Portraits my work of art- II

* This is the original work of Achyut Telang and you may not reproduce or distribute this information in whole or in part and all photos, images etc on this blog post cannot be copied, edited, reproduced or used without the prior written permission of Achyut Telang.

I already have another post with this name. Please see- "Portraits- My work of art"

The only thing is that in that post I had put up a few of my portraits but they were taken by a digital camera and so aren't that clear. Thus, in this post, I have again put up 3 of those 5 portraits this time scanned for better results. Hopefully I will upload that other two portraits after getting them scanned soon enough. Do watch out for them.

1) Akshay Kumar :

2) Franziska Almsick :

3) Preity Zinta :

GHAJINI

* This is the original work of Achyut Telang and you may not reproduce or distribute this information in whole or in part and all photos, images etc on this blog post cannot be copied, edited, reproduced or used without the prior written permission of Achyut Telang.

Just recently I saw the movie Ghajini. For those of you who might not know, Ghajini was originally a south Indian movie made similar to Memento. And this movie was made in Hindi with the other actors and the team being the same except the main actor. The actor in the hindi movie Ghajini was Aamir Khan- the 'perfectionist'

And what a perfectionist he is! Initially he was skeptical about playing this role but others convinced him and he made a wise choice. For this he underwent one year of training to build up the kind of body required for this role.

Below is the portrait I have made from the movie Ghajini:

* NOTE : Click on the drawing for a larger and better view.

MY DRAWING OF AAMIR KHAN IN GHAJINI

Ever since I saw this movie, I have not been able to get it completely out of my mind. And this movie being directly a remake of the south indian movie, they have kept it the same except the last half an hour. It contains a bit too much of violence and is a little gory though, but is essential for a theme of revenge.

The story itself is interesting and something that the audiences would not have come across much- the concept of Anterograde amnesia, called 'short-term memory loss' in the movie in the layman's language. A man affected by this disorder, who forgets everything after 15 minutes, seeking to take revenge of his beloved!

It was emotional and also touching many a times, mainly due to the sincerity of Aamir Khan. That is one thing for which I would recommend this movie to everyone. I really admire such sincerity which two actors in Bollywood definitely possess that come to my mind- Aamir Khan and Hrithik Roshan. Obviously Amitabh Bachchan is always there but for me the tag of 'perfectionist' and 'the most sincere' would be for these two.

Sincerity comes through everything and directly touches your heart. And this quality was what made me do this portrait and I tried to show the same sincerity here too and hopefully I have done justice to it. I wouldn't say it's perfect or as best as it could be, still I tried and am happy with my effort. I was motivated to do it and would constantly listen to the song 'Tu meri adhuri pyaas' from this movie while making this portrait to surround myself by that environment that I required to make this portrait.

* See my other post- PIANO NOTATIONS for notations on the song- Tu Meri Adhuri Pyaas from Ghajini movie.

PIANO NOTATIONS

So, you always wanted to learn and know how to play your favorite song or tune on a piano, or harmonium or even guitar or violin? Even if you have never learnt music and still want to play your favorite songs , you don’t have to worry. I am here.

First let me tell you that I am not an expert musician but I have learnt it mostly by myself. And I am mainly interested in the Bollywood, Hindi songs. And whatever song or tune I like, I find out how to play it. Now, even if you don’t have a musical instrument, you need not worry. Even I don’t have one with me! All that you need is a computer and it can become your musical instrument. I always loved being able to play my favorite song and people recognizing it when I did. And since I did not possess a musical instrument and neither did I want to spend money on it, so I found it out through the internet. Yes, internet- the current God!

If you too want it, it is quite simple and free too and just 24 K bytes. It is the t-piano and you can just download it from this- http://www.geocities.com/tacc21j/tpiano-e.html

I have had it with me for a few years now and still I don’t know about all its features! You can do so much with it! I just used it to play the tunes; that’s it. Just read all the things mentioned on that site and you will come to know. It has lots and lots of musical instruments options and a few others as well, you can adjust and even reassign etc.

Now for a sample, the latest song that I love and play it is- “Tu meri adhuri pyaas” from the movie Ghajini.

Here I will provide you with the notes, not the normal musical notations that you might know but specially for this t-piano- The keys on your keyboard that you need to press. Perhaps this might be the first time that such notes will be used. Maybe I am the first one to provide t-piano notes instead on the normal western notations or the Sa re ga ma notes!

Enjoy-

Movie- Ghajini

Song- Tu Meri adhuri pyaas

Music Director- A.R.Rahman

Instrument in t-piano- 25. Acoustic Guitar (Steel) for the main part

Initial music for the humming-

(Flute)

ytrertr erte w qweq Tab ?

? q r y tyut r ert

You can use any other instrument and it will not make any sense reading it, you only have to play in order whatever is written here including the various keys like Tab or even numbers. All are related to the song itself and no other extra key or comma etc is used.
Hope you were able to play it.

Now the main song-

Tu meri adhuri pyaas pyaas……..aaja paas paas

r ri uip tu tt (repeat 3 times)

Hain Guzaarish

y tyi [repeat full] for Hai haal to dil ka……….

Kehde tu haan to zindagi chain-o se chhutke hasegi

oi u u y uiu i u y y y t y u y

Moti honge moti rahon mein Yeh yeh yeh

tt tt tt ti i iii i u y t r

Humming- r t y u ytr

Sheshe ke khwaab leke, Raaton main chal raha hoon

uyuyu uy ui uyuyu u y u i

Takra naa jaau kahin

p i u y r e r …………..(2)

Bas ek haan ki guzarish Fir hogi khushiyon ki baarish

r ri u y tre r r i u y t r e

* Please see my other post for notations of more songs- PIANO NOTATIONS II

As I have already said that even if you don’t know how to play a musical instrument or never learnt music, still you can play on this because now you have an instrument and also the readymade notes. But my observation is that it is still difficult for most of my friends who have never played an instrument before. The only thing is you have to have the tune in mind and decide how long to press a key or after how much gap to press the next key. The only thing that you need is an interest. Perhaps even the desire to impress your friends might act as a motivation. The more you play on this and the more you practice, the better you will get as it.

Remember, in the beginning you need a deep interest and later on just one word- PRACTICE! Have a great time playing your favorite songs, and do tell me about whether you were able to download it and also play the song? If you are not able to play it properly, just ask me and I will put up here or send you the recording of me playing this so it might make it clear.

You can also request the notes for other songs that you like and want the notes for it to be able to play it. I will do my best to provide it to you to the best of my capabilities. Do write in your requests in the comments here itself.

But do note that it might take time before I put it up here. So keep coming back to check it.

Portraits- My work of Art!

* This is the original work of Achyut Telang and you may not reproduce or distribute this information in whole or in part and all photos, images etc on this blog post cannot be copied, edited, reproduced or used without the prior written permission of Achyut Telang.

* NOTE : Click on the drawings for a larger and better view.

Yesterday I got a bright idea and I thought - How about including all the other stuff that I do on my blog itself?

If you have seen my profile, you will know that my hobbies include - the very first one being drawing portraits. So for those of you who might be wondering what kind of portraits I make, fret not, here it is, just for you to look at and marvel, if I may say that!

Also note that these pictures that I have made on paper are not scanned but taken by a digital camera without even switching the flash off! So it might not be the best to look at. I will soon update these portraits scanned. So watch out for it.

1) Akshay Kumar-

For those of you who might not know, Akshay Kumar is a famous Bollywood actor in India. He has always been my favourite and for me to draw portraits, that is an important requirement that I love the subject whatever I am doing. Yesterday someone asked me to make his portrait and I have got many such requests and have been getting them since my childhood. But those of you who have never tried their hand at drawing, specially portarits won't understand. He also asked me to put an ad like- Get your portrait done for some amount of money.

Now though that is tempting, it is really not for me.

- Firstly, I can't just draw anytime anyone asks me. For me it is more of a personal thing rather than commercial. I have to be in that frame of mind and inspired to do it. -

- Secondly, I can't just make anyone's portrait; for me I need to have an interest almost a deep interest in that person whose face I will be making. And only when I love that person, can I draw it beautifully because that love comes out in each and every mark that I make or a line that I draw. The intense care with which I make a person's portrait whom I love cannot be there for just about anyone.

- Thirdly, I would rather prefer drawing from pictures rather than a person sitting in front of me. The reason being, one that it is much easier to draw a 2-dimensional portrait from a 2-dimensional picture rather than from a 3-dimensional person and also most of my attention would be on the fact that I would be making the person wait, making him sit like a statue which obviously isn't quite pleasing or comfortable is what I would like to think. So drawing from pictures, I don't have to worry about that.

In this picture, the frame that I have made was not in the original picture but in another one hanging on the wall in my home. I made it from there, just to add to its beauty.

2) Amitabh Bachchan-

Again for the people not knowing, Amitabh Bachchan too is a Bollywood actor, perhaps the best in India and among the world. He is really an icon, the man who can and who does represent Bollywood and India to the world.

In this picture, the look was what was inspiring to me - the intense feeling portrayed by the face, the agonizing look, to capture that was what made me do it and I am glad that if not anything else, it has managed to get the look which is conveying so much.

3) Franziska Almsick-

The name is already written in the drawing.

Now I don't really know who she is. Perhaps many of you might know her. And neither do I know why I did her portrait.

One thing that I would like to mention is techniques in drawing, just in case many of you might want to know. Generally I don't use any kind of technique at all. Neither did I have any kind of formal training in art or anything. Although, my grandfather who was a good artist and his daughters i.e. my maternal aunts did suggest a few things.

One was that we can make boxes i.e. grids on both the original picture and the paper on which we are going to draw. If the size of the picture is too small or too large and you want to draw a normal size, you can make the grids in various ratios whichever would be appropriate like 1:2 or 2:1 , 1:1.5 etc and you can take it one box at a time and make the 1st box exactly as it is in the picture, then the corresponding second one and so on.

Though useful for people learning art, I did not find it too useful. The reason is that the grids can never come out exactly matching and so after you have taken it a box at a time, finally the picture won't be perhaps quite as you might expect it to be! The only suggestion I can give for this technique is that even though taking it a box at a time, do keep an eye for the whole picture as well i.e. constantly have the 'big picture' so to speak in your awareness.

The examples of the grid technique( I don't even know if it is called that, or whether such a technique exists or it is just a name I gave!) are- Akshay Kumar and Franziska Almsick. Others are just free hand.No technique or anything.

Another thing that I insist on, just my craziness, fussiness, that noone should look at my drawing before it is completely done!

4) Jennifer Aniston-

There she is- Jennifer! Need I even mention her name?!

Actually it was also kind of a fun game at the end when I would ask my family members or anyone whom I showed the pictures to tell whose portrait it was. And if they got it right, it would please me that I did a good enough job and atleast it was recognizable! The secret to this, whoever wants to achieve it, might be to capture those stand-out features or the unique features of that person which we link to that person very strongly, like for example, although I haven't done her portrait, Keira Knightley's famous pout. If you get that right and other features might not match as well, rest assured, most of the people will immediately recognize!

Now I did Jennifer's portrait mainly because I absolutely adore 'FRIENDS'! Those of you who have seen FRIENDS would understand. It was a sitcom about 6 friends and Jennifer played the role of Rachel Green in it and interestingly she was the reason I started watching FRIENDS in the first place! An interesting circle don't you think?

So when I came across her beautiful trademark look, I just had to do it, perhaps as a tribute to FRIENDS!

From this portrait, one another thing I would like to mention is an advice that my maternal aunt gave me from one of the mistakes I had made in one of my portraits- draw the hair-lines in the same direction as given in the picture. So one thing I understood from it was basically, make it exactly as the original picture is!

And talking of techniques, the one that I have invented which I feel is quite revolutionary for me specially if you are into the kind of art I am in of trying to create almost the same picture is to from time to time to just turn both the picture and your paper upside down and then look at it. You will find a new perspective and what you thought you did exactly like the picture might not really be. It was that only from one view point. When you look from different dimensions, you become aware of so many other things and dimensions.

5) Preity Zinta-

Ah! Another one of those pretty ladies. There isn't a thing as too many portraits of pretty ladies is it?

A secret that perhaps very few of you might know is that this woman, whose portrait is there just above is one whom I really love and admire from a long time. She is Preity Zinta -another one from Bollywood, India and is an actress.

Perhaps you can feel that in this portrait and the point that I made below the first portrait- the love and care with which I made this. This is what I am talking about.

This picture is saved for the last because according to me it is the best. What is your opinion? I know it might differ but I consider this the best I have ever done and lovingly call it- "My Master-piece"!

It is such a simple picture, the eyes are very simple, just a circle and a 'windows' kind at the centre of them, as my sister famously once remarked!

For me the eyes are the most important in the portrait and perhaps called as the most difficult. But I do them first and usually that is what I do best. Lips and teeth feature among the things that I do worst in addition to fingers! I really don't know the reason behind this!!!

Also a difficult thing to negotiate is doing the left side proportional and properly complementing the right or vice versa. Generally the eye level of both eyes is what you need to watch out for specially if the head is tilted to a side etc. Just a practical advise for you wannabe or budding artists or anyone who wants to know. I feel like an art expert giving expert opinion and advise to novices etc which by no means I am.

Infact I don't even consider what I do as 'creative'. Because basically what I am doing is I am taking a picture and recreating an almost exact one on another paper. I work on making it as similar as possible. Not even a smallest line I make without making sure it is exactly as in the picture. This is the difference between a good look-a-like portrait and others. I have seen many people just see a line in the actual picture once and just make it on their paper, assuming it is the same. No! it is not. Even a smallest point or dot misplaced can completely change the picture specially in the eyes atleast that's what I found when I do it.

Now what I was saying was I don't consider my work creative because afterall basically I am just copying! I am making another one alike. But what is the point of it? Even a photo-copy machine does it better, infact much better, with absolutely no difference! So what is the point of me making it. One is I enjoy it and second it gives me joy! Yes, yes I hear you saying that the first and second point are no different but that is what it really is! After 2,3,4 or 5 hours I look at what I have made, it makes me feel proud and brings a smile to my face.

But still it isn't creative. Creative would be when we make something new, something out of our imagination, our original ideas expressed. That's creative, not just copying. So though people marvel and appreciate my work and compliment me for what I have made, within I know it's not much.

They say a good work, a portrait or sculpture is not made, you don't make a good sculpture rather let me put it this way- it is said about a great sculptor that he said about a Jesus Christ statue he had made that he did not see the rock but he saw Jesus Christ beckoning him and he just removed the parts of the rock surrounding Jesus Christ and there it was! He did not create it, he just removed the unnecessary things and there it was which was already existing. It only became apparent and manifest.

That is really art. That is the perfect definition on art. You are not the creator, you can only allow existence to create through you. You can become a vehicle for the creator just like an empty flute!

Most beautiful woman and Most handsome man

Is this the most beautiful woman in the world? And is this the most handsome man in the world?

I know you are smart and by this time you must have already figured it out a bit atleast but in case you are still wondering who these people are, and are wondering where you have seen them, you have not really seen them exactly because they aren't real people....but are made up of real people though.

Ok, enough of playing around. These pictures are actually morphed pictures, as you can see written on the pictures the name of the website wherein you can morph various faces together.

Most of the faces on that website are of Hollywood actors and actresses, few sports stars, singers etc. From the Hindi film Industry (India), there is Aishwarya Rai, Deepika Padukone (!), Shilpa and Shamita Shetty (!!!) so far. Really surprising list!

It is a very interesting thing to morph various people together and it gives you a mixed face with the combined features of all. You can select the people you like or dislike, or morph a man and woman picture or two people who might be friends or even enemies ..Anyone.

As far as I am concerned, I tried to find out morphing what faces would give me the best looking man and woman. I tried various things. I searched for 'The most beautiful woman' and 'The most handsome man' in Google and whatever list I got, I morphed those top 10 women. Didn't find such list of names for men though and even on this website, majority of the pictures are of women anyways.

An interesting thing is that not necessarily the morphing of best looking top 10 women would give the best result. No, in fact it could be anything. And since you can morph 4 faces at a time, you can morph any 4 and with this morphed picture, you can morph another 3 and so on. So if you want you can morph together all the people given on that website to try and see what is the final result! I have no idea..but should really look weird.

You can even upload your own picture and morph with the celebrities or upload your favourite celebrity who is not in there or whose picture given there you don't like and so you can upload a better picture of that celebrity. But I should tell you that the pictures you upload might not give the best result as compared to the pictures that are already there on that website because of the image size and that you have to specify a lot of points like the top of head, bottom of chin, left and right side of face, a few points of eye-brows, eyes, nose, face etc.

All right. Now finally I will reveal the celebrities that I have used to morph together and get a face that I feel is the best I could get out of all the experimenting and morphing together all kinds of celebrities.

For the woman pic, the people are-
1) Catherine Zeta Jones
2)Alessandra Ambrosio
3) Cindy Crawford
Not too unexpected..is it?

And for the man pic, it was quite easy-
1)Brad Pitt (who else?)
2)David Beckham
3)George Clooney
4)Leonardo DiCaprio

I had a few other good pics too like the ones below-

Alexis-Bledel--

-- Allison-Mack--

-- Alessandra-Ambrosio-

- Alicia-Silverstone

Britney Spears--

--Lindsay Lohan--

--Paris Hilton

In case you are wondering if or why I didn't use people like Angelina Jolie or Jennifer Aniston, Nicole Kidman, Aishwarya Rai, Kate Winslet, Eva Longoria etc and Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Tom Cruise, Keanu Reeves etc, let me tell you that I used them all in various combinations and even others like Cameron Diaz, Halle Berry, Drew Barrymore, Kristin Davis and a lot more. I don't think I missed anybody while morphing although I might have not written all the names here. But I consider the topmost pics as the best ones I could get. Decide for yourself.

So do visit this website and try it out for fun, upload your own picture, try weird combinations or try to find out what gives the best looking man and woman picture. If you do indeed get very good results with any combination, do let me know!
Enjoy!

* Also there is another website which you might be knowing, for face morphing where you can make your face into various ways like Caucasian, Afro-Caribbean, East Asian, West Asian, Ape etc. You can visit that website here

My Body- Health Enigma!

Arnold Schwarzenegger. See the biceps

WANTED- Experts.

Today I am going to write about one topic that almost every human being on this earth has faced at least at some point of time in their life- your body and health.

It is such a complex thing to understand at sometimes and seems relatively simple at others. I guess around 90% of people face the problem of being over- weight or obese! Well, why do you eat so much then? So, as you might have guessed, I am in the other 10 %. The simple indication for this statistics that I have written are simply from the fact that you will always see advertisements for weight loss everywhere. I am yet to come across an advertisement that even shows- “GAIN WEIGHT”- 10 Kgs a month with people testimony etc, leave alone an exclusive ad like this.

Coming on to my situation, let me tell you that I am 24 years old, almost 5’ 10” (178 cms) with a weight of 50 kgs (110 pounds) for the past 10 years I think! Since the past 10 years, I don’t think anything has changed. My height is still the same, my weight is still the same and even I look the same! No matter what I do, not even a kilo changes on either side with the exception that I feel a couple of times it has gone down or come up 2-3 kilos. You just have to visit my Orkut profile and you will find my school friends writing that I still look the same!!! Perhaps I look 18. No harm, but I would prefer to look my age though and it has everything to do with weight. Only if I weighed 70, I would definitely look 24 or even more.

Arnold Schwarzeegger. The lights and shadows give an amazing effect

According to the BMI (Body Mass Index), I am very clearly underweight at 16 BMI for which 18.5 is the starting range for normal weight. According to my age and height, my ideal weight needs to be between 65 and 70. That means I need to gain atleast 15 to 20 kgs of weight! Which in itself means 40% of my weight!!! Just see the arduousness of the task in terms of percentage. In terms of numbers it isn’t too difficult, people lose 15- 20 kgs quite regularly, atleast according to the ads but putting on 40 % of your current weight?!! That looks impossible right now.

A little of my back ground as well, I actually have a long, lean frame and I am deceptively strong. At the age of 12 I joined Taek won do and I was surprisingly good at it having won a trophy and standing first in the very first exam for Yellow belt. It is another thing that after that year itself, it closed down. But now if I look back, I surprise myself. How did I manage to do everything so easily? I remember others always complaining when they made us do hundreds of push-ups, running many kilometers, doing the fights, getting punches in the stomach or breaking things and other things and I tell you, I performed every single action sincerely and with dedication. At no point I felt that I wouldn’t be able to do it, my body managed it perfectly.

That did help me with strength and flexibility. I became as flexible as I can be. Splits which many found impossible, I performed with consummate ease and could hold that position for as long as I wanted.

Around that time, I came across Arnold Schwarzenegger of course through movies etc, and I was fascinated and wanted to have a muscular body like that. And I used to do all kinds of things- push ups, pull ups, weight lifting- of course never by joining a gym but doing it at home with whatever I could find. And I did get good muscles for the people of my age group but still I was lean.

Nothing’s changed and I still have good strong muscles but not big or bulky at all. At rest, my arm may look absolutely thin with no strength but when I flex my muscles, it might seem like a very strong, muscular person. Just see my pictures to understand.

Me with tightened ab muscles

As a child I wanted to be like a body builder- Arnold Schwarzenegger type and used to exercise, lift weights. But obviously I never became big and bulky and not even in the normal weight range and am still an underweight by some margin. Now I don’t want short- term or unhealthy measures to gain weight etc. Right now I am facing the problem of deciding what really do I want. Do I just want to put on weight? But I have a love for exercise and having muscles and there can be 2 things. Either you can have big bulky muscles or long lean muscles. Both are for different purposes. After thinking and analysis, I have come to the conclusion that obviously I can almost never belong to the first category and it’s no use either being big and bulky. It’s basically unhealthy. Nothing should be done in extremes. It is very easy to go from one extreme to the other. The most difficult thing is to stay in the middle. The “middle path” of Buddha and walking on the razor’s edge.

Flexing my biceps

I had figured it out a long time ago that Flexibility = strength. The more flexible you are, the more strength you actually have. From being extremely flexible, I have come down a lot and flexibility only decreases with age. I have tried many times unsuccessfully to get back to the shape I was in by all terms during my Taek Won Do time.

And one thing that has had me thinking and is responsible for me writing this blog post is that recently I came to know of a website called hundredpushups.com. It is a 6 week program at the end of which you will be able to do hundred push-ups consecutively. I loved the idea and am going to do it, in fact have already started but it also made me wonder, what would be its result. It should definitely make me stronger but would I put on weight or lose it? Would I put on muscle mass or have leaner muscle which, with the same weight would make me look thinner? It is a complex thing with many myths attached to fat and muscle and various theories.

So in the end I am quite confused. I only know that in the end what I really want is to be in a normal weight range- around 65 to 70, with good strength and flexibility and a nice muscular look. Now what diet should I have, the percentage of protein, carbohydrates etc, the kind of exercises I need to do- has to be ascertained. I do have some idea about a variety of topics of health that to put on weight or bulky muscles mass, heavy weight lifting with a high protein diet is the way to go. But what I have to decide that what I really want in the end as mentioned above, is it possible to have it all at the same time? Or would I first only need to put on weight first, then take on strength and flexibility training!

Some other information is that my diet might be less with people always saying that I eat too less, but I eat all kinds of foods that is vegetarian, occasionally eat eggs too for the proteins, but will definitely not have meat, fish etc for personal reasons and is almost out of question. I eat all kinds of vegetables and have a balanced diet. I have reduced milk consumption and only have it with tea. And currently I also walk a lot but otherwise have pretty much sedentary lifestyle, not like most people have but still not a very active lifestyle either. If I play a sport etc someday, some muscles ache that day or the day after.

But I also have an excellent heart rate or pulse I guess at 60/min which I know that only meditators or athletes have less than it.

So this is my situation .

ANY HEALTH EXPERTS OUT THERE?!! HELP ME!

Stick twirling or Staff Wielding

This is a video available on YouTube as well.

You all would have seen the video. Now I don’t really know what you might have felt after seeing it. Personally my experience of showing it to others has been that first of all my friends, relatives etc none have been able to identify that it is me in the video in the first place. One another comment I got is that it is too short- just 5 seconds. Also some have suggested that it is some real fast twirling and even wondered whether it is a trick of technology etc. Generally everyone has been impressed by it.

So to clear it all, it is me and I have really, actually done it although what you might not know is that the stick fell out of my hands just after this. But it is allowed I guess for what came before it!

So how in the world did I get into it? I will start by giving a brief history. As a child, I have been fascinated by almost all aspects in life. And I can safely say that I have tried my hand at almost everything that I was exposed to or that which was within my reach. So till now I have practiced my hand at drawing, mainly portraits (which you all who have seen my whole blog would know), even tried my hand at cartoons like the ones that come in newspapers making fun of the political situation etc, writing poems, and now obviously blogs, tried my hand at making a novel or story book whatever you call it at the age of 14. I still have it with the pictures that I had drawn in it. Sports too, my true love being Cricket since as long as I can remember and am still so crazy about it. Also online games of all sorts, reading lots and lots of stuff from books, websites etc, Making things from clay etc, playing the piano, also dancing and even tried singing when I converted my poems into songs, composed and played music, sang it, recorded it, edited it all by myself at my home with just my PC and head phones! An achievement in itself I guess. Also Taekwon do which was an amazing experience and for which I got a trophy, the only one I have I think, learnt and loved swimming, learnt skating by myself on the terrace of my home, falling innumerable times, juggling etc.

So as you can see, I have tried many things.

I was also a huge fan of Akshay Kumar, Bollywood actor, whose movies were mainly action-oriented and consisted of stunts he performed himself. He was an inspiration. So too is Arnold Schwarzenegger and I have done various kinds of exercises through my life and am deceptively strong for someone with a weight of 50 kgs (110 pounds)

So this whole stick twirling thing started with a single glimpse of Daniel Goddard in Beast Master on Axn. He did that stunt of jumping from a height and somersaulting in the air and landing on his feet. I have been fascinated by it but never tried it full-fledged. It is a dangerous thing to do without an expert or instructor and there are serious chances of injury. Since then I was hooked to Beast Master and what a great show it was. Really commendable! It is there that I saw him wielding the stick or his staff so gracefully and easily and at least that was something I could try without getting seriously hurt. Fortunately at home we had a bamboo stick but it was a bit too long I guess as you can see from the video. It must be 6 feet long, me being 5’ 10” and it wasn’t really straight. It had a bent shape which might be visible.

The show itself was so wonderful, the people selected fit the bill perfectly. The combination of Dar and Tao was great. The combination of physical and mental strength. It also had emotions and well thought out characters. Click the link below is an introductory video of the show Beast Master : BEASTMASTER VIDEO

Now I cannot really teach or tell someone how to wield the stick. It would be very difficult. You can only learn by trying it yourself. Maybe you can watch in slow motion, try various things and experiment and if you are really interested and have a desire to learn it, you definitely will. There are lots of videos out there on YouTube as well. Happy stick twirling!

Kip-Up- Martial Arts step of getting up

Some of you who follow and read my blog would already know about me, but if not, then I'll tell you that among the various things that interest me, Martial Arts, in any of its various forms is one of them.


At the age of 12, I had joined Tae Kwon Do classes and it was one of the best things that my parents suggested me to do. Remember, I am using the word suggested, because they never forced me to do anything and also because I am a bit too lazy or not ambitious enough to do something on my own, or think about joining a class or something.


It was one of the best experiences of my life and one of the most memorable year of my life. One, because such kind of things always attract me and the one year that I did this classes, I did it with utmost sincerity and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was always interested in learning new steps and doing various things on my own if required because they won't teach you too much in a year.


* See this other post of mine of Stick Twirling by clicking here


Whatever memories I have include first the warm ups, then the various kicks and punches that we were required to do with as much force as possible,the form steps and the push-ups (one of my favourites), the splits i.e. spreading of both the legs absolutely horizontally on the ground, the various official fights they used to make us have, tightening the stomach and after gauging how tight it is, accordingly they would deliver punches to it, and none of these strangely ever hurt. And perhaps as a culmination of all my sincerity for the one year, I stood in the first position for the exam of Yellow belt and was awarded a trophy! My first one.


I remember people always grumbling and grunting as the instructors would ask us to do 'a little more' of everything. I enjoyed the splits because as I was young, I was able to learn it quickly and do it with real ease, I used to learn by observing the seniors and trying out on my own various kicks with spin kick being my favourites among the limited repertoire I possessed.


Thus after 12 years of having a yellow belt, I still some times like to do a few steps, learn a few new things and one of them is the step of getting up on the feet from the position of lying down on the ground which is a very common step that you would have seen in almost all action movies. It is something that I have tried on my own and can do but never practise. It is very important to do it regularly otherwise it becomes very difficult. I try it once in a few months so I am not at my best in this and hopefully I'll put in the practice and put up an even better video!


I am sure most of you who are interested in doing various martial steps want to learn how to do it because it is a relatively simple thing with less chances of you hurting yourself even if you do it alone without any instructor or supervision. It is apparently called "Kip-up" and can fall in the gymnastics category too and in Chinese, the term is "Wushu". It can also be called "rising handspring", "kick-up", "kick-to-stand". From my experience, I'll tell you a few things about it. First of all you have to lie down on the ground and I would suggest to immediately raise your body meaning after you lower yourbody, don't waste too much time there because if you get into it as soon as you go down, you can carry the momentum and that is the most important thing here because you have to exert so much of force down on the ground for your body to go up in the air.

I would say that you need to use both your hands and legs as well as your complete body for this. Never neglect any one part here and use maximum force from both hands as well as legs. The legs are the most powerful though and the thigh muscles are used the most. I can tell this from my experience because I usually do it once in a few months and so after trying a few times continuously, the next whole day I become and remain aware of my thigh muscles (as they ache) :)

You lie down with your shoulders touching the ground, bring both your legs up folded, close to your chest, then push- the initial push has to be from your hips area and then your legs as you straighten them and finally your hands as you leave them from the ground. You just have to concentrate on exerting the maximum force down on the ground with each part of the body that leaves the ground by pushing downwards and thus the part going up. I find that harder the surface, the better it happens and even if you fall down trying it, it doesn't really hurt. So I do it directly on the floor.

Again practice is the key again and I can't tell you too much about it because I myself neglect it, but it sure is an attractive step and will keep you fit as well. Hope you are able to do it. Try till you can do it and enjoy the moment when you are able to do it for the first time. It is an achievement!

PIANO NOTATIONS- II

Please see my other post of Piano Notations

In that first post of mine on Piano Notations, I have mentioned that even if you don't have a musical instrument and don't know how to play it, still you can play your favourite songs with the sound of the musical instrument that you want.

Here, I will give you some other musical notations of other Hindi songs. I will not be providing for the full song. If you know a bit of music, you can figure it out yourself or if you do want, you can ask for it in the comments. Just request the notations for a song that you want and I will provide you the full notations.

Do visit my other post to understand how to read these notations because these are not the usual western notations or the Indian notations, but the t-piano notations.

Here it is for you. Enjoy!

1) The Airtel tune :
4 44 4 8 5t54 3 5 454345t 5431
8 5 7 5 5431 345t4 543

2) Tune in Om Shanti Om :
In the song- Tum ko paaya hain to jaise....

Instrument- Music Box

i o i o i o iuy y u y u y u ytr r t r t r t rewq
Tabqww eree rtrr tyt iy y t e e r

3) Tu Hi to Jannat Meri :
Movie- Rab ne bana di jodi

Initial Music- ty yui uyuyt

Tu hi to jannat meri, Tu hi mera junoon
r r t e r y t t t y r r r .....repeat- 2

Tu hi aakhion ki thandak, tu hi dil ki hai dastak
i o p p o i u i i o p o i u i

Aur kuch na janu mein, bas itna hi jaanu
i o u u u i y y yt yyt yyt ytre w

Tujh mein rab dikhta hai Yaara mein kya karu
w 7 8 y y 5 4 3 7 7 8 yy

Hope you were able to understand and play it. If not, do ask me for it and I will send you the audio for it as to how to play for these notations. And don't forget to refer to the previous post to clear all doubts.

Me and cooking!

Regarding this topic, let me tell you that those people who know me, know that kitchen is one of my least frequented places- not because cooking is one of the things I don't have interest in but because I am not a foodie whatsoever. It will be difficult to find a person who is as indifferent (if I can say that) to food as I am!

If you have read my other posts, you will know that I weigh 50 kgs and I clearly fall in the underweight category. As regards food, I have always seen people around me having strong likes and dislikes about food to the extent that they have so much aversion to some foods that they will just not touch it and other food items that they like, they can have any amount of it!

For me, there are only 2 categories for me- Foods that I prefer and foods that my body doesn't tolerate. I don't have likes and dislikes about food. I am a vegeterian by my own choice and I am proud of that because it is not out of belief or any other reason but because it is my own decision coming out of my nature or understanding or tendencies whatever you can call it.

There are some people who are born in a vegeterian family and because of their family belief or religion are vegeterians and they have never tasted or eaten non-vegeterian food. And this I don't find good because it is just based on their beliefs or fear and that is not a very good thing to base upon and certainly in their sub conscious this thing will remain- the curiosity of tasting non-vegeterian food, about wondering what it is like, about why people all over the world who eat it praise it so much for its taste. They can never be free from it this way.

There was no particular thing about food in our family and so this was never a question for me so I must have had nonvegeterian food 2 or 3 times in my life and I remember vividly the last time I had it mainly because I was thinking about the proteins but I just couldn't get it down my throat. It was so apparent to me all the time I was trying to have it that this was a living thing which was killed, something that had life and now I am consuming what is actually a dead body. The main thing was I was having food at the cost of taking a life and that cannot be acceptable to me. So that was the day I stopped...for good.

Now in this post, I will put up a couple of pictures of the food items I have made.

1) Sabudana Khichdi

As I have already said, I don't have much likes or dislikes about food. I prefer any form of sweet food and avoid too hot or spicy food because I just cannot have it. My body doesn't tolerate it. I am among the rare people who eat every vegetable. But throughout my life, whenever I was asked to name the food that was my favourite, the answer throughout the 24 years has been the same- Sabudana Khichdi

This picture is after I made it just the second time in my life. Now I stay alone with my friends and I made this for myself so I didn't have to do anything fancy and do any decorations or garnishing etc but of course when you make it, you can. By all means go ahead and do it.

I had gone home for a few days and at that time my mother told me about how to make it and I observed it and after coming here made it. If you want to know the recipe, it is quite simple. Here is one way to make it:

-Wash sabudana and soak it for 15 minutes, then drain the water and let it remain for a few hours. -Chop the potatoes into small cubes.
-Mix crushed groundnuts,sugar and salt and keep aside. -Heat the oil/ghee in a pan and add mustard seeds. When the mustard seed crackle add cumin seeds, green chillies and curry leaves. -Add potatoes and stir well. Mix sabudana mixture and mix gently. -Mix the grated coconut and garnish with coriander leaves. -Sprinkle some lemon juice over it and serve hot or it can also be taken with curd as it is usually done.

2) Poha :

For the recipe to this-

-Put the poha in a sieve and wash under running water for 2 minutes. Keep aside to drain. -Heat the oil in a pan and add the mustard seeds, curry leaves and green chillies. Fry till the spluttering stops and then add the onion. Fry till soft and translucent. -Add the peanuts and potatoes and stirring frequently, cook for 2-3 minutes. -Drain the poha completely to remove all water and add it to the above mix. Add the turmeric powder and stir well to blend all ingredients. -Cook for another minute. Turn off the fire. Pour lime juice over the poha and mix well.

Poha is a dish that I hadn't given a lot of thought to up to this time but after coming to Mumbai, where it is a standard breakfast dish along with Upma and others, I started having it in college and started liking it a lot and that was the first thing I started having at my room too in the evening. It too is quite simple to make and good to have.

Now I never showed much interest in cooking from the beginning but I did like it to some extent because to me it is also an Art. And somehow I always knew and felt that this was something if and when I got into it, I would like it and do it well too. It is interesting indeed and you can innovate and experiment and someone who does it well is my sister whose blog covers it extensively. You can see it here- Nikita's Blog.

In fact in my family, all are great cooks! Definitely my mother and even my father! I feel that if there is a competition of all the fathers in a society or any other place for cooking, my father will win it unless some one's father is a chef by profession! But if that is the case, chefs wouldn't be allowed in the competition then..would they? So yes, my father would win!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Interesting Fact - When the famous explorer Marco Polo returned to his homeland of Italy, from China in 1295, he brought back a recipe (among other things). The recipe, was a Chinese recipe for a desert called "Milk Ice." However, Europeans substituted cream for the milk, and voila..."Ice Cream." Ice cream has been a hit ever since!

PIANO NOTATIONS III

For those of you who don't have a musical instrument and still want to play, please refer to my other 2 posts on Piano Notations where you will see how to turn your computer into a musical instrument and various types of notations.

Here I will be providing normal Western Notations for a few songs-

* I will use lower case letter like a,b,c,d,e,f,g and a#,c#,d# etc for lower octave, upper case letters like A,B,C,D,E and A#,C#,D# etc for middle octave and A+,B+,C+,D+,E+ and A+#, C+# etc for higher Octave


1) Do pal Ruka from Veer Zaara
E+D+C+B BABAGB ABC+ BAF GAGFGFE


2) Do Lafzon ki hai dil ki kahani
ABC+E+A+ E+A+E+D+D+G+ D+G+D+C+C+F+F+ C+F+C+BC+BABA


3) Tere Liye from Veer Zara
G#BAG#G#G#G# AG#F#F#F#F# G#F#F#EEE

D#C#D# EEE D#C#bbC#C#C# ED#C#bC#C#C# C#D#EF#G#ABC+#D+#D+#D+#

ED#C#BC#C#C# G#AG#F#G#G#G#


4) Suroor
Initial music
D+F+D+C+ D+F+D+C+ D+F+D+C+ D+

O Huzoor- G+F+E+
Tera, tera, tera suroor- C+D+E+G+F+E+F+D+F+E+D+
Mere baatein- D+D+E+F+E+D+ D+D+E+F+E+D+ C+C+D+E+D+C+ C+D+E+G+F+E+F+D+F+E+D+


5) ICICI bank music tune
E+E+C+D+C+D+E+G+E+C+D+
E+E+C+D+E+F+G+


6) Reliance Music tune
AE+D+E+A+ F+E+D+E+ BC+D+D+E+C+ BC+D+D+E+C+ BABAGA


7) Kaun Banega Crorepati music tune
C+D+D+# C+D+D+#F+G+


8) Happy Birthday music tune
C+C+D+C+F+E+ C+C+D+C+G+F+ C+C+A+G+F+E+D+ A+#A+F+G+F+

If you have a request for notations of any song you like, please do write it in the comments section. And I reply to all the comments and give the notations as you can see in my second post of PIANO NOTATIONS II.
Happy Playing!