Baas Ki Baat

Typed 'Baas mar raha hoon'(I am farting/smelling) instead of 'Baat kar raha hoon'(I am talking) while writing down my new story idea. This is what I call an existential typo. Sigh.

The Rain Song

I was asked to write a nature-themed short poem for a 12 year old's poetry recital at school. Here it is:

So there is this thing,
This thing I want to do
Splash on a puddle
Drink a raindrop or two

Feel the damp earth beneath my feet
See the umbrellas on the street
The rains are here again
The rains are here again
Oh I just love it in the rain!

So there is this thing,
This thing I want to hear
Raindrops on a tin roof
Stopping on the window near

The smell of damp earth under my feet
Rainbow umbrellas on the street
The rains are here again
The rains are here again
Oh I just love it in the rain!

Joyful showers shared with friends
Hot cups of cocoa with my family
The rains are good to me
The rains are good to me.

Response to "The Rayon Effect"

In reference to this article: http://www.transadvocate.com/the-rayon-effect-what-cisgender-actors-bring-to-transgender-characters_n_13344.htm

Well we can go deeper and discover the meaning of acting then. Is an actor capable of playing anything that is not the person the actor is? How do we go about fiction then? Why is no one questioning the writer who actually wrote the part? Does the writer/director/producer also have to be the same person the film is about? Is art really a collaborative effort?Can a certain level of authenticity really be achieved by fiction in general?

"When a man steps into makeup to become a trans woman, he embodies this mainstream trans narrative…" hmmm not necessarily. Isn't that a gross generalisation? Can an actor really play Romeo then? Can an Asian theatre group really interpret Shakespeare the 'right way'? I hear these arguments all the time and it pisses me off, to be honest. I'm not saying that the film was perfect. If you have problems with the specific performance then please by all means take it apart specifically but do refrain from making random statements that put people in a box.

As a filmmaker myself, I think this is an important debate and it certainly got me thinking but the article itself I found quite ridiculous, vague and lacking intellectual rigour on the whole.

On principle, there is nothing wrong with Jared playing the role. How the character itself was perceived by the writers and then interpreted by the director could be up for debate, but I personally did not see anything problematic about it and I don't think a comparison with the Mammy character in Gone WIth The Wind is fair to the filmmakers.