....for "My office is a madhouse" awards.
Here's my entry.
Try-n-Match that!
Saturday, February 25, 2006
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Set your priorities right, will you?
Session 3 at the Urdu high school, I notice something different about all the girls in my seventh standard class.
The head mistress tells me that some "US based Muslim organization"'s just donated head scarves for all the girls in the school.
A total of 109.
Half of those 109 black scarf covered heads don't have slippers in their feet.
Most can not identify the alphabet.
Unless something extraordinary happens, not one of these 109 will make it to 11th standard.
The school does not have a permanent water connection.
Got an electricity connection just this year. (Its a 50 year old school, inside Bangalore)
Might be asked to move because it does not own the land it's built on.
Desperately needs a big piece of tarpaulin for the kids to sit on when the afternoon meal is served.
Now, I am a big, almost belligerent supporter of preserving our cultural identity.
But, we got to set our priorities right.
Don't you think?
The head mistress tells me that some "US based Muslim organization"'s just donated head scarves for all the girls in the school.
A total of 109.
Half of those 109 black scarf covered heads don't have slippers in their feet.
Most can not identify the alphabet.
Unless something extraordinary happens, not one of these 109 will make it to 11th standard.
The school does not have a permanent water connection.
Got an electricity connection just this year. (Its a 50 year old school, inside Bangalore)
Might be asked to move because it does not own the land it's built on.
Desperately needs a big piece of tarpaulin for the kids to sit on when the afternoon meal is served.
Now, I am a big, almost belligerent supporter of preserving our cultural identity.
But, we got to set our priorities right.
Don't you think?
Friday, February 17, 2006
Now that’s greatness...
At 26, Orson Welles produced, co- wrote, acted in and directed Citizen Kane.
It was Orson Welles's first movie as an actor and a director.
And Citizen Kane is considered to be the greatest film EVER made.
26 Year old Welles, in one of the most difficult roles ever, portrays millionaire Charles Foster Kane from ages 25 to 76.
And does it so convincingly.
Orson had only one casting rule "get people never before seen on screen"
The role won him an Oscar nomination. One of only 5 actors to be nominated for best actor for their debut film.
The movie itself is loosely based on life of Tycoon W. R. Hearst who controlled a third of all media (print and radio) at that time. Hearst tried his best to stop the movie release.
He tried buying the movie just to destroy all prints.
However, Orson had signed a contract with the RKO giving him complete rights on the movie. Something never before done in Hollywood with any director (let alone a 26 year old rookie)
The battle that followed destroyed everyone involved.
Citizen Kane is the last movie made by RKO
Orson Welles's name and the movie itself did not get a single mention in any of the Hearst's newspapers and radio stations.
Movie theatres refused to screen the movie and it was shown in tents all over America.
Major Hollywood studios refused to work with Orson Welles for a long time.
"I passionately hate the idea of being with it; I think an artist has always to be out of step with his time."
-Orson Welles
It was Orson Welles's first movie as an actor and a director.
And Citizen Kane is considered to be the greatest film EVER made.
26 Year old Welles, in one of the most difficult roles ever, portrays millionaire Charles Foster Kane from ages 25 to 76.
And does it so convincingly.
Orson had only one casting rule "get people never before seen on screen"
The role won him an Oscar nomination. One of only 5 actors to be nominated for best actor for their debut film.
The movie itself is loosely based on life of Tycoon W. R. Hearst who controlled a third of all media (print and radio) at that time. Hearst tried his best to stop the movie release.
He tried buying the movie just to destroy all prints.
However, Orson had signed a contract with the RKO giving him complete rights on the movie. Something never before done in Hollywood with any director (let alone a 26 year old rookie)
The battle that followed destroyed everyone involved.
Citizen Kane is the last movie made by RKO
Orson Welles's name and the movie itself did not get a single mention in any of the Hearst's newspapers and radio stations.
Movie theatres refused to screen the movie and it was shown in tents all over America.
Major Hollywood studios refused to work with Orson Welles for a long time.
"I passionately hate the idea of being with it; I think an artist has always to be out of step with his time."
-Orson Welles
Tuesday, February 14, 2006
Monday, February 13, 2006
Highschool Drama
My chemistry teacher casting for drama titled "The periodic Table"
I was heaviest of all actors, and hence offered the Lead.
I was heaviest of all actors, and hence offered the Lead.
I am fine, how are you?
"You as a software professional can contribute a lot to this effort to spread literacy in every village."
Join Pygmalion Content Development
‘I am fine, how are you?’ - Deccan Herald - Internet Edition:
"‘I am fine, how are you?’
Kids in government schools are discovering the joy of learning English, thanks to a novel project, says Jayalakshmi K.
At the Kudremala Government Primary School in Mysore, you see happy children everywhere. Some are taking a test from a dietician. Some others talking and playing. But when they see they have visitors, all the 50 odd students ranging from six to 12 years of age, come running to greet us. Every grubby little hand wants to give a hand shake accompanied with a “How are you?” and an expectant pause for you to reply and ask the same. “I am fine, thank you.” “My name is Mohan. What is yours?” The chatter goes on for some time and we are taken to the sanctum sanctorum, the school’s single classroom that now houses the computer. A teacher is finding her way around the workings of the machine under the guidance of another.
While politicians and intellectuals bicker over the need to teach English in government schools at an earlier stage than is being done, some enterprising individuals have been on the job already. Under the leadership of Dr G K Jayaram, the first chairman of Infosys, and now founder director of ILID, an NGO that imparts professional help to the social sector, these men have been tirelessly covering distances to reach schools in remote areas and impart English education to the eager audiences there."
Friday, February 10, 2006
No, I did not conceptualize this organization
...but if you see a ".co.in" version of the same, you know who's behind it.
For every M.A. in English literature who thinks I am an idiot if I advocate phonetic spelling, I know 100 children who think "English" is stupid language if "So" , "To" and "Go" don’t rime.
Aim.
The reform of English spelling for the benefit of learners and users everywhere.
Objectives.
A. To publicize the unnecessary difficulties of English spelling and the benefits that its simplification would bring.
B. To raise awareness of the alphabetic principle, its corruption during the long history of written English, and its more rational application in other languages.
C. To promote research and debate on ways of reforming English spelling, and to prepare a graded set of proposals for relating word-forms more predictably to speech-sounds.
D. To help co-ordinate proposals for English spelling reform across both English-speaking and non-English-speaking countries.
E. To persuade the public, opinion-formers, policy-makers and relevant agencies of the need for and practical possibilities of reforming English spelling.
Six Axioms on English Spelling.
1. The letters of the alphabet were designed to represent speech sounds; that is the alphabetic principle.
2. The alphabetic principle makes literacy easy, allowing the reader to pronounce words from their spelling, and the writer to spell them from their sounds.
3. As pronunciation changes through the ages, the alphabetic principle tends to be corrupted; the spelling of words then needs to be adapted to show the new sounds.
4. Unlike other languages, English has not systematically modernized its spelling over the past 1,000 years, and today it only haphazardly observes the alphabetic principle.
5. Neglect of the alphabetic principle now makes literacy unnecessarily difficult in English throughout the world, and learning, education and communication all suffer.
6. Procedures are needed to manage improvements to English spelling as a world communication system."
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