Other People Are India Culture Too!

Despite having regular internet at our disposal for the first time on our trip, we have been oddly silent over the last week. Why, you might ask, when we know that our loyal readers at home, many of whom are vacationing vicariously through our experiences, are eagerly waiting for the next installment.....it's just that we are too busy. Too busy! How can you be too busy on a vacation! Well, if you "are India culture" (as we have ascertained in prior posts that we are) then you might go to a cultural summer camp, as we have done at the Vijnana Kala Vedi. This cultural centre is dedicated to the fine arts of Kerala, and each "camper" gets to choose a primary (2 hours a day of lessons) and a secondary (1 hour lesson a day) subject. Now, obviously this won't keep you very busy, but if, like us you have chosen two main subjects and have a Mrdingam teacher who is very enthusiastic about teaching you, making you practice more then you do back home, so you might get very busy.

Our main incentive coming to the center was to learn all about the rhythms of Karnatic music - or the classical music of south India. While in Bangalore last year as well as this year we fell in love with this music and with all of the percussion instruments used, mostly to accompany singers or violinists, but also as solo instruments. The instrument we have chosen, Mridingam, is the most important percussion instrument in Karnatic music, and is made of a hollowed-out piece of jackfruit wood, with leather skin covering its two ends. In our first lesson, with Subash, our teacher, we have learned the basic alphabet of Karnatic percussions, called Konnakol. This is almost like a language with different words, used to describe different sounds you can produce: Tha, ti, tom, nam, dim, cha, tham and so on. We started with really simple exercises, in order to learn the basic strokes: Tha tika ti tika tom tika nam tika (repeat many many times), and progressed to learn complete "compositions" that took our teacher three lessons to dictate, starting like this:

nam. dim. dim. nam. tikathaka dim. dim. nam. dim. tikathaka dim. nam. tha.taka tika tatha chatathat kita taka nam. dim. dim. nam....
Below are shown (from left to right: nam, ti, tha, tom)



You'd think learning a percussion instrument would be about rhythm, but this one is much more about memory (we were expected to know these compositions by heart for the next lesson) and hand coordination. We have been practicing about two-three hours a day, but still haven't got some of it right - we'd really need a few months just to be able to accompany a simple song.

When we were still in a cool and level-headed frame of mind back home, and knowing how have a tendency to get rather excited about interesting percussion instruments, we had a discussion in which we agreed that a Mridingam would be a heavy and impractical purchase while we were traveling. Of course, when your teacher asks you after a particularly fun lesson if you plan to continue with Mridingam back home, what can you say but "do you know any good Mridingam makers?" Of course he does, and before you know it he makes an appointment for the next day at 8 am in the next city at a local maker's shop. He was kind enough to weigh it for us, and it is "maximum 8kg" (which in India means 9.5 kg).

The fun thing about this "cultural summer camp" (which actually runs all year long) is that they offer many exciting Keralan/Indian subjects such as Katakali (more on that later), wood carving, mural painting, cooking, ayurveda, yoga, 2 types of south Indian dance, Kalari (Keralan martial art), and Karnatic violin, voice and percussion. For us, however, the most fun was meeting a lot of other people who were "India Culture". Don't get us wrong, we love each others' company, but after a month and a half on the road, we only met two or three other travelers who were interesting to talk to, and we were getting eager for company. Everyone comes to India for their own personal reasons, and most of the people we met elsewhere had other interests in mind... like the two nubile Swedish girls who always wore their bikinis everywhere under their clothing in case an appropriate beach presented itself. And they were complaining that everyone seemed to treat them like porn actresses. Or the American teenager we met whose conclusion was that India was generally a "fun" place except that she hated Indian food and Indian people.

Our summer camp is full of people just as crazy about India as we are. They wear saris out and about, and were all eager to have a look at Kim's sari wrapping book (several asked to photocopy it!), they enjoy discussing the fine points of Indian musical theory and compare ragas they have learned, and it is not uncommon to hear people say "would you be interested in seeing a Bengali movie from the 50's or the latest comedy in Malayalam?". There are only about fifteen students at the center at any given time, and each one follows their own schedule according to the subjects chosen. The lessons are generally private and taught by excellent teachers. For all of you out there who are also "India culture" we can highly recommend a few weeks here.

Last week's big adventure was an all night Katakali performance at a nearby temple. Katakali is a type of Keralan dance/drama, usually based on stories about Rama and Krishna. It involves several actors dancers who act out the drama using a series of "mudras" or hand gestures, dramatic eye movements, and wild facial quivers (lips for sadness, eyebrows for love). It is highly stylized, and accompanied by two singers (who narrate the text, but are required to repeat each line as long as the actor/dancer keeps acting/dancing) and a team of percussionists whose job it is to keep the audience awake for those all night temple performances by playing extremely loud and clanging metal things together. The best thing about it, however, is the over the top costumes and the make-up that takes all together about three hours to put on. It was fun going into the "green room" to watch the actors get dressed and ready for the performance. Although the show lasts until dawn and will include three plays (each about three hours long) we only made it through until two o'clock in the morning (we had to get up for yoga the next morning), but thoroughly enjoyed it none the less.

We had originally planned to stay here for only a week, but after about two days realized that it would not be enough, and if we really wanted to get anywhere with Mridingam we would have to stay here for two months, and practice "many many times" as our teacher keeps repeating. We didn't have an extra month and three weeks, so we have settled for four more days, and sadly, will be leaving the center on Thursday. From here we are off to Cochin, and our Indian vacation is quickly drawing towards its end. We are still hoping to do one or two posts before that, so stay tuned!