The lessons I learnt from animation and children’s movies and why they are so close to my heart

Writing has been really close to my heart and off late due to my busy schedule, in a long time, I had not had a chance to write about something close to me. When I was randomly thinking of a subject to write about, it suddenly struck me that animation and children’s movies had taught me a great deal and have always been dear to me and therefore I immediately began writing about it. Animation movies have always been close to my heart as I have always been a child at heart and therefore immensely enjoy them. Even to this date I still jump in joy when Harry Potter movies are telecast and watch them with the same enthusiasm that I used to, six years ago! This blog post is dedicated to some of the animation and children’s movies I cherish, which have been close to my heart and why have taught me very significant things.

Recently I watched ‘How to train your dragon’ and loved the movie immensely. Apart from the insanely cute dragon, ‘Toothless’ and the relationship that he and Hiccup share, there were several things that struck me. When Hiccup befriends the dragon, slowly attaches a wing to it and helps it fly, feeds it, communicates with it, learns harmless ways to deal with the dragons and eventually understands that they are after all harmless creatures too, I learnt the importance of a change of perspective; how viewing something with a biased perspective might stop us from seeing the most beautiful things around us and prevent us from learning from it. When I saw why dragons raided the land to steal food to feed the gigantic dragon, I also learnt that there is always an unknown side of the truth and before we judge anything about anybody, we need to know why individuals behave in a certain way. It was an extremely delightful movie to watch!

A week ago, I watched ‘Happy Feet’, which was another cute movie. The penguin Mumble, which was born ‘abnormal’ believes in its instinct, separates from the group and uses its unique quality to save its tribe, as an answer to being ousted from its tribe for being different and therefore being a bad omen. His unique quality is seen as ‘cool’ from a new group of penguins he meets, so the importance of perspective is highlighted here. The desire to prove himself and circumstances push him to events that enable him to save his entire species and all he does is tap dance! :) I learnt that being superstitious and doing nothing about the problem is not the solution and if your desire to solve the problem is great enough, it will help you and push you to see the truth which would not have been visible without your effort and will! I learnt that one must always follow their instincts and stop at nothing when they believe in something strongly. The only barrier is you! :)

Several months ago, I had seen ‘Frozen’ and was completely bowled over after watching the movie, which has such amazingly powerful characters and a great story, a huge change compared to the usual romantic fairy tale movies. This is one reason for which Frozen remains an all-time favourite and close to my heart movie. Both the sisters have equally powerful characters. While Elsa fights hard to hold back her powers to protect her younger sister, Anna pushes her to realise that she does not have to hold back her powers or be afraid of it and helps her to see a solution to her problem. While Elsa sees running away as the solution to the problem she faces, an impending danger to her sister that she constantly fears due to the special powers she possesses, (which is right in her perspective) Anna stands by the fact that running away is not the solution and she fights hard to push her sister to realise that she can solve her problem. What was most striking to me was the maturity that Anna displays when Elsa puts her in danger to say that her sister would never harm her, something we as humans tend to forget in the course of  our lives. For example, parents would take harsh decisions for us that might bring us sorrow. But eventually we realise that they did it for our own good. I wouldn’t say all of the decisions that parents take for us are good and work in our favour, but it’s always good to think just once why our parents took a certain decision :)

Ice Age series has been immensely cute for its own reasons. The relationship between Sid, Manny and Diego is wonderful. Each of these animals, with a completely different personality, come together and stays together. The reason I think is that they find something in the other person that they lack. Manny finds Sid’s nature extremely forthcoming and irritating in the beginning, but eventually he becomes friends with him for the same qualities that he dislikes. Both Manny and Sid distance Diego, when they find him to be a traitor. But when Diego refuses to kill the baby, they realise that Diego too has a good heart. Such small and meaningful instances bring the completely different animals together, even in difficult times! Throughout the sequels, it’s a delight to see the animals bond with each other, support and help each other :). Similarly in the movie ‘Over the hedge’, the animals that come together with the raccoon, realise that the raccoon had been using them to fetch food to feed the bear and desert him. But the raccoon shows that it too has a good heart and faces the bear by being truthful to him and honest to his friends.

Kung Fu Panda is yet another excellent movie series :) it’s funny and interesting to see how a Panda, chosen as the dragon warrior is a complete fatso, unfit to learn Kung Fu in the perspective of the Five’s and Master Shifu, challenges their thinking and proves to be The Dragon Warrior. It’s funny how Po sees solutions to his problems in his own perspective. When the dragon scroll turns out to be empty, he understand what it means and figures out that the secret to being the best is being yourself! It’s interesting to see how Master Shifu trains Po using his eating habit and sees that Po is able to learn Kung Fu and eventually takes on Tai Lung. This movie taught me that to be the best you need not be of any particular type! Anyone can break barriers and stereotypes with the right attitude and desire to be the best! :)  

The movie ‘Mathilda’ also taught me that being treated and considered different is not a bad opinion about you. It’s just how people see you and their perspective and judgment about you need not be the ultimate test of your personality. Each individual is different and there is a place for everyone in this world. People who think otherwise will understand the truth eventually. But it is indeed sad to see that being ‘different’ is seen as ‘abnormal’ until something really phenomenal happens. It makes me want to question what is ‘Normal’ itself and I realise that normal to me is not normal to someone else! By the way, Mathilda is a hilarious, insightful and a lovely movie to watch!

The anime movies from Japan have been my favourite for a while. It made me fall in love with Japanese culture and one of my greatest desires is to settle down in a village in japan, teaching school children and leading a rustic life :). My love for the culture is to such an extent that I am longing to get a Japanese word, that’s close to my heart, tattooed on my arm! Movies like My neighbor Totoro, Kiki’s delivery service, Grave of the fireflies, From up on the poppy hill, Spirited Away, Laputa Castle in the sky, Howl’s moving castle and Whisper of the heart have been my favourite movies. The children in the movie are extremely mature for their age and there is so much to learn from them as they take such mature decisions and do things that defend themselves and their families. It’s intriguing for me to see children portraying such strong characters. I have learnt so much from these movies and they have always been close to my heart :)

I save the oldest for the last. Harry Potter has been especially close to my heart not just because of the characters and the wonderful storyline, but because of the important lessons of life the movie teaches. The relationship between the three friends is shown in such a natural way, changing as they grow, with different emotions changing in time, but the underlying concern and the connection is never lost among the three friends. 

The most meaningful of friendships is one when the other person does not have to pretend or try hard to retain your friendship or please you. True friends will stay, no matter how bad the circumstances in your life are and can tolerate and understand you at your worst! Harry Potter taught me that with the support of people who truly love you, you can take on the world’s toughest challenges. I strongly feel that Harry, isolated from his supporting characters would not be as great as he is, no matter what the prophecy said about him, about killing Voldemort. He would have never killed Voldemort, without the sacrifice of his parents, the advice of Dumbledore, the protection of Snape, the timely help of his friends and Hagrid in his tough times.

There is so much to learn and understand by just looking carefully around us. Animation movies are for people of all age groups and according to me, adults should definitely watch them because in the course of living this challenging life, people become harsh and tough and train themselves and people around them to be tougher everyday. These movies remind us that we do not have to be tough or  a fighter to face life's challenges. As  L R Knost says 'It's not our job to toughen our children up to face a cruel and heartless world. It's our job to raise children who will make the world a little less cruel! :) Do enjoy these movies yourself or with children around you. I have anyways planned to watch these movies with my own children in future and relive the memories and lessons that I had learnt when I watched them. It will also be interesting to hear what children have to say about these movies! :)

Too much 'fake'ness around!

This is a set of thoughts that came to me on an extremely frustrating day, when I could do nothing but to write this to get the frustration out of me. The text is as good as I wrote it the first time. I initially thought of making it into an article, but the value of it would be lost, I felt.. Not sure how people will take it! Here goes..

"This world of money has no space for being human (being bored, hungry, upset, emotional, happy, cheerful, angry, sick, frustrated). It turns you into a machine, which operates on commands by some external source. You ultimately become a machine, no matter how hard you resist becoming it. It is always easier to go in the direction of flow of events in life. But what kind of flow is it which allows humans to become machines? This is an inhuman world for people who function from their hearts, who are true to themselves and never cheat, betray, harm or hurt their own selves. You ultimately have to put on a mask and live this life of self-betrayal, which is the worst thing that can happen to someone!

You have to smile when you are upset; control your feelings when there is a neutral situation; control your tears when all you can do is curl in your bed and cry all day!  What freedom are we talking about here? This is a world which won’t let you be yourself. It is going to mold you into something you would not have even imagined being! It’s not easy to escape from this trap! There has to be a constant effort to fit into the space available. Otherwise this world of competition, betrayal, lack of humanity, mercilessly casts you out! The best part is you have nowhere to go and you are always part of this dirty filthy game!"

My obsession with Batman decoded!!

Surprising to find a girl being obsessed about Batman and being crazy enough to go to the extent of writing a lengthy blog post about it? I have got this reaction pretty much from every guy friend of mine when I told them how much I love Batman! Why Batman? How can girls ever like superhero movies you ask is it?

Well, is Batman like any other super hero you have seen it? I think not, as he is believable, unlike the other superheroes! He is the only superhero with no weird special powers, and that is the most special thing about him! His strength is his will power, the courage to stand against wrong and to give whatever it takes to help people, even if it means tarnishing his own image! I only wish he was real! Batman is one of the best things that ever happened to me, so just praising this character and movie won't help!

I wish to describe through this blog post, how Batman is relevant to each of us in our lives, how much we can learn from him and how much I am inspired by him! Christopher Nolan created a masterpiece character out of him and has taken the character to such great heights; yet he is one of us! A silent guardian, a watchful protector, The Dark Knight, as Gordon puts it! Am I crazy, you ask? Of course! :P

He is believable and inspiring. He has something to teach each one of us

Batman was not born great. It took a lot of loss and pain to build himself to become the Batman. He passes through a phase of darkness in his life and turns it his strength. He shows us that pain is not a weakness, nor is compassion. He shows that sometimes to do the right things, one need to take extreme steps, to come out of their comfort zone and explore the world by themselves. Superheroes are not ones who can fly, who can weave webs and all of that nonsense! People become extraordinary, I mean superheroes, by their choices and actions and not fake special powers! Batman stays in our minds because the path he travels is similar to the paths that each one of us might have time at some point of our lives. Hence you can relate to him!

He gets along with criminals and law breakers, but never really becomes one of them. He turns against his own mentor, when he disagrees with his ideology! He teaches us never to betray our conscience! He teaches us to do the right thing, even if it means sacrificing our own selves! He has overcome fear of his own life, but fears for the safety of his loved ones! He has sacrificed his life so much to his goal that he says "I am what the people want me to be”. He is much more than just a favourite superhero to me! There is just so much to learn from him, the deeper we look into him!

Why would Batman be special only because he beats up a few people and jumps buildings? He is different from the rest as he is not shown as someone impractical! His journey to victory is filled with challenges and hurdles. He is not a hero. He is a reflection of each one of us, as just like he did, we might have traveled painful roads in our lives too. He stands out because of his choices and because his journey is so believable and filled with hurdles and how he overcomes them! Otherwise he would be another of the stupid useless superheroes, with so called super powers!

The remarkable journey of becoming Batman – How his choices define him

Bruce Wayne's first encounter with the bats and what his father says to him really intrigued me. 'Why do you think the bats attacked you? Because they were afraid of you! All creatures feel fear, especially the scary ones!' It was not just Bruce who felt fear, even the bats did! Are they bad just because they attacked him? Such a complicated thing said so easily! We only think of ourselves, how much others hurt us and how much they troubled us. But we never think why they behaved in a certain manner. We come to conclusions very easily. There is a lot of truth beyond our own emotions and struggle and one must leap one’s boundaries to understand the truth! We need to look beyond our own selves!

Bruce loses his parents, blames himself for their death and is in limbo. He is completely disconnected from the world. He then finds the killer of his parents and intends to kill him. Rachel takes him on a trip in her car and pushes Bruce to think beyond himself. 'Look beyond your own pain Bruce. This city is rotting. Falcone floods the streets with drugs and crime.. He prays on the desperate creating new Joe Chills, every day! Falcone may not have killed your parents but he is destroying everything that they stood for! Justice is about harmony, revenge is about making yourself feel good'. She pushes him to see the fact that he needs to think beyond himself, at the larger scheme of things, because we are always a part of something large. Our actions influence so many people in the society and on the other hand, we are influenced by the things happening in the society. There won't be any difference from that guy who killed his parents and him! He would have chosen to become someone who is the reason for his anger.

By the way, how can I forget Alfred, Fox and Gordon of course? Three great stalwart actors and brilliant supporting characters! Would Batman really succeed without the support of these people? Here too, he shows how humble he is! He needs Alfred as a fatherly figure and Fox and Gordon to support him. No matter Bruce has become the Batman, Alfred continues to guide him and support him and show him the right path, sometimes, even pushes him to see things that he has failed to see! We all need to not forget that someone should always be there to challenge us, to guide us and to contradict us. Because the challenges they throw at us, helps us build ourselves and Batman demonstrates this excellently!

Ra’s Al Ghul and Joker – How he stands out defeating them

Ra’s Al Ghul:

Bruce denounces his royal life, becomes a recluse and meets Ra's Al Ghul, who inspires him to join the league of shadows and Bruce seeks to learn the means to fight injustice. Bruce comes in search of Ra’s after a tiring mountain trek, but Ra's attacks him and beats him up. He says that life does not wait for you to be ready for a battle. Life does not wait for us to be ready to face a challenge. One needs to come out of their comfort zone to live life. It just throws a challenge at you and what you do with it is completely up to you. To be beaten by the challenge or to rise beyond it is completely your choice. The choice is all that matters!

Ra's helps Bruce to better understand his past. He says that if only the people that we love did not exist in our lives, so we would be spared the pain that we have to go through! He explains who was actually responsible for his parents’ death. 'It was not your fault that your parents died! It was your father's! He failed to act. The man had a gun! Would that stop you? I have had training! The training is nothing. Will is everything!' Excellently put. Don't need to explain anything in this case I guess!

Bruce has completed his training and he needs to demonstrate his commitment to justice. He needs to behead a farmer who has snatched his neighbor's land by dubious means. He refuses. 'I cannot do it. This man needs to be tried! Ra’s says, ‘By whom? Corrupt bureaucrats?’ I will fight injustice but I will not become an executioner! Ra’s says ‘Your compassion will not help you.’ ‘That's why it is so important, it separates us from them'. Bruce burns the house down, saves Ra's and leaves. He teaches us never to forget to question. Never accept anything, as long as it agrees with your own reasoning, as said by Buddha. Your choices and actions define you. What you think, you become, as said by Buddha!

The time comes when he has to be face to face with his own mentor! Ra's Al Ghul is determined to destroy Gotham and Batman opposes him. Ra's says to Batman "You were my best student ever! It’s you who should be standing next to me and supporting me. Batman says I stand where I belong, I stand against you. The league of shadows is nothing but a gang of psychopaths with misguided ideology" He teaches us never to forget who we are, never to accept anything that does not agree with our own conscience and never to give up on the people that put their trust in us!

I should not forget to credit Ra's because, if he did not challenge Batman, he would have not become a legend today! Ra's guided him, challenged him, hurt him, taught him and stood against him but Batman stands out because he challenged his own mentor to do what is right. He proves to us once again that it is our choices that define us.

The Joker – An extraordinarily brilliant performance by Heath Ledger!

The Dark Knight is challenging again! Well by now we all know how great Batman is, how much he inspired us, how much he taught us, blah blah blah... Excuse me, make way ladies and gentlemen, THE JOKER is here to make noise! WHY SO SERIOUS!!!! What a brilliant character Nolan created! Joker is the best villain among all of the ones that Batman has ever encountered. He is the real challenge to Batman, according to me!

When Bruce is trying to understand about Joker, Alfred saying something excellent! “Some men do not want anything logical like money! Some men just wanna watch the world burn!” Joker's playing card is to bring out the worst in human and expose what humans really are! He believes that there is bad hidden deep down within us and all it takes is just 'One bad day' even for the sanest man to turn evil! He believes humans are so predictable and their actions are always selfish at the end of the day! Is he true? Batman proves him wrong!

The Dark Knight is of course a crisp and fast paced chase between Batman and the Joker. Batman literally has no time to breathe! The Joker creates hell everywhere and leaves people sleepless! Each of joker’s dialogues is worth tattooing on our bodies! I swear, I mean what I say!  He creates mayhem, turns people against each other and tries to prove that there is bad hidden in everyone and people all show their true colours in the most trying of times. His ultimate master stroke was the creation of Two-Face out of a sincere Harvey Dent. Batman takes the blame for the murder of Dent and ultimately outruns Joker. He claims the responsibility for all that Two-Face Harvey has done and become a recluse. Again, his choice demonstrates his commitment to his responsibility. And Joker finally says, ‘You truly are incorruptible!’

Review of the Batman Trilogy

I watched the batman trilogy movies much after it released. People had watched the movie, had gone gaga over it and the fire of enthusiasm had died out. I watched batman movies when I was just in the right state of mind to understand the philosophy of the movies and appreciate it. Batman shows us that justice is more that revenge. Batman Begins registers as a serious movie, a successful adaptation of a comic character in the real world and touches fans, not just entertainment wise but through its ideology and strong characters and their difficult journey to truth! This movie lays the foundation to the two sequels. Without having developed the character philosophically and deeply rooting the ideological stance and making him believable, it would have been impossible to gain momentum in the next two movies. This movie was indeed brilliant!

The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight rises leave their own mark amongst fans as the characters give life to the plot and Batman is simply not boosted as any other superhero! He has to prove himself over and over, in the face of challenge, pain, loss, betrayal and defeat! He stands up and fights no matter to what extent his enemies try to break him. Similarly in The Dark Knight Rises, he is broken deep in his bones, but he still manages to build himself, takes the ultimate leap of faith, stands up against Bane, sacrificing his own life to save the lives of the people of the city from a major nuclear explosion and saves the day! Out of the three movies, The Dark Knight is the best since Batman is truly challenged; his ideals questioned and put to the ultimate test. Joker almost tries to bring down Batman, but fails towards the end!

I have had so much to learn and connect to from all of the three movies. I still watch the movies when I find time with the same enthusiasm. Words are not enough to describe Batman if you ask me; I only wish he was real! Dear Batman, thank you! You showed us that the world needs people like you! Thank you Christopher Nolan for giving us an idol who I will always look up to and creating three extraordinary movies (along with your other great works like Inception, The Prestige and Interstellar of course). Thank you Hans Zimmer for the extraordinary music composition that brought the characters much closer to us! Seriously, thanks to the creators of Batman! You created something extraordinary and Nolan made it larger than life and took the character to such great heights! Hats off! J

My conversations with a working child

I pass by Gandhi Bazaar[1], a busy area bustling with flower sellers, people selling food on pushcarts and roadside stalls, small fruits and vegetable vendors and lots of shops, filled with people, almost all the time. Occasionally, I buy flowers from a little girl, who is engrossed in stringing the jasmine flowers and sells it to people in a small bamboo basket. I have seen a lot of children in this area, helping their mothers string the flowers, while also tending to their young ones. Sometimes during the winters, it is a really sad sight to see the children unclothed and fast asleep or playing in a corner near the mother while she sold the flowers!

For a while, the flower sellers association had restricted the selling of flowers from small vendors as they sold at a cheaper price and this was affecting the business of other medium and large scale vendors in Gandhi Bazaar. This led to the disappearance of many of these small vendors over a period of time. However, despite the rule, I usually see this one girl (never asked her name), seated in a corner where I usually pass by, where she strings these flowers and sell them to people at a mere Rs. 10 per meter of flowers. I buy flowers from her and don’t miss an opportunity to have a little chat with her, when she is free. She is a sweet girl and is quite good with how she interacts with people!

She speaks Tamil and I have managed to have some conversation with her in my broken Tamil. Upon speaking to her a couple of times, I learnt that she knew Kannada. I once asked her which school she went to and how she performed in her exams. She said’ “I go to school just a kilometer away from here. I study in 8^th standard. I did well in my exams, akka[2]!” When I asked her about her examination results, she said, “I passed, akka!”

Recently I spoke to her again and asked her why she didn’t sell roses, along with the stringed jasmine, because that’s usually the practice of flower vendors in the markets in Gandhi Bazaar. This is what she said to me, “Gandhi Bazaar people don’t allow me to do this. I am somehow managing to do this. How can I leave this akka? I make at least Rs. 1000 everyday. If I sit at home, it is so boring. At least I can spend time doing this!” The child’s maturity was really amazing! She was fearless and spoke to me very confidently when she said that. She seemed really happy with the work that she was doing and made money, and helped her family.

Children work for reasons best known to them. It is really easy to comment as an outsider that children should not work and be in school. I am not sure if she was honest with me about going to school, but why should she be? Who am I to question the choice of the girl, without understanding why she made the choice of working? The girl probably comes across all kinds of people who tell her different things. Some people question why she works, telling her not to work and go to school; or worse, scare her that the police might come and take her away; some people just don’t care and there are others like me, who want to probe her to increase their understanding of why children work. Despite all this, she still continues to work! Have we ever wondered why she works, before saying that she should not work?

I have learnt that child labour is not an independent problem in itself. It arises from a set of conditions that necessitate its inception. Child labour is the result of poverty, which is the result of adaptation of skewed ideas of development, being influenced by the Western notion of development. Without having addressed the root causes that give rise to the problem, we cannot hope to solve the problem of child labour. The solution to child labour begins with a deep analysis of the problem. Without having understood the complexities of the problems, the solutions that are devised to address the issue will not work.

The dominant reaction to this situation is, guess what? Raid and rescue the child, because we think that the child should not be working and that the child should be in school. But did we think once, before we passed our judgments on what the child should or should not be doing, what the child has to say in this case? Did we even begin with thinking if it really does any good to the girl? From my experience in working with CWC[3] and talking to working children, I know that the raid and rescue approach has not worked with working children because the way it has worked so far has only managed to traumatize children and push them into far more worse conditions that they were in before being raided and rescued! Do we really think about the problem and solution before we agree and sign up for it?

So coming back to the example of the child, what would have happened to the child, if she were to be raided and rescued? The child would be traumatized and punished for trying to help her family and because she liked doing it and earn a little money from it. Did the child need someone to come and ‘raid and rescue’ her? Without understanding the reason behind the choice made by the child, how can we impose our ideas on the child? And while we did that, say with a good intention to help the child, did we care enough to understand that if it will really help the child? One need to ask these questions to oneself before saying children should not work, children should be in schools, and working children should be raided and rescued and so on because even with a good intention, one can harm the best interests of the child. So before taking any decisions for a working child, we need to consider what the child might have to say for him/herself because it is critical if one considers helping a working child.

When we intend to help others, the basic ethic should be to listen to others and understand best in their words, how they would like to be helped. Judgmental attitude is a barrier, through which a lot of essential information is lost, which prevents us from effectively understanding a situation and acting upon it, in order to help and support someone. Listening to the children simply does not mean listening to them, but to understand what they say, what it tells about them and what kind of support they might require. So the next time you see a child working, think about what might happen if you do something that takes away the rights of the child, is detrimental to the best interest of the child and think, question and find out if what you are doing really puts the child in a better off position.  

‪#‎workingchildren are NOT the problem but part of the solution. They must participate in the ‪#‎childlabour debate. Let us not be ‪#‎antichild!

To understand the nuances of the child labour debate, please follow the campaign:

http://www.concernedforworkingchildren.org/news/2015/05/are-you-antichildlabour-or-antichild/

http://www.concernedforworkingchildren.org/publications/newsletters/cwc-newsletter-issue-05-june-2015/

https://www.facebook.com/workingchildren?ref=tn_tnmn

https://twitter.com/workingchildren

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[1] Gandhi Bazaar is a commercial area in Bangalore South.

[2] Akka is a word is Kannada used to address one’s elder sister, or used for older women, with affection.

[3] The Concerned for Working Children (CWC) is a not-for-profit secular, democratic development agency based in Bengaluru, India. It works on the issue of working children and their needs, children’s rights, particularly children’s right to self determination.