I LIKE TO IMPROVISE
I've trained in Improv comedy at the PIT (People's Improv Theater) in NYC. Drop in for a show and you might catch me playing a cat mom, or the cat.
TAUGHT FOR INDIA. LEARNT FROM IT.
They'd call me Didi (Hindi for 'sister'). This is my journey of becoming their Pratibha didi, from the moment I walked into that classroom with no desks, no chairs, no fans (except for those twinkly-eyed ones of the teacher). Volunteering for Teach For India as a Teaching Intern, I didn't know I'd end up learning more from the kids than they'd learn from me.
THE LEARNING
The very first discussion was about the problem of water shortage in their respective localities—with some of houses receiving water only once a day or once a week. And to think how often a school teacher would tell scold a student for coming to school looking “shabby.” Here, everything usually taken for granted, was precious.
One of the most striking memories is of the day that I was asked to conduct and record their "English Conversation Skills Test" as the language had only been introduced in their curriculum last year. I was to ask them a fixed set of questions, and was clearly instructed NOT TO HELP by translating it in Hindi or it would defeat the purpose. Their answers, ranging from happy to profound, were quite eye-opening.
I miss you more, kids.
I miss you more.
i'm your writer for the end of the world
Back in 2020 when the world came to a brief, this is how I advertised myself to advertising.
pocket-size poems