Yesterday I met Maphava in Hundung village Life was quite in her place She spoke of things of the past Of what life was of the Nagas
Yesterday I drank rice beer in Hundung village Old men were singing folk songs in one place Tears rain in my eyes The songs will die as the old man dies
America is far away But Naga children like their music, they say Radio and records have corrupted their minds In our tradition of memories, they crossed lines
Tomorrow I won’t see Maphava in Hundung village Life would be noisy in her place The past would be buried in her grave And there would be no Nagas left
Note: I had gone to Hundung village in Ukhrul district to do photography with (Guru) Rewben Mashangva. Two of my old classmates Biplab & Sword on a Tata Fellowship were there to do research on Rewben and the roots of his music i.e. the Tangkhul Naga folk music traditions. I thoughtfully listened to the old men & women singing their folk songs and the verse is an expression of what I felt at that moment.
The photograph is of Maphava, one of the folk singers. She had asked me to send her a copy of the photograph which I would do so.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Save Loktak, our life music campaign was launched by Ranbir Thouna, one of the biggest music composer/singer of Manipur. He has 16 music albums to his credit as well as music direction for 11 feature films. Her Royal Highness Princess Padmashree MK Binodini was the chairperson of the campaign. she is a writer of novels, short stories and screenplays. out of the 9 screenplays she wrote, all of them won either a national or an international award.
i directed a number of shorts, PSV, a music video called LOKTAK and produced video installations for the music concert. The PSV included international icons like Padmashree Ratan Thiyam, MK Binodini, Award winning filmmaker A Syam Sharma, Ranbir Thouna, myself, environmentalist Nandiram Sharma etc.
Our Partners were AIRTEL, BSNL, WWW.SIROY.INFO, NARAYAN ADVERTISING, THOMTHIN DIGITAL.
Blended with a dash of animation & real life characters, Koken is an economical ‘crossover’ film.
Though based on realism and combines an interest in social issues (youth unemployment, insurgency, AIDS), the film adopts occasionally a non-realistic approach, surrealistic post-modern style. This blend of genres, themes and determinedly self-conscious aesthetic style give the film a fresh and innovative approach.
The world of Koken is dark but infused with a sense of humor that is exhilarating, fantastic & unordinary.His world is peopled with characters that hold alternative lifestyles but permeated with humanism & understanding that represents them as victims of either society or circumstances.
But Koken’s adventure completes a circle and makes his journey back home while his doting mother waits in the verandah of the house beside a lantern with the words “ I will wait for my son’s return”.
As I sip my chilled beer in a cozy restaurant in Mcleogandz, Dharamsala Linda, a young Scottish girl who had just joined me in the front seat tells me, ‘I moved from Scotland to America to complete my studies and started working there. I had everything before I reach 30; a good job, a big house, fancy car, a steady boyfriend and lots of friends to hang around with. But I was not happy inside. Then I found Buddhism. Now I am very happy. I have been practicing meditation whole day in my hotel room”.
It was just before 10th march, the Tibet national uprising day and Dharamsala, the small hill town in the northern part of India is teeming with unusual people and activities. I landed there early in the morning in a Himachal tourism deluxe bus and I had to wander around for almost an hour finding a place to stay as most of the hotels were full. The Dalai Lama’s teachings was a few days away and so hordes of foreigners from America, England, Switzerland, Netherlands, Australia, Germany, France, Italy, Taiwan, Mongolia, Korea have come down to this Buddhist capital town of the world. I enjoyed a chat with whoever I can from these countries due to my insatiable habit of digging at people and things.
Other than the Dalai Lama’s teaching, there was a Buddhist crash course in Tushita, 9days Tibetan opera in Tibetan institute of performing arts (TIPA), Tibetan arts and crafts exhibition in Norbulingka and of course preparations for the Tibet national uprising day that was coming up. Monks & nuns in red and yellow robes from Karnataka, Ladakh, Mongolia, young Tibetan kids selling their national flags, momo and Tibetan music cd/dvd vendors, Buddhist postcard retailers, white skin foreigners in sunglasses, backpacks, gigantic cameras; they are all around.
One of my travel companions Jan, a 65 something year old high spirited lady from USA walks around with a 17 kg still camera bag and introduced me to so many things about the place.I went up to Norbulingka to meet the managing director Kim Yeshe as referred by a friend from Los Angeles before coming down to Dharamsala. She had gone to Thailand to promote their products and came away awestruck by their exquisite paintings on silk. (Her PRO called me up in the morning the next day in my hotel).
In the evening a film producer from The Netherlands has brought her film Buddha’s lost children for a screening in TCV (Tibetan children village) school and I made another rush.
A few of the veteran foreigners nostalgically revealed they don’t like Dharamsala anymore as it is not it used to be years back; a quite place where one can come down and seek tranquility in a local Buddhist setting. Now you find bars, restaurants, resorts, alcohol vendors, Italian pizza outlets, loud traffic, travel agents, Buddhist antique shops that thrive on the tourists. Even His Holiness teachings had to be listened in an FM radio with earphones as he preaches in Tibetan while you hear translations in French, English, Japanese etc. Somebody told me His Holiness quipped in one of his sermons that while the Western people are now running after Buddhism chanting ‘om mane padme hum’, Tibetans are frantically running after materialism and chanting ‘om money home come’.
It is not only the Tibetans who are laughing in the cash counter but the local Indians are also excited about the business prospects the presence of His Holiness has brought to Dharamsala. And though the Tibetans and Indian locals are seeing dollars, euros and pounds in their dreams, Eric from The Netherlands tells me, ‘ if you visit Netherlands, you wont find any hotel room below 3000 bucks or get a pizza below 360 bucks while in Mcleogandz, you get them even in a 200 and 75 bucks respectively’.
His Holiness, the Dalai Lama escaped to India in 1959 from the Chinese onslaught and since then has set up a Tibetan government in exile in Dharamsala. It is such an irony ( I called it the test of faith) that millions from around the world relentlessly flock to him to hear about the Buddhist principles of human compassion while the same righteous virtue is being tested upon him by the unscrupulous Chinese invasion of his own homeland and being forced to live as a refugee. A young Tibetan youth sitting next to an obtrusive donation box in Mcleogandz tells me ‘we have overstayed in India. We thought we would win our freedom and go back home to Tibet but....’
I saw a cute little Tibetan boy sitting in the lap of his grandma among the opera audience in TIPA. I cautiously pointed my camera at him to take a picture. He puts up his two little fingers in a V sign. I was amused. He did this whenever I point my camera at him which I did several times being awestruck. I wonder what the little Tibetan boy who hasn’t even learned to speak meant by that symbol. Yo or Peace!
I guess the Buddhist superstar, His Holiness must be in the same dilemma.
~OINAM DOREN is a writer / filmmaker who is fulfilling his childhood dreams of making connections with different cultures and races Copyright@OURVILLAGE
Any high-spirited youth who had grown up with rock music can easily identify with these jargons. They cast their spell as the nuclear tools of a rising rock star. A philandering segment also kiss rock music as an appetite to chill out and might have tried screaming or plucking the strings of a guitar in any chance encounter. And of course there are the insecured aliens that despise rock as “noise” but hang around, mugged up and gossip about it just to belong to a crowd. If he is not into rock, the rest might say he “isn’t cool”.
The early 90’s prove to be a renaissance period. Mtv arrived with their sizzling music videos, cool & stylish VJ’s and the rock stars; they swept us off our feet. Personally it made a major influence in the way I doll up myself, my accessories or the clothes I buy. But more importantly, forming rock bands became a huge trend. (Indigenous rock bands have been there since pre-Danny Mc Gill though). In every colony you hear amateur bands blasting away with their gig sessions. The neighborhood wars that stream in with such alien disturbance were normal. Schools or college weren’t spared. Functions have guitarist strumming away or somebody screaming. There were myriads of rock festivals and rock contest in the city. A lot of us who doesn’t have a band felt wipe out. Coz it was the most hip and happening youth culture then.
A decade later,
bread butter And beer
Does this jargons sound very fatherly? Now when I hear about those eccentric ugly band mates that used to drive the city girls to frenzy, they have been wiped out. All the enchanted ugly friends who would rather flunk a class test or miss school for a gig session, they have been wiped out. Small town rock bands carp about their plight that they seldom make money from stage gigs. Everyone has to scrap for a living. Therefore, the nascent roosters that once stood on rock are either lazing a life of a vagabond or quite a few business savvy souls are engaged in bread winning activities like running a studio, employed in it or open a musical instruments shop. A few musicians would play in somebody’s music album to earn a few bucks worth 14 meals. I met a dashing musician in Dimapur (Nagaland) who married a rich woman. This is smart music sense. No roosters can scream or bang a guitar with an empty stomach. Lou Majaw, the Shillong rock icon preached me this gospel truth by laying his hands in his new born baby, “if you are doing something only for passion, you won’t make any money”. I understand what he predominantly meant. If you nurture an enduring passion for art or sport, support it with a strong business sense.
The big city bands like in Delhi, Mumbai or Bangalore enjoy more liberalized economy. Performing in hotels or music assignments for small screen films or TV serials draw in some extra bucks to pay their beer bills. But these off track benefits are also rare as myriads of seasoned music composers are around.
Making an album, a lot of them who had done it said a local rock album doesn’t sell. If it’s hard for the western bands to make it a success, it’s triple hard for Indian bands.
Firstly - it’s the language barrier.
Secondly - the target listeners. Rock music lovers in India or even Manipur are marginal. Indigenous bands spreading out to American - European soil is unthinkable as they lack originality, technique and mega bucks to market them in a massive scale.
Thirdly - the corporate business of music. No Indian music companies are willing to put in money where they seldom see much returns.
I tried asking the decade old Delhi band Parikrama, one of the most popular Rock band in the country. They said music companies are ready to promote them if they go Hindi. But they prefer sticking to English rock, their passion and depend on gigs in college fest and hotels for the band’s survival. Personally, the band mates run some business of their own for “bread-butter-and beer”. Sonam and his wife Dina run the Parikrama Music School. At least they are living out of music. Recently Parikrama made a smart move by jamming with Bollywood star Saif Ali Khan. I went for a concert in Mumbai and a lot of my neighboring female audience was there for the actor, consequently building more aura around the rock band.
Eastern Dark, our own Manipuri band made a smart move by going Manipuri. Manipuri rock album would harvest more target listeners than an English album. Their debut album Kangdroom is a nice piece of meat. I met their ugly vocalist in a lavish wedding ceremony blooming with Manipuri hot chicks. But both of us were wearing fake Rayban sunglasses and so I told him, “Dude! If you market the album appropriately, it is going to be the greatest Manipuri Rock album of all time”. Even a music connoisseur like me came across it by chance in a music store. I didn’t know the band even existed or have released an album. What about the common people? Lokesh boasted by showing off his new Motorola mobile phone (bought from Singapore) that they are not worried about money. I also showed off my marketing skills by telling him, why he doesn’t use the strategy of piracy (free music) to earn more listeners and fame for their album. Upcoming European rock bands also use this path to win fans before they are fully established.
In this corporate world, it is not the talented but the smartest & the most talented rock-stars that win original Ray Ban sunglasses & hot chicks.
Ps: the article was originally written for www.e-pao.net, a year back in my posh flat in Mumbai. This is a pirated version.
~ DOREN is a writer / filmmaker who is fulfilling his childhood dreams of making connections with different cultures and races. Copyright@OURVILLAGE
There are so many things I am proud of Shillong; the Shillong cool weather due to the AC installed by Jesus Christ in celestial Cathedral church, the quintessential herbal Kwai making all the Khasi girls unfit for kissing, the flourishing educational institutes run by catholic missionaries, the seductive girls from all over the northeast headed by Raisa Deb Barma, NE-Mega model 2004 vanquishing the male libido consequently breeding confused races, the kingly Lou Majaw, mesmerizing music videos by Pradeep Kurbah and Jova's compact DVD store in Police bazaar where you get some of the best non-adult movies. Now see what happens when some Khasi, a Mizo and a Manipuri get together in some corner in Shillong.
The first time when I saw Khasi Don and Khasi Jimmy pompously striding down Laitumkhrah road in their boisterous bikes, I thought these guys must be asshole. They didn't look intelligent. They didn't look clever. They didn't look creative. But when I listen to their diligently crafted song Mawlynnai, I became the biggest asshole. I promptly got converted into a Snowhite fan. And I have to make a music video on this song to promote their new album-URANGDAJIED.
Making a good music video usually can cost 31 thousand and 75 paise and can go up to 49 lakhs and 55 paise. But Snowhite as a band didn't have any collective bank balance other than the band members' huge personal accounts. (The bassist DON a lecturer in a college, the vocalist TIMMY an engineer, the guitarist BAHEP a sound engineer and the drummer JIMMY a hot model and a college student).The money that Snowhite have earned from stage gigs, have they spent it on drugs, booze and whores? Ask Snowhite these questions if you are an asshole.
For the production, the only assets we had was the lovely song Mawlynnai by this Khasi band, Mizo Reuben's Canon XL1 camera bought from remote Australia, Manipuri Doren's strong aesthetic and technical sense lauded even in Bihar and our biggest asset FAITH. The Bible says 'Faith can move mountains'. Honestly, we were planning not to move any mountains in Shillong and alter Meghalaya's geography. We just wanted to make a good music video.
In the first scene, Khasi Jimmy - the drummer plays a Khasi warrior. Mini-kong Darinia, our asst. director and make up artist had to use cow's blood (purposely) that could eradicate bulls miles away on Jimmy's face. In fact the bull Jimmy got almost eradicated. He felt sick.
In the second scene, I wanted to shoot in chroma key, which needed a good well-lit studio with a blue screen. I wanted to show Bahep, the lead guitarist running in the nude with Shillong's fast traffic in the background. Hiring a good studio required a good deal of budget that could eradicate the Khasi band Snowhite from this planet before completing their first music video. But we had a novel idea. We borrowed Mizo Maria's sun gun lights and Khasi Don's blue coarse plastic sheet used to cover his monster bike. It was fun shooting, not Bahep's nudity but the cheapest guerilla production technique.
In the third scene, Timmy the vocalist with the power chord needed to be painted in
yellow. We decided to hire Laitumkhrah painter, the wistful Leo. We honestly bribed him with kwai, persuaded him with bidi. If it didn't work, our last option was to kidnap his doting mother. Timmy's scene also needed an exceptional studio with gigantic white screens. I instinctively knew too many slipshod compromises could eradicate me from this tough profession. Poor Jimmy was almost eradicated. But we apprehensively had to be contented in Golf link against the blue sky.
In the last scene, Khasi Don the bassist and talented lyricist play an inquisitive philosopher. We shot in SengKhasiCollege where he teaches with candlelights. For the band's shoot in Rudy Walang's studio, he charged us by the hour. I think none of us unequivocally tried to fool him about the money. He looked cleverer than all of us. He looked smarter than all of us. We also acknowledge Merina, the beautiful Mawlai chick for the graveyard scene, the dancers and supporters from Seng Khasi institute of dance and music.
Our last stop was Mawdong Vision in Laitumkhrah own by Khasi Ampareen Lyngdoh (my weird ex-professor who is a politician now and has become a minister) with Khasi Andreas technically supporting the studio as editor. I guess we were technically smart enough to extract more tea, biscuits and kwai from her house than the economical fees we paid her. I hope kong Ampareen didn't have to consequently sell her non-linear editing machine to pay for her gruesome grocery bills. A chance encounter with NeTV channel Chairman & Managing director, the flamboyant Manoranjana Sihn to show the video in her channel didn't finalize, as the time wasn't ripe.
Ajtak and Headlines Today showed clippings of Mawlynnai video in my interview. People who have watched the video are wild about its strong concept but honestly said it lack the technical excellence like other professional music videos, the ones you see on MTV. Well how much can you achieve with a camera and all the equipments and technical compromises. If people who have seen the Mawlynnai video like it, give the credit to Manipuri Doren, his associate Mizo Reuben and his Australian partner Canon XL1 camera. If you hate it, blame Snowhite.
Snowhite has released their new album-URANGDAJIED. I assure you these guys are really talented. Please do get an album of URANGDAJIED - the ultimate in Khasi rock. Please support local bands. Please support Khasi rock.
PS: The article was originally written 5 years ago in an apartment in New Delhi.
~OINAM DOREN is a writer / filmmaker who is fulfilling his childhood dreams of making connections with different cultures and races.
I was visiting my roommate’s studio in Bandstand, Bandra (Mumbai) which he runs in partnership.
He had directed me that it’s located a little ahead of Bollywood actor Salman Khan’s apartment and just before Shahrukh Khan’s bungalow ‘mannat’.
As I was walking following the assigned house numbers and their names, one particular name struck me. The address reminded me of somebody. We had exchanged hand written letters for years thousands of miles away from each other and she had even sent me personal photographs of her. Though the contents of the letters were pretty plain, they used to steam so much goodwill. Now as I stand in front of the gate with that familiar address I started feeling nostalgic. I also saw the coconut groves which reminded of her photographs’ backdrop. She was my pen friend of so many years which we ultimately lost contact.
I grew up in a small town in Manipur in an eastern corner of India. Even as an ignorant wondering kid, my eagerness to connect with the big outside world was immensely wild and irrepressible. So I used to fervently cut pictures of people, places of different cultures and races from newspapers and magazines and maintain a scrapbook. In my days of loneliness, I used to take them out from my tin box and vacuously stare at them for hours. I was a very shy kid then and hardly made any friends. I hardly go out and meet my classmates other than the school hours. So my only instant connection with the outside world was my scrapbook, books, music and my notebooks where I had scribble anything; verses, thoughts and mostly lyrics.
As a teenager, I found a magazine called ‘Teenager’ which I subscribed through my school. It is here that I found my penpals. Sometimes I used to get 20-30 letters of them. But only a handful of them lasted. Everyone had sent me their pictures and though their faint images are still engraved in my mind, it seems like ages and their memories have faded into oblivion. In fact the classic era of pen friends have elapsed from my memory until one day I stood in Bandstand, Bandra (Mumbai).
Those letters how far they have come from, they always used to bring the personal human touch in them. Good handwriting, big bold letters, unreadable scribbles, personalized artworks, letters in all shapes and sizes duly stamped. Now I remember my friend in Bandstand used to write in big bold letters, according to handwriting experts is a sign of self-confidence.
While in college, the internet revolution trickled in. Email, chatting, instant messages brought a sad demise to my pen friends. My letters became fewer by the day. My last pen friend was from Goa who had called me up sometimes even after my graduation enquiring what’s happening in my life. That also ended with a thud as there was nothing much to look forward to.
After graduation while in New Delhi, the mobile revolution trickled in. SMS became more accessible & instant as internet reach was marginalized. Coded words, few words, new jargons popped up. They were considered ultra-cool and writing letters became a metaphor of an old grandpa in the village; nostalgic yet uncared for.
These are the days of making connections, networking, bonding whatever form they may be; professionally or personally. We have Hi5, orkut, twitter, myspace, facebook, bigadda where people doll up all sorts of pictures and personal statements. You don’t know who are real and who the real crooks are. No real name, no specific address, no personalized revelation of self but only an electronic manifestation of what the cyber founders want you to be in matrix.
That day as I stood there in Bandstand, Bandra (Mumbai), I felt nostalgic. I started missing my pen friends and their letters from far away. Those letters how far they have come from, they always used to bring the personal human touch in them. Good handwriting, big bold letters, unreadable scribbles, personalized artworks, letters in all shapes and sizes duly stamped.
As I remember them now, maybe my old pen friends will one day see my films or read about me in some magazines or newspapers and remember me.
~OINAM DOREN is a writer / filmmaker who is fulfilling his childhood dreams of making connections with different cultures and races. copyright@OURVILLAGE
