Kannada

Amar Chitra Katha and a nostalgic dive back in time

Amar Chitra Katha - Abhimanyu
Image Courtesy: AmarChitraKatha.com

Ajatashatru
True to its name, Amar Chitra Katha has always been the lively comic book with the tinge of Indian culture. When I was a kid, these books were unaffordable to my Mom (and my father never bothered to buy me books), so I always had to read them at libraries. But for my nephew, that is not the case. All of us keep buying Amar Chitra Katha whenever we catch them at the book store. But funny side is that he fancies watching Hattori (!) on Nick, Noddy and Mr. Bean on Pogo rather than read something!
The lovely digital pictures that Tata Sky puts directly to home from the satellite without interruptions isn't helping him much, either.

Looking at this little announcement of sorts on The Hindu today, I remembered how we used to search corners of the library to fish out the unread titles. The number of titles released in this series is huge. I used to enjoy the Kannada translations of these books the most. Apparently, the translations had gone into good hands and we never felt that it was actually a translated version that we were reading. The then ignorance and quality of Kannada on the translated books sometimes made me believe that Amar Chitra Katha first came out in Kannada and was then translated to English (which clearly was not).

Debian Etch and hp nx6120

debian
It was a long time since I installed debian on my laptop. Unsupported hardware issues dogged it the last time I tried it on this (which seems years back). But this time, it was really worth giving a shot.

I found Debian sleek, more nostalgic than any other present distribution. It is probably the best distribution to work with.

But the old kernel that is shipped with etch had some ACPI related issues. And sound wasn't there. I had to download and compile the latest Kernel after which everything is good. Pidgin has to be compiled if you don't fancy gaim. iwp2200 wasn't working fine, but did after installing the firmware. And that is about my log of installing Debian etch on my old laptop. :-)

10th Sampada Podcast with Nagesh Hegde

10th edition of Sampada podcast with Nagesh Hegde

It was a sunny day and the usual Bangalore pollution was in the air. We were headed through the freaky traffic of Mysore Road towards Kengeri with our own imagination of how a farm near the city would be like. For me, it turned out to be very different from what I had imagined. It was an atmosphere very different from the city and that too just few Kms away from here; almost as if we were teleported to somewhere much inside Karnataka! This was the "Maithri Farm" we visited on a Sunday in January to record a podcast with rare thinker, environmentalist - Nagesh Hegde.

9th edition of podcast on Sampada with Vivek Shanbag and Status Update


L
imitation in funds, time have stalled improvements on Sampada for a while. The fact that we never expected traffic to burgeon into what it has during last 12 months on Sampada also added to it (we have been getting over 3 million hits each month). Need for better infrastructure has put a roadblock on new projects which has made few of us contemplate a lot on what needs to be done with Sampada and related projects in future.

So, we've decided to invite suggestions from everyone to see the options we have and decide on which works out the best. Get in touch with us over email if you have any.

Meanwhile, Sampada Podcasts have seen thousands of hits each in last one year. This had made us feel even more guilty of not coming up with interviews regularly. But this time around we did manage to come up with a podcast after a long time. It was the sheer interest shown by writer Narendra Pai that made another edition possible.

The 9th edition is with Vivek Shanbag who is well-known for his short stories and as the editor of the popular literary magazine - Desha Kaala.


Listen to the podcast here, and leave a comment if you liked it (that would encourage future podcasts).

Sampada Foundation

Sampada Foundation was brought into existence in last few months to manage sampada.net and other related projects in a better way. The organization would also be taking up several projects related to Kannada and technology.

Sampada.net has done a lot of difference to the Kannada community on the Internet over last two years. Our dream now is that this new organization would bring in new stuff that makes huge difference to Kannada loving people (and people who use Kannada) both inside and outside the cyber world. In this initial and critical juncture though, we need support from all of you to get started.

Here's what you can do:
1) Contribute funds to Sampada Foundation.
2) Volunteer

Your contribution could translate into work that makes difference to Kannada language in various vital aspects. As always, feel free to get in touch with us if you have queries regarding the contribution.

GaLipaTa: 2+ hours of pure entertainment

 

 

"GaaLipaTa" is a purely entertaining film. It is a film that you would not like to watch with questions packed in your mind about the story. It is something like a present world fantasy movie that also makes you laugh. The cinema demands only a passive involvement from the viewer, lets the viewer enjoy the comedy and ends up as a good entertainer.

Witty dialogs spontaneously flow from actor in the lead role that keeps the audience hooked to the screen. Screenplay is lively if not meaningful. The music is very different and the songs seem well adapted in video. Cinematography is excellent. Digital effects are good and convincing although not perfect.

Ganesh fits in aptly into his role. Daisy Bopanna's character stays in the mind as an angel even after you leave the cinema hall. Supporting actors add to the goodness of the film with some fantastic acting.

A morning spent watching "good" Kannada Cinema

"ಮುಖಾಮುಖಿ"

For years now, we've had very less of quality films in Kannada, and here is one cinema that is good on quality, but never got to the theatres. Distributors here fancy films that have songs, dance and crazy fights which on most occasions merely are low quality mockery of Bollywood/Hollywood. Sadly, it is the song and dance films that bring in huge moolah for them as art films go untried.

The film screened was "Mukhamukhi" and the screening was at "Suchitra Film Society" on Saturday. The film bagged the (Karnataka) State film award for "Best Dialogue" in 2006. The director of the film who lives in Australia is an active member of the [:http://sampada.net|Sampada Community].

"Mukhamukhi" Screening at Suchitra today

A Kannada art film, "Mukhamukhi" is being screened today at Suchitra Film Society. Time: 10.30 AM. Entry is free.

Be there this morning. :)

More details on the event [:http://sampada.net/event/6074|here].

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