attention!

This week I was joined by the director of Live Music Now Scotland, Carol Main. It was good to show her around the city and take her to see some of the places I have been working and meet some of the people who have been influential on my residency. She particularly enjoyed our crazy trip to Dadar to capture some of the sounds of Mumbai! I did a bit of dodgey recording on a mixture of my mobile phone and my laptop, but hopefully I will be able to compile something interesting out the results - watch this space...

Dadar flower market was looking particularly stunning this week so I took some pictures!

I seem to have a really low attention span this week! Perhaps it's because I feel the end of my residency is coming really quickly, and I still have lots that I could do here -there's just so little time! New opportunities are being presented all the time and India is so open to what I can bring.

It's not just me with a short attention span, I have to say. Every child this week seemed to have something on their mind, most probably because there were holidays. This wednesday and thursday brought the huge celebration of Holi! An annual Hindu festival of colour celebrating the arrival of Summer and equality of human life - everyone covers everyone else in lurid coloured powder, saying "happy holi", usually followed by a great water party! It was fantastic to celebrate this with a wild bunch of people on a lovely sunny day in Andheri (north Mumbai)! Unfortunately, there was too much water around to take any photos...one of my still pink feet coming soon!

On Wednesday, I went back to work with Aashansh's early morning children in Worli. Last time I visited the children were excitable but were very responsive and interested. This week, however, there was a completely different atmosphere, with the kids on the verge of running wild! There was not much sharing going on and clearly tensions amongst the group were coming to the fore. Many of the children seemed pretty unhappy. I really struggle to say why this was but I think these children seem like they haven't had enough to eat - they are really malnourished looking and small for their ages. Most likely a lack of sleep, and food combined with the excitement of Holi was taking its toll. It will be really interesting to see if this is the case next week, when things perhaps will be more normal.

Here's some photos from my first visit to Aashansh in Worli