Maitri 2009

The Path of Philanthrophy

Ah Ha!! So it’s that time of the year again. Hoards of new faces would be streaming into the campus - the bus stops, the subway, the library , the parking lot and even the red route bus. Experience having made me wiser, I thought I could afford to dole out a little advice to the new-bies. (Who doesn’t love “giving” advise : )? ).

I recently came across an article which listed out the top 20 ways to stay happy. Getting richer than your peers was one of them – ah – if only things were that simple! However, philanthropy and “trying out new things” also figured on the list. I have always regretted not having had enough time for both philanthropy and experimenting. If you are a new-comer, here is something you could do at U of H - to - you guessed it right – to stay happy! I have done some of them myself- with – should I say – “resounding success” :)

• Enroll for free Salsa dance classes. They are held both at the recreation center and the cougar den once a week.
• Join “Cougar for kids”. I saw a guy sporting the “Cougar for kids” T-shirt. Trust me. From the look ron his face, I am sure it was worth the volunteering efforts.
• Buy a 35 dollar guitar or any other musical instrument of your choice and enroll for a course. At the end of six months, you would be a ‘certified’ and also ahmmm… hopefully a good entertainer. The catch here being that, you would also be poorer by 1000$ – 1500$.
• Join AID – Association for India’s development.
• Participate in marathons – the regular rush of fresh oxygenated blood to you head might do you some good in the long run :P
• ‘Pratham’ holds small fund raising events every 3 months or so. Volunteer in it.
• Register for donating your Bone marrow – you will be surprised how simple the process is.
• Learn Turkish for free for 3 hrs on Tuesdays – for all you know, you might one day see yourself at an Indian restaurant with a Turkish date. ( ‘Kind old lady experience’ tells me that’s a far-fetched idea though…)
• And last but not the least, Houston – it seems, has a separate season set aside for it – the hurricane season! Pray for a few hurricanes...and when the hurricane arrives, stop, take a deep breath and then move around effortlessly as the world around you comes to a mesmerizing stand-still.

Anyways, here’s the original article that I referred to earlier:

Ok, so how about starting your philanthropy sessions by advising the next person you come across? If you look closely, I just did that : )

-Sandeep Bellure

A Maitri to remember!!

“Aankhon mein sapne liye,
Ghar se hum chal toh diye…”

Shaan crooned in my ears. My MP3 enabled phone showed there were at least ten more Shaan songs to come and I smiled. Tea and songs go together better than Vodka and Sprite.

A roommate suddenly crashed into my room,

“Maitri’s coming up in a month. Dude, you have to be in it.”
“What am I going to do in it?” I knew what he had in mind.
“Err, mimicry!!”
“Yeah, right!”, I mumbled and continued in silence.

I entered the University next day on what should have been like any other day. Doing nothing but looking at the girls, eating, attending a lecture; or not attending anything at all and coming home later in the evening. But as that awaited evening approached I found myself amidst a group of fired up enthusiasts, all my age talking animatedly about “I am in a dance”, “Main dance aur fashion show”, “Ok, folks, gather around…”. Stuff that made little or no sense to me. And then,
“What are you here for?”
“Mimicry”
“Mimicry? That’s difficult to adjust in the show”, said a girl, who introduced herself as Shilpa later.
For no reason at all, I was disappointed. I should have been happy. Chalo, I'm free
But a girl sitting on the sofa opposite me, looked and said, “Why don’t you audition for compering?”
Uh oh!

I couldn’t stand on stage for more than 10 minutes, throat would, for sure, go dry not to mention a lingering feeling of 3rd degree interrogation. My heart races beyond time and everything blanks out. Urghghgh

“Ok.... I am Saumitra, and you are?”
“Mayuri”. (Nods at both ends)

Audition time: The President of GISO, Graduate Indian Students Org., for the uninitiated, introduced himself, with a small pep-talk about how good he wanted the show to be, and I was blank all the while. After an audition that had me and two others and a half hour later, I was told that I would be contacted.
Hmm...it seemed to be bigger than I thought.

***********************************************************************************

After almost a month of not practicing at all and hardly meeting the co-host twice, who had a major role to play later, I was confident that we could pull this off.

April 3rd, 12:00 PM…

Roshiny, the co-host, calls me,

“Saumitra, there’s a problem”

I suddenly felt like a bolder hit me, straight at my heart. Even before I could hear her next words I concluded that I was going to be alone on stage, facing the crowd, thinking what do I say, looking puzzled, shivering, and may being pulled away by someone from backstage.

“My advisor is not letting me go, I am going to be horribly late” (Urghghgh Advisors!!)

I let the biggest sigh ever. It was bad, but at least I wouldn't be alone. So what if we were the least practiced of all, I was confident before and I was at least breathing now.

The stage was ready; it looked grand; just like the last time I had stepped on one. Nine years had gone by in ultra-zipped mode. I looked at Roshiny, thought she looked perfect for the occasion. ‘What if I goof-up?’, ’what if I blank out?’, ‘what if….’

The prayer was sung, the speech delivered, and the hosts were called upon.

Moment of truth!! Roshiny looked at me, “All the best”, “Same to you.”

***********************************************************************************

Five minutes later I was back in the wings, banging my head. I had goofed up. Blanked out and all the other ‘what ifs’… Okay, I am not doing it again, I told myself; and five minutes later I was almost in sweat and shivering from the second goof-up, and all the spoonerisms.

Roshiny gave me a small pep-talk and all I heard was, “what the heck was that? What are you doing?” although that was not what she was saying.

We went up again, after a near perfect performance by Dhun. I remembered all my lines, and Roshiny took care of the rest. Making fun, involving the crowd, making them laugh, making them clap, basking in those claps… all the perks of being on stage.

Backstage was a totally different story.
“Vishal, I want the next group ready.”
“They are”
“Great, I need them in the wings in one minute”
“Arey, don’t worry about that, concentrate on your compering”
“Saumitra, look at me, concentrate on our job. Don’t look at what’s going on”
‘I can’t, we cannot put fillers for everything’
“yeah, yeah”, I muttered
“So, the next part, we will use this filler…”
‘Everything’s so blurry…’

How in the world was I hearing Puddle of Mudd out of nowhere? But it was what it was – blurry.
The crowd in one section was getting unruly by the minute. Backstage, everyone was starting to get worried, some were getting fired up. Something had to be done. ‘You cannot do that’, I heard someone say. Many were visibly irked by that particular pocket of audience.

“I am going to tell them to be quiet” – Roshiny
“No, please don’t do anything rash” – me

***********************************************************************************

It was my turn to go back stage for the skit. Thankfully, after all the well covered goof-up and near perfect impromptu stuff, with people laughing we left the stage and I was back on… in the half naked Ravana out-fit, I played in the skit.

Dance.

Singing by Dhwani, another round of fashion show, ‘The Dark side of moon’, and all were waiting for the next event. At least everyone back stage and everyone who knew what was coming up.

Sand-animation was announced. It took a while for the set-up. I let Roshiny go to see it. I had had my share of choking in the noon. Vishal asked me to put in a filler as the set-up was taking a while. But something in me stopped from going up. I did not want the mood to change. It was somber after the exploring the ‘dark-side’, it was about to go up to an emotional high now.

Lights… stage… silence… music… Gandhi… the charismatic Bapu enthralled the audience in sand-form on a white screen. The story-telling was perfect. Many must’ve chocked on one image after other. I saw the show from behind the screen, and the effect was same. With tears in my eyes, nostalgia in mind. The crew went up for what seemed to be an endless round of applause. Omkar later told me that he was very emotional while receiving that applause. They deserved every single bit of it. No more words spoken, everyone rushed towards food in pure desi shtyle. A perfect end to a perfect event. Smiles, congratulatory remarks, hugs, flying kisses, more hugs, hand-shakes, smiles, some more hugs, and food.

It is difficult to put all that went by in words, but Maitri will remain.

‘Mitti ki khusbu aaye, palkon pe aansu laaye,
Palkon pe reh jayega, yaadon ka jahaan’

~Saumitra Vaidya

For Real?

It wasn't supposed to turn out this way, however we half hoped for it. Going in, none of us had predicted the impact it would have on each of us. Cliched, but true. We couldn't deny it, we couldn't verbalize it. The night before, we were struggling, in every sense of the word. Dances weren't set, ticket sales were frighteningly low, every possible quarrel was surfacing, I for one was ready to give up. It wasn't like me, but that was it. I couldn't take it anymore.

I went back home thinking about all the work that we had put in for Maitri 2009 to be a success- the publicity and sponsorships Mayuri and Ravi worked for, Saravanan going through what every President goes through handling an organization, Manny trying to keep up with us with our extravagant demands regarding videos and website updates, Karthik and I still in a conundrum on dances, Prashanth trying to figure out why half of us were screaming at each other, Shilpa going out of her mind handling all the events and then Vishal, poor Vishal handling all of us- who was handling him remains an unanswered question. Chaotic right? How we pulled it off, will remain in the enigmatic books of unknown history.

There was no pressure(all pun intended). Srinath's team had pulled off one the best Maitri's in GISO's history, we had to top it. We had to cut down performances cause there were so many of them emerging, it was hard to do that. It was our reputation on the line. Friday evening was do or die, for me-do and die .

And then it happened, everything fell in its place. A three hour event, all with its glitches, hidden carefully and professionally. New records surfacing, every participant in everything. We couldn't suppress too much talent, yours truly guilty of this as well. Dances were an instant hit, the UH band pulled off their spirits, fashion show living up to last year's side effect, Ram-Leela- hmm I am sure we can keep that off the list given the impact it had on us, phenomenal to say the least and then Sand Animation. That one event we were counting on to make our Maitri better than the rest, our savior from all possible criticism, our messiah. There was not one glitch when it took place- nostalgia filled up the air like never before. Omkar and his team pulled off something none of us had even dared to predict.

The aftermath of Maitri, like generations before had faced, still is the same. An oft heard phrase around the UH campus amongst the Indian crowd - "Let's go practice". Kranti teased me the following weekend, asking me if I had gotten out of the Maitri fever. The answer is a little too obvious. Its one of those things that leaves something on you- be it missing deadlines, be it not caring about homework, be it time management skills (that we dutifully forget later on), be it anything- it keeps us talking of the good times.

To all who helped us make Maitri 09 a success, a sincere Thank You from the Editor. I shall now stop writing since my labmates are wondering what I am doing and let you off the misery this write up has brought about.




~Shreyasee Das