Author Archives: Dashachka

Passion. It does have a place in the hierarchy of life.

I’m used to separating passion with things I must do. There’s  debt I must repay, and that is something I have to do. Everything else is just details. Things are rarely that simple. Even subconsciously we strive towards the things we fever for. It takes effort and a step beyond ourselves to realize that.

I won’t claim that the Community Service Project made a huge change in my persona, but it has dawned realization. Though the extent to which I utilized the expertise and staff is questionable, the knowledge that they were there was undoubtedly comforting. it’s a sort of a safety net that we’d all like to have. A safe button before the big bad boss.

With a hint of whimsy, I will claim the honors study lounge a support center that I’ve utilized.  The haven just beyond the intrepid staircase of the harrowing steps. Yes I’m making it as blunt as paper that I’ve  graciously tripped many many times. The twin tables that hold the commerce of knowledge. The glass opening to the story of the lone anemic tree and the fire escape ladder whose steps look safer than the intrepid staircase of the harrowing steps. These are the stipulations one must face when  utilizing the honors study lounge.

Though the stipulations seem daunting, the bounty is plentiful, Having a variety of beautiful minds in one room creates the cynosure of student life. I will take a moment to describe a personal pet peeve of mine. The saying, ” all great minds think alike.” It makes me implode. Majority does not imply perfection. Yet we ask ourselves where peer pressure begins.  Back to the cynosure. It’s a source of knowledge, discovery, and dallying. All aspects an idealist champion can splendor.

As I’ve mentioned before, looking to the future is not a talent I’ve mastered. Too many possibilities. Too many expectations. As organized and structured as i can attempt to be, I will always and undoubtedly fail. Whether that’s a hinderance or an opportunity is another question. I find solace in the realm of the unknown. Naive for sure, but I see endless opportunity. I will put the knowledge of these resources in my survival pack.

I will also include a can of passion in that survival pack. It’ll serve as an epitaph to the one that came before the idealistic champion. Through my participation in the project, I’ve discovered that passion finds us consciously and subconsciously .Partnerships for Parks started out as a plea for manual labor, but it uprooted a distant memories. I will avoid personal sentiments and focus on the park where I thrived as a child. It was a terrain that held adventure and mystery. In going from where the sun ross to where it set meant going from the the top created from gravel to the watery bottom that nearly claimed an idealistic champion. Let’s quiet the memories and decipher what they mean. The park that alongside my parents raised me left a seed of appreciation in me. Parks are a neutral ground. Take Madison Square Park for instance. The benches are shared by the suits and the parents, the young and the old, the financially fit and the not so very. It’s a modern garden of eden where a deep breath and a tilt of the neck can do wonders. I lost the passion in the requirements for education, but am slowly embracing them once more.

A to fin, food for thought to indulge.

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself

Leo Tolstoy

I have not found my role. To make a whimsical reference to theater, I am auditioning. I know what is expected of me. I have the script. I have yet to make it my own. It’s a hurdle.  It’s a mix of little eccentricities that create the perfect storm.  Everyone takes change differently, and I apparently don’t do well at all.

According to the Myer Briggs personality assessment, I am an ENFP. (Champion). Why would I take such a test? A test may come up once or twice in a lifetime, but I hear about it repeatedly. So I decide to succumb to coincidence and take the test. If you take anything away from this reading, please do remember that to confuse coincidence with fate or signs is to confuse flour with asbestos.  Don’t do it.

While I doubt the validity of the test, I can certainly go for the role of an idealist champion.  I’ll take the liberty to pat myself on the back and go as far as say that I have the gusto, the knack, and the pure Dariya-ness that is necessary for an idealist champion.  What it comes down to is execution. It’s easy to be a beautiful mind. Being able to think means nothing without contribution.  As the good ol’ Russian proverb goes, Аво́сь да как-нибу́дь до добра́ не доведу́т.

What will the idealist champion contribute? Joviality maybe. An interesting dinner conversation for sure. Something that will change the Baruch script as we know it? Maybe.  Too many questions and too many possibilities, which call for action! So stay tuned and take notes. This will be epic.

Take away the busybody stage, the glamorized costumes, the abundance of actors and whatever else makes Broadway the spectacle that it is.  Give me the talent of actors and that alone will grant you my utmost respect. Mahayana Landowne’s directing of Euripides’ “Medea” does just that.

The air holds to the audience with a chilling grip. The theater is big enough to hold a crowd but small enough so that the farthest row can connect with the spectacle. Though the pillar at the back of the stage is small, it sure does create the ambience of the good old days in Greece.  I might as well take some creative liberty to say that the pillar serves as a sort of metaphor.  The theater requires a sole pillar to create an unforgettable experience. That pillar relies on the connection between the audience and the actors.

Talk about a connection.  The actors move to and fro on the stage and in the rows. The audience has no choice but to turn right, left and move closer to the action.  There is no forgettable part in the play.  In fact, there are a few revelations about theater itself. For example, the chorus is as a vital as Medea and Jason. This detail doesn’t translate when reading the text alone. Somehow I didn’t recognize the chorus because of a preconceived notion that the chorus is there for musical enrichment. To witness the chorus interact with Medea rather than be in a group somewhere in the corner of the stage is to witness ingenuity at work.

Another new experience is seeing actors read directly from the text. At first it seems like there is no rehearsal involved, but through the performance the reason for this technique becomes clear. Because the actors read from the text, the performance is fresh. Rather than having to memorize the lines, the actors give the text a whole new enthusiasm that translates well with the audience.   There are times when the actor looks down and it appears that the rhythm might break.  These moments, however, are overcome by the simple realization that the patrons of the theater are captivated.  The audience wants the actors to progress. It isn’t like waiting for a crash at Nascar.

For me, details such as lighting, costumes, and scenery are distractions. I find that an imagination is a terrible thing to waste.  That’s why I appreciate the lack of distractions in the performance.  Light did not set the mood because it didn’t need to. The actors did just that. The somber yet simple attire keeps the attention on the actors. If their attire isn’t so simple it is hard to notice the change in sashes, which signifies a different character. The use of sashes is another technique that takes the viewer to way back when. The scenery is simple and minute. This is another detail that forces the audience to focus on the actors.

A point of controversy in the play is the use of masks to replace children.  I appreciate the replacement because children can be hard to deal with. I also believe that the audience connects with the children on a deeper level because they have to use their imaginations to create them. The audience can also choose to treat the masks as hollow objects. It all depends on how far one is willing to open to theater.

If all theater had these attributes, I might go once in a while for curiosity.  There’s no doubt that I’d recommend this production because it’s different (in a good way) from the common notion of theater.  Greece is as good of a place as any to start a patronage to the theater.  The actors know what they’re doing, and there’s comfort in that.  There are no distractions from what theater is supposed to be: a connection between the spectacle and the spectator.

Consider this a response to the blogs that I’ve read. This poem might not have great poetical elements but it was given to me by one of those amazing people that I mentioned in the previous blog. It helped him, and it helped me. Now I’m just passing the love along.

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will

When the road you’re trudging seems all up hill

When the funds are low, and the debts are high

And you want to smile, but you have to sign

When care is pressing you down a bit

Rest if you must, but don’t you quit

Life is strange, with its twists and turns

As everyone of us sometimes learns

And many a failure turns about

When they might have won, had they stuck it out

Don’t give up, though the pace seems slow

You might succeed with another blow

Often the goal is nearer than

It seems to a fain and faltering man

Often the struggler has given up

When they might have captured the Victor’s Cup

And they learned too late when the night slipped down

How close they were to the Golden Crown

Success is failure turned inside out

The silver tint of the clouds of doubt

And you never can tell how close you are

It may be near when it seems afar

So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit

It’s when things seem worse, that you mustn’t quit!

Author Unknown

Use this wisely.

Born: Almaty, Kazakhstan.

Favorite Movie: Ирония судьбы, или С лёгким паром! Translation? The Irony of Fate, or Enjoy Your Bath!

First Food Memory: Syrup Kasha.

Hair color:  Who knows? I haven’t since I was four.

Coolest Person I Haven’t Met Yet: Steven Jobs

Best Thing to Ever Happen to Television: Big Bang Theory

Ridiculous Fact: I get motion sickness from video games.

Soundtrack to My Life: The Killers- Spaceman. Please do ask why.

Since you’ve kept reading through my impersonal attempt at revealing the gritty details of who I am, I might as well quench your thirst for a tall glass of crazy .

I don’t recall answering the ever-dominant question,” who do you want to be when you grow up?” until I was required to write an essay about it for college. Still, even if I was asked the question at a naive age of four I’d probably ignore it. It’s ridiculous to think that there comes a moment in one’s life when the growing process stops. Sure physically maybe, but shrinking counts as growth in the opposite direction.

What would I measure success in? The people that surround me. Everyone who reads this blog entry already has brownie points for living in the mecca that is New York City. The people that can stand us are a representation of who we are.  I can say without bias that I’m surrounded by some amazing people. Guess that makes me kinda awesome.

It’s hard to list my expectations, hopes and concerns because I don’t like to look that far ahead. Taking it one day at a time works better for me.  Hopes can’t replace action. Concerns are distractions. Graduating and getting a job seems to be the obvious answer, but if I fall into a pattern of measuring my successes through a bank account and a fancy piece of paper then I might as well pick my poison.

I’d like to give an overview of the events that influenced my developing psyche. I’ve tried to go in-depth for an autobiography assignment. I left it as is on page sixteen. Now you might want to know the grizzly details for all of them but everything will come in time.

There’s the almost watery grave. A painful lesson in gravity. The great outdoors in a tiny backpack. A flight to Moscow. The case of the chairs and the snickers commercial. The final transition. The great discovery of the orange pumpkin. The Russian domination of an E.S.L class . The physical bout for honor and a hula-hoop.  An unfortunate series of events for an eagle.  The case of a missing pen and a mouth full of green.  The battle for what’s right and what’s redneck.  The redefinition of a social experiment. Mr. Gray and the bleak, bleak world. College Club Fight Now.

Each and every tittle has its own lucrative aspect. Some share in comedy. Others in…    Dramatic pause

All are little anatomical aspects that combine to make a Dasha.

Seems like I’ve still good your attention. Good. I’ve hit word number 500,which means I should wrap this expose up. I know how zenith feels.  I know how nadir feels. I appreciate both equally because they make life interesting. I get through each with equal gusto and leave them where they belong.

In conclusion, С лёгким паром!