Ustad Anb Jogi

Today, I received news from friends Zulfikar and Saqib from Jamshoro that my dear friend and collaborator Ustad Anb Jogi passed away. He was performing at Sewan Sharif and died of a heart attack.

What can I say about this wonderful human being? He was an incredible musician. He applied his deep knowledge of classical tabla to dholak and created something unmatched. We collaborated on several projects over the years and he always provided a depth of knowledge and love in creating musical excellence, without ego and brought out the best in an ensemble.

We became dear friends, above and beyond the wonderful work we created together. His efforts were vital in putting together groups of musicians to record music for my short film ‘Gul’, two ‘Girnari Jogi Group’ (first album, second album) albums, a ‘Shah Jo Raagi’ album, a solo album for sitarist Shahid Ali and 6 albums based on the poetry of Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai. These were challenging experiences, helped by several kind people, but at the core of it all was Ustad Anb Jogi, without whom none of it would be possible.

Over the years, we were in contact on the phone, via whatsapp and I would get glimpses of Ustad sahib’s travels to perform in Dubai, the UK and Canada. He was a sought after accompanist, and to those in the know, an excellent music director. You could see the trust and respect that senior, contemporary and younger musicians had for him. People who really knew their work, looked to him for guidance during recording sessions. He could pick up almost any instrument and sing the part, or play it as instruction for others. He deserved far more recognition than he received. Though respected in his community, his classical musicianship was an area we tried to bring to a wider audience. I often spoke of him to institutions and groups that had the means to bring musicians out to the world with that level of respect.

In addition to this, I learned about his efforts to support his family and the larger Jogi community who during his lifetime went from wanderers to sedentary life. It was a huge change, that meant much reevaluation of how to live and how to survive. He supported much of his extended family financially and in so many ways that I will never know.

As if all of that was not enough, he was a wonderful friend. We shared meals together, accomplishments and challenges. I think of him always as I talk to people about our collaborations and the love that I have for all that he shared and all that he was as a much cherished human being. In recent times I have been in touch with his son Hakim Jogi, who under his guidance has become a gifted singer. He was a grandfather, a husband, a father, a community leader, an excellent musician and to me, always a dear friend.

Photos below. From the last time I met Ustad Sahib in London with my wife and son, to session photos taken by friend Saqib Ali and the second last photo by Saeed Mangee sahib from our first collaboration and the last photo, from our initial meeting thanks to Fatah Daudpoto sahib and Suffi Bilal Khalid sahib.

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Fareed Ayaz and Abu Muhammad Qawwal Party Grand Performances Jam

Thanks to Leigh Ann Hahn and the wonderful people at Grand Performances, I got to enjoy a little musicians jam with Fareed Ayaz and Abu Muhammad Qawwal Party, all the way from Pakistan right here at Inner City Arts. I've enjoyed their soulful music for years and got to see them a few years ago at a concert put on by the Pakistani Arts Council. It was a real treat to see them in such an intimate setting and to spend time and talk to them as well. Did I mention there was delicious Pakistani food catered at this little jam session? How could anyone pass up such an incredible opportunity on all levels.I can't thank Grand Performances enough for making opportunities like this possible. Don't miss their public performance on Sunday at Grand Performances in downtown Los Angeles!Here are a few sketches I made during the performance.

Kristeen took some photos and video with a cel phone:

You can see where friends Sheila Govindarajan and Sri joined in. Also in that last, unfinished sketch, you can see Tasneem with a saxophone on her lap and a tuba next to her.

Day in Gujrat

I woke up in the comfortable Gujrat University guest room. The view outside was beautiful. The sun was still low across the fields, and a thick fog lay over everything. I took my time getting ready, and by about 10 am, went to meet my friend Anwar for breakfast at the canteen.Afterwards, we walked over to the fine arts department, where I got to visit with a few more staff members and check out some of the various majors. There is an FM radio station, as well as pottery, ceramics, printmaking, industrial design (complete with 3D printers), multimedia and much more. It was fun to see some of the work these students are doing.By then it was time for my presentations, so I went to the multimedia lab and shared some of my professional work and then my short film “Gul” and the design process behind it. The part I enjoy most in this presentation, is sharing the process of taking a vague concept and developing it through clear visuals into a finished piece. It is a lot of fun to have a conversation with the students to learn about their own interests and to see what aspects of what I am sharing interest them most. I had a lot of fun sharing with them.Speaking to some of the faculty, I heard a lot more about the usual administration issues. The problems are very real and quite serious with all of the institutions I have come across. I have faced a number of challenges in my work that really made it hit home for me, how corrupt the system here is. So in that sense, it is understandable why people vent and certainly have legitimate things to complain about. However, it does not make sense to do that with someone who just arrived. Almost everyone I met, after a brief introduction, went into what a mess things were and how impossible it was to get what they would like to do done in this environment. That’s great, but not really appropriate to dump on a guest. This happens a ton wherever I have been. When it is a friend sharing something with me, that is different, but so many places that seems to be the very first and only thing people share, is all the horrible crap they are dealing with and how things are so awful and hopeless.It is not that what they are complaining about is untrue. I think a lot of it is very accurate, however, when I look around and see all of these young students here to learn and quite clearly being taught well by these same professors, I feel like they should share more of that with me instead. After lunch, Anwar showed me some beautiful displays by the industrial design and ceramics departments. The work looked beautiful, and it was quite clear that the staff really do care about their students. From there, I got a high speed ride into town to the local bus stand. I hopped on a little wagon (van) for Rawalpindi as there was no direct bus to Peshawar from there.We had only gone a few miles, when the wagon stopped by the side of the road. There was some kind of issue, so another one was called and eventually we all piled into it and were on our way. I kept dosing off and being jolted awake by the sudden starts and stops. There was an older man next to me who kept mumbling things that were hard to understand. At one point hey yelled out to the driver to let him off at Mundra. Eventually we got there, and the driver pulled over. This guy starts asking everyone whoever wanted to get off at Mundra should get off. He kept asking who it was over and over. Finally someone said, you are the one who asked to stop here. He seemed to have forgotten but since so many insisted that it was him, he relented. He was kind of entertaining like that, announcing stops from there on and giving advice to people on where to get off and which route to take the rest of the way. It was all pretty funny.Eventually, I hopped off in Islamabad and got on a van for Peshawar. It took a while for passengers to fill up, but after an hour we were on our way. It was dark and my suitcase was wedged on top of my lap. I stared out the window at blobs in the shadows, between dosing off for a few moments and looking for signs to see how close we were to Peshawar. Once at the station, I called my friend who came and picked me from the Daewood stand down the street. We drove past a ton of secured areas that had been attacked by suicide bombers in the past, including the school bombing last year. This city has been through a lot.We met up with some more friends of Abdur Rahman’s at a studio, then went out for some food. The restaurant was closing, but we were in luck, they had one prepared chicken left. It was seasoned more or less with just salt, green peppers and lemon. It was really delicious and much more subtle on flavors than spicier food in Lahore.From there we head back and I went to sleep.

Gujrat University

I got a call early in the morning that my ride to Gujrat University had arrived. I finished getting ready and head out to meet Fayaz in an empty lot off the main road, since the place I am staying is in a narrow lane and there are no street names or house numbers to speak of.We had been driving for a bit when a breaking sound came from the engine and we pulled over. Luckily, there was a motorcycle repair shop by the side of the road. After a bit of back and forth, they patched up the car. Like most cars on the road, it was just barely held together enough to run, so we were on our way again. I watched the landscape change and a few small towns and farm land lead us to the outskirts of the city of Gujrat (in Punjab, Pakistan). The campus had beautiful buildings and wide open spaces with lots of greenery.I met up with Anwar, a lecturer there and had been a student when I met him at CEAD in Jamshoro, Sindh years ago. I got to meet some of the staff and walk around a bit. We grabbed some breakfast at the canteen before I gave a lecture on my work. It was fun to share. We scheduled another lecture for the next day, then went out for lunch.In the evening we visited the tomb of the man who bequeathed this land for education. It was overrun by grass. After that, we visited some old buildings in the city.

Books

I spent the morning at the Landa Bazar, looking for some cloth for a river bank for “Risalo”. I have been here so many times over the course of this project. It is great to see the finished backgrounds, neatly framed in cloth. Umar has done a beautiful job of helping to design these backgrounds and hand stitching and figuring out the many challenges to bringing the designs to fruition.I took one of the finished backgrounds to the bazar to match some colors. Most of the people selling cloth in large heaps could not be bothered to talk to their customers, but as I looked through the stacks at one stall, I chatted a bit with the owner as Umar and I have come there quite a bit. I opened up the background and showed him what we had been up to with all these pieces of cloth that we had purchased here. He was really happy to see it and told the neighboring shopkeeper all about it and called him over to have a look. They really appreciated the hard work that went into piecing it together. It was fun to share.I spent the rest of the day hanging out with my friend Kabir, sifting through stacks of old books at the Sunday book fair and then heading over to Ferozsons book store. They have opened the whole back area of the store again, having rebuilt it after an electrical fire years ago. I grabbed some ice cream at Chaman, then sat down with some book collectors and sellers. Over tea, it was interesting to learn about big estates in Lahore that housed huge libraries that ended up being sold for their weight in paper, rather than the true value of all these antique books that had made their way into the hands of a private collector from all over the world.

Azam Gardens

I caught a wagon to Azam Gardens. From where I am, it is fortunate that I can get a Qing Qi to the main road and then walk a ways and hop on a van to some far off places. Vans are pretty cramped and it takes a while, but once I was in, we were on our way.We made it about a couple of kilometers, before a bunch of scrawny M.A.O. College snots came by and insisted that everyone get off the van and go to another one so these pieces of shit could go on a joy ride at the driver’s expense. They don’t want to deal with these kids damaging their vehicles and this is their route, so we piled into the next van and were on our way. The conductor on the second van told us about how these college students do this stuff.After that we were on our way once again. Eventually I got to the neighborhood I was headed to. I spent some time at a couple of houses. People were a bit busy or sleepy, so I ate, made small talk, slept a bit and then no one was really around when I woke up, so I left.It was dark by then. I walked out the neighborhood, to the main road and crossed the many lanes of traffic. There were no wagons stopping there so I just kept walking for several miles until I got to some crazy intersection, crossed it and hopped on a wagon. That took me to the Qing Qi which took me home. Good times. I am ready to be done with this trip.

Not buying

I woke up and made some tea. My friend Imran’s home is rather quiet most of the day. Umar works at night, and Imran heads out for work in the morning, so for most of my time, it is just me and my thoughts. When I was preparing to shoot “Risalo”, things were quite busy, struggling against constant load shedding and piecing together storyboards and resources. Since I decided to take this production home, I have put all of that on hold.My mind still swims around ideas of how I will make use of this extended time and the potential resources I can piece together in Los Angeles to make this film what it truly should be. There is also that lingering self doubt as to whether I can pull together all of these beautiful elements into a worthy whole that expresses the ideas and experience that I am working so hard to create.Other than that, I made the rounds visiting more relatives before I leave. This time I visited a few families that live near where the Prime Minister lives. This makes for challenges when you are coming by bus and walking around, looking for an address. Eventually, my aunt and uncle drove up and got me from a market in the area.I found it interesting that with the older generation, conversation went to religious stuff and eternal damnation if one does not choose the right path. None of my generation had that to say. Other than that, there was the usual asking about the rest of my family which is sweet, eating lots of food and many, many long and awkward silences. I don’t understand this obsession with eternal damnation and fire and brimstone, so I would try and ask about grandkids or other more lovable family members. I was surprised that they had nothing to say about that and the conversation would go back to the necessity to follow the exact correct belief. Seriously, that is some headache inducing stuff. How can you enjoy good food, and have such nice little grandkids and still be obsessed with just hellfire and earning brownie points for the afterlife? I mean, I get if you have a pyramid scheme, you just have to blurt it out once, maybe twice, but then I would figure the mention of grandkids would bring a little joy to your face and a harmless silly story or two.As religion obsessed as people are, I wonder where that appreciation for their quality of life and love went and why people feel that this is the best way to “sell” their beliefs to others? I try to respond less to these things as I am older now and not under anyone else’s thumb, but I do find myself pouncing on certain remarks with some rebuttal, and in that way refrain from the four letter responses that are running through my head.Interestingly, I feel that the adult children of those same relatives are quite different. They too love their religion and practice to varying degrees, but I have not seen that same obsession with punishment, damnation and salvation. Perhaps in that there is some hope.

Phool Patti and Faiz Festival

Haider Ali and Ali Salman of Phool Patti dropped by in the morning. I went out to pick up some halwa poori, while Umar fixed up the place and made some tea. I must say, he is really good at uncluttering the place when he needs to. I can't say that about myself.Haider and Ali Salman are as usual up to great things with Phool Patti. As a truck artist, Haider has pushed his way past so many barriers to develop his skills and then rise on the merit of his hard work. Painting trucks has been in his family for several generations, but from his teen years, he made a point to seek out training in all areas related to his work. He went to cinema board painters to work on portraiture and landscapes, and studied with sign board painters to push his calligraphy skills. He wished to insure that he could cover all aspects of his art, and never be at the mercy of someone else. I feel very connected to that. In working on my own projects, I try to pick up as many skills as I can, and while I may not become an expert at everything, I want to at least be able to put things together. This helps a lot in directing and collaborating with other artists as well.In hearing Haider talk about his own journey thus far, I see a lot of the same obstacles that I hear from other artists or experience myself. Yet despite all of that, here he is, pushing and creating connections and opportunities for himself as well as the team he has created, traveling the world, breaking all of those barriers that others have tried to set, particularly on artists who don’t have recognized academic training or the benefits of other bars to admission in this very hierarchical and incestuous system. On the other hand, I have a lot of those benefits, but I recoil in disgust at a lot of that whole scene, while leveraging it in a way that better suits my temperament. He is an internationally recognized artist, yet if he had more of a snooty attitude about his art, and some inflated degrees; an acknowledgement to the academic gate keepers of art, then he would be Haider Ali sahib and not referred to as Haider bhai. What a bunch of crap. Despite all the nonsense, it brings me a lot of joy to see him and his team traveling the world on the merit of their work.After some food and sharing some music and artwork from “Risalo”, I head over to visit some relatives. I returned later towards evening, and took a series of buses and qing qis to get to the hotel Haider was staying at. We sat down for some green tea, then Umar and I saw them off at the railway station. That one sentence sounds so simple, but what it actually entails is so much more. We crossed several lanes of insane traffic from all directions, navigating potholes and open sewers (covers are often stolen), the public latrine (any wall or corner), misdirection on the train platform (running around with heavy luggage up and down stairs to every which platform we were directed to in a huge mass of people), then squeezing aboard the train and ignoring incorrect and official sounding pronouncements of being in the wrong berth, then walking all the way back through all of that to move on.Umar and I head to the bus stand and waited for a bus to Alhamra. Our friend Imran was there at the Faiz Festival, in honor of poet Faiz Ahmad Faiz. We sat for a while, watching a beautiful solo dance performance to Faiz’s poetry, intermixed with other songs and pieces that pulled together readings of letters between Faiz and his wife during his imprisonment. There was a lot of humor in their exchanges through what must have been such a heart wrenching experience. I felt a bit sad, thinking about all the struggles, apathy and lack of a genuine desire to do your part to make things better that I see here and certainly back in the US as well. There are so many people who do care and are doing incredible things to make the world a little better, but overwhelmingly as was before and as is today, our goals and purpose in life are to accumulate wealth for tomorrow or brownie points for the afterlife.We took a walk through the beautiful Lawrence Gardens at night, before heading home to enjoy some delicious food courtesy of Umar’s sister.

visiting

Umar and I visited my friends Haider Ali and Ali Salman Anchan of Phool Patti. They had just returned from a trip to the Pakistani High Commission in India, where they had painted some walls in their truck art style.We caught up, then head to the train station to book their return tickets to Karachi. From there we grabbed some lunch at a little dhaba, before heading to Olomopolo, an interesting open arts space where they had a meeting scheduled.I walked over to visit Sohail sahib at Checkpost and the rest of the group went their separate ways. It was a bit of a walk to get to Checkpost, but I felt like just walking. After my experiences with production people here, I really wanted to just get back home and move on with the next stage of things. After all I have been through to accomplish whatever I have for “Risalo” so far, I just wanted to get back home. I had gone over some more details for the last river background with Umar that morning. I planned to be out of town for the next week. That is a bit risky as the work may not get done, but so be it, I don’t want to sit around here waiting another week, just trying to bide my time.It was good to catch up with Sohail sahib. I shared the reasons for my decision to go home and not shoot “Risalo” in Pakistan. The director of “Manto” dropped by to see some progress on a project he was working on. I felt very fortunate to get a chance to sit in on the session and see some previews of a very lavish production that he has been working on. It makes me feel good to see projects that are raising production standards here.We had some coffee cake, courtesy of Hamza Imam who recently became a father. Hopefully I can stop in again before I leave, but I certainly appreciate all the friends at Checkpost, who let me use their resources for weeks on end to digitize DV tapes for the music portion of “Risalo”. Sohail introduced me as being someone of some significance in relation to my work, but I feel quite the opposite. I look at the work around me and see funded projects with entire crews, and on one side I see myself, quite battered by the experience of trying to make this film. What I am trying to make is certainly an oddity. I don’t see something like “Risalo” being made at any point if I don’t do it. That does not necessarily mean anything of any significance, it just is. Sometimes you just make stuff, because that’s the stuff you want to watch, and whatever with all other considerations.I took the usual long walk to the metro, followed by a bumpy ride home via bus and qing qi. I have a few lectures lined up in different cities for next week. I might as well do something useful before I leave. That should pretty much take me through to the date of my flight. I am tired of waiting and thinking, so hopefully this will help.

Friends from Peshawar

A former student of mine from NCA was in town so I went to visit him at the college. I spent some time catching up with Suffi sahib as well, before Abdur Rahman and a couple of his artist friends from Peshawar head out for a walk. His friend Imran had never been to Lahore before, so we went to the Lahore Museum next door. Though I am tired at this point in the trip, whenever I see some interesting art, ideas start flowing and I feel excited to create new things or continue with what I have already started.After the museum, we had some food in Anarkali, before Abdur Rahman needed to go take care of some chores. I offered to show Imran and Shams around. We spent the day walking through new Anarkali, to Lohari Gate. From there, we walked through winding lanes, admiring bits of old architecture whilst dodging traffic. I took them to see the beautiful Naunihal Singh Haveli. From there we walked through all the cloth markets, past Sunheri Masjid and found our way to Masjid Wazir Khan. Incidentally, I had never actually walked by Sunheri Masjid before. I had heard of it and seen some photos, but each time I walk these old lanes a different way and come upon new things, that have been there for ages.They really enjoyed all the detailed fresco and tile work on Masjid Wazir Khan. We sat down for a bit as the sun began to lower in the sky. We had done a lot of walking. From there we walked around the Shahi Hamam or royal bath house before hopping on a Qing Qi outside Delhi Gate and head to Data Darbar. From there we figured out where they needed to go next to meet a relative of Shams’. I sat them on a wagon (van) and sent them off, before walking down Ferozpur road and hopping on a Qing Qi the rest of the way back.It was nice to share the city. I have been to most of those places several times on this trip, but if someone is visiting the city for the first time, those are certainly some things they should see. I told them to try and visit the fort and Badshahi Mosque the next day. I felt tired as I got home. I want to try and make good use of the limited time I have left in Pakistan, before I head back. I worked on a design for the final background I need to get finished and then sat, just thinking abit about what comes next.

Trip to Ichra

I had picked up some clay pots in Multan for one of the stories for my puppet film “Risalo”, but felt that the larger ones were a bit roughly finished and I could use some more. The size I needed was not available at a number of shops I searched around Lahore, and a friend had suggested I go to Shama chowk.The chowk itself is around Ichra Bazaar, which is apparently the oldest part of Lahore. I had passed it many times while riding the metro across town and figured that I would go there at some point, but it had yet to happen. So it was, that I made plans to go. My friends Ifthikhar and Mohsin agreed to join me, and though that made us start about 3 hours late (it is seriously difficult to get people to stick to a schedule here), I was very thankful for the company.The metro was insanely packed. It is always packed, so when I say that it was even more packed than usual, that means I spent the duration of the trip pressed up against a lot of people rather intensely. Getting out was that much more of a challenge, but I made it out, like ripping free from the clutches of some hungry beast.Mohsin and Ifthikhar got there about 7 or 8 buses later. We walked down to the main road. An old man asked me how to get to the bus in the opposite direction. This is a huge problem with traffic and metro here. There is almost never a safe way to cross the street. I manage, but just barely, so you can imagine that elderly people or anyone disabled, or just any regular human being is going to find it difficult to impossible to cross through traffic that comes from all directions and never lets up. It is a cruel and dangerous setup. The metro does not have a way for pedestrians to cross from one side to the other. You have to walk down a long flight of stairs, cross anywhere from 6 to 9 lanes of traffic, and find an unobstructed crossing point in the middle, then run across the other side.I looked at the old man asking for directions to the other side. I glanced up and down the street. There were stairs that crossed over the street a good distance from where we were. I told him to cross there. We had to go the same way, so we saw him and four women hobble painfully down the street to the stairs, then up and down the other side, only to have to keep going to get back to the metro stairs, then up again.We continued on our way and found a shop that sold clay decorations. They had some pots that could work, but I wanted to explore more options before deciding. We would come back this way when taking the metro back home anyway, so I I figured we would go explore the bazaar for other options if there were any.Through backstreets we came across an old gateway with beautiful fine brick work. It turned out that the gateway lead to an old mandir, or Hindu temple. When Pakistan and India split in 1947 and the bloodshed of partition caused mass migration on both sides, the Hindus and Sikhs of Lahore left as many Muslims from across the border made their way here in one of the largest mass migrations and massacres.Refugee families came to Lahore, while many who had lived here for countless generations left. Those families that came here were allotted homes, including spaces within this mandir. So the numerous rooms that lined the perimeter of this large mandir had been converted into small single room residences where families had been living for at least three generations. They had treated the spaces with respect, though their former religious functions had ceased long ago. Then when the Babri Masjid was destroyed in India, by fanatical Hindus, the fanatical Muslim groups in Lahore decided that they needed to destroy mandirs. The Muslim residents told us how they were extremely afraid, running to save their families as crowds of politically motivated groups descended upon these long abandoned places of worship and caused damage that is still visible today.It always makes me sad to see these remains. The dead buildings seem to echo the anguish of all those displaced and murdered to make way for what exactly, I do not know. We explored for a bit, before continuing to Ichra. There were a ton of cloth and clothing shops. I picked up some sewing supplies that Umar had asked for as we explored. We did see some pottery shops, but none with anything useful for me. In the end, after much walking with friends, we went to the first shop near the metro to pick up the clay pots we had seen there. This time, the first man I had spoken to was nowhere to be seen and his assistant was running the shop. I asked for a dozen of the clay pots I needed. He mumbled something about six times and all I could figure was that he was quoting a higher price than the owner had earlier, but I could not make out exactly how much. I did not care. I just kept telling him the pots were rs. 30 each as had been stated earlier and that I would take 12.I got a ladder and brought them down. He filled all twelve in a single plastic bag. I had to insist, several times for two bags. He refused several times. Finally he said for me to pay him the money first, since he thought I would run away otherwise. This guy was quite the character. So, I paid him, he brought the change and we put the pots in two bags before Mohsin, Ifthikhar and I squeezed back onto the metro and head back home.Umar spent the night working meticulously on adding backing and borders to the backgrounds he had completed. I must say, they look quite incredible all finished and ready to hang.

Looking at clay pots

I had stayed the night. In the morning I spent time with my cousins and aunt. Faiza baaji, who has been instrumental in many of my Punjabi language efforts on other projects, took me to her collection of clay decorations, to see if there was anything I could find useful for my film, “Risalo”. I did find a few pieces to finish off the unfinished hookah prop I picked up from Multan.Besides that, it was just nice to take a break from sitting in isolation waiting for time to pass. I left in the late afternoon to head back to the other side of town. This is part of the process of wrapping things up before I leave for home. I had picked up the other suitcase I had and spent a few hours trying to figure out how to get all the film related props, puppets, backgrounds and production gear into my suitcases while still keeping it at some estimate of the airline baggage weight limits.

Keep going

In the morning, Umar and I picked up some more cloth from the Landa bazaar. Though we have often picked up cloth from the second hand sellers outside, on this day, we head inside the shops, deeper within the market where they sell all kinds of new cloth. The shopkeeper we had called before coming was still not there so we searched the neighboring shops for some other cloth needs.I looked at more cloth that could make for an interesting river background. I had figured out the mechanics for the design that I thought would work. It takes a lot of time to find the right material and certainly, new cloth is more expensive, but very necessary for certain tasks.After hours of hunting and bargaining, I handed the bags of cloth to Umar and sent him home, then walked down the street to grab a rickshaw to my relatives. The rickshaw driver was interesting. He quoted me the right price, so I did not need to bargain. I hopped in and we were on our way. He discussed all kinds of life philosophies with me along the way. Luckily, he did not need a response from me beyond an occasional “mm hmmm”. It is very loud in a rickshaw, with the sound of the vehicle and all the traffic around it. Add to that the fact that the driver is thankfully facing the road and all of his sound is being projected away from where I was sitting in the back and it makes it very tough to understand much of a conversation.I picked up that he was grateful for all that he had despite hardships and that love for all was all that mattered. People love to compliment themselves and share how virtuous they might be. Who knows what is true and what not. I was just along for the ride. I thanked him for getting me there safely, then spent the rest of the day and night catching up with my relatives over some nice food and a break from the world of puppets.

Reflection

Imran and Umar provide a breakfast feast.

I sent some money to the puppeteers for their time, waiting to be called to Lahore for “Risalo”. It is interesting. I look back at how I had planned to shoot the film on my little Canon Rebel T4i with it’s minimal 720p resolution for raw recording with Magic Lantern. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to shoot on a nice professional grade camera, with a proper crew. I really did want that, but there was no way for me to afford it.I understood the limitations of my budget and tried to make a plan within that. Yet when I came to Lahore, I was told by so many well meaning production related friends that I was foolish to do that. Surely they would help me to gain the resources I needed to shoot the film with a cinema quality camera and crew. This is not a huge project and my planning is quite meticulous as far as what we need to shoot, so it was well within the realm of possibility. However, for that to happen depended on a few variables beyond my control.Contacts who knew the people that could provide crew and equipment. I had that.People to state what they wished to help with honesty.People who actually felt connected to the purpose and the film to work with me rather than getting people just trying to size you up and see what they can take you for.Two and three were my downfall. It took so much energy to set things up properly and get the key people and equipment in place that when the promises and reassurances all turned out to be lies, I had neither funds nor energy to continue with a shoot. Certainly I tried, but that endless sizing you up to squeeze you as hard as possible is what forced me to stop the production right here. This is not how I can make this film.The biggest casualties here are the puppeteers, who will go back to their menial labor jobs. Thankfully there are opportunities for them to begin making puppets again which can lead to performances and a more sustainable life for them. This depends now on them putting in the effort to do this, with the support that friends and I can provide. We’ll see how this goes. Being open and looking out for the puppeteers was appreciated by them, when it came to production people I met, that same attitude was seen as weakness and they sharpened their knives that much more. So the far more educated and wealthy people were the dirtiest and nastiest of the bunch. The puppeteers called me as Khurshid visited them to distribute the funds I sent. Jamil thanked me for not forgetting them and for treating them with respect and care. It is so necessary to work with people with whom you can create a bond like that, rather than these production people that I came across.I texted the DP that dropped out and told him, that I wished he had told me he had no interest in doing this film before I went to Multan. I had visited him and shown him the animatics for both stories, reconfirmed that he was on board, gave him the option of splitting the production into a week in November and a week or less in December according to his schedule. Yet here he was intent on telling me he would do the work, only to begrudgingly say he was out, once I had raised the hopes of the puppeteers and trained with them. Even his admission followed another attempt to delay telling me for another ten days?!So what does this tell me? It does not matter how good their friends are and how good they are to their friends in a non professional space. As I have made my decision to rearrange the schedule for the film, by going home to my family and hopefully a job, while working on the animation and audio portions of the film, I find myself having to explain to so many people. People tell me that I should have planned better to get an Indian Visa and go there to work, or I should have magically had more money, or I should have hired more production people at the beginning to help record the music, or I should have been better, smarter and more capable at everything. Sure, I wish I was, and that more things came easily, but no. This has been my struggle and my effort. Having seen the video folks that same friend recommended, I don’t see how I would have fared better with his audio friends. People have all the answers when they are not actually doing the work. It all sounds great as an idea, but once you try those resources, you realize the painful process of bringing each piece to life.There is a lot of learning from this process, but unfortunately, it consists largely of making more money and staying away from Pakistani production specialists. I had this lesson regarding music folks when I came to record music for “Gul", then actors when I came to record voices for another project and now video production people and arts institutions on “Risalo”. These are not just my experiences, for along the way I have heard so many horror stories regarding other friends’ dealings with arts institutions run by corrupt appointees. Now I must leave, to create this work and survive these challenges, but in an entirely different place and with a different set of circumstances to be determined.I would leave tomorrow if Umar was not still working on backgrounds. I might as well finish that so I do not have to return in case I end up shooting the film elsewhere. The suitcases are heavy and I will likely pay a great deal to take it all back. That does not make it seem likely that I will return to shoot in Pakistan.

pound of flesh

I woke up feeling a little less crummy than the past few days. I no longer felt as strong a desire to protect and promote people who might be potentially involved in the project. Certainly, there is a level of paranoia and truth to seeing these production people around me as being calculating and trying to see how much skin they can slice off your bones.This has recurred during the process of trying to make “Risalo”. Musicians applied pressure to squeeze out more money, as did puppeteers. Based on the level of income they usually received, people reached out for money. The less well off would try to squeeze out a few more thousand rupees. Production people who work in an industry where they see the potential to make thousands of dollars a day on high profile commercials want to squeeze that out of everyone that walks past. This is despite the fact that fewer can command anywhere near that as far as fees for their work. So some jerk of a producer cuts them down to size and gets them to work for what they are willing to give. Things are not different at other jobs and industries around the world, but it is a bit more extreme here than in some places.I thought about all of this garbage in the morning. I opened up some recordings I had made of the puppeteers practicing in Multan. The work was not particularly polished. It would take a lot to get decent performances from them, but it might be possible. It made me wonder whether I could effectively shoot this film while fighting with production folks and pulling out performances from the puppeteers. That’s not who I am and it is not how I want to work.There was much to learn here. Certainly, I could become a bit more producer like in my dealings, but I kept wondering whether what I was risking all of this for was going to be worth it with this bunch of people. It is a tough decision to switch paths, but you can’t just run down a road because you are on it.I spent the morning pacing around the living room, thinking about what I could and should do. It is time to leave. Yes I can play the game to some extent and get some work done, but I don’t want to work with these people who so blatantly just want to see how big a piece they can gouge out of you. I will do my part and pay the puppeteers a bit more for their time and see if they can take the initiative of puppet making, leveraging the connections I have given them.Beyond that, I have things to pack, some finishing work to do with my friend Umar, and perhaps the first step to a better way of seeing this film through. I don’t want to give up on my optimism or the desire to do some interesting work that helps to support fellow artists, but I think I have run far enough down this particular path.I feel a sense of loss, but I realize that I can’t shoot this film with so much madness. So it was that I had to break the news to the puppeteers. With friends, I am also trying to get their puppet making going again so that they can sell pieces to the public. That is a big way that puppetry has survived in Rajasthan, just across the border in India, and with all the handicrafts events in cities around Pakistan, I think people would really love them. They just need some help getting started, some exposure to different quality and price tiers that they can create and some funding to start. So, I’m trying to help facilitate creation of one puppet as a starting point. Let’s see where we can go from there.It was really painful telling the puppeteers that we won’t be able to shoot the film. Instead of making promises to them about shooting in the future, I will keep working to connect them to opportunities now. I think there is a lot of potential here, but I feel sick in my stomach that this did not go through, after all the reassurances and checking in with our DP/producer. There’s only so much I can do, but I feel like a piece of me died. That’s not the project, but what we hoped to create together right now, does not seem possible. This is just the beginning of where we go next.

To become that which you hate

A few friends of Imran’s came over and cooked a delicious meal of eggplant and rice while I added lighting references to my spreadsheet for Sorath. I continued to put the word out to try and work out the many logistical issues that have been thrust back on my shoulders since the loss of the person who had agreed to DP and line produce the film. He came in with a lot of promises, and I made sure to keep him in the loop as I moved forward and checked in with him to make sure he was still interested, but after much chasing around to get a hold of him, he dropped the project, just as I had secured puppeteers.That puts into question how I can manage this production. Getting the performances for the film out of these puppeteers who are not quite so finely trained is going to take everything I have and more, but now I have to wrangle camera, light, location, funding and so much more on top of all of that. So I put out calls to friends to see what we could come up with.I’m not gonna pretend this is easy. I feel a tremendous amount of pressure, and on top of the work, there is a realization that financially, I could get back and be all right until I can find a job at the present, but if I sink more into this production, I will be in a much more difficult position. So I tried to enjoy some time with friends, but my mind is of course fixated on these many challenges.Imran’s friend Hisham offered some good advice later that night. He reassured me that regardless of how things went, things would get done. It might not be shot with the skill I want, but one way or another it will get done. My friend Imran had also talked to me about trying to be okay with just letting go, while still doing his best to contact people who may be able to help with resources. It is tough to let go, but important to reassess the overall situation. Is it best to continue down this road, or put a stop to things and regroup?We walked down the street for some late night jalaibis in hot milk. I came back and felt a little lighter. Then I spoke to a potential DP on the phone. He was interested, but wanted to know what I could offer in terms of a budget. That is a fair enough question. I talked to him about the production and where we were at the moment. I discussed what I could pay and other options. I talked to him as someone looking out not just for my interests but for his as well. He is a student, and one thing I have tried to do during this process is to make sure that the people I work with have a good environment to work in. It does leave me open to being labeled naive or easy to take advantage of, but there is a balance in my opinion, between creating a nurturing environment where you can build relationships based on mutual trust and a desire to see each other succeed. The problem arises when both parties are not on the same wavelength regarding that.Afterwards, I talked to another production friend, who is on the opposite end of the spectrum. He tells me about how cut throat everyone is and how he too is the same. It turns out the other DP had dropped out because he decided that he saw no financial gain to be had. Why he wanted me to wait another 10 days, I don’t know. He did know, and said so himself that this was an art film with no commercial value when we first met. He agreed to take on a producer and DP role all the same, making all kinds of lavish promises. I checked with other production friends who know him well and they all vouched for him.Yet in the end, he strung me along, like a vulture, waiting to see if he could get any bits, until he felt there was nothing to get from me and dropped the project. Talking to my rougher around the edges production friend, he made a strong point that my way was not the way to deal with this sea of rabid dogs. It was a very bitter pill to swallow. Once again, I looked back at a lot of my experience working with different artists on this project and the conversation just made me revisit every person who pushed to get a little more of a bite out of me. If I was going to do this project with these people, I needed to push back and get just as cut throat. He is right. Though I resisted the idea in the conversation, and was pretty mad about it all, he was right and by the end of the conversation, I agreed. So this is what needed to be done, but the question for me remained, is this what I should do?I talked a lot to Umar, who was nice enough to listen and share his experiences. He was starting his night shift of working on backgrounds for the film. Each person has their challenges and certainly financial needs to deal with. The question is, how ugly do you get in this system and when you become no different than anyone else, will you still be able to create something beautiful out of all that ugly maneuvering. There seemed to be a lot of maneuvering going on with production people and that’s not my way. Yet if you find yourself working within a system, do you become it or set it on fire. I think you can guess which option I lean towards.

Reconfigure

As things are being shifted around and refigured, there are a lot of little positive things going in during the production of “Risalo”. As I have been working on this project, I’ve been traveling around the country in the course of my work and in doing so, I end up at a grass roots level, revitalizing the idea of traditional puppetry. Many people have expressed interest in hiring a group to perform, or bringing them to different institutions.While that may or may not happen, there is some ground work being laid for future plans. Now that I have finally met Abdul Hakim sahib, who can make puppets, we have a starting point. Several people who saw the puppeteers when we went to the design school expressed an interest in having puppets made. This is a way that puppeteers in India have been earning for many years, but that has never happened in Pakistan. I am trying to facilitate this, by explaining some of the opportunities that can come out of this process to the puppeteers. They suggested I buy some premade ones. They do not sell their own, but some may have puppets that they are willing to sell. These are family heirlooms, and I really have no interest in separating these artists from the treasures of their elders. So, I have explained that we want them to earn from this and start puppet making once again. At first it will be the master puppet maker creating a puppet head and perhaps other family members can make clothes and paint it.If a few people in Multan get puppets made, then a process will begin. Then it can spread from there. Eventually, I would love to see these puppeteers with a booth of their own at an event like Daatchi, selling puppets and booking performances directly with the general public. I think it will take some time, but if we can get things started now, it could even happen within a year’s time. The beauty of it is that no one need stand between the puppeteers and the general public or their earnings. I really want to see this happen.Other than that, it has been a roller coaster ride today. I have to pull this production together somehow. My funds are low. I of course have the puppeteers properly covered, but I don’t have much left for any additional expenses, such as equipment rental or hiring a DP. So I have my beggar’s bowl out so to speak to see if I can get the help that I need. I also have to keep in mind that if I need to pull the plug on this and try again another day, then that is my last resort. It would be very painful and I am doing everything in my power to prevent that, but there is that.It is tough to keep on task when there are so many things to figure out and a lot of uncertainty, but with any production, you have to keep moving forward. I continued to fill in the shot spreadsheet and then took a walk to pick up some materials for props. I bought a clean jharroo (kind of broom) and created little puppet sized jharroos from it. One more prop crossed off the list.I met with a few DPs today. I am thankful for their time. One dropped by and watched the Sohni animatic. He felt that the piece could use animation to bring it to life. His thought was that the things that these puppets can’t do, such as changing facial expressions or creating detail in the backgrounds, could be done with 3D animation. He is a very talented photographer, so it was good to hear his thoughts. They differ with what I am attempting to do, but he was very straight forward about his feedback and offered to at least visit the set and offer some technical advice once he is back in Lahore. I appreciated that.Afterwards, another pair of DPs came by. They had just finished a shoot for the day. I can imagine they were quite tired, but here they were, willing to take a look at “Risalo” and give it some consideration. I’m not much of a salesmen in terms of pushing people into making decisions they may regret later. I would much rather lay out what we have and certainly tell a person why I feel this is a great project to be a part of, but in the end, I want people to do what they feel best about. I want to create a great environment for people to work together and flourish.They agreed to discuss the project and get back to me. I feel like there are three scenarios for this project. Ideally, I would love to have a fully committed DP who can dive into the project and bring their love and creativity to it. Barring that, perhaps a few people can commit time to different scenes or stories, which they can put their personal stamp on, building on the framework I have laid out. If that is not possible, then I have a contingency plan. I have a group of friends who are talented artists and photographers, but not necessarily DPs. We’re all on this project one way or another, and we’ll get some initial guidance and go for it if other options don’t come through. I felt a bit better after deciding on that. My friends Imran, Shoal and Yaser are also trying to connect me to resources and people. So I need to get camera and lighting gear, explore places we can shoot and stay, finish up spreadsheets, get a DP, finish up props, guide backgrounds to the finish and figure out any and all other logistics to make this thing happen while still making sure I have just enough money left to get back home and put together a life again.No pressure, consider your work done…

Bring to a boil

After many unanswered text messages to the director of photography, I tried one more before going to bed. I woke the next day, and well into the morning there was still no reply. I could not concentrate on the rest of the shot breakdowns. I needed to know that we were going to shoot this film. Finally, I called him again and the phone seemed to ring and ring, until at last he picked up the phone. I was not sure it was him at first. He barely spoke. I talked to him and it turned out that unlike that first day when he wanted to grow the production. I suggested we shoot on a Canon Mark III, he suggested we’d shoot on 2 Black Magic Cinema cameras and create a full pulley system (which I felt was not needed) for the puppetry and shoot on some location he had in mind. Well, today, after all that, and weeks of not getting together any kind of budget or steps towards progress on his end, he dropped out.He had taken on some commercial projects and that was the end of it. So, why I wonder had he suggested I wait for him to be free by November 17th? Seriously, I wonder how much people want to destroy this project if on a subconscious level? I mean what the hell? Why did he string me along all this time? So, another door closed. Perhaps he might allow me to use some of the equipment at his disposal, but I wondered if I had the strength or funds to pull this thing together. After all that I have been through, I got slammed by that same issue that made my work in Lahore back in 2010 so difficult. “Aaap samjo aap ka kaam ho gya (consider your work done).” He didn’t use that sentence, but the results were much the same.Once again, I considered the very real possibility that I needed to pull the plug on this project, instead of continuing to do the work I was trying to finish. I sent a few messages and made a few calls to see if there were options. People encouraged me to stay and finish the project. Help was offered. I like the sound of it, but the help needs to happen, otherwise the project is still dead in the water and if I don’t finish soon, so am I. Being without money seems to be the biggest sin all over the world. To hit that point is where you will feel the disdain of society, piled high upon you. What a pathetic situation I find myself in. I fight against all odds to get this music together in Sindh where people visited my room and tried to evict me, where the people in charge of the recording space down to the gate keeper put constant pressure on me to shut down things during my recording sessions at an institute that was created to promote Sindhi culture as I worked on a project based on the greatest Sindhi poet, paying all costs to do so and support Sindhi musicians. Musicians would not rehearse, even when paid to, puppeteers were unknown to all the folk art and performing arts institutions. Yet I found them, and gathered a rag tag team, even trained with them to do something new, yet here I was. People don’t want to follow through with their word. Sure, the idea of working on something to promote your culture and art sounds nice, but why would you want to actually do that?So, I looked at ticket prices to go home. I wasn’t broke yet, and if the film was not going to happen at this time, I would be better off returning, recuperating, saving up by working at jobs, while I worked on other parts of the film and if I was foolish enough, I could return with a proper crew in place to shoot the rest of it. Sohail sahib put me in touch with another dp friend that is a mutual friend of his and Imran’s. That dp said he would drop by in the evening and there was another dp from Sohail sahib, that could be a possibility barring that. I’ll give it a bit more time, but then I’m gone. I’m hanging on, because these puppeteers are deeply impoverished. I’m trying, because this is a good project and we’ll never see anything like it waiting for some company with commercial interests to bankroll it, but I can only do so much to fight against institutions, indifference, corruption, and all that is this hellish experience of trying to make a puppet film in Pakistan.I contacted the second dp in the evening and the meeting was shifted to tomorrow evening. Well, that’s one less day before I pull the plug. Between all of this, like a badly battered machine, I continued the tedious task of breaking down shots for the film in a spreadsheet. i spoke to a few dps and consulted other production friends who were kind enough to reassure me and give me advice.

Cracking

I spent the morning working on my shot breakdown spreadsheet, getting all the details on each shot in to prepare to shoot the film. It is a tedious process, but it will make the difference between focusing on the puppetry performances as a director or trying to figure out what we should shoot and whether it will flow with connecting shots.There was a handicrafts fair at Tollinton Market. It had a rs 200 entry fee, so that kept out most of the general public, and I got to see a lot of those wealthy folks from the other side of Lahore. It was quite miserable to be there. There was a lot of beautiful work on display. There were clothes, decoration pieces of wood and metal, paintings, toys, furniture and all kinds of beautiful things to appreciate, but it was so packed that I had to really force myself to walk through all of it. I just wanted to get out and stop dealing with all of this crap during this entire journey to make this film. I was looking for some clay pots that I need as props. I had picked some up in Multan which I would use for some shots, but I felt the need for some different ones for other shots. Unfortunately, the clay artists at the show did not have that, so I will search elsewhere.I pulled myself out of the show and walked over to Anarkali, thinking I would enjoy some food. Somehow, my mood was just sour. I walked up and down the street and though I was hungry, I did not want to deal with, see or eat any of it. I just did not feel a thing for any of my surroundings. The things I appreciate about being in Lahore, all seemed to just turn to ash and none of it mattered one bit to me. If anything, I felt really agitated by the usual insanity of motorcycles and cars trying to murder you in crowded streets like Anarkali and on main roads. There is no quarter given to pedestrians or really anything or anyone.So, I walked through New Anarkali which is even more crowded to find my way to Lohari Gate. I walked through the old city, all the way out to Delhi Gate, not caring where I might get lost on a wrong turn. I walked down all kinds of lanes, and felt none of that joy I usually feel, even in the madness of the old city. I did not stop to eat anything.Walking out Delhi Gate, I picked up some lace, bits of thin dupatta cloth and rope to use for backgrounds. I walked through traffic to Landa bazaar and started digging through the piles of cloth. There were even more people out today than usual, which is really saying something. I felt pretty miserable, but I kept walking and searching for materials. I found some large sheets of cloth that would take care of a few background related needs for “Risalo”.After that, I just walked all the way through the walled city again, grabbed an aloo naan along the way and munched it on the way to Hafiz Juice Corner back at Anarkali. I sat down tired and had a khoya khajoor shake. You don’t get those in Los Angeles as far as I know. It was nice. I walked through the book bazaar to Pak Tea House to meet a couple of friends I had not seen in a while. It was nice to catch up. They were headed back to Datchi and said my ticket should work to get back in, so I joined. I’m glad I did. It was still packed, but I certainly felt better with friends.I walked around once more and this time a few other things occurred to me to pick up. I finally found some clothes I liked for my adorable baby niece. One piece was from a project supporting women’s livelihoods in Sukhur, Sindh, while the other was from women in Peshawar, KPK. They are both beautiful and I can’t wait to be back in Los Angeles away from this mess, and in another, but at least playing with her.I also found some more ajrak. I had one that I picked up to go around the neck of a puppet, because I need a thinner cloth than traditional ajrak. I ended up getting a printed ajrak, as opposed to an actual block printed cloth and it was far too clean looking with crisp lines and none of the beauty and warmth of real ajrak. The thought of using it bothered me each time I looked at it. Besides that I needed some cloth to match or contrast another character’s dress to add a dupatta for a scene. There was an organization that had ajrak done on thinner cloth and one regular one that matched the dress, so I picked up both. It felt good to manage that.We all head back and I shared the animatics with my friends. One they felt worked really well, while they other was less easy to follow in just a visual form. That is good feedback, so I will work on that. I’m so exhausted. This day has been tough, not because anything in particular happened, but I push so hard to get each thing done and surprisingly manage a few things here and there, only to have to chase the next thing. Whether looking for items I need for the film or chasing down people that I am working with, I am so tired. It gets to me at times, and today was one of those times, where I just wanted to torch all of this, not because I don’t love the work that has been done so far, but because I don’t want to deal with the rest of this garbage it will take to try and get it done.That is just how it goes. I get it out of my system and I’m back at it the next morning. I’m too stubborn to just stop. I believe too much in the potential that we can make something beautiful and that it can benefit some people in this corruption riddled mess of a world. Yeah, I think that’s what it will be tomorrow, but today I just want it all to be done, so I can go home.

Goodbye Multan

I enjoyed a nice breakfast, thanks to Azam the next morning, before grabbing my things and heading to the main road to catch a rickshaw to the bus station. The rickshaw driver took us around the completely destroyed by seemingly unnecessary metro bus construction Multan roads. He stopped at one point and mentioned that he struggles as both his feet are disabled, or not in working order as he put it. He has a physical disability with his feet, and yet he struggles through it to drive his rickshaw. He mentioned that he had a few daughters and was trying to save rs. 3,000 for their school books, so if I could help at all he would appreciate it.You never know what situations people are actually in, but I gave him the extra money that I could to help him along his way, once we reached the station. Who knows what is true and what is not, but when you feel like believing, you just do. I got there 5 minutes before the bus was set to leave. I was not too worried, as there were seats and I could get another bus an hour later, but I managed to get my ticket and board the bus. There were less people on than usual, so that helped.After a tiring 6 hour ride, I was back in Lahore. It was dark and I needed to drag my bags to the metro station to get the rest of the way back. I pushed past rickshaw drivers who call out or try to pull you into a rickshaw along the way. These same guys would refuse to take me such a short distance if I asked. I had to get past a lot of them and the usual murderous traffic to get to the metro. One rickshaw driver tried to tell me that luggage would not be allowed on the metro bus so I should take a rickshaw. I wanted to tell him something else at that point, but I just told him he was wrong as I had ridden with the luggage.So, I squeezed in the metro with a backpack and suitcase that had a box on top of it and my tripod dangling on my shoulder. That was fun. It was packed as usual and after a bit I squeezed up to the far inside window. That saved me being knocked about as much every time we came to a station and people pushed out and pushed their way in. It made things more difficult when I had to get out at my station, but I managed. I took a rickshaw the rest of the way.I got back to my friend’s place and Umar was so nice, he made me some tea and an omelette. My brain and body were exhausted. I sat with him and we went over some of the work on huts he had been up to. The task is taking some figuring out and I need to get some more materials tomorrow, but his work is beautiful.