SANKARA

Last night I watched the award winning Sri Lankan movie “Sankara” with Gayathri and Janaka. With very different comments over the grape wine I was eager to decided on it myself. Having watched it it's sure thumbs up from me...

I felt connected to the movie in many ways as it portrayed the inner struggle over desire that a Buddhist monk faces and with my life plans this is something I face daily and a great challenge that I would have to overcome to achieve spiritual peace.

I guess that this would not be a movie that everybody will take to and I'm quite interested to know how somebody who's not familiar with Buddhism will understand it. If any of you happen watch the movie remember to talk to me about it when we meet.

I found how the lay desires of the monk was depicted through another physical representation ( hypothetical character) a fascinating and appropriate way to portray the story line.

Sankara Sri Lanka, 2006, Colour, 35mm, 85min

Ispired and deeply entrenched in Buddhist philosophy, the film revolves around a young Buddhist monk Ananda, arrives at a temple in order to restore its paintings.These paintings depict Thelapaththa Jathakaya, a moral story where Lord Buddha said that a man with a big target in life must not be swayed by passion (Keles), the five senses and especially beautiful women. One day, Ananda picks up a hair pin belonging to a young woman. While attempting to return this object to its owner, his repressed feelings are awoken by the beauty and sensuality of the woman. The young monk's inner spiritual world is plunged into turmoil. Then one day the paintings are destroyed. While restoring them for the second time Ananda begins to realize that he is trapped in a web of his worldly desires and attachments.

Awards won by Sankara ...

• The Special Jury Prize The Silver Pyramid at the 30th Cairo International Film Festival.

" We wish to underline the very special nature of this award, and the fact that it shows a cinematic achievement of the highest level by director Prasanna Jayakody"

• Award for the Best film in Competition from Asia at the 11th International Film Festival of Kerala

• Award for the Best Debut Director the 11th International Film Festival of Kerala

For a detailed review visit http://www.varietyasiaonline.com/content/view/518/

Need I say more !!!

“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.”

Robert Frost - Mountain Interval. 1920.

Full dose of Transition

This weekend was all about Transition for me with both MC Team transition and MCP transition kicking off.

It was the start of MC Team Transition on Saturday and this was interesting cause of several reasons...

First it was the first time we met together as elect and current MC and this was a good start to the transition process from my eyes. I found the day to be not so preassured with more of a relaxed setting and I think this helped to make things better.

One interesting part of the transition we were looking forward to ( or at least I was) was the MBTI session run by Sif and Katty. It helped to gain self awareness and also interesting to know about the others preffered styles and how they saw themselvs in this context. For those who know about MBTI my team had 3 INTJs, 1 INFJ and 2 INTPs according to the test. This i found initially surprising cause I was expecting more diversity in types than this.

Sunday proved to be the highlight of the weekend or of the whole week I'd say with Sahan and I starting off transition by preparing for IPM. I wanted to do something different for this and decided to take him to Thotupola where we had our preparation sessions and lunch. It was exciting for me and him to be discussing on the future of AIESEC globally and to be discussing the future of AIESEC in Sri Lanka.

Then was the fun part of the day which involved adventure games Climbing Wall ( I couldn;t get to the top cause my physical endurance is not so good) , Aerial Rope - where u come down hangging from a rope from 70m hieght to hit the water and then lastly a long Kayaking trip. The funny part was that was that Sahan didn;t have a change of cloths though we got wet and we were then just hanging around for our cloths to dry.

Besides the exciting parts of the day it was also awesome to be sitting at the poolside talking with each other about the history of the organisation with the sun setting and a cup of tea in our hands.

I enjoyed the day loads and do hope it was fun as it was for me for Sahan!!! Well I'm positive that we can keep the level of excitement high for the rest of the transition and set high standards for other to achieve.