a seed festival, a fashion show...
...i will start from the most recent of these two events, the fasion show, which was last night. at bottles and chimey- a club/pub we have frequented a few times, there was a sunday night fashion show. sunday is a big night in hyderabad, apparently; it seems people go out more often but venues close earlier. anyway, the place was packed and we had front row seats- meaning we were at a table next to the elliptical bar in the middle of the club, on which the models did their little dance on the catwalk. the clothes were designed my some mumbai designer and in general they were nice, but not much to write home about. i would describe them as a fusion of indian fabrics and western styles. the male models turned it more into a strip tease than a fashion show as they generally wound up taking off their shirts- the very fashion they were supposed to be modeling. despite their tacky attitude, it was a good show, and despite a few recycled outfits and a few recycled songs, it was a fun time. this guy oliver, who we had seen perform there a week ago and turned out to have had a number one hit in india at some point, performed a few of his songs as well...and then, inevitably, he performed 'summer of '69.' i don't know what it is about that song, but i've heard it in pretty much every single country i've traveled to. really, i don't get it.
anyway...the more interesting part of this entry is the story of the day before. we drove about three hours to a little town near the border of Andrha Pradesh and Karnataka and talked with some people from an NGO called the Deccan Development Society (Deccan being an anglicized version of one of the many indian languages' word for 'south' and refering generally to the southern region of india). DDS promotes organic farming and biodiverse agriculture among groups of dalit women- dalits being india's former 'untouchables' or 'children of god.' anyway, if you are interested in learning about this organization you can check out their website:
http://www.ddsindia.com/www/default.asp i would suggest it at least skimming it because its really quite an incredible organization. another thing they have done aside from farming is to train some of these illiterate dalit women in video and editing; the films they make give them a voice, whereas in print-newspapers, journals- they are voiceless. one of them was present at the traveling biodiversity festival we also attended that day. this is a festival which each year focuses on a different topic- last year it was the watershed and this year it is seeds. there are carts that travel daily from village to village all over the coutnryside of andhra to celebrate and teach. it was truly an incredible thing to see ( i know i use this word and others like it- loaded words or cop-out words, however you choose to see them-quite often, however i promise that i always use them genuinely as there are genuinely too many incredible things in this country...kind of amazing). so here is why it was incredible: there was a procession of cow-drawn carts, most of them driven by children, each carrying a display of various kinds of millets in little labeled glass containers. women were singing songs in telugu about anything you could possibly imagine on the topic of seeds: the different types of seeds and the nutritional value of each, recipes that can be made with them, the importance of an organic diet, the role of biodiverse seed crops in creating self-sustainability and good health in poorer communities and how these crops can improve overall quality of life....you name it, they sung it. there was dancing and a general sense of merriment, there were the vibrant colors that india is so well-known for, there was involvement from basically every person in the community (every age group), and there was the feeling that something was actually getting done. i wonder what could be done in the states if people adopted this celebratory method of promoting organic farming?
i have lots of pictures i was hoping to share, but the computer is being a silly head and won't let me upload them tonight. booo! they'll be up sometime soon, hopefully.
on another note, guess who's going to goa next weekend?
...i will start from the most recent of these two events, the fasion show, which was last night. at bottles and chimey- a club/pub we have frequented a few times, there was a sunday night fashion show. sunday is a big night in hyderabad, apparently; it seems people go out more often but venues close earlier. anyway, the place was packed and we had front row seats- meaning we were at a table next to the elliptical bar in the middle of the club, on which the models did their little dance on the catwalk. the clothes were designed my some mumbai designer and in general they were nice, but not much to write home about. i would describe them as a fusion of indian fabrics and western styles. the male models turned it more into a strip tease than a fashion show as they generally wound up taking off their shirts- the very fashion they were supposed to be modeling. despite their tacky attitude, it was a good show, and despite a few recycled outfits and a few recycled songs, it was a fun time. this guy oliver, who we had seen perform there a week ago and turned out to have had a number one hit in india at some point, performed a few of his songs as well...and then, inevitably, he performed 'summer of '69.' i don't know what it is about that song, but i've heard it in pretty much every single country i've traveled to. really, i don't get it.
anyway...the more interesting part of this entry is the story of the day before. we drove about three hours to a little town near the border of Andrha Pradesh and Karnataka and talked with some people from an NGO called the Deccan Development Society (Deccan being an anglicized version of one of the many indian languages' word for 'south' and refering generally to the southern region of india). DDS promotes organic farming and biodiverse agriculture among groups of dalit women- dalits being india's former 'untouchables' or 'children of god.' anyway, if you are interested in learning about this organization you can check out their website:
http://www.ddsindia.com/www/default.asp i would suggest it at least skimming it because its really quite an incredible organization. another thing they have done aside from farming is to train some of these illiterate dalit women in video and editing; the films they make give them a voice, whereas in print-newspapers, journals- they are voiceless. one of them was present at the traveling biodiversity festival we also attended that day. this is a festival which each year focuses on a different topic- last year it was the watershed and this year it is seeds. there are carts that travel daily from village to village all over the coutnryside of andhra to celebrate and teach. it was truly an incredible thing to see ( i know i use this word and others like it- loaded words or cop-out words, however you choose to see them-quite often, however i promise that i always use them genuinely as there are genuinely too many incredible things in this country...kind of amazing). so here is why it was incredible: there was a procession of cow-drawn carts, most of them driven by children, each carrying a display of various kinds of millets in little labeled glass containers. women were singing songs in telugu about anything you could possibly imagine on the topic of seeds: the different types of seeds and the nutritional value of each, recipes that can be made with them, the importance of an organic diet, the role of biodiverse seed crops in creating self-sustainability and good health in poorer communities and how these crops can improve overall quality of life....you name it, they sung it. there was dancing and a general sense of merriment, there were the vibrant colors that india is so well-known for, there was involvement from basically every person in the community (every age group), and there was the feeling that something was actually getting done. i wonder what could be done in the states if people adopted this celebratory method of promoting organic farming?
i have lots of pictures i was hoping to share, but the computer is being a silly head and won't let me upload them tonight. booo! they'll be up sometime soon, hopefully.
on another note, guess who's going to goa next weekend?
posted by beeke at 3:52 AM
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