Go to Kathalaya, Bangalore to hear stories and to learn how to tell stories.
By
P.R.Ramachander
All of you must be
knowing how simple is to teach children by telling them stories.Once upon a
time it was a job of Grandpa and
Grandma to tell stories , because
they did not have any job to do
.Much much before the world knew about
art of story telling , India knew it. In fact
one of the greatest collection of folk stories of the world called “Brihat Katha Manjari” (The huge bouquet
of stories) “ was written in a language
called Paisachi , which existed
prior to Sanskrit . You all know how
India kept the lamp of her
religion burning bright through story telling –The story of Rama,
The story of Krishna, The Story of the
goddess and so on,. When majority of Indians did not know how to read Sanskrit
, a group of minstrels called
Hari Katha exponents roamed all over the country telling these stories
to the common people in the common language. Yes, the art of story
telling still exists in India but a time has come when we are not able
to attract modern children and lads and lasses by following the traditional method. So there
came a need for a group of expert story tellers with sophistication,.Kathalaya
(the home of the stories) grew out of
that need. Smt.Geetha Ramanujam nurtured
the story telling plant called Kathalaya. Now it has grown in to a huge
banyan tree with several branches as
there was a need for such a tree.
Kathalaya realized that it cannot go to all places to tell stories and train people. So just
like teaching the art of growing
food is better than direct supply of food to people,
Kathalaya started training people to tell stories. I understand 70,000 opeople have been trained. Here is a Small
poem that I wrote about them:-
Once upon a time
in the state of Magadha,
There were five princes
who were fools ,
And the king wanted
them to be made wise,
In a period of
six months sharp.
A great wise man undertook that job
,
And told the
five princes within that six
months,
Five stories
which encapsulated lot of wisdom,
And at the end of
that period , those princes wise.
Are there any such great tellers
great ,
Still in our
country vast and great ,
Who would be able
to make all of us ,
AS wise as those
princes of yore.
Yes , there is in
this city of Bangalore,
And she runs Kathalaya-the home of stories,
She was once upon
a time teaching school kids ,
And she found
that the best way to teach kids,
Was to tell
them a story so that
they understand.
Once she told , Hey children learn lot of lingua ,
And they did not understand and were staring at her,
She told them how
when her kittens were attacked,
By a fierce dog, the cat barked and chased him away and they understood
She started
telling them stories to teach
science,
She made the difficult maths easy through stories,
And all the
kids who came to know
her,
Felt at ease to
learn everything to stories.
Knowing that she
alone cannot transfer knowledge ,
To each and every one
, by telling them stories,
She started teaching
lots and lots of people ,
How to
transfer knowledge to others
through stories.
All the world
sent their teachers to get ,
Trained under
her so that
the struggle,
They used to have
to train every one ,
Became easy
through story telling.
The Banyan tree
of the “Home of stories”,
Grew every
where by striking roots ,
In Very many countries of the world,
And awards and
recognition for it grew
This
organization is in Bangalore . So you can always send your children to heat their stories or even get trained by that
Institution. You can contact them in Bangalore:-
88 , BHBCS Layout
2nd Cross, 3rd Main
Banerghatta Road, Bengaluru
Karnataka 560076
Call us: +91-80 2668 9856/ +91-8277389840
E-mail: kathalaya@gmail.com
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