The Dairy Milk that I couldn't eat

Dear readers,

I decided to take a spoon of Chyawanprash everyday for its claimed health benefits. The medium sized Dabur's product is worth 125/-. I paid the shopkeeper two 100/- notes but he couldn't manage to get a 5/- change that he had to pay me back. To spare him from the trouble I decided to take a 5/- Dairy Milk bar.

If you had read the first line of this entry, you would know that I also needed a spoon. I rode to the nearest utensil shop and bought a steel spoon worth 15/-. To my dismay, even this shopkeeper did not have 5/- change for the two 10/- notes I had given him. I recounted the incident at the last shop to affirm that I really did not have 5/- change with me. He thought about it for a while and said "Chalo, chocolate hi de do. Aap bhi khush, hum bhi khush, bachhey bhi khush." (Okay, you can give me the chocolate. You'll be happy, so would I and so will be the kids.)

Chocolates are the new currency.

Regards.

Random tests.

Hello [Hello] [Hello] {simulates an echo}

 

This is Plan 9 from Outer Space.

 

Regards,

Sauvik

 

 

Playing live in Bangalore (November Reign)

Dear readers,

It has been a nice month for me. Our manager Anirban "Kaké" Ghoshal has almost kept the whole band busy. We had shows every weekend. Most of the shows were in pubs and close spaces except one open air show. You learn a lot of practical things from all these shows. Open stages are more fun to play. However, in most cases, you might get a monitor mix that you will never be completely happy with. What I have learned so far is to trust the other band members - that they will play their parts to the best of their abilities and to play my part to the best of mine. This invariably means that you do the shows with some gut intuition.

I really want to get some exposure in playing open air shows. It is a different set of ballgame altogether. That being said, I am looking forward to playing our songs in front of an younger audience -school children.

Sagarneel Biswas has been tracking us from venue to venue. You can find some really good snaps of the band if you click on the image below. Do check out his other works as well.

My PhD defense has been fixed on 8th December. I am not so well prepared, especially considering the fact that my external is IIT Kanpur's Prof. C. S. Upadhyay and he had sent a 4 page set of 39 questions as reviewer's comments.

Regards,

Gigs and problems

Dear readers,

We kind of played quite a few gigs this month. These are like practice sessions, but with an audience. I am also a bit more alert than I would normally be in a practice session. There are good venues that have transparent payment structures (e.g. The Kyra Theater) and there are venues that exploit the band (wouldn't name any). Nonetheless, we played for the sake of people who came to watch us - and let me tell you, it is worth the crap the venue or the organisers or the scenario throw at you.

Some of the most useful comments came from Ananth Menon, the guitarist of Galeej Gurus. We (more specifically, I) will have to surely look at these things and work everything out.

Our setup has increased its size by about 30%. Transportation is a problem. Previously, we could lug our instruments on our shoulders and go for a gig. It is not the same anymore. Last time while getting back from HRC, we had to split our luggage in order to reach back conveniently and still not pay too much on transportation.

Regards.