This time too, there's some serious drumming I can hear behind the closed door.
So I knock. Drums drown it out. Knock again, louder. Drowned out still. Bang with my fist. Kick the door. Rat-tat-tat with a set of keys. Yell through a tiny hole in the door. Pound again with my fists.
People in the cafeteria, just next door, are starting to turn their heads in wonder at the sight. It could hardly be every day that an aging alumnus turns up and starts screaming and pounding at a random door on campus. What's with these 25th-year reunion nutcases, I can see it written all over their faces.
Just as I think of giving up, just as the cafeteria people seem ready to call the dreaded Institute Authorities, the door opens. It's a slender young lady in her fourth year at BITS, Ambily Sivadas, who's standing there. She smiles radiantly up at me and goes right back to her seat at the drums. Picks up the sticks and resumes where she left off. Here by herself, nobody else in the Music Club, she's practicing the drums with energy and verve. Hours later, she will be on stage in the Auditorium, performing with a panache I would not have believed had I not seen it. Right now, she's practicing on her own for that splendid performance.
All through the trip back to this campus we love, we've been talking of, marvelling at, the changes here. Right here in the Music Club is one of those changes, young Ambily. A woman drummer? No disrespect to the lovely ladies of our class, but really, what a thought! And I tell you, she beats out one mean rhythm.
Helllll-ooooo BITS Pilani! I swear, you look better than you ever did.
(One of possibly a few vignettes about a trip about a hundred of us made back to our college, 25 years after we graduated).
23 comments:
I remember all-female rock bands when I was in college (1991). That's guitar, bass, drums.
It's a good question though, why women aren't commonly found playing some instruments. In jazz, there have been some great pianists (Marian McPartland, Diana Krall) and violinists (Regina Carter), but hardly any horn players, bassists or drummers of significance. (I have seen lots of amateur women playing these instruments though.) In carnatic music, female violin, veena or flute players are common, mridangam or ghatam players are almost unknown. It can't just be a question of physical strength or ability.
Hey Dilip,
Am sure it does feel amazing to be back at the place where we all love to be... happens to me everytime I visit Xavier's (I am the guy whom you 'encountered' on the road)...
Btw, If time allows you, do visit my blog for my latest post. Need your opinion. My friend wants to publish it in Mumbai Mirror as a news report!
Your writing rocks as always and am a frequent visitor to your blog although I do not comment!
Hey Dilip the recent news floating around stating 20%of Tomorrow's Leadrers Today fronm BITS Pilani has lot of girls also from BITS Pilani who have been regularly bagging the coveted Aditya Birla Scholarship year after year. Your alma mater is indeed a graet institution. One BITS Pilani versus rest IITs and that is Big Bout man.
ah bits pilani! that great storehouse of iit rejects.
> that great storehouse of iit rejects.
And proud of it! Grateful too. I assure you.
Oh anonymous. Most important lesson you learn in life is to respect others. In life it does not matter what you talk to people or what you write to people or what you do to people and what is important is how you make them feel. If you make them feel good you have achieved your goal. Pilani made the stay for BITSians happy and they have a life long bonding with the place. It's not too late for you to learn these things just because you did not study at BITS Pilani. You may try for their off campus work integrated learning programmes and learn something useful at least for the rest of your life. God bless you
i dont know man...i couldnt afford to go to bits pilani. so i had to slog my balls off in my 12th and go to iit. bits pilani is for rich kids.
Come to think of it Dilip, anonymous was right in calling BITS Pilani as storehouse of IIT Rejects because whole lot of BITSians had rejected IITs to join BITS Pilani. Thanks anonymous for pointing this out.
i had to slog my balls off in my 12th...
Don't feel bad. I hear there are modern reconstructive surgery methods becoming available to address this situation.
Besides, when you do this again, do start slogging a wee bit before your 12th.
oh God. As per anonymous guys without balls went off to IIT and those with balls came to BITS Pilani. Sad scene indeed...
coming to think of it bits pilan wasnt very expensive either, considering the kind of money kids pay join DPS these days. And the best part is we got single room for 50 bucks a sem.
not expensive? perhaps not for you, oh sons and daughters born in the lap of luxury.
sorry for reminding you i made it through life through my own efforts, not to mention 'merit', while you didnt have to work especially hard thanks to wealthy pops.
Hey Dilip this discussion is going out of the Drummer Girl topic and its time the ball game is called over
As one anonymous to another: rich pops are desirable. Don't be upset if yours was not, I am sure he is a good man who does his best. If you do even better than your pop, La Graduate IIT Sans Testes, you will be a rich pop and you can send your children to BITS. There is hope, do not despair.
The semester fees right now at BITS Pilani is Rs 22,500/-. Can the anonymous glory tell how much it is at the IIT. From the IIT Madras website http://www.iitm.ac.in/Academics/Fees%20Structure.html it is clearly emerging that it is about Rs 19,200/- which is too high for an Institute which lives on funds doled out by the government. From the IIT M fees link it emerges that FEEs for Day Scholars is more than Hostellers which must be joke of the century for an institute with half a dozen of its cousins put together has claim for a slot in (out of)Times top 100 universities survey. BITS Pilani stands on its own legs and does not go to government with a begging bowl. BITS Pilani put a campus at Dubai and Goa and putting a campus at Hyderabad with its own funds.
you can get educational loans these days. in my time, fees at iit was rs 100 or thereabouts per semester. fees at pilani was in thousands, by far beyond our ability to pay. consequently, only wealthy kids went to pilani. did dsouza have any poor classmates? i had many in iit. i was relatively well-off compared to some of my batchmates. i do not know what their castes were because iit was a 'merit'ocracy and nobody gave a rat's ass about caste or class.
sorry to remind you of your privileged background. it must be hard to live with the fact that you got a free ride all your life and now put up a facade of social consciousness.
when the IIT fees was Rs100/-, who do you think was paying for the real cost of your education? The Tax Payer whom you are probably calling rich. If the difference between rich and poor was measured by the quantum of fees at IIT and BITS Pilani, how come the fees today is almost close in IIT and BITS? Between 97 and 2002 BITS Pilani had no fees hike while IITs were gradually raising fromthree figure to four figure to five figures. Its time for anonymous to do a mouthshut.com job
Hey Dilip Good that anonymous has done mouthshut.com. I read that the Bollywood Film Director Mani Shankar of 16 December fame is from your alma mater BITS Pilani? Wow Your Institute has produced all sorts people for all walks of life indeed.
When the going gets tough, only the tough BITS Alum gets going
Subodh Karnik, a Mumbai native, and graduate of the Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS), Pilani will become president and chief executive of ATA Airlines effective January 1, 2007. Karnik follows in the path of Rono Dutta and Rakesh Gangwal, both alumni of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), who went on to head United Airlines and US Airways respectively. But while both Dutta and Gangwal left their jobs amid a downward spiral in the airline business in the months after 9/11, Karnik is credited with rescuing ATA after being brought in as CFO from Delta Airlines (where he was senior vice-president).
For more details click:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-2210639,curpg-1.cms
Alright, since the drummer girl is no more in discussion, may be I can help. Ambily was my roomie in the first 2 years and now my wingie.
She has this undying enthusiasm when it comes to music. She joined the club as a vocalist and now is the 'lead drummer'. Sad, because 'the drumming' restricts her sweet voice(calling it just voice wouldn't do her justice) to a couple of songs every Music Nite.
Ok then.
Looks like the discussion has moved from Drummer Girl to BITS Beat ............... East or west North or South BITS is one of the Best.
BITS Music club has got another female drummer, Prerana Manvi, who happens to be the current secretary. She, too, joined the club as a vocalist and picked up drums.
Ah, the lovely Ambily! She seems to have managed to brew a storm in the tea cup by simply being the subject of Dilip's musings! I witnessed that performance, Dilip, and many others by the little lady before and after that :)
Ambily is this awesome (and rare) combo of beauty, brains and multi-faceted talent. I had the privilege of being her teacher and am proud to inform you that our little drummer girl is now pursuing doctoral studies in Bioinformatics in a premier US University with a full scholarship, purely on the power of her merit. I hope she still plays the drums though, it was so much part of her persona, that I think I wouldn't recognize her if she stopped playing... somehow.
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