Marcus Miller on Bass Player TV

As a former Bass guitar player I started to save this video
link and then I thought I'd share it here.....hope you enjoy the
brilliance of this Bass Master !


Click this link to view the video

See all the videos at www.BassPlayer.tv

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This Old Sari

Painting by Raja Ravi Varma

SARIS: AN ILLUSTRATED GUIDE TO
THE INDIAN ART OF DRAPING

Chantal Boulanger, French author, cultural
anthropologist and researcher, regarded as the
ultimate authority on Saris :

'I didn't make this lengthy and difficult research for the past.
I made it for the future. This book is not an achievement,
but a beginning. I hope it will raise an interest in drapes,
not only in India but in general. Archaeologists, ethnologists,
artists, stylists, etc. need such studies to understand the
clothing of the past, present and future.
To a large part, saris are also the expression of women's
creativity and could become anyone's inspiration.
I don't think that these drapes should simply be recorded
and have for only future the dust of libraries.

Most of us, Westerners, think that people drape because
they don't know how to stitch. This wasn't true of the Romans,
and Indians have always had additional stitched garments.
Even though Indian women, clad in their elegant saris, evoke
in us visions of our Antiquity, they live right now in the
20th century. Drapes have many advantages over stitched
clothes, especially when beauty is an important value.
Saris are much more practical than we think, especially since
they can be so easily modified.

Saris are fun to wear. From the material of this book, they can
be tried by anyone, and more styles can be created.
By teaching workshops on draping, I learned that there is
for each woman one drape that fits her perfectly. It's not
often the modern sari, and can be any of the styles in my
book on "Indian Drapes", or even one the woman invents for
herself. I also made this work for anybody who wants, at least
once, to wear a drape, any kind of drape.

Draping is an art. I hope my book will help it take its place
as a heritage of mankind'

Like Liz Hurley elegantly attired in the right sari for her
Desi re-nuptials, today's woman is almost instantly endowed
with regal status upon donning a Saree*. Sari. Sorry.

*This thought is not lost on the most visible folks on the planet,
Celebrities as presented by Ebay vendor Sabira.

Finally, here's eye candy in a gold-and silk gem of a sari.

Ferry Halim : Flash Grandmaster

http://www.orisinal.com

First off, this link may be old news to Gamers and users
who have been on high-speed connections for a long time.
For me it was a source of hidden treaures, filled with delightful Flash
animations that I figured would keep my neice's 5 year-old son
mesmerised forever. Only as I delved deeper into the site, away from
all the games did I realized how carefully the site was aimed as a
diversion for the whole family. No gore or eroticism here, just
wonderful pastel backgrounds interloped with nursery-like images -
mainly animals - as the main characters in an astonishing array of games.
For starters:
Watch the Orisinal trailer

Okay, so that was all hi-speed Flash and sound effects roaring through
your surround-sound system and it didn't quite blow you away since you see
trailers attempting to grab your attention all the time. Good. Now you're ready
to lay back and relax, courtesy of Fresno, CA-based Ferry Halim, who is the
prolific twenty-something genius behind all this. This was his output after two
years in the USA, with no formal training in Flash animation whatsoever.
Updates are frequent so it'll take you a long time to go through all the stuff here
- there's so much of it. Don't forget to check out his Portfolio !

Quote from a 2002 Wired.com review :
'Ferry Halim -- a 28-year-old accountant from Fresno...doesn't need the latest
version of Flash for his website to stand out...Instead, Halim has created dozens
of what may be the world's most addictive video games using Flash 4.
They also may be the world's simplest.'

Outsourcing Canada

2 min 30 sec - Mar 8, 2007
Description: ADG Security Ad

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International Women's Day : Blogged

International Women's Day
The United Nations Organization :
'an occasion marked by women's groups around the world.
It is designated in many countries as a national holiday.
When women on all continents, often divided by national
boundaries and by ethnic, linguistic, cultural, economic
and political differences come together to celebrate their Day,
they can look back to a tradition that represents at least nine
decades of struggle for equality, justice, peace and development.'

O-kay. All right-y, then. Let's put it in a nutshell and say that even if
you were abandoned as a child, right now you're probably seated
in front of a PC reading this. You turned out alright. But somehow,
somewhere a woman in your life remains in your head and probably
pops up at times like these. So after all, would you say, "You've
come a long way, Baby !" Huh ?

Blog-a-Thons
are marking this day everywhere. I noticed these :


http://www.takingplace.org/blog-against-sexism-day

Not A Feminist, But.... Blog
which is just that, musing on women from a
'Gin swilling feminist with a tendency to swear too much,
a super sweet tooth and a satchel full of rants to share'.

I can dig this because it's of Indian origin. Like me.

BlankNoise Project http://blanknoiseproject.blogspot.com/
Flickr Photos

I miss my Mom, my sisters, my nieces and female cousins
today.....actually, everyday.

The One Campaign

Today I was checking out some really nice photo slideshows
at the one.org website and shortly thereafter decided to sign up
with them. Even more shortly than the previously-mentioned
thereafter, I received this e-mail from one.org:

'Thank you for taking action with
ONE: The Campaign to Make Poverty History.
Your voice DOES make a difference!

But there is still more you can do to help get the word out :

Get local with ONE in your community

Please help us
tell your friends and family about The ONE Campaign
and how they too can lend their voice to help beat global
AIDS and poverty.

Tell them to sign the declaration now at ONE.org
ONE by ONE, we can make the difference.'

So, I'm letting you know. Spread the word about this
campaign. Sign Up HERE

You might have heard of some of these people who have
already signed up :

Penelope Cruz* George Clooney* Brad Pitt* Salma Hayek* Bono*
Antonio Banderas* Jamie Foxx* Ellen DeGeneres*

Now Berkeley Succumbs

A Bollywood dance team competes in the
Bollywood Berkeley dance competition in
Oakland, California. (AP)

A couple of days ago this blogger sat up and took
notice of the Bollywood dance frenzy in Yorkshire, UK :
Play That Desi Music, White Girl

Around the same time a related AP article * appeared
in Gulfnews, a newspaper in the UAE, about UCLA
and other institutions delving into the Bollywood angle of
India's World Market penetration.

*an excerpt:
The rise of popular culture as an academic discipline,
which brought analysis of hip-hop and "Star Wars" to
university classrooms, has also led to a recent scholarly
examining of Bollywood, says Robert Goldman,
professor at UC Berkeley's Department of South and
Southeast Asia Studies.

"It's like junk food," he said. "It's schmaltzy. You know
it's not the most intellectual stuff in the world, but it's fun,
it's entertaining."

The Bollywood Berkeley Dance Competition is in itself
an anomaly, meshing Bollywood with local dance 'flava'
while all along Bollywood had been borrowing beats and
dance moves from their Western counterparts, creating
a 'Masala', or mix. This is like the early Beatles copying the
American R-n-B groups, who in turn hoped to stay potent
on the music charts by copying the Beatles Pop-Rock harmonies.
Back and forth, feeding off each other all the while adapting to
an ever-increasing global cultural sensibility.

And so it goes with this blog....slowly but surely, as our
global differences diminish, it succumbs to everything Bollywood.
And not a moment too soon. For now, we must press on to even
more penetrating things. Like the real-life Bollywood Dreams of
recently-wed Elizabeth Hurley. I will refrain from saying the Hurley
bird got the worm, for that would mean Indian Biz Mogul Arun Nayyar
is a worm. I don't know him like that, and I wish them a long and happy
relationship.

Gratuitous pic here.
And here.

Global As I Want To Be

Virtual Poona is now officially registered and
on the map ! ClustrMaps is keeping tabs for
me free of charge and it is heartening for me
to know which of my friends worldwide are visiting
and reading and who else is tuning in/lurking from other
continents. Thanks a million, come again !

Walk The Night

Hello!

This year on International Women's Day, March 8,
Blank Noise supported by Radio Indigo invites you
to WALK THE NIGHT!

We are meeting at Rest House road, (off Brigade Road)
park at 6 30 pm. The walk begins at 7 pm. We conclude at 9 pm.

All we need is you and your enthusiasm!

Please email us immediately at blurtblanknoise@gmail.com

or Phone at 91 98734 85284 (In Delhi)
+ 91 98868 40612 (Bangalore)

Bring along your friends, family, neighbours anyone, any age group!

Fun. Thrill. Action. Guaranteed!

Blank Noise
--
BLANK NOISE PROJECT
www.blanknoiseproject.blogspot.com

Play That Desi Music, White Girl !

click to enlarge this BBC image

Choreographer Zoobin Surty, formerly of Mumbai,
holds dance auditions for Bollywood Jane in between
attending to his duties as a cultural dance ambassador
for South Asian Arts in Yorkshire.

First Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber gave us Bombay Dreams.
Then came The Guru with Jimi Mistry dancing his socks off
to the Bollywood beat. And now Bollywood dance fever has
gripped Yorkshire, resulting in hot and heavy auditions for
Bollywood Jane, a play which runs through June at the esteemed
West Yorkshire Playhouse. It's hoped that staging the play will
add to the buzz that is already being felt across Yorkshire in
anticipation of the 2007 Indian International Film Academy
awards which are being held in the region this summer.

BBC Slideshow of Yorkshire dancers