I have been working on the Constitutional Observer, packaging for Manesiri, a freelance work for Repair Cafe India and in general the mind has been full with many things.

In the midst of all this, I would like to share with you 2 conversations. Me and Man [3 characters missing] were talking about using AI for coding, and how easy it is to spawn agents and AI tasked with creating scripts and sometimes whimsical concepts. I reflected and then shared something I had been feeling with weeks of using AI for implementing and testing conceptual user interfaces for the Observer. I said I lose a personal and serious connection with the work. I no longer feel it mine, and I lose track of the goal.

The value of something that you make would be most strongly felt only by you!? Is it not? You must have the conviction and belief to make it real. Along the way, I have been losing some bit of the conviction on the Observer. I consistently criticize the internet in my head. What is the point of a work like the Observer being primarily on the internet only? What work on the ground is it contributing to? That singular thought has been chipping away my heart for the Observer.

The next few weeks, we hope to come up with a manifesto that reflects our values and the outcome we would like to create. A manifesto written by the people working on it presently. It will help me remember and continue with conviction.

I write with so much clarity presently, because as we walk in a grassland in Bidar, me and Harsha are discussing about people motivated to documenting the beautiful grasslands of the region, how many are there now? He says: Dimaag mein kheeda rehena! Translation: The insect, the idea, or conviction must already be in the head!

How can somebody to be trained to ask certain questions? How can you train somebody to be curious about grasslands, butterflies and birds? It is this question I asked Harsha, and he said: Dhimag mein kheeda rehena! This kheeda about kheedas is going to remain with me.

• I have been working in the Church Street BHive, when I have to meet and work with friends from across the city. It is very convenient.

• I saw Mein Vaapus Aawunga. It was a strongly made film, and I was not questioning anything, I was lost entirely in the magical and devastation present in the movie. I watched it at a time I was thinking about what it would be to not focus always on the critical, dissappointing aspects of people and things. You should watch it!

• I have started reading “Everybody loves a good drought” by P. Sainath. It is a must read for people interested in the development history of India. I had been following PARI’s stories published on Instagram for a long time. And resonated with the diverse stories they brought to light.

• I have finished the three free services available for my Karmegam (Honda HNess 350), and am realising the cost of maintaining the Honda. They charge 4000INR for a basic service with oil change, air filter change, other consumables and chain cleaning and adjusting! In addition a frequently wearing out brake pad means higher costs everytime. I have decided to source basic parts (air filter, oil filter, break pads) and make an accessible inventory for me to service wherever necessary.

• We used Sveltia CMS in a new project, it is convenient to setup, and I really like that it does not have to be bundled with the project. My only wish was that it is easy to set up Authentication with serverless websites. Organisationally I am considering setting up a OIDC server.

• I have been mixing Manesiri Millet Mix in the chappathi dough at home. I have not yet had the courage to make stand alone dishes with it. But friends and customers have been sharing their baking and cooking recipes: Multi Millet Cake, Thalipeeth, Rotis, Soup etc.

• I am going to be a fellow in the Creative Peer Program at Srishti for a 3 months, where I will be working on the Constitutional Observer and facilitating a few units. My guiding question for designing facilitation plans is going to be dhimaag mein kheeda kaise daal sakthe? How do you put a insect / idea into somebody’s head? Haha. Thanks to the Nagarathna Memorial Grant and Srishti, I will be able to put in a solid few months of work on the Observer.

• My house owner and possible BLA (Booth Level Agent of the party), which is a term I learnt recently asked if I wanted to be on the electoral roll in Bangalore (since SIR in KA has begun). I have been asking the question to myself since 2022, but have not done it yet. I voted in TN this year. I have reasoned that I have not yet found a stable house where I have stayed for >2 years, this is the only house I have stayed in for > 1 year. What brings other people to consider themselves ‘Ordinarily a resident of Bangalore’?

M: A…Which tree is this?

M: The bats like it… There is the short nose fruit bat, see?!

A: Hmmm…. Cherry! This is the Singapore Cherry Tree

Malaika has been quizzing me on the Singapore Cherry for a while. I have learnt to recognise it with its jagged leaves and the white flower. Harsha asks me seriously while at S’s farm in Bidar: “You should be able to recognise it!, you have seen it before…take the leaf, smell it, see the flower…” I sensed the disappointment that I could not distinguish between the Drumstick and the Custard leaves at the beginning. He insisted I try and recognise it.

• My concern in the previously week note was also perhaps overly and irrationally concerned about Capital, to the point that I was thinking of creative work and reasoning based on what the ideal pathways would be. Since last week, I have been reading Gustavo Esteva’s writings on ‘Development’. It made me realise that much of the history I have read, learnt, and listened to (except in Bidar, because of the unique narrators I hear from) had led me to uncritically consume history outlined by capitalist and economical concerns. Gustavo makes an argument that modern hunger and scarcity are created by ironically, the imperialist term ‘development’.

  “There is not enough wheat. We are short of food. Men, turned into thieves, loot their neighbors. People want to run, and they can’t even walk. Children cry. Young people stumble as if they were old. Their legs falter and they miserably crawl. Their souls are empty, filled with air. It’s all over.” A few centuries before Abraham, a pharaoh carved on stone his cry of desperation.
  
  Such a dramatic testimonial has been used, with many others, to show the ever-present hunger and scarcity, “old companions of men”. I intend to dismantle this ideological operation. My contention is that the situation of these men, who lived and died very close to today’s Ethiopia, has very little to do with modern hunger. The habit of colonizing the past with our present perceptions has cast a veil that prevents us from imagining the conditions suffered by such men. That same veil covers and distorts our current perceptions.

• We launched the website of Manesiri. Manesiri is a women producer company that is based in Channapatna and Bidar. Manesiri has launched with millet based products, and will soon have fresh and seasonal products that will be made by the women. Please visit and try the dosa mixes out. I personally enjoy mixing the Millet mix with Chappathi dough. Visit at Manesiri.org

• Animals are common on our streets. Cows are common because there are still dairy farms within the city. Did you know donkey dairy is also present in bangalore? The Bangalore Mirror appears to have mistakenly called them Wild Asses in this article.

• I have not had Jamuns before! I have had a lot in just the last few weeks though.

• I wanted to attend the Cockroach Janata Party protest on the 15th. I was unable to, but a dear friend shares this flyer from the protest with me.

  

• We took a walk in Yelahanka Old Town. There are a lot of Pawn shops, and hand embroidery shops. There are cow-sheds within, and there are quite a few wet-land like areas