It was dark. The beginning. They were dark. The images. And in the darkness a dark voice rumbled some ostensibly good poetry with a dark sense of poignancy. And in the dark a stand up audience turned 360 degrees to get quarterly glimpses of images that promised to show visions of a forgotten Hyderabad but instead delivered a dark monotone of predictable locations.

The unveiling of the photographs was an innovative re-introduction to Hyderabad audiences. Never since the original audio visual inauguration of MF Husain’s exhibition at Cinema Ghar (with a lively script by Dr. PM Bhargava, voices by Chandana Chakraborthi and Vijay Marur,lights and sound by Zak and Proxy) has this been attempted. But Cinema Ghar had levels…it had a walk around feel and it had the charisma of the maestro in the lead. And it had a wall full of Husains. So kudos to Goethe Zentrum for having tried out a departure from lamp lighting inaugurals but…

The one thing that the images managed to convey was the timelessness of the city, its topographical facets and its monumental dimensions. But the major dependence on enhanced cloud formations and extra wide lensing left one wondering if memories should indeed be so lifeless, and the triggers so melancholy.

I chose to partake of the orange juice served instead of the wine because I was scared that a hangover from the visual impact of the exhibition may land up making me feel maudlin if wine assisted, and then with a cheer in my step, I bounced off to Lamakaan.

Nikhil Heerekar’s Beer, Smoke and a Lovely Tale

was a collection of three skits, put up with the least fuss in a simple setting. Emboldened by the Lamakaan samosa neemboo paani combination we settled down for an hour long glimpse of some unabashed fun. The scripts were nice, the enactments fairly good…though voice projection could have been improved upon. While Nikhil and Krishna were good, the girl who stole the show was Namita of the gorgeous smile. Inspite of being constricted into playing the role of a beer can chick she let her smile take centre stage and brought the evening to life.

But was it a heady glass of beer? No, it was a refreshing glass of neemboo paani. And it is as good a cure for depression as any…