The top exposure was taken about a month ago from our building rooftop and the bottom one last night. For both these shots I used my 10-22mm which I got my hands on just couple days before I left for India. It is one heck of a lens to get handle on especially given the distortion it provides at the wider end. But that is also the reason I got it for. I had been using my kit lens and 50mm f1.8 for a while and just got tired of the kind of images I was able to make using them. Which lens to buy was the easiest decision to make as all I had to to do was to take a look at my favorites on flickr. 80 percent of them are of wide perspective.
I haven’t been able to photograph much lately. After quitting my previous job in September I went back to India to get my wedding documents in order. Last week I finally got around converting my work visa to joint family resident visa (JFRV). The whole god damn process was monumental PITA (more on that later in a separate blogpost).
Anyways I’m pretty much settled in my new job by now. It’s a great place to work and I am enjoying the kind of work I’m doing and excited about the many other opportunities I have to work on. At last I got to work in Taipei city. It’s bit painful though, for now, as it involves two and half hours of commute everyday (from pusin to taipei and back by blue local train) but I’m hoping to move closer to Taipei in couple months after I see through my rent agreement. I’m thinking of Sanxia.
I will leave you with some more shots from last night.

siwei road, yangmei

one of the many alleys in the neighborhood

while coming back from nearby 7-11

me on the rooftop

Dear Friends,
I am happy to inform you that the 2009 INDIA FESTIVAL TAIPEI will be held in Taipei from September 19-26, 2009. The Festival is being organized by well-known Taiwanese Indophile and organizer Mr. Jeffrey Wu, with assistance from India-Taipei Association. The Festival would feature various events spread over a week including an India bazaar, Indian Cultural Parade, an Indian Mask Exhibition, Lectures on Indian Culture and a Bollywood Party. The main attraction of the India Festival this year is the Ramayana Fantasy Performance on September 20th at the Minsheng Hall in Taipei. This event would feature an enactment of the Indian epic Ramayana, and also performances of Indian classical as well as popular Bollywood dances performed by Taiwanese dance groups.

A detailed brochure of the event is enclosed with details on venues as well ticketing. Tickets can be purchased online from www.ticket.com.tw.

Mr. Jeffrey Wu has offered a special discounted price of NT$ 200 only to those who receive this email. To avail of this discount, just reach the venue half an hour in advance with a copy of this email.

This is a good opportunity to not only enjoy Indian cultural performance by Indian as well as Taiwanese artists, but also to promote Indian culture in Taiwan. Please also pass on this message to all your Taiwanese friends and encourage them to come for the performance on September 20th.

DISCOUNTED PRICE OF NT$ 200 WITH A COPY OF THIS EMAIL. AT THE VENUE, PLEASE CONTACT MR. JEFFREY WU (MOB: 0932155526)

Well not sure if you could get away with printing this blog post instead of the said email (especially since if you haven’t received one, I presume) but I’m sure the original price should be reasonable for the kind of entertainment that is in store most notably the enactment of Hindu mythological epic Ramayana

It sucks not being able to help Taiwan recover from Morakot. Having donated some money to the relief fund it still bothers me that I haven’t physically helped out with relief operations. Lack of communication skills and not being able to drive a car are the things that discourages me heading out to the southern Taiwan which is where the catastrophe struck. Wish I was more courageous.

On the other hand, Pune, my home in India, is now described as an epicenter of H1N1 in India. With as much as 16 deaths out of 44 reported so far in Pune I can’t imagine the scenes back in the city. I have been constantly asking my friends and parents about the situation and with no 100% cure at present it sounds pretty scary.

My close buddy Manoj wrote an email last week to me and others about the current state in Pune. Here it is presented with his permission.

Bloody swine flu!

Air is poisonous. Roads are deserted. Paranoia is the state of mind. All television news channels are as usual playing the only news. Reading newspapers is like reading obituaries. Masks are suddenly sold at prices burning holes in pockets. Cell phones are ringing. SMSs are making rounds to spread awareness, rumors and jokes (latest I got was not to throw old bras as they can make two masks). Exit traffic is taking toll while no wants to enter the city. Everyone wants to have fruits now. Health is top priority. Ayurvedic savants are offering solutions and delivering sermons together. Lines outsides medical stores is the only crowded place apart from screening centers of course. No one can deny panic in there. Doomsday theories are been circulated. All of a sudden Gods must be getting hiccups. Yeah, swine flu has changed the lives of Pune and for that matter soon will change the entire nation. And to add more pain multiplexes are asked to shut down and I couldn’t catch Kaminey on its release day and still not able to.

After in house arrest for almost a week a whole day in office is somehow lifting the grim clouds around me. Last Monday (Aug 10) was traumatic. Felt a little feverish, and was more than sure I caught the deadly virus as Sonali(wife) felt a little feverish too. Twice is not coincidence. Fortunately that wasn’t the case. I couldn’t be sure anyways. May be I got it and got over it. Those who got it and recovered supposedly develops higher immune against the notorious virus and faint are chances that they will get it again. But the little fever caused our parent a few sleepless nights. Same is the case with our rest of group. Prasad and his wife were asked to pack their bags and hit Nasik asap. One of our friend is in love as in “frankly my dear I don’t give a damn” mode. Meanwhile many, many Ayurvedic remedies and medicines have been couriered to Kothrud(Pune suburb). Cell traffic on my mobile was on toll last week. I was freaking out. Had tones of stuff to do but wasn’t feeling like it. At last, last night after giving in to the temptation, we sneaked out of our apartment like our parents are watching us to hit Rahul by eight thirty and catch the late night show of Kaminey but auditorium was dead silent. No one welcomed us in Mangala either. Business is badly hit I can tell. Apart from few watchmen and guards whole scene was bleak. Bummer.

To find some sort of recreational activity Vickya(brother) talked me into buying a pirated DVD with latest films released. I preferred to watch Luck which is nothing but pure garbage. But it was good garbage which I wished I should have watched with Prasad to appreciate more of this parallel cinema. It took our minds off flue for sure. No causality is been reported since 48 hours. May be it’s cause of all crowed places like theatre, schools, colleges, hotels are shut down. People also making a point not to pile on. Everyone is scared. Me too. Woody Allen once said, “I am not afraid of death; I just don’t be there when it happens”. Well my sentiments exactly. What is it with the my places I inhabit? Outside Latur people only recognize it by earthquake, now onwards Pune by swine-flu. I am suddenly afraid to migrate in the name of national security.

While Pune is coming back to normalcy and Ganesh festival starting on Sunday, I hope the charm of Pune returns sooner than later.

Earlier in June I had canceled my planned trip to Pune and postponed it till Nov-Dec. That was before H1N1 outbreak in India. Now as much as my parents wants to see their grand daughter, concerned about her health and ours, they have ordered us to postpone our visit until there is a 100% cure available for H1N1. I will also suggest everyone who is planning to travel India in coming months to put it on hold or if not avoidable then take exceptional care to prevent contracting any flu.

Janmashtami festival witnesses many interesting customs and rituals in various states and cities of India. While some rituals are common to all, others are unique and restricted to a particular region or city. These customs and rituals are followed religiously by all the Lord Krishna devotees year after year.

In North India “Rass lila” plays are staged to recreate events and accomplishments in the youthful Lord Krishna’s days. Sothern India and Gujrat state have their unique way of celebrating. West and north of India also hosts ‘Dahi Handi’ with enormous zeal and enthusiasm.
From Wikipedia

The handi is a clay pot filled with buttermilk which is positioned at a convenient height prior to the event; the top most person on the human pyramid tries to break the handi by hitting it with a blunt object, and when that happens, the buttermilk is spilled over the entire group, symbolizing their achievement through unity. Various Handis are set up locally in several parts of the city, and groups of youngsters, called Govinda, travel around in trucks trying to break as many handis as possible during the day.
Many such Govinda Pathaks compete with each other, especially for the handis that dole out hefty rewards. The event, in recent times, has gathered a political flavor, and it is not uncommon for political parties, and rich community groups to offer prizes amounting to lakhs of rupees.
Some of the most famous handis are at Dadar, Mazgaon, Lalbaug and some in Thane a neighboring district of Mumbai and Babu Genu, Mandai in Pune.
Cash and gifts are offered for Govinda troops to participate; for over 4000 Handis in Mumbai, 700 Govinda troops compete for the prizes.

Here is a youtube video of 9 level human pyramid crashing down. This is truly crazy thing to do but so is couple other festivals in the world.

Last Sunday Taipei City Foundation for Krishna Consciousness had also arranged Janmashtami celebrations in Taipei at Taipei Artists Village [their website . Be informed it will open a new window and some music will start playing immediately]. Barely a day or two ago Arvind, who is currently studying in Tainan, informed me about it. We have been communicating over internet for last 2 years but never really met in person so I thought this would be great opportunity to meet him and also participate in an Indian function in Taiwan for the first time ever. There have been celebrations for Diwali over the years in Taipei, Hsinchu, Taichung and Tainan but I never actually made it to any of them. I wasn’t really sure of making to this one either as we had other plans for this day already. But I did and glad I did make it. It was fun meeting Arvind finally and as expected he is one helluva fun guy to hang out with. Also it was truly refreshing to engage with other Indians and make new friends. AND I finally managed to get hold of someone who is actively playing cricket in Taiwan.

Taipei artists village was a breeze to find out but was nothing like I had imagined before. I guess it’s the artists that makes this place special. I’m sure artists love to hang out at the cozy, dimly lit Village Cafe at the front though.

I reached well past the 4 PM mark of supposed start of the event and registered myself at the entrance. There wasn’t any entry fee which anyways wouldn’t have mattered. Upon entering what looked like a small garden full of Indians, some of them clad in traditional Indian cloths, mostly women, I was swamped by Indian smells;incenses, dhoops, flowers, mehandis and of course the food. Now that was nice.

I stood in the corner for couple of minutes. Everyone else seemed rather busy, some of them were arranging chairs near the music setup which was basically a single pair of Tabla and some form of Veena set atop a blazing red fluorescent mattress on a tiled floor. I asked around if they needed any hand in that but was asked to enjoy the program instead.

A while later Anurag and wife also arrived on the scene followed by the mighty Arvind. Arvind had quite a fan following at the event :P While the first set of melodies were being played on Tabla and Veena I started introducing myself anyone who ran into me. I mostly remember all of the names. It was nice meeting Kiran and Akshay who I also knew previously but hadn’t met in real life. Lot of interesting folks. I even met couple guys from the same county where I come from in India. It was a pleasure to talk with them in my mothertongue, which by the way also reminded me how much I have screwed up after coming to Taiwan.

L to R in the front Nauti, Akshay, Amit, Arvind, Ashish and Rahul

Small number of stalls were selling Indian goodies such as hand crafted diyas, colorful bangles and classical dance cd/vcd/dvds. At one special stall ladies had lined up to get Mehandi drawn on their hands. One kind lady had setup a small frying pan and gave away delicious crunchy papads.

In the mean time a lot of activities were going on inside a small foyer next to the bar. Group performances of Bharatanatyam, National dance of India and also one of the oldest form of dance originated in southern India, couple individual performances on bollywood songs. One group also performed a small story based dance on Lord Krishna and Radha. I was quite pleasantly surprised to see lot of Taiwanese performing most of the dances.

Someone mentioned in the passing that crowd here was bigger than it was for Diwali celebrations in Taipei last year. Not surprisingly the free dinner queue was rather long and snail paced. Lack of any ambient light discouraged any possibility I had in mind about photographing the queue. I had been out since the morning bicycling at Bitan riverside and later to Taipei 101 for lunch and was visibly tired. Standing in a queue for another half an hour didn’t seem enticing enough either. It was just past 7 PM and still a good part of an hour to mark an end to the great event. I said goodbye to couple friends and left for Yingge, where Selina picked me up on her way back from her sister’s place in Sanxia.