August 12, 2009
Lights, Solar Panel, Action
Today the whole system was installed, and at around 4:30 pm, we turned on the computers for the first time! The last couple days have been a rush of events, and I’m still trying to come to terms with how significant today was. I'm still trying to soak in all that's been happening, cause boy, it’s been a lot…
Two days ago I went to Bangalore to pick up the equipment. Then yesterday morning, my uncle came from Pavagada in a hired van, and after picking up Anand Uncle (not a biological uncle; we're in India so everyone is an uncle), we went to Powertronix. We met with Mr. Ramesh, who owns the company and has designed our system, and Mr. Dilip, his partner, and both know my uncle Subba and Anand Uncle very well. It was more like a reunion of friends than a business meeting, and they talked about old times and new; apparently, my uncle had given Powertronix their second ever order in 1995, and now was giving them their second ever solar order 14 years later. They discussed a lot of the things that I didn't follow, but eventually the conversation turned to the project, and getting the equipment to Pavagada. After everything was figured out, we had a long talk about the future of the project - expanding the system to power all 20 computers - and things sound super positive. I’ll be staying in touch with Mr. Ramesh throughout the next several months, and we’ll be trying to get government subsidies, which have recently increased dramatically for solar projects – up to 40%!
After tea and a few pictures, we went outside and Subba Uncle (that's my uncle) and Anand Uncle oversaw the people loading up the equipment into the van. The solar panel, which is two meters by three meters, was too large to go in the van, so it got strapped to the top while all the other stuff went inside. After meeting the engineer from Powertronix who was going to come to Pavagada to install the system the next day, we set off for home with a van jam packed full of electronic gizmos and gadgets. Bouncing down the pot-holed road to Pavagada with my feet up on the box of the charge controller, surrounded by all the equipment we had been talking about for months, I felt so excited and so happy. “Yes! It’s finally happening! And these are the parts that it’s going to happen with!” When we got back to Pavagada, we went straight to the school, where about 10 gentlemen were waiting to unload the equipment. Among them were the Headmaster and school Clerk, and seeing them in their pajamas at 10:00 pm was a reminder of how much sway Subba Uncle has; when he makes calls, people listen.
Then, this morning we went to the school at around 10:30 am. In order to fix the solar panel to the roof, a cement base support had to be made, so my uncle made a few calls to arrange it. The engineer was already on his way from Powertronix, so it had to get done quickly, and for about twenty minutes, things weren't looking good. During that time, I helped one of the computer teachers (Venkatesh) to unpack and setup the three computers that the system will power, and just having something to do felt good. In that time, Anand Uncle had shown up, and he and Subba Uncle figured out a temporary way around the cement base, and things were back on track. They also phoned a local electrician to come over and help finish up the school's internal wiring so we could actually use the system.
By noon, there was a small army of people buzzing around the school - me and Venkatesh in the new computer lab, my uncle and the electricians in the room where the equipment was going, a whole bunch of people up on the roof making cement fixtures and hooking up the solar panel, and various others who were just interested and wanted to see what all the hulabaloo was about. Soon after, I switched into my role as camera man and joined the Club-of-People-Standing-Around-Not-Really-Doing-Anything-Constructive-But-Getting-In-The-Way. I was able to take a lot of good pictures and recorded some good videos, which I’ll be piecing together into a short film about what we’ve done so far. Then, I’ll be sending the film around to let people know about our work and to try to fundraise. I’m hoping that because you’re reading this, you’ll be interested in it, so let me know in a couple months and I’ll send the film your way too.
It's only a ten minute walk from the school to my uncle’s house, so I went home for lunch, and when I returned, things were almost done. The crowd had thinned to around 6 or 7 by then, so I was able to talk with the engineer from Powertronix and get the details about how the system works. It turned out that this was his first installation job, and he looked as happy to see it up and working as we were. Just after the school was let out, we all gathered in the computer lab, and switched everything on. The first thing the monitors said was "Unrecognized Power Frequency: 86.5 kHz/ 50 Hz." The collective disappoint was pretty tangible, because it had already been a long day, and the engineer had double checked all the system parts. However, someone hit the “reset” button on the computers, and then the monitors started to work, and huzzah! Success beautiful success! We switched everything off, shook hands, and called it a day.
Since the next step in the project is to move the whole computer lab, the current set-up is a temporary one. There are still several changes that will be made, some in the next few days, some in the next few months, and probably more will happen as things develop. For example, the solar panels needs to move to a part of the building where it won’t interfere with future construction, and as mentioned above, the computer lab is going to be moving to a different room. However, these are things for the future; right now, we have can sit back and eat a few mirchi bondas. I think that after today we can officially stamp Phase One of the project a success.
I want to point out that while I have been saying "we" while talking about a lot of the work that's happened, the credit for the project really goes to my uncle. In the last two days, he has hired a van to transport the materials, finalized the business end of things, arranged for an engineer to come install the system, hired people to make a cement foundation for the panels, gotten electricians to come finish up the network within the school, oversaw the installation of the system, arranged for me to videotape students and teachers giving their opinions on various issues, and is now preparing a function to inaugurate the computers at the school. And yesterday, he also travelled 9 hours to and from Bangalore to pick up the materials. I am in awe at the amount of things he got to happen, and in debt for his generosity of time and patience.
I don't think the reality of the situation has really set in for me. It doesn't feel real that the solar panel is actually on the roof of the school right now, and that when the computer monitors lit up earlier today, it was the culminating event of about six months work. It's sort of like finishing a semester; you race and race towards the end you know is going to be a doozy, and then you get there and it feels...strange. I guess that's the only way to put it.
But typing up this entry, it's starting to feel more real. We did it! Hurray!
Posted by avable at 01:02 PM | Comments (1)
August 03, 2009
Bollywood, Mollywood, Tollywood, and All The Rest of Them
My cousin Raksha just got back from watching a movie at the local theatre, and we discussed her whole movie experience today at lunch. After talking with her as well as my aunt and uncle about movies here, it became clear to me that the Indian concept of a "film" is far different from the American one.
The film Raksha went to see is in Telagu, the language of the neighboring state. It was pretty hyped up, though not anything like the bigger Hindi films, which seem to blow the whole country up in excitement. The movie opened last Friday, and she went to go see the 10:30 am showing on a Monday. The movie is only playing in one theatre in the village, but since its opening on Friday it has played 15 times already. Since she was going to a semi-popular movie showing on a Monday morning that had already played more than ten times, I assumed she would try to get there about twenty minutes before to get a good seat. Makes sense, right? Well, apparently not...
When I asked her about it this morning, she explained how in order to get a seat, she and her friends had reserved a ticket last night. But a ticket isn't the same as a seat, since the theatre would be trying to cram as many people into the 500-seat theatre as possible. Therefore, in order to make sure they got to sit down, they were going to get to the theatre at an hour in advance to get a place in line. She said that ordinarly, they would go even earlier than that, but since they know the theater owner's son well, they would get "special treatment." Harsha, who lives down the street, went to the opening showing on Friday three hours early, and had his shirt ripped all the way in half fighting for his ticket.
Then in the movie theatre, things were equally out of control. The theatre was completely sold out, and she said there was literally no room at all; in addition to people filling up the aisles, they were also stuffed in front of the first row and against the back wall. During the movie, the crowd would be cheering for the hero or booing the villain so loudly that she couldn't even hear the dialogue. And even though the movie was released only three days ago, many people in the crowd had already seen it enough times to memorize the words and were yelling them as loudly as they could, just in case the characters on-screen forgot what they were suppoed to say next.
I could understand all of it - the multiple hour long wait, the battle with the blood-thirsty line, the cramped and sweaty theatre, the obnoxious crowd - if the movies were good. But to me, they're not. They're not even alright; they are just plain bad. I've sat through two and a half of them, and watched tons of scenes on TV, and I'm still trying to figure out why you put yourself through it. The acting is on par with the stuff you see on Jerry Springer, every movie is a rehasing of one of three plots, and the films often look like they were made in the early 60's. The only redeeming quailty is that the songs and dances are entertaining, and every movie will have at least a couple of them.
But the weird thing is, EVERY movie will have four or five songs. Regardless of plot, mood, or genre, every movie will have the songs. I understand that music doesn't mean a movie can't be serious - I've seen Fiddler on The Roof and Les Miserables, and appreciated how music enhanced the story there. However, in those musicals, the music seemed to work with the plot and fit into the context of what was going on - here, that's not the case. A character will be facing his enemy at somewhere near the climax of the movie, then launch into a happy bubblegum-pop song about the power of love. Dreams are also good ways to introduce songs, because then there doesn't have to be any type of connection at all. And all popular music in India comes out of the movies; the music videos are all scenes from the movies where you can tell the actors and actresses are lipsynching to someone else's work.
On TV, there are always at least three movies getting played at any time, and there's a channel sort of like MTV that only plays the song and dance scenes from movies. My aunt and cousins will sit and watch these for hours on end, and it just blows my mind. And on TV, they don't even show high quality versions of the movies - it's clear that you're watching something off some person's video camera that was stationed in the back of a theatre.
And yet, the movies grip the whole nation. There's Bollywood, which pumps out the world famous Hindi movies from Mumbai (formerly Bombay), and those are pretty high end. There's also Sandalwood from the state of Karnataka, Mollywood from the state of Kerala, Tollywood for the movies in Telagu, and the list goes on. Each region of the country seems to have their own xxxx-wood, and often kids learn new languages to watch the movies - Raksha said that movies are the reason she learned Hindi. What's more, it seems to be a global phenomenon; I remember when we went on a family trip to Egypt, the street vendors would call my dad Amitab Bachan, the most famous actor of his generation, and I've heard about similar things in some of the Pacific Island countries.
Bollywood puts out the most movies each year, and in Raksha's opinion, the best. She says that although the actors are hotter in Mollywood or Tollywood films, the songs aren't as good, and the acting is way worse. In my opinion, garbage is garbage, no matter how bad it smells.
It's also funny because in the papers, there are sections of the paper devoted to tracing the careers of the actors and actresses. There are always quotes like "Director Patel really pushed me to my best in our last film, and I hope to continue stretching myself" and "Shakur gives a refined and sophisticated performance in his best film to date" or my favorite: "I turned to Demi Moore for inspiration; no one is as sexy as her, though I think I gave her a run for her money."
I try not to get too cynical when I watch the movies, but it's really difficult. I wish I could just enjoy them, because they are everyone's favorite form of entertainment, and clearly a really "cultural" thing. I guess I'm just too American.
Posted by avable at 06:01 AM | Comments (0)