Bal Vividha- Kalam (day one)

Bal Vividha

(15th to 17th October)
The theme for this year’s Bal Vividha was Education for Change and a concentration on alternative forms of education. Creativity has been as a mover of change and all the workshops were centred on this theme.
Kalam conducted three full day workshops on poetry and creative writing. The workshop was called ‘Power of Writing’ and facilitated by me and Nargis.

DAY 1
The sessions had fifteen participants from various schools and backgrounds( there were two participants from English medium schools, a few participants from Murshidabad who had problem talking, and the other participants were from various other parts of the city and state. Their ages ranged from 13 to approximately 20) and thus it was one of the most diverse groups of participants I have worked with till now. The participants were asked to introduce themselves after which we played a ‘name game’ where the participants had to associate their names with a place which began with the first letter of their names. This was an energiser round and was intended to break the ice between the participants and the facilitators.
The participants were asked what they had thought of when registering for the workshop. For some of them it was a forum to polish on their writing skills. Others had never written before and thought they could use it as means of learning how to write and for some it was the first time they were participating in a public program like this and had no idea what to expect.
We started the workshop by handing out blank sheets to all the participants and other stationery such as crayons and pencils. The participants were told to imagine that they cannot talk and write and the only way of expression for themselves was through images. They were asked to draw images and share it with the rest of the class.

It was observed that most of the group belonging to the higher age range preferred to just use their pens and pencils and kept the pictures as minimal as possible whereas the participants from the younger age group had colourful pictures and made use of lots of colours and imagery. There were two teachers from the organisations participating as observers and they took part in this activity as well.

After the participants had finished with their drawings, they were asked to exchange their papers and each had to explain the drawing of the co participant and tell what they thought of him or her through the drawings. After which the participant who had made that drawing was himself/herself asked to explain it and share it with the rest of the group.
Bilkis Khatun for example had drawn a tree and a house. Nargis started the discussion by saying she though the tree was where Bilkis had for the first time met her lover and the house was a dream which she perhaps wanted to build some day. Tumpa on the other hand felt theatre was somewhere Bilkis used to hang out with friends. Bilkis said the hosuelike structure was her school which she was very fond of and the tree was in her house courtyard and she felt a strange affection towards it.

Some of the common images that were seen through this exercise were trees, flowers, televisions, house (or house like structures)
Hazara Khatun was the only participant who drew a nurse and spoke about her life’s ambition to become one through her image. Many of the participants also spoke about their dreams through these images.

At the end of this exercise the participants were told how poetry was also nothing but written imagery. Keeping this mind they were each asked to write one line about what they thought about ‘Night’ and compare it to one image. They were asked no to use common images such as darkness. Solitary, etc but to try and think of other images which one might not immediately associate with night. The lines were then read out and a group poem was created titled ‘Night is’ with each of the participants having contributed one line each.

Night Is
Night is a beautiful woman
Night is the drooping eyelids
Night is silence
Night is the light in the darkness
Night is the solitary heart
Night is the dark clouds
Night is a message that like night is followed by day, sadness is followed by happiness
Night is the light of the new moon
Night is watching stars on the lonely terrace
Night is the soft sound of breeze
Night is the moonlight streaming in through the broken windows
Night is the end of all my hopes and wishes
Night is walking through the lonely streets
Night is sleeping in the cool shades of my mother’s sari.

After this poem was created there was a lunch break for an hour after which the participants would return for the second half of the session.


After lunch the participants were asked to play an energiser game where they would walk about the room and a number would be called out and the participants would have to form that number and the remaining few would be out. This would continue till there were two remaining participants.
The participants were then given copies of Al Mahmoud’s poem “Poetry Is” The poem was read out and then discussed by the facilitators and the participants themselves. Some of the key points discussed were: what poetry means to the poet and what it meant to the participants. How poetry talks about everyday life and such. Poetry is not only about having a rhyming scheme.

At this juncture the concept of five senses- smell, touch, see, feel, hear was discussed and using these senses the participants were asked to write a poem of five lines each about what poetry was for them. The poem was titled ‘Poetry is’. After which they were asked to share it with the rest of the group. The poems were discussed and suggestions and changes were made.