Official Blog Post #6: END THE HATE P.S.A

I’m back people. It’s been a while since I last posted and I apologize for that forum. So much has happened since I last posted, for the past three or so weeks in Drama class we have been working on something called PSAs. A PSA is a Public Service Announcement made to benefit out society. The PSA we were required to make in drama class was for increasing the awareness of a serious topic; our group chose the large topic of Hate. There are many different forms of hate in the world: Racism, prejudice, domestic violence, we focused on the topic of homophobia.

Our group campaigned this topic with a simple yet powerful name: End the Hate. We chose homophobia as our primary topic because we felt the world wasn’t addressing it enough. In the month of September alone 5 homosexual teenagers chose to take away their lives because they were treated unjustly. This touched me because if we as race make love as an importance, why is it that we condone it for homosexuals, they just represent their love in a different way.  We chose the colors purple and white to represent us, purple was chosen for two reasons one: it represented our production company Prolific Productions and two: it represented gay pride. White was chosen to represent Hate, this is because white is a very simple term and hate is tossed around like a simple word. This project was a wonderful experience because I portrayed the role of a homosexual in grade 9 drama and this PSA allowed me to further increase my knowledge of my character.   

  

Official Blog Post #5: SPORTS GALORE

He drives into the lane… step back move… and a SHOOTS FOR THE WIN. Welcome back forum, tonight I was at a loss for a topic to blog about and found myself on NBA.com watching highlights from a recent New Orleans Hornets game when I realized that my topic was staring me right in the face. I love sports from cricket to football. Although my favorite sport is basketball I’m a football player at the core. The thing about sports is when played competitively it will bring about both the best and worst in people, but when they’re played as for fun they become a source for activity.

I am incapable of playing a sport just for fun, I have got to win. If I don’t win I try to think about what I could have done better so that next time it doesn’t happen again. I play football for my school Fletcher’s Meadow Arrows, and when I’m in practice and I miss a tackle I slam my head and think about how next time I can tear the guy apart. Sometimes my competiveness overcomes me and I become a very horrible person, for example this summer while playing basketball with some of my close friends I aggressively grabbed a rebound causing my friend to fall, my actions eventually went on to a conflict where we were on the verge of exchanging blows. If I don’t win I will do anything I can to win. But thankfully I’m not usually a sore loser, if I lose a game my disappointment will quickly transfer into optimism.

Some of my idols in sports are LeBron James, and Michael Jordan. I appreciate each of these athletes for different of reasons. LeBron James, although widely disliked now for his actions over the summer is one of my favorite athletes because he’s just a perfect example of how talent mixed with hard work can pay off. Michael Jordan’s is not only renowned for his athleticism but also for his mentality towards the game: He played an NBA finals game with a severe flu, the Utah Jazz gave him no room to breath but through his will alone MJ propelled his team to victory. Ra        

Official Blog Post # 4: Why so Wicked?

Good evening forum. I had one of the best experiences of my life on Wednesday, November 3^rd; I went with my drama class to see the play Wicked in the Cannon Theatre in Downtown Toronto. This was definitely the highlight of my week for I got to experience something completely out of the ordinary. I have never seen a live play in my life, and Wicked blew my mind.

Prior to getting into telling you about the experience itself let me give you a brief description about the play. Wicked is a prologue to the well known story “The Wizard of Oz”, Wicked is the story of two witches Glinda the Good and The Wicked Witch of the West, and how their original rivalry grows into a unbreakable bond of friendship.

When the play began I was somewhat overwhelmed by the musical experience, since majority of the play is in song it can be hard to infer the point of the scene. But I put my pickiness aside and chose to watch the play through the character’s eyes and I began to thoroughly enjoy the play. Halfway through the play I realized something about the play which made it much easier to relate to. The main character Elphaba has her world turned upside down when she finds out that her hero, her idol, The Great Wizard of Oz is truly powerless. Although the world seems no different when she finds out in her mind the entire Land of Oz is in anarchy. How is that one known and recognized for his power and wisdom is in truth just a fake.

This can be related back to when you first begin to realize that your parents who appear as the light at the end of the tunnel, those who know all and see all in truth are just human. Although the Wizard was not a positive character one of his points rendered true: The people of Oz still need to have a leader – (not the exact words). This is true because when there is someone to govern people work better, knowing that there is a greater force at work in the world. Whether you believe this force to be your parents, the government, or a god.   

This experience was truly an eye opener for me and I genuinely enjoyed watching this play. For it helped me re analyze my life from a different perspective

Official Blog Post #3: My Music

Welcome back to “The Art of Being Shaank,”  forum. the official definiton of music is: “an artistic form of auditory communication incorporating instrumental or vocal tones in a structured and continuous manner”. But this meaning is often disputed as music means so much more, from symphonies written by Mozart to your annoying little sibling tapping on the table before dinner, it’s all music because it appeals to your ear, it invokes emotion. Be it sorrow, joy, or anger if its stirred by sounds then its music. This is my definition of music, and I love music although I’m incapable of making it myself I truly love it. I listen to music whenever I get the chance, after waking up or before going to sleep, to pump me up before a big game or to calm me down before a big performance music is my bread and butter.

The kind of music I listen to represents me; confused, sometimes clustered but with many ideas. When I listen to rap I listen very closely to the lyrics my rap must have a meaning whether it’s said directly or there is complex lyricism involved. My favourite rapper; Lupe Fiasco is known to be the best complex lyrics rapper often enough, the meaning of his verses are so much more than skin deep. In one of Lupe Fiasco’s songs “Dumb it Down” he talks about how many in the music industry want him to decrease the complexity of his lyrics and how beneficial to society they are, so they want him to ‘dumb it down’. He’s truly is on another level and proves it with the phrase “I’m flying on Pegasus, you flying on a pheasant”- he is telling his rapping competitors how he’s flying on a level above them.

I’m not limited to rap however, I listen to other genres of music, if not to appreciate the lyrics then to appreciate the music itself. I love rock, my favourite band being Linkin Park. They are absolutely amazing they are one of the most original and risk taking bands ever, each of their albums is something new. Their first album Hybrid Theory, released in 2000, used a lot of guitar and had many screamo tracks. But as the decade passed the band somewhat grew up and matured with their music. Their newest album A Thousand Suns is a very techno album and is often slower then their other albums, but the music is much more grown up, and something truly out of the box.
Rap and rock are my favourite genres of music but I also listen to so much more like jazz, techno, hardstyle etc. Most people limit themselves to one or two genres I want to open myself to all sorts of music so i can be a more well--rounded person.  

Official Blog Post #2: Branding

Greetings forum, Shankazoid here and I want you guys to get up to date on an epic project we completed in Drama class recently called “Branding”. Before I go into how hectic yet fun the entire project was let me give you all a brief description of the project.

Branding is the process of turning a regular interesting drama class into a full fledged Company, this includes everything: Logos, Colours, company name, the whole nine yards. But the entire project revolves around one presentation, and the presentation isn’t just going up on stage and talking its so much more than that. The presentation includes having a proper menu of food that you should be able to serve, several performances that represent your group and its company platform, a playbill should be created that summarizes the entire presentation and has info about the group members. All this wrapped in a sleek and professional package.

I’m probably making this sound as though I didn’t enjoy the process, which is not true at all. There may be some parts of this that I would prefer to forget about, but on the whole the process was very enjoyable and quite frankly educational. I plan to take drama again next year and it’s quite likely that I will be part of a branding process again and again for the next two years so being a part of it in grade 10 would only help me in grade 11, and 12. 

Now in this entire project I played multiple roles. In my group – Enigma Productions, my most major role was that of media manager, I designed our logo, business cards, and playbill. Most of the items were not to difficult to create, I found something that could work as our logo on the internet, photoshopped it a little and… a perfectly enigmatic logo for Enigma Productions. The business card too was simple enough to create I found a template online, sent it to our project manager she put the logo and our info, and a perfect business card. The playbill was probably the most difficult thing to create, primarily because I’m so proficient at procrastinating and waited till nearly the last week before beginning it. I had decided that our playbill must have everything possible so I put in name and description of everyone, itinerary, pictures, etc. Half of that stuff didn’t make it to the final playbill. What annoyed me most however was printing the playbills – it cost me 50$, 50!!.

My favourite part of the entire process however, was MC-ing the show. I love getting out in front of a crowd and talking I usually don’t suffer from severe nerves and I love being on stage so really enjoyed it. I think what really gave me the edge as an MC was my prior experience, I MCed my cousin’s engagement party less than a month prior. All said and done it was a wonderful experience, unfortunately Enigma lost the Branding but being the competitive athlete I am I wait patiently for next year where I can hopefully try again, and maybe this time I may get the chance to lead my group.                 

Official Post # 1: Seeing the World

Hellos to you, forum. You know I’ve been thinking the world is a beautiful thing isn’t it? Te complexity of our planet always baffled me.

The amount of activity going on in our world every day is incomprehensible in our continents, countries, cities, neighbourhoods, schools, even in our very own minds. But every living things path in the world can be broken down into three simple things Birth, Life, Death.

Take a moment and think about what is going on outside your bubble, outside your everyday. Try to see the world from someone else’s eyes… it’s quite different, no. So in that respect I think there isn’t just one world, but six billion worlds each seen differently from each person’s eyes. Some world’s maybe similar to yours in most respect but with some alterations, others maybe a complete contrast to yours.

I honestly don’t know what I’m trying to get at with this post, but I’m new to blogging, but I guess that’s what you try to do with blogs just kind of spit ball your ideas onto paper. Well, I guess the moral of this blog post would be when your in an argument or disagreement try to see the world from the other’s perspective, maybe you’ll find enlightenment, if not at least you can empathize with them.

Opening Remarks

Hello wonderful world and my gracious readers A.K.A forum. I’m the one and the only ShaShaank A.K.A Shankazoid. I’m a 15 year old, who’s still trying to find his place in the world. To do this I joined a Dramatic Arts course at my high school hoping to find my true calling. I’ve always loved entertaining people, and putting a smile on another’s face is the reason for my existence.

"The heights by great men reached and kept, were not obtained by sudden flight. But they, while their companions slept, were toiling upward in the night."

-          Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

This is a quote once told to me by my father Srini, has always been sitting somewhere in the back of my head driving pushing me to follow its meaning. My goal for this school year is to make this the quote for my life, I hope I can finally live up to it this year working hard to get ahead of anyone else.

“The Art of Being Shank” is my first blog and is my blog for my grade 10 year let’s see where it goes on from there. The name of the blog comes from my theory that being you is an art, an art that no one else is capable of performing. This blog will display the art of being me, ShaShaank A.K.A Shank.

The course Acting for T.V and Video has been quite an interesting course and definitely my favourite course of the first semester. During a regular day in my life the

High points in my day are my drama class, and my football practice. The reason I tend to enjoy this course so much more than any other course is probably because I genuinely enjoy the subject and the atmosphere of the course is so positive and encouraging of being yourself. This something I noticed in both my grade 9 drama class and now in my grade 10 drama class, the course allows you to form strong bonds with your peers. This is all the more possible when your teachers and her assistants create the positive environment you need to flourish. All in all, these past few weeks in this course have been wonderful, later forum.