daily accounts- | by Saugat Datta - revised January 29, 2004 |

Closing Ceremony: missed out on the people’s march downtown to Azad Maidan for the closing ceremony. Earlier that day I was documenting Medha Patkar in her third day of sit in front of the office of the Chief Minister of Maharastra. Ignorance about the forum on average Mumbaikers face made me feel like part of some exotic circus troupe. Desperate need to get back to my crew and to watch the closing ceremony overtook me. My mind was swirling with more contradictions when all I wanted to do was run around the Azad Maidan with a propaganda flag, flying it as high I could.

Apart from starting the day with the newspaper’s juicy accounts of the South African case bringing everybody back from Utopia, musicians kept another World’s evening alive with their vision of future. My healing started with the sight of flags flying high, amalgamation of noises from different parts of the world into a harmony and various visual delight of the mass with all the hues. Cultural Minister of Brazil and Grammy award winner, Mr. Gilberto Gil, kept my tears following as I watched him from the backstage against the masses. Following were two mind boggling West African musicians in their traditional outfit, gear and songs. The reason for my exclusive backstage entry was the last band of the evening ‘Indian Ocean’, friends of mine from New Delhi.

With couple of beers to top off the night, we all saw the sun set in another World, yet I still feel in the dark without content on my perspective or with no perspective at all.
Why was the WSF 2004 contained?
Did anybody realize each other and the festival of oppressed?
Did the ways of another world get to each and everyone when it couldn’t get outside the WSF gate to the rest of Mumbai?
A showcase of the deprived . . .
series of adjectives to pump the adrenalin . . .
do we still have time?

Honestly, World! If you are out there, tell me. I want to know; or should I join ranks with the taxi and auto drivers of Goregaon Station (east) and say “can this happen every year in Goregaon?”