Today we celebrated Easter Sunday at St Mary's Cathedral.

Otherwise, it's been a muddle of a week. Lots of work again. And a big blitz of old electronics, as some students at university are organizing a collection (which is great, because it's pretty hard to know what to do with this stuff).

Plus preparations for journeys. "Last coffee before..." "Last strange blue drink before..." (The latter was supposedly a soda gembira, but we've never seen one that colour...)



Oh, and worries about nuclear war. That's different...

There's been cake, from various regular suppliers. And a chapatti breakfast from Sangeetha.

And a movie and a concert.

Gattu was the movie (another Speedy videos acquisition). It's about a poverty-stricken young Indian kite-fanatic who needs to put his wits to work to fulfil his dream of knocking out the big black kite that's been terrorizing the neighbourhood. As this review suggests: "[T]he film is admirable in the way it presents poverty, child labor and the ugly side of life within a basically joyous, upbeat story, making it educational without being shocking. The school song, for instance, fervently sung by the principal and children, celebrates India as a paradise, but the director feels no compunction about showing such locations as a junkyard, a garbage dump and a public toilet."

There's a similar observation here: "Gattu's days are spent amidst trash and flies, but the film's beauty is that it doesn't ask us to pity him. Instead Khosa celebrates his chutzpah and ambition. Like the kites he loves, Gattu soars."

The concert, by our beloved MPO, featured a Haydn symphony and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben (A Hero's Life). As the programme notes suggest, it's a piece full of "opulent sounds, glowing orchestration, huge climaxes, enormous energy and a veritable kaleidoscope of tonal colours". Strauss wrote this at the age of 34. And it features the composer himself, in the role of the hero, mocking his critics, riding out to battle, and contemplating his achievements, always supported by his lyrical (and apparently dominating) wife (the solo violin part). Musically, it's quite an experience. Humanly, I guess it's a little arrogant. Or was the composer laughing at himself?

Much later in life Strauss headed into far murkier waters, as he tried to negotiate being a musician under Hitler. I wonder if he looked back, and thought, "Back then, I knew nothing about what heroism might require".