Project Day 2007
Project day 2007 was held on 6/11/2007 at Mylapore Fine Arts Auditorium. Rasa’s 3 centres presented performances of Theatre structured around the theme "Satyameva Jayate – Truth alone Triumphs".

The three centre heads share their experience of working on Project day 2007

Abhiramapuram Branch
By Usha Shankaran
Project Day at Rasa is a very important event for all of us. This year also, like the previous year, a theme was chosen and given by our Director. It was “Satyameva Jayate” which means ‘Truth alone Triumphs’.

One fine morning the Abhiramapuram team sat together for a brain storming session. All the enthusiastic members came up with a lot of story ideas. There were some which were rejected because it was’nt applicable to the theme. Finally, the seed for the story was sown by one of our members & from there we took off Contributions were plenty from everyone and the story was born.

The team immediately started on the dialogues. It took us almost 2 hours but the rough script was ready for us to begin with. Roles were allotted, with of course, provision for change, teams were assigned for costumes & props. After the holidays when the school reopened, the first class was only an experiential session where the students had an interactive session, about the story and the value behind the story. It was told in simple terms for them to understand & there were contribution from the students regarding the theme.

Practice session started. One staff member penned the lyrics & we had to set it to tune. Once the practice sessions started we realized that a lot of changes had to be made in the original script to suit the needs of the students.

Slowly the whole drama began to shape up. Of course, we had to contend with absenteeism and the weather which continued to play truant & gave us a lot of sleepless nights.

By the end of the first week, we knew, where we were heading, students were more confident, & were enjoying the experience.

Of course, as usual some of the students had to multi task as a few students were absent.

It was absolutely marvellous to see the students take to their roles like fish to water.

Everything was in place, & ‘D’ Day was fast approaching. Now all we had to do was pray to the Almighty for his divine blessings to make the programme a successful one.

Mehta Nagar Branch
By Anitha Mohan
Our core team comprises of our centre head Niveditha, Mala, Amali, Ahil & Anita. When the theme for the project day was announced, it was a frantic search for an ideal story line. We settled for a beautiful Jataka Tale, later we finalized the cast & the major elements that went into the presentation.

We are lucky to have very talented Vaishnavi Poorna to score the music, sing & give the sound effects. Our own creative writer Valli has done the lyrics, script and the dialogues. We also have Mekala a wonderful artist helping us with this presentation. Our helpers have whole heartedly supported our endeavour.

Last but not the least, our special performers, put up with all the frenzy & all the changes we made from time to time.

The celebration has begun we are looking forward to the Project Day.

Mandavei Branch
Experience of working for the project day - 2007 by Shanthi Paul
November 6th was the planned date for the project day. 'The Triumph of Truth' was the given theme around which the story had to be woven. A simple and traditional story was chosen and adapted so that all the 28 students of the Mandaveli branch will have their own special role to play in the drama. There was so much to do; script to be written, songs to be learnt, props and sets to be made and costumes to be organized. All in 12 short working days. To say that the Rasa team was as busy as bees in a bee hive is and understatement. As the story took shape there was this feeling of joy and fulfillment among all the staff and helpers

The presentation is not only about the 'Triumph of Truth' but also about the 'Triumph of Team work', the co-ordinated effort put in by the students, staff, volunteers and the helpers of Rasa which made this play possible