient and I bumped my head really badly. Big up Soham for all the help man. The Oz performance went so well I was like wow! Coz the first two times it was kinda clumsy but WOW. Big up ART Excel brats! Oscar does a wicked French accent. Different kids did different stuff like sing, poetry, limerick… there was also meant to be gymnastics but hey. I really wanted to chill for satsang but we had our own ART Excel party back at the class. Sam and Ryan got down to wrestling. Ah good old days of submission moves. Remembered Kushal and Aneesh. But yeah it was getting heated up so I thought I’d referee and then folks had a lil one to one about the energies and how it felt and stuff. I’d like to tell you more but the kids gotta do the course to find out for themselves and well I just wanna give you glimpse of what kids go through and why all this helps them so much. Censored: Vain Princess was told stuff that was uncalled for. Ma man Sam was leaving that night so it got pretty emotional. I don’t know if it was the bond or the breathing but first time I’ve seen kids cry for about an hour or so… and this is late at night so it was kinda concerning, kinda funny coz the adults in silence would come out and see kids just crying late an night. Danny was again doing his thing. At one point he was being a statue at the stairs and even though it cracked me up I was like dude you have the imagination I want! Oh and also after the meditations or breathing when they were describing what they felt… we were blown away. Like how do they know these feelings, words and one of the boys especially was so action packed and… well reminded me of a young Paras but behind all that he admitted he felt angry or cried during kriya etc. Some real gems man. Yay finally join the finishing satsang as folks get out of silence. Was so drain but wanted to do more. Something about seva makes you feel like that. My room mate was an old fuddy-duddy that loved writing poetry and sharing it. Even on the first day I could tell he’s not one to be silent. But he was only he did read at night which is really a no no. But yeah now he’s belting out poems and chatting away. I’d bought the Shiv Sutra’s book coz the cd I have is in Hindi so wanted to read that but he’d keep sharing… which I really didn’t mind but he kept telling ok go back to your book I wont say any more than then… he’s say more! All nights I slept like a baby. I’ve said it before but I really love the fact that you make such good friends with folks of different ages and always encourage it. You just realize age in the end is not such a big thing coz they all feel the same stuff, experience the same stuff… it’s just like the intensity of it and even that is so weird how one same age will feel the intensity of different ages… depending on where they are mentally. I know I’m still in primary but in a good way.

16/08/10 Sunday – Some more poems. I was rejuvenated so thought I’d share some of mine too. Today’s kriya took me to some mad raves and what not. Give flower girl an acorn instead. Turned out to have a spider which worked out even better coz everyday is not a Sunday and dark times symbolism stuff and stuff. I don’t know I’m just making stuff up. Nikita was meant to exchange presents with me but instead she got a which flower ring and I got nada! I’m still waiting! :oP The YES! crew had some great performances going on. Singing, dancing, poetry was deep… I don’t know who the black girl was in the red but I want that poem. She basically opened up to a level you’re like I could never share that but I’m glad I’m not alone. Dhru (Soham’s bro – no wonder Soham was always talking about MJ) bust some wicked MJ moves. Tai-chi stuff. Some instrument performance. And before I had to leave Dhru brought up 4 of the teens who were really helped by YES! One girl with difficulty, boy with issue, girl with shyness kinda thing and one plain old bad boy! Goodbyes, group hugs, sleep on the ride home. Gotta get to Judit but fell asleep on the bus and the driver didn’t tell me when I reached my stop so took longer. My Ballerina hooked up some amazing food… MEAT BABY! Ice-cream and a crazy but amazing movie. Major Jai Gurudev. Facebook status: Bow down AOL! Always manages to take us to Wonderland and back. I’m gonna miss the ART Excel brats. See you guys soon and remember… say no to chocolates… give them to me!

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