This is what my friend Ravi Teja vedula wrote about me on my 26th Birthday. I never really took time to thank him or appreciate his efforts but I did understand that it's not easy being my friend. Happy to be a part of your life buddy. May God be crazy enough to keep this friendship intact for as long as we exist on this earth.
His Original title :
orey vedavaa....."oye, vasthunna"
Vamshi 'Krishna' Reddy....One of the very few people whose names were assigned almost perfectly to what they are. He remains to be one from whom lots of unexpected outcomes are seen:
A relief: During the initial days of my engineering at CBIT, I used to take RTC bus to reach college. However, my mother out of her worry managed to get a slot for me in the college bus where I had the chance to meet this IDIOT. Having said that, due to a consistent habit of waking up late in the morning, I many times missed the college bus due to which still took RTC bus to reach college. It was during these times when my immature character couldn't bare ragging from 'sirs' and 'madams.' Now I get a smile on my face thinking of the whole concept of gaining respect from 'juniors' by asking for one. Nevertheless, after the most adventurous task of getting rid of seniors, I used to look for someone to chat for relief. I don't remember if Vamshi was the one that I ended up speaking mostly with during these times. But whenever I (successfully) took the college bus, I used to look for a seat available next to him. Of course, used to get annoyed many times when I didn't find the window seat and lot more times when he used to wear his headphones all the time. Irrespective of whether we talked in the bus or not, I used to go to canteen during break time to see if I can find him there. Many times I ate breakfast twice (first one at home) as he mostly had his breakfast in the canteen.....Now this sounds too cinematic right! Well, sometimes to eat along with him and sometimes just to eat (which I love to do then).
A dancer: The days were passing by with my punch dialogues hitting him (who received something that sounded "hit me hard ya!") and with our creative rotten jokes and rejoicing comedy chats. But one day, I saw this STUPID dancing in front of the crowd (Chemical Engineering Event) with his smooth yet scintillating moves that included moon-walk for "O ham dam Suniyore" song from movie Saathiya and Ganesh Hegde's "Main deewana." I was totally looking at a different Vamshi from what I knew till then. After some time, I came to know that he is crazy about dancing since his school days. We have a pretty much most awaiting dance performer Vivek Chaitanya in my class, however, I was more looking for dance videos from Vamshi and also tried to persuade him in teaching me (which did not happen though!).
An actor: As a part of our college's annual cultural event, we tried to make a skit on 'Tenali Ramakrishna' with my friend/competitor Amit Kumar in the lead role. However, due to some reason, that skit got cancelled and we unexpectedly ended up in Dilip's team who played a parody skit on '75 yrs - Vajrothsavam.' Vamshi played the role of Mahesh Babu while I was the fire-raising Mohan Babu. We used to rehearse for this skit staying late in the college and took RTC buses (2 or sometimes 3) as the college bus leaves at 4:15 PM. These were those few days of my undergrad when I spent most of my time talking/ making jokes with him. It was my first ever stage performance as an actor (I sang before on a stage competition) in my life and it came out so well that the team was awarded Rs 500/- (Dilip managed to spend that amount by taking us to a nearby restaurant).
A techie/motivator: Among the people whom I know, he was the only one who participated/presented in many IIT's and other institution's technical events. His way of planning (ahead or last minute submissions) and participating in these events made me to think about participating in one. After individually researching for upcoming/ongoing events with an external motivator in my mind, Gopi Krishna and I could manage to participate in IIT Madras's national technical event and I gave a poster presentation in SNIST, Keesaragutta. Whether he likes it or not, or in the future whether I like it or not! I will always give 'some' credit to Vamshi when someone appreciates my SOP that I used to apply for my Master's program.
A writer/director: While I was completing my Master's in Virginia, I opened a link that he sent and it turns out that he was writing a blog on a fictional journey that we thought of before to walk from our college to home (just about 30 km). This was when I started developing the art of imagining and writing dialogues while I was co-authoring the blog. One fine afternoon while I was at my apartment, I got a call from from this VEDAVA saying that he was planning to prepare a trailer, and a video in future, on this blog. So we spent a couple of hours on phone in audio recording for the trailer. Although may sound as a silly video, this was one of the first videos made my Vamshi who added me as a co-founder for our short films production "Forced Singles." After starting this production, he made few awesome videos that received critical acclaims from many but I (not as a co-founder) used to enjoy almost all the videos he sent to me while commenting few things about every video. Here is his videos' youtube page.
An editor: For some, Vamshi is a good director but for others (including himself) he is a good editor. He edits his short films with the adept and fresh choice of background scores and music which makes his videos so attractive to the viewers. His editing skills are so influencing that he sometimes do editing for short films made by other productions.
His other unexpected characters at unexpected times include a mind-wanderer, egoist, and an unexpected character! I ll try to expand about these when I know more about them. You may have observed that I was calling him IDIOT, STUPID etc. because he is the only one in my life whom I would scold or tease wholeheartedly. Well, that was the case until recently when he might not be taking them with the same "hit me hard ya!" attitude anymore. I don't know, I may be wrong but at the same time I may be right!
Nevertheless, I have mentioned this earlier but again I am glad that I met him in my life especially well before he became famous as an editor, director, writer or dancer. Last but may be the least :-P
HAPPY BIRTHDAY VAMSHI
My notes for Ravi :
Buddy, For all the tough times you had to go through because of me I will never be able to ask you forgiveness but as long as I am your friend I will remember you as that one guy who never stopped believing in me. The beauty of sharing this video is that we played both the roles in each of our lives for which I will always be proud to be known as 'Friend of Ravi Teja'
My notes for Ravi :
Buddy, For all the tough times you had to go through because of me I will never be able to ask you forgiveness but as long as I am your friend I will remember you as that one guy who never stopped believing in me. The beauty of sharing this video is that we played both the roles in each of our lives for which I will always be proud to be known as 'Friend of Ravi Teja'
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