Singapore Writers Festival - 2013

The much awaited event of the year SWF-2013 was concluded on Nov 10 after a week full of so many wonderful events. I applied to volunteer for SWF some months before, i was bit worried because last time they had rejected my application. But this year i was selected and i was really happy. I was assigned as a room manager for Tamil events. Before going to the event location, i saw a Indian woman with saree , i was thinking i have seen her somewhere ,yes , it was writer Salma , whom i'm following in Facebook for a long time. I went and spoke to her , she was very polite and asked about my life in Singapore and gave me autograph.

Salma

Nov 9 : My first day of volunteering . I was posted at National Museum of Singapore (NMS). NMS is a beautiful building. I have been to this place many times before but this time it was bit crowded as expected. The event was "Literary Styles and Innovation / இலக்கிய வடிவமும் புத்தாக்கமும் " ,the authors participated were Imayam, Salma and JM Sali.  I was very excited to see writer Imayam, when he spoke , his voice was stern and honest - not hiding his feelings. The authors explained their source of inspiration for their books.

The second event of my day was "Evolution: Women;s Voices in Tamil Literature / பரிணாம வளர்ச்சி - தமிழ் இலக்கியத்தில் பெண்களின் குரல் " . The authors on the panel were Kamaladevi Aravindan, Suriya Rethnna and Salma. The writers talked about how they worked their way up to write stories.Writer Salma's story was interesting . I did not understand much of writer Suriya Rethnna's speech. The moderator was not good , she was just listening.

Imayam

The third event was " Meet the Author : Imayam / எழுத்தாளர் சந்திப்பு : இமையம் " . It was an one to one session with writer Imayam. The writer started his biography telling major events of his life and how he started writing his stories. Very interesting because all his stories are inspired by the real life characters . According to him , if a writer is not writing from his life then its no use. Again the moderator was not good , he did not know the details of the author and he did not initiated any questions, he was just another participant.Shame , he would have asked so many questions related to the recurring themes in Imayam's book etc.. After the session, i spoke to Imayam, he was very polite and i got his signature. For all the other events i did not go inside the room.

Nov 10: Only one event to volunteer and  that was the final Tamil event of SWF 2013.  It was held at National Library Board (NLB) @ queens street. "SWF 2013 Literary Pioneer: Memories of G Sarangapany /  இலக்கிய முன்னோடி : தமிழவேள் கோ.சா. நினைவலைகள் " .  I was the only volunteer for the event so i was posted outside and given the job of checking tickets and guiding the guests. I got a chance to meet many Singapore Tamil writers , many of them i never heard of but got to know through the venue manager.

My other volunteering colleagues were students and some are Tamil Literature students.Very excited to talk to them about Tamil books but unfortunately most of them did not recognize the writers i mentioned like S.Ramakrishnan, Vannanilavan, Jeyamohan , even Sujatha .Heartbroken i stopped asking them about writer and books. But i liked the way they conversed in Tamil , i felt ashamed of my Tamil.

Overall a great experience.