Whispering Shadow

Having finally got a holiday, I decided to catch up with Haider. I had received mixed reviews about it, but since it is a Vishal Bhardwaj movie, I was willing to take my chances. I was not disappointed. The adaptation of Shakespeare's play 'Hamlet' in the context of Kashmir's history was masterful. The story was stretched unnecessarily at certain points in the plot, but the execution and performances were so stunning that I was not complaining. I am not going to review the movie in detail in this post. Instead I want to capture the feelings which Tabu's portrayal of Ghazala evoked in me. Ghazala's role is a complex character. She is torn between her love for her son, her commitment to her husband and her passion for her lover. At no point does she have all three of them due to which she is always left wanting in the movie. The void itself is difficult to portray because all these relationships are defined in a manner that would be considered unorthodox in Ind...

Mehak is one of the advanced readers in my classroom who demonstrates a high degree of value based leadership and takes immense pride in her team’s and her own learning. In the month of September 2014, our team was struggling with two out of four fellows in the grade being out of action due to severe illness and the rest of us struggling with our own wellbeing. As a contingency plan, we had to reshuffle fellows among grades 7 and 8 to ensure continuity of learning. Due to the sudden changes in class structures and increased number of students to manage, the quality and quantity of my interaction with my own class fell significantly. I was feeling dejected that I couldn’t finish the term on a high after starting off on a strong footing. Noticing my mood, Mehak wrote to me a letter. Among the many things she wrote, she mentioned how I was the one who told her “how each chapter links to the vision” and “made her goals more clear”; how I showed her the “importance of friendship” by “c...