Recording Sur Sorath

Mohammed Hasan with his surando

banjo

Ustad Sodho Jogi singing Sindhi and Abdur Rahman Abroe singing Urdu

Chacha

Zulfi sahib setting things up.

the recording setup.

I took all my gear and head to Sindhology. After setup we waited. I hoped that the electricity would not go. We were recording sur Sorath, the longest piece of music in “Risalo”. Hasan Mohammad, the Surando player was coming from far away with his Banjo player as was Abdur Rahman Abroe, who would once again sing the Urdu verses. The surando is increasingly becoming a rare instrument. Master musicians like Hasan Mohammad are rare and this much loved instrument is at risk of vanishing.It does not take that much to support these musicians. If only the organizations, receiving government funding in Sindh allocated the designated funds to benefit them. If only the Sindhi tv channels created programming that gained a wide enough audience on the merits of their quality to pull in advertising money, rather than making musicians pay to have their music aired. If only the general public placed any kind of importance on their cultural heritage in monetary terms. I’m doing what I can, but I am not an organization.The recording session went really well. It was more difficult to judge how the bits we recorded would come together, but I feel like there were many special things about today. The mere presence of the surando brought a lot of excitement to everyone in the room. It is an all too rare and cherished treat to listen to this beautiful instrument these days.Today, I was even able to get overtime which helped us finish this long piece of music in a day. That was a huge win. Though I was exhausted at the end of the session and a bit unsure of how all of it would come together for the film, this was a much needed bit of success.After the session, we all had a meal together at a local dhaba. It was such an effort and stress to get to this point, that my feeling after recording was more of just exhaustion than even joy. Thanks as always to by friend Saqib Syd for the session photos and for just being there to help.

Kitties being silly

At Darya sahib’s place where I am staying, there is a cat and her two kittens that wander in through a hole in the front screen, then walk through the house and exit to the hole in the back screen door. It is kind of funny seeing them wander through.I spent the day trying to get the VTR working, to digitize some tapes. No luck there. The day passed slowly. In the evening, Saqib and I met at the hostel when I went for dinner. The hostel staff was leaving for their Eid holidays the next day, so if I was able to finish my work as hoped, before Eid, it would be the last time I saw them. There was another kitten at dinner time. I fed it some food.I took a photo with Daulat, and thanked him again for all the hard work and food. I was glad that he and his brother were going home to their village for several days. They really don’t get any time off, and their lives are very difficult.Well, there goes my source of food. Hopefully, I can finish up soon and move on from here. It is difficult to imagine finishing all the work that I hope to get done during the next 3 days of recording sessions, just because absolutely nothing has worked as planned up so far.

Nothing much

Between working, going over to the hostel for meals or getting visits from Darya Khan with food and a smile between all the many responsibilities that keep him busy, or hanging out with Saqib Syed in the evenings the time went by in these past few days.There is the stress of whether things will work out in the coming days that looms over me, but I do what I can.

Technical stuff

I spent most of my time dealing with technical issues, but the fact that I had a comfortable space to be in, made it much easier to deal with. Preparing footage and editing was made more challenging because the formats were a bit unfamiliar, so I had to figure out how best to work with it. The DV videos actually had 4 channels of audio. I realized that my initial edits were wrong because I had converted clips and they had become stereo tracks.This kind of stuff is what you can expect to deal with in the course of a project. It took time to look at all the pieces and then figure out the right way to put it all together. I even put together a tutorial for anyone that may be in a similar situation, dealing with miniDV tapes with multitrack recordings.Yes, none of this is particularly exciting, but getting the pieces to fit together properly let’s me get to that next stage of making something beautiful.

New place

Each new place requires an adjustment, but being out of the heat of the hostel room was a huge and welcome reprieve. Darya Khan opened his home to me, and that really helped to ease my struggles.I was able to set things up, rest and work on editing. I have days to wait before the next recording session, but with the company and help of friends, things are possible.

Big day delay

My last night in the comfortable ac room, and the electricity goes out early in the morning. After that, I could not sleep and the electricity did not return. It was hot and uncomfortable. I gathered my things and head to the hostel. The electricity was out all over, it seems. This did not bode well for my recording session. There were several groups of musicians coming in. I tried calling the power company, but there was no response. I think their office opens at 8:30am.What to do? Do I tell the musicians to not come? Some have come in from far away, so this is going to cost me. It was a bit early, so I could not reach any of the audio folks to see if we could run the cameras on batteries in some other space for this session. Perhaps the electricity would come back just in time. I tire of these constant obstacles…but I guess it could always be much worse.The day was spent at Sindhology, waiting as musicians trickled in. I felt very grateful for their patience and bad for this problem that was out of my control. They all seemed quite understanding and insisted on waiting for several hours to see if the electricity returned. There had been a major outage over night and our area was one that had not been fixed yet. Information was unreliable and tough to come by. People around talked about electricity being gone everywhere in Sindh and Balochistan. Where they got this information, I did not know, but friends in areas around us said they did have electricity.So, we sat. We talked. I got to see Jairam Jogi, the fantastic murli player I worked with on my short film Gul, as well as on the Girnari Jogi Group album. I also got to meet people I had only seen in the footage I edited for that album, like Anb Jogi’s father, Bhiko Jogi and Mawa Khan, the harmonium player.These musicians just want to come in and work. I appreciate that. Unfortunately, despite looking into various options, we really could not find a suitable way to make that happen. Instead, I consulted with Ustad Anb Jogi and we paid the musicians half their fees, with the rest upon recording the following week. We would try to finish all of our recording tasks in the first three days of the next week, just before the Eid holiday. It seemed possible, but I am surprised at the number of challenges at each step.Darya sahib and Sikandar sahib invited me for dinner in the evening. I was happy to take them up on that. I have several days to go before I can record again. I’ll have to work on some editing in the meantime.I felt tired after being at Sindhology for so long. After saying goodbye to the musicians, I head back to the hostel, saw my friend Hisam, hung out with Saqib for a bit and then went to sleep exhausted.I dreamt I was home. It was a good feeling. Then the phone rang and I woke up. The room was hot and there wasn’t much I could do, but lay on the floor and try to get through another day. Sikander sahib dropped by my room. I pulled myself up, showered and then we head over to Darya sahib. We went out for tea and Saqib joined us. They were very sweet in offering their help to me in any way possible out of a love and appreciation for Shah Latif and what I was attempting to do. That really meant a lot to me. It certainly boosted my spirits. Darya sahib also offered me a place to stay, to get out of the hostel room. We got my things and I shifted over there.Afterwards, Saqib and I went to Sikander sahib’s place for dinner. He is a talented artist with a lot of beautiful calligraphy pieces. It was a lot of fun to look at his work and chat about poetry. It was nice to see the little ones running around and being silly too. I feel humbled by such sweet people. These morale boosts from people that step in at just that key moment to help pull me through are vital. I stayed in my new found home, thankful to be out of the oven hostel room.

Recording Farzana Bahar

I had to take care of some early morning tasks due to early Ramazan closures and internet issues the day before. I walked over to the society area, took care of my errands, then had Saqib get me. We head over to Sindhology and several of the musicians were already there. I felt bad for being late, but explained the tasks I needed to take care of and they seemed ok with it.We chatted a bit, then I head upstairs as they waited for a round of tea. Two musicians were on their way. The room had been cleaned and the sound gear was up and ready to go. Eventually the musicians came up stairs, but there were still two missing. We lost an hour to that, but got things going once they arrived.It was amazing to see Ustad Anb Jogi guide each of the musicians and the singer through each raag and portion of the music. He was, as usual very much on top of and aware of how best to utilize each instrument to create the strongest impact in regards to the story I was trying to tell. I figured out some less obtrusive gestures that could signal the singer to wait after a verse or for the musicians to continue and then fade out. I kept the stop watch on my little phone going to help me work all of that out. It was grueling to concentrate on each word in the script as Farzana sang, and keep track of timing so that both language versions could have some hope of matching well enough once I mixed and edited the pieces down. As always, Saqib Syed was there to take fantastic session photos.Darya sahib had invited his friend Sikander to the session. Sikander sahib helped with pronunciation of Sindhi words where needed. In addition, he brought his little daughter and son, who had memorized many verses of Shah Latif’s poetry. During breaks. it was adorable to hear them recite Latif’s poetry.We did a lot of hard work, but the session went well and we got through more of the script than we had anticipated. If not for the delay in the morning in some musicians’ arrival, we could have finished it.I spent the rest of the day digitizing tapes and preparing for the next day. There are so many logistics to work out. I also had to move out of the nice air conditioned room at my friend’s place as his nephew who is normally there is returning. So, once again, I lugged my things down the street to the oven that is the hostel room. I feel thankful for whatever time I did have at the room. It really helped.

The work before the work

The day was spent preparing for the recording on Tuesday. I needed to book the recording studio, pay fees, make sure everyone there was on board, work on how I could direct the music in terms of getting spots without poetry between the verses where shots I had storyboarded would fit. I did not want to make the work more difficult, and yet, I needed to have a good grip of the timing between verses for many key story elements.I worked all morning, walking back and forth to work out all the arrangements. There were countless challenges, and many brick walls. By the end of if, I was very tired and had only accomplished part of what I needed for the next day. Some key things would have to be taken care of first thing in the morning due to early Ramazan closures.After the rehearsal the night before, things were looking up. My wife, in Rajasthan was also working on getting the puppets I wanted, so there was a lot of conversation and photos back and forth to pick the puppets I need for background characters in the stories. There were many internet issues, slow connections etc. It was pretty tough. The whole day, I felt like I was constantly juggling 3 tasks at a time and making progress on any of them was a monumental effort due to all the obstacles.

A good rehearsal

I worked on preparations during the day, before heading in to Hyderabad on the Mehran University bus. If my timings line up, I usually take the Sindh University bus, but let me tell you, this bus was nuts. This guy drove really fast and crazy, but we got there, so that was good.I needed to send a script to a musician via courier, but the one in Jamshoro was closed. I called in and learned that there were some branches in the city that would be open. First I picked up a bunch of DV tapes for recording music, then I walked all around and found a TCS (courier) branch, only to learn that they were closing for the day. They sent me far down the street to search for another branch. Walking down the street is in most places, no big deal, but in Hyderabad, you walk around sewage, piles of trash, half built road materials, broken roads, insane traffic from all directions, heat and dirt. It is really not fun. I made it, and sent the script on its way to a singer in a farther off corner of Sindh.After that, I made my way back to Majeed Soomro’s office and hung out with my friend Saqib to wait for Ustad Anb Jogi. Once he was done with recording for the Sindh TV program for the day, we would head over to rehearse a singer. Eventually we head out of the office, then Saqib joined me. He was so kind that he offered to just hang out in the city and wait for me, even knowing it could take several hours. I insisted that if he was going to stay, he would have to join, so that he could at least check something new out.We head over to the musicians home through winding lanes, dodging bulls, children, motorcycles and other people. Inside the baithak (sitting place) in the musicians’ home, we sat and waited. They came out and greeted us. Ustad Anb Jogi was coming straight there from working a grueling day at the station. I felt bad for him having to do all of this even though he was tired, but we really needed it, and this rehearsal is what was supposed to be taking place before, but did not.We sat down and rehearsed for hours. It was like magic. Farzana had been working very hard to get comfortable with all 11 pages of the script. Ustad Anb Jogi guided her on how to sing the verses. He basically composed the whole chapter, as I gave story cues for different sections. We went over the entire script in both languages and Farzana sang each line as Anb composed it for her. Her brother was practicing with us on the harmonium and there was definitely a lot of excitement in the room. She had really connected to the material and found herself trying to express the story in her singing.It was a long night, but we all left feeling like this was something special that we were trying to create. That was amazing. Anb, Saqib and I grabbed a very late dinner at a little dhaba in the area, then ate some mangoes, Anb’s namesake (anb means mango in Sindhi). It was fun to hang out for a bit, but we were all pretty tired. Saqib dropped me off and we all called it a night.

Sindh TV

Saqib picked me up in the morning and we head over to Qasimabad to check out Sindh TV. Ustad Anb Jogi had invited me to the tv channel as he was performing for some recordings. That was all I knew. After a little looking around, we found it in a neighborhood.Ustad sahib met us at the gate and in we went. There was a nice room setup with some large backdrops for a program on Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai. How perfect! It was a Sindhi language program, where they would be discussing the poetry of the poet whose work I am adapting into a puppet film. There were a number of musicians there and technicians preparing for the show taping. Ustad sahib had brought some juice for me, which was pretty nice. He introduced me to Razzak sahib, who was running the show. It was a labor of love, showcasing the most beloved poet of Sindh. We spoke a bit about what I was up to and we inquired about recording. Razzak sahib graciously offered to do anything he could to help. Unfortunately, the setup was like other sound setups I have seen here. The separate tracks coming in from each mic to a mixing board and are recorded only as a single mixed track.I really need multiple tracks so I can control the mix. Sindhology has been the perfect setup for that. Not only do I get a multitrack recording, but I also get video which is great for promoting the musicians and putting together DVDs for their music albums. Still, other options in various cities were offered as well, and all I can say, is that I am humbled by the support people have offered with big hearts, to help promote a project on Shah Latif’s poetry. Every bit of encouragement helps me along my way.The program started and though the discussion was in Sindhi, I felt like I understood at least 60% to 80% of it. It was mostly general discussion of themes in Shah Latif’s poetry, citing specific examples. It was a primer of sorts on Latif. It was nice to sit back and watch the process. During one of the longer breaks, Razzak sahib introduced me to the Gaddi Nashin of Shah Latif. He was very kind and appreciative of what I was trying to do. Waqar Hussain Shah sahib felt deeply about the responsibility of conveying the message of Shah Latif to the world.The electricity would go out at times, and the generator would be switched on and then off once it returned. The discussion seemed longer than necessary. Hopefully they will edit it down some and intercut the music. We were all pretty sleepy by the time the discussion ended. The musicians requested more tea to get them started again. It is pretty fantastic that non commercial programs like this one are being made. The musicians performed several beautiful pieces of Latif’s poetry with guidance from a music director.A sitar player who had bailed on a recording session without telling me came and introduced himself to me towards the end. I knew who he was. He is very talented, but professionalism and reliability is pretty important too, if not more important than sheer skill or talent. I greeted him nicely and did not mention anything about what had happened, as I had called him during that session and expressed myself on the situation already. He apologized for bailing, and I complimented his performance. While there are many musicians, it is still a small circle of professionals.I spoke to Ustad Sodho Jogi who I have met thanks to Ustad Anb Jogi at the radio station several times. I heard him sing during a proper performance, for the first time that day. Anb and I were planning on asking him to sing one of the chapters for the film, as the singer I had been talking too was really bad about answering the phone, and talking about the actual work. I really could not afford to spend more money on this project without getting work accomplished. The project has a very tight budget and I am likely to be close to broke by the end. It is a huge risk, but also an opportunity to try and do something I care about, while I still can.Anb and I visited a female singer I hope to record soon. She had been rehearsing and the material was out of her comfort zone, so we were certainly concerned about getting her ready. While she does not have the same command of this material as other singers who are accustomed to singing Shah Latif’s poetry, she has a great voice and clearly she was much smoother with the material than previously. With some effort, it could even be possible to pull the music together. I only have faith that this could happen, because Anb Jogi is there.Anb insisted on feeding me before I head back to Jamshoro, after we left the singer’s home. We sat down at a dhaba and discussed all the many pieces of the music I need for this project. We worked out a bunch of logistics. Ustad sahib had suggested that I should record some tracks with a singer from the eastern side of Sindh, out in the desert. This would be an album in addition to the work on the film. I am trying, where possible, to record additional material that can showcase the diverse music of Sindh in some small way and support these musicians. Of course, it helps promote the project as a whole as well, but most importantly it puts these artists on the map in a deliberate way to promote them.Getting back to Jamshoro proved more challenging at 10pm. There were lots of people and vehicles all around, so it was safe enough. I hopped on a little vehicle that is a cross between a suzuki pickup and an auto rickshaw. For 10 cents, you get a bumpy ride through crater filled streets, often filled in with sewage. I took that to where I usually get the bus back, but after a while it was clear there were no buses coming.I took another 10 cent ride and eventually made my way to a spot from where I walked half a mile to another intersection and waited for a bus back to Jamshoro. It took a while, but a bus finally came and it was packed with people hanging out the side. I squeezed in and managed to be on the inside with elbows at my head and other armpits near my face. After all that waiting, I was really glad to be on a bus, with all its bumps and being squished.It was tiring standing there. Eventually we got to the railway tracks (phaattak). I hopped off and searched out a shared rickshaw. The problem was, that because it was late, it was taking forever for passengers to fill up. It was just me and another guy waiting for what seemed like forever as the driver tried to call over more customers. The shared ride is cheap, so they try to fill up the whole vehicle before leaving. That can take time, but there was no one coming over.Eventually, I got tired of sitting there in the dark, and walked to the rickshaw behind me and paid him to just take me all the way home. What a tiring day! I felt good though. There was potential to get a good deal of recording done next week. I got back to the room and sat down to check my email and see what my wife had sent me regarding puppets in Udaipur.Najib sahib brought by the firewire cable and adapters that Hameed Magsi sahib had so kindly sought out for me in Karachi and then delivered while I was at Sindh TV. I looked over at the DV deck courtesy of Shahid and Tariq sahib, in the comfortable room and started digitizing some tapes.

Finding a way

After some rest, it was time to keep going. I spent a good portion of the day just doing boring but necessary things, like backing up work. I needed to refocus once again on making this project possible after the huge disappointment with yesterday’s singer and his lack of preparation.I spoke to Ustad Anb Jogi on the phone and we worked out some options regarding music. Later in the afternoon, I called up Rashid Haideri and asked him what happened. Why did the recording go so badly? For an artist, their work is their calling card and is the standard by which they are judged. The music wasn’t going to make me look good for using it or him for his performance. I asked if he could come by again after memorizing the script so that we could get it right for all of our sakes. He agreed to do so. That means additional costs on my end that I’m just going to have to eat up in regards to studio time, and the fees for the other musicians, but it’s no good to have substandard work in a film. That would cost me a lot more in credibility in the long run. Also, this was the opening of the film.In the evening I printed some scripts to hand off to some replacement singers for a singer who clearly was not going to rehearse or call me back to make my life any easier regarding another major portion of the film. At this point, good singers who would put in the time to rehearse were more important than that particular voice I really wanted who was clearly not going to do the work to pull this off. It was a question of doing this film or not.

The fight for Sindhi culture

Recording day is always exciting. It is scary and requires a great deal of preparation. I constantly check and recheck my end of things. I got up in the morning, with all the gear I needed already packed from the night before, then head out to the Institute of Sindhology.I got to Sindhology early for the day’s recording session. Staff came in, but the person who had the key to the recording studio, who had messaged me the night before to ask what time musicians were coming had not shown up. I had replied with the timing and he confirmed, but he was not there so we could not setup.About forty minutes later, the person who had the key arrived. I learned this by calling him again. He said he had given the key to someone who was bringing it upstairs. Being a person with many years of tv experience, working with musicians, I politely mentioned that as a media person, he should have come early or at least on time as he knew we had to setup. He told me it was not his problem and then hung up. That really made me angry.The level of unprofessionalism at the institution was ridiculous. People sat around all day watching tv, rather than doing any work in the media section. They spoke of the many great things they would do, if only the organization would approve their plans. When asked to do the slightest thing, several of them refused, or avoided the conversation by talking about how the people next door had so utterly wronged them that they would not take 10 steps to pick up a piece of equipment from the room next door or give me permission to do so, while the people next door said I needed that person’s permission.This organization receives a good deal of government funding every year. It is a testament to the hard work of people that have come before, that such an important institution even exists to focus on preservation and promotion of Sindhi culture. Yet as with all the institutions I see around me, they have become so mired in politics that they have largely become places where people sit during the day for a few hours to collect a regular paycheck before going off to their other source of income. Everyone had a long story about how they had been wronged and would love to work hard, but the institution had tied their hands. While from the very top of the institution, I was granted permission to use the facilities, with all proper channels followed, including filing paperwork and paying fees.So it was, that I sat there, at the mercy of so many, working on a project to promote Sindhi culture, at the institute whose purpose was that. With the door to the recording studio finally opened, the two recording engineers who were always on top of things, got to work setting up. We waited, and the first group of musicians arrived an hour late. Considering how short our recording times were at Sindhology, this really was not helping. The other singer that was supposed to come was nowhere to be seen.I called him and he had just woken up. This was kind of a big problem as he lived several hours from Jamshoro. Though he had been told over and over again to be here at 9 in the morning, he somehow had decided that I had said 9 at night. He drowsily got out of bed and Ustad Anb Jogi convinced him to hurry up and get to Sindhology.In the meantime we recorded the Shah Jo Raagis. They were incredible. They carry the traditional instrument (tambura or dambura) and singing style that accompanies Shah Latif’s poetry since the very beginning. Every night, at Latif’s darga in Bhitshah, one of the groups performs. I wanted to record them with a singer for the film’s opening. Since that portion was so short, I knew we could record an hour of material to support them.They came in and gave me two options. One was to sing in the high pitched style for which they were known, or there was a lower pitched method that I had not heard before. I liked the lower pitched version, but the high pitch version is the signature sound and I wanted a bit of that too. Ustad Anb Jogi, our music director worked with them on integrating the two forms. After a short preparation, they were ready to record. I had chosen the 4 main Surs used in Risalo and that is what they had prepared. They went through each piece, one after another with great precision. Each track was recorded in a single take. At the end, we had a bit of time left on the tape, so they performed Sur Husseini. The room was mesmerized. After each track, all we could do was express our awe.Rashid, the singer was still far away. The sitar player he had suggested, who called me the day before to ask what time the recording was had simply decided to go somewhere else and ditch this session without any notice. He had been so concerned that he wanted to get done in time to go to a darga where he was to perform. I had reassured him the night before that Ustad Anb Jogi was going there too, so if everyone just came on time, we could get things done by noon, allowing them to get to their evening performance with ease. Yet, somewhere in the night he decided to ditch the recording session and leave right away for the darga without a word.We recorded some short interviews with the Shah Jo Raagis and then I walked them to their car. Rashid had just arrived as they were leaving. The piece he was going to sing was short, so it was still possible for us to record in the time left, but things were tight. In the recording studio, we got to work setting up for his recording. We needed a string instrument to replace the sitarist who had bailed, so a local banjo player was enlisted at the last moment. He was on his way.Rashid needed a tanpura, so I downloaded an app on the iPad. My internet connection was painfully slow. Meanwhile the musicians discussed how the piece would come together. The banjo player arrived. Eventually the app downloaded. Then some well wishers of Rashid came in and started to make requests. I was told that I needed to let them have that, so I just asked the recording engineers to record it.Meanwhile, I was being constantly pressured regarding time. Although overtime had apparently become possible the week before, it was not any more. With time running out, I went to beg for additional time at the main office. Before getting to the office, I had to deal with the museum door keeper. He insisted that it was impossible, along with the person in charge of the recording studio who walked me to Mangi sahib’s office. With great reservation and some insistence from the well wishers of the singer, I could get some additional time.We went back up, and the piece was still going. I told them I needed to record the piece for the film. They said I needed to wait for that piece to finish. So I sat, once again wondering why each of these things needed to be such a challenge. Eventually, the piece ended and we got started on my work. The first lines went fine. From the third line onwards, it was clear that Rashid was reading the script for the first time. He tried to cover this with a lot of classical singing embellishments, but you can’t hack a line to bits and still keep it coherent. I was at a loss. There were constant calls about wrapping things up quickly. The musician in front of me was very skilled, but had not bothered to prepare at all, though he had the script for weeks and we scheduled the recording session according to his convenience.It was all too much. I was so angry, and yet, I needed to fend off all these different issues and somehow get the performance I needed out of someone who had trouble with each line. I had to bring my laptop over after each line and playback the Sindhi recording of that line of the script for him each time. There would be no clean flow of music. It was all chopped to bits and then chopped some more by his performance. I asked him why he had thought so little of his murshid (Shah Latif, as he had claimed) that he did not bother to practice. That he would come here to sing Sindh's and his apparently most beloved poet’s work without preparing surely meant he regarded it as trash.So we recorded something. It was painful and not very good. I was enraged by all the politics and nonsense. From who has jurisdiction on what, to musicians not preparing or coming anywhere near on time, to the session being a free concert with requests, to the intense pressure to wrap things up immediately. What was the point? What was the purpose of the institution again? Besides the two recording engineers, Zulfi and Zuhaib, my good friend Saqib and our music director, I could not rely on anything else. Saeed Mangi sahib had been kind enough to grant me permission to record, but what went on in the institution was my misery to deal with.I paid overtime as we left, as I had said from the start. The employee at the museum door was happy for his ten dollars. If there was ever a question as to why the institutions were in a state of decline, the answers was clear as day now. I felt pretty devastated. Though I had done everything in my power to prepare and plan, it seemed all was undone by so many factors beyond my control. This would be a major bite out of my budget and worse than that, I could not use this garbage in the film. The Shah Jo Raagi recordings were great, but that was not part of the film. It was for an additional album meant to support them.I spoke to Ustad Anb Jogi, and told him that if this was how difficult the shortest chapter was, we may not be able to record the longer pieces. He reassured me that we would make this work. I did not feel very confident.Everyone left. Saqib dropped me off and hung out for a bit. I felt finished. The day had been challenging for all the wrong reasons. Now I needed to somehow strengthen my resolve, reconnect to why I was here and make plans to try and avoid the challenges I had just faced and been defeated by all whilst convincing myself that I should. In the evening, I visited friends for a bit of a mental break and some ludo.

Bugs

I spent the day figuring out the best workflow to get the footage recorded thus far put together. There were many technical issues. I found several software bugs and had to piece together a workflow that avoided them. It wasn’t fun, but that is part of working with computers. Once a workflow was figured out, at least I knew it could be used on the rest of the film, so the extra time up front would be worthwhile. Here's a tutorial I wrote on todays issues along with a way around them.

Lining things up

night sky

I went over to Sindhology to check on one of the tapes from the recording session with Jamaluddin Faqir that was incomplete. It’s challenging, as digitizing takes a long time, and since I don’t have ready access to the DV deck and cables needed, I have to go during office hours for Sindhology. I am very fortunate to have that help, as simple things like the particular cable I need are not available in electronics stores in Hyderabad. These mundane sorts of issues take up a lot of time and energy.There turned out to be a technical issue where it recorded the first 20 minutes of the tape to the computer, but the last 40 minutes did not get digitized to the computer. With a bit of finagling, I got it to work, but it took hours for that bit of progress.I spent the rest of the day trying to synchronize the clips. I ran in to more technical issues that I am working on, but the footage looks and more importantly sounds great. I made some phone calls and have two recording sessions lined up for Thursday of this week and another for Monday of next week. This is great. I am really trying to get this music recorded. I just have one final singer to schedule, but he has not been feeling well. Saqib dropped by in the evening and we checked out some web site related stuff for something he was working on.

Air conditioned bubble

At Sindhology, I digitized the last tape from the recording session we had last week. I took it back to my room and started organizing the pieces and checking to see if everything that should be there was. All of this took me into the afternoon, where I realized I was missing about 40 minutes of footage from one of the cameras. I would need to go back to Sindhology to use their DV deck to play the tape and see if the video is on there and did not record to the computer for some reason, or if there was a technical issue during the session. I’m guessing and hoping that I just messed up while digitizing, but I will need to wait a day to to find out.In the evening my friend Saqib dropped by and later I went to Hyderabad with Najib sahib. That was actually really nice. We both needed to get out for a bit. He drove us into town. I had some really good rasmallai and a chocolate shake. More than that, it was almost a surreal experience to sit so comfortably in an air conditioned car. It really hits home how big a divide there is between the experiences of people in nice cars and suvs, versus those on public transport or even motorcycles. It felt unbelievably luxurious to be in a comfortable car with air conditioning. I looked out the windows and saw the same world I had been coming to day after day, but I felt so removed from the pain and discomfort of it. When we passed the horrible sewage canal in Qasimabad, as I have so many times, I was in a fully enclosed car. I did not have to turn my head away from the sewage and hold my breath. I did not have the same courting with death at each turn feeling. I did not feel the heat, the dirt and the stench of being outside. I saw all of that, but I was not a part of it. It probably seems really silly, but it really was that shocking compared to what I have become somewhat accustomed to.Seeing people suffering from behind windows in an air conditioned car really removed me from most of the challenges that people face. On top of that, I was not driving either. That is the experience of wealthy people in Pakistan and certainly of politicians. They don’t experience so much of what their constituents go through. When you never have to smell the stench of the open sewers, why would you care about fixing them? When you don’t experience the pain of living as most people do, how can you represent them and work to improve their conditions?Honestly, I don’t want to experience all of this misery. It is really tough and I don’t have it as bad as most of the folks out there by a long shot. It reminded me that regardless of how difficult I feel that this work is, I really need to do it. As an artist, making a film that humanizes Pakistanis by showcasing our art, culture and beauty while supporting artists here through new collaborations is an important contribution. It is how I can use my specific skills to try and play a small part in contributing. I don’t want to live like this for even a moment. There is no romanticizing how uncomfortable and challenging it is to even taste what it is like for people here every day. I want to stay in the air conditioned car. I don’t want to smell the sewage, but I will try to add my positive bit to all of this.

Day of rambling

Not much to do. I’m waiting, so I might as well be productive. I head on over to Khan Academy’s website and started working on some programming tutorials. After all, I’ll need a job after this…adventure.Wow, I spent the whole day working on Javascript tutorials on Khan Academy and Python tutorials on Code Academy. A comfortable room and nothing else to do can do wonders to focus the mind. In addition, it is interesting to see the conversations people are having on facebook regarding the US Supreme Court’s decision to rule in favor of Gay marriage rights in all 50 states. I get to see the conversation going on here in Pakistan as well as in other parts of the world. I certainly see some folks who are bigoted, or resentful from some religious sentiment, but what I also see are people from right here in Pakistan questioning and debating that narrative. There are days when things can seem very bleak and hopeless, but this debate would not have been possible before social media. Exposure to different points of view is an essential thing. I read about a ruling in favor of LGBTQ rights in Lebanon, based on a case that was against a transgender woman.Why does any of this matter? Even if for some reason you lack the ability to appreciate the humanity in those you feel are different from you, it is these movements in support of human rights that allow Muslims and all others to practice their faith, have places of worship and have recourse against discrimination in countries that have protections for minorities. No one cares about your personal like or dislike or the religious "reasoning" behind your disagreement. If all these different movements had not struggled for their and your rights, you probably would not have your rights protected in any of these places either. Even the most selfish fool should be able to appreciate that. There's still a lot of inequality and hatred to fight, but these laws help strengthen basic protections for all people.I spent the evening chatting with Najib sahib. I read a fantastic Urdu short story he recommended by a contemporary writer named Mumtaz Hussain. I felt it had the same depth of thought and beauty of language as the excellent short stories I have read by some of the most respected Urdu writers of past generations. There are thoughts and feelings explored in these stories that would surprise many, and bring a great deal of nuance to people’s perceptions of the types of social movements that exist and have existed here. For me, these books are where the real treasures are to be found.

Energy conservation

dorm windows

Sachal says

Nothing much to do. I sat reading, and waiting for the day to go by. Saqib came by in the evening and I helped setup some web stuff for him, which was a welcome bit of trying to be useful.Having hit so many obstacles, I need to refocus and conserve my energy by not believing anything people say. It is quite silly, but I have to be more careful about going through the trouble of following up on all these leads. I am getting towards the finish of tasks here in Jamshoro. I just need to get these last few music sessions set when the musicians are ready and available and then head out. These are big tasks.I already reduced my travel to conserve energy, because this process I guess is a bit like a marathon. If I use up all my energy now, I won’t be able to make it through the puppetry portion of things. At least thanks to Najib sahib, I have an air conditioned spot to sleep at night. It really helps.

Visit to Azeemi Studios

Another night in air conditioned bliss. I head out in the morning to get breakfast at the hostel. No one was around. I checked in with a friend at Sindhology and he was there with the cable I needed to digitize my tapes. It being Friday, Sindhology would close even earlier than usual, so I needed to book it over there if I wanted to digitize these tapes and have something to work on this weekend.I got there and as often happens, there is no movement. Something is being waited for, but I don’t know exactly what. I got the cable and after a few minutes, went next door and just picked up the DV VTR and brought it over to the archive room where I plugged it all in and started digitizing. Once a tape is started, there’s nothing to really do. You just wait as the entire hour long tape plays through at regular speed. I sat around, chatted with folks and waited. Some good news was that the staff were interested in staying later for my recording sessions. I would pay overtime as per rules, but that was perfectly fine by me. I feel like brick walls stand in the way and then they vanish, only to reappear a step further during this process. For some reason, I am assured that something is impossible, encouraged to explore other paths which takes a great deal of time and effort and ultimately leads to other dead ends, before what was impossible the day before becomes…possible. Sigh. I still make sure to follow up on all leads, because it takes every bit to get the smallest task done, so you never know which lead will become that small bit that helps you get there.I had one tape left to digitize, but at 11:15am, there were only 15 minutes left before Sindhology closed. One of the friends there who brought the cable to me suggested that I could borrow his dv cam. I would need to come by Qasimabad in the evening to pick it up. While it is a bit of time and effort to do that for me, it could save me two days of staring at the ceiling in which I could begin editing.After Sindhology, I returned to the hostel and rested. Towards evening my friend Saqib dropped by and we went to visit the recording studio past Mehboob Ali Shah sahib’s place. We got to Azeemi studios. I spoke to a couple of family members of the studio owner, then met the owner and we sat in the lobby of the studio. The studio was locked. The electricity was out due to load shedding. We sat and chatted. Once again, as on the phone the previous night, I clearly explained what I needed. I had several groups of musicians who needed to be miked separate as they performed together, with each mic recording to a separate track. No mixing or editing on their part. I just wanted this recording, along with video of the musicians as they played.People love to talk themselves up., We sat for what felt like an hour and half, listening to how great they were and how primitive the setup at Sindhology was. I don’t care how great someone thinks they are. Show me the work and let’s talk about that, but I felt like I should at least look at one recording studio to see what they had to offer.On and on it went. Some of it clearly nonsense. We record the American way. We use software that is registered and you can’t even get it in the market. Yes, none of this had anything to do with what I needed, but really it is about wowing me with your greatness. At one point, the younger, technical genius talked about how he had worked for a non profit, receiving British Council funding. He was overjoyed at how they had pulled one over on them by documenting fake projects and winning awards for this. Yes, pride in dishonesty helps ingratiate one to potential customers. Sure, he wasn’t the one that made that system, but he sure was proud.I have seen a few examples of this. While the organizations involved are the most to blame, I do think that the folks giving them funding, particularly US and British governments should, if they truly care about benefitting the country and not just looking good on paper, hold the recipients of their funding, and my tax money to account. Who gives large sums of money and then does not care how it is spent? By supporting corrupt people within a country, you make me question your honesty in wishing to benefit people here. There are honest people doing fantastic work. They often don’t have the academic or English skills to apply for grants. Why is it in English anyway? So elite thieves can take advantage of it?Anyway, this stuff makes me pretty angry, but I did not bother sharing with this fool. We tried to get up and go several times, but they insisted that the electricity was coming back in mere moments. Finally it returned and we checked out the studio. It had shiny mixing boards with colorful lights and a dark, claustrophobic row of sound booths. It seemed a better choice for recording completely separate vocals, but not for what I was doing. We would not even be able to record the video in such a cramped space. They kept talking about how they could mix things as I wanted as well. I explained that I don’t like the style of mixing there. It dulls the sounds of instruments, in essence, mashes them down and adds really ugly echos to the vocals. They played some unreleased tracks that should remain thus.As we finished up, I asked how much they charged, and suddenly they back pedaled that perhaps Sindhology was a better choice for what I needed. I guess I blew one too many holes in their pitch. We thanked them, then head to Qasimabad, hoping we would have better luck with the camera.We got there, then waited another hour for the guy we were meeting. Finally, his friend calls for me to meet him at his studio. I walk over as Saqib is waiting on some food we ordered at a restaurant there. I met the friend. They do wedding videos. He showed me steadicam shots and other fancy things. He asked if I brought the tapes to digitize. I had not. I was here to borrow the camera. It would take hours to digitize and I don’t want to digitize to a pc in AVI format, then convert that to quicktime which would take several more hours. Somehow the plan changed at the last second.So I called the initial friend who had told me to pick up his camera and he said he would come by. He came by with the camera, but needed the cable. He had told me that the cable was not available anywhere, then he said that it is available at one market in Hyderabad. It had been almost 5 hours of running around in circles first at the recording studio and now here. I felt bad for leaving Saqib at the restaurant and this was all a waste of time. I thanked them and asked that he just bring the cable on monday to Sindhology. I would just waste another two days.Saqib and I ate, then head back to Jamshoro. I’m going to need to change my belief in what people say. It has lead me on too many wild goose chases to confirm misinformation and waste loads of time and effort which is demoralizing and leads to nothing productive. I have some more resources that I will focus on. They just are not available at the moment. Thus, I wait.

Everyone would do it smarter than you

I woke up after actually sleeping through the whole night for the first time in a while. I washed up, rested a while, then head back to the hostel for breakfast. From there I checked in with Zulfikar sahib at Sindhology. I needed to basically get the footage from the recording session with Jamaluddin Faqir sahib off the DV tapes and into my computer so I could begin the laborious process of editing and mixing.For that, I needed to use their DV deck hooked up to my computer. I took the usual 15 minute stroll through Jamshoro’s oven to get to Sindhology. It’s a grueling walk each time and I am covered in sweat even though it is not that far. I spent several hours there, waiting, finding out I needed another cable, learning that I could not use the computer there because the staff members don’t play well together, and then, empty handed returned home with the promise of being able to do so the next day with the proper cable.I was told that the radio station had a good multitrack recording setup which would make my life easier and that I would not have the 3 hours of actual time to record that I had in Sindhology. Having been to the radio station several times, I mentioned that they just have the one mic in the middle and record all the musicians in a circle around it. I really needed multiple tracks that I could adjust the mix with. They assured me that they had a very good system and would be happy to help me with a project related to Shah Latif. I was also told various other mistakes I had made. I should have assembled a solid team before I came. I should have brought in a whole video crew. I should have recorded it all myself.With a contact there, I called a few times with no response. Then I got an sms asking what I wanted. After taking far too much time to send a whole bunch of sms, (text messages), I explained. After another half hour I called and was welcomed with open arms to record at the studio, but sure enough it was as I said, just the one mic. So…as usual, I spent several hours to achieve nothing, except to be postponed for another day or more with incorrect information and no real options. This city is really testing me. I need some other recording options, because I won’t be able to record the longer chapters in the short amount of time afforded at Sindhology.

You wanted this

I sat updating my blog. My wife is going to Rajasthan to get some puppets, so I did some coordinating with Rajesh, the puppeteer in Udaipur, Rajasthan from whom I plan to purchase more background characters for “Risalo”.I feel grateful for the recording session yesterday, after a ridiculous number of challenges. I got to thinking about a few things. The previous morning, Saeed Mangi sahib at Sindhology had remarked that what I was dealing with here was by my own choice, I think as in because I was doing this project. My reply was that it was not entirely my choice, but he insisted several times that it was my choice and that was all there was to it. I left it at that, as I really needed my brain focused on working with the musicians.There are various assumptions that we all make about each other I suppose. We decide on certain hard and fast rules and that is it. Certainly, I made a decision to create this puppet film; “Risalo”, but I disagree that all that I have been through has been due to my choice. I have found, on many occasions here, that people assume you have some infinite store of wealth, for who would take a risk for something that lead to no academic credentials nor any guaranteed income when you can’t quite afford it?I remember Sadar sahib in Multan wanted to know my caste as several people have asked on this trip so badly. This isn’t quite the same as the major castes in Hinduism, but there are similarities. This “caste” tells people where your family is from and what, perhaps a hundred years ago they might have done as work. There are certainly social dynamics to it. He pestered me so much, that finally I told him, even though I despise all of that horse shit. His immediate response was, oh I have seen they (as in my “group”) have huge mansions around town. It was such an arbitrary load of nonsense. I could have said anything and he would have responded with that. We must define others by what we perceive as the infinite resources at their disposal. With certain privileges, they must not suffer any of the challenges that others do. That perhaps makes folks feel better at times. In a sense, I feel at times people are like screw this guy. He doesn’t have to be here. He could fly around the world while people threw more money at him for showing up. Ok, fantastic.That is easier to believe than the fact that some idiot would pack up and leave with his almost spent savings to try and create something. I’m not the only one to take on a challenge. People here that do the same don’t ask those questions or try to look for reasons to think you have a silver spoon in your mouth.There are things that are easier and many that are more difficult for me than the next person. It is just tiring to struggle and have people just tell you, even when you are not complaining about it, that you’re here for fun, or well, you wanted this so there. I see people with lots of challenges. I also see people owning homes. I don’t even have a place to live. When the musicians came to my room, they could not stand it for 15 minutes, and yet I am grateful for it, though I wonder how I will get through whatever number of days it will take me to finish here.In the evening, Najib sahib dropped by to visit. He saw how exhausted I was and kindly gave me a spot to sleep in his guest house. AC and fan, in a room less hot than my hostel room. What more could I ask for? I feel like these little wins are what help me keep going when I feel I can’t do any more.