Decisions and Shoes

Hello,
So as it turns out I don't need to wait until the end of December to make a decision on my plan from now. It may or may not come as a surprise to some of you, but I have decided to cut my trip to India short by 2 months. I had originally planned to spend 5 months in Kolkata and 2 months in Lucknow. I now plan to spend 3 months in Kolkata and 2 in Lucknow. Which means I'll return at the end of March 2014. The plan has been to study Kathak under Anuj Mishra in Lucknow, the son of my Guru's Guru however Pt. Arjun Mishra, his father, is very ill and so whether I will be able to go there to study depends on his health. If the months I now want to go there aren't suitable because of health issues then I shall come back at the end of January 2014.

My decision is based on a lot of reasons. Originally I wanted to come home earlier because I wasn't settling here and if I'm honest I'm still not completely settled. I also felt a little unwanted at times and a bit of a burden. I have since realised though that that isn't true.So reason number one is because I'm not completely settled here and I don't see the point in using up so much of my gap year somewhere where I'm not 100% happy. Another reason is that as much as I now know beyond doubt that I want dance in my life and I want to continue to train and perform, I don't know how much I want it as a profession. I haven't decided that yet, I might still pursue it as a profession but whilst I'm deciding I think it makes sense to use the rest of my gap year to explore my passion for languages. Perhaps the final reason I've decided to leave early is because I just feel that 7 months is too long in one place. This is my gap year, I have an entire year of my life do exactly what I want to do, why spend it all in India?

The plan after India is to find 3 work placements in French, German or Spanish-speaking European countries, on campsites or in youth hostels. Allowing for one or two weeks at home in between each. If I find 3 placements then I think I'll start a new blog for my travels in general. None of this is to say that this time in India has been a waste or that I won't enjoy the next 4 months. I'm going to work as hard as I can and I'm going to make the absolute most out of the time I have left here. I don't know if I'll ever come back to India so I am going to do what I can whilst I'm here. My goal is still to come back I better dancer than when I came here and so far I am realising that goal.

In other news I bought some shoes :)

Camel leather, Rs. 550 - just over £5

20% off in a sale and then another discount because I didn't try and haggle, Rs. 320 - just over £3

and in case y'all were interested, this is the fabulous shop I got them in, definitely going back there!

Kathak Marathon, World Yoga Society and Misunderstandings

Hello everyone,

Before I write about how I'm feeling in general, I'd like to tell you all about an amazing opportunity I had on Sunday. Padatik Dance Centre, Kolkata has for the last 6 years organised a Kathak Marathon, this year was it's 7th year. It's an all day event of Kathak solo performances with live musicians. The idea is to develop the dancers' improvisation skills since they have no rehearsal opportunities with the musicians at all. The performances started at 10am and finished well after 9pm, and I got to stay pretty much all day. I only missed the first two soloists. I went with Aunty's youngest son who was a Kathak dancer when he was younger before he decided to pursue his Carnatic singing professionally instead. There was an hour's break in between the morning session and afternoon session and then again between the afternoon session and the evening session, so we went to a well-known restaurant called Haldiram's, 100% Veg (yay!), in both the breaks.

The soloists were a mix of junior and senior performers' and each session finished with a performance of a professional Kathak dancer. Most of the dancers were stunning, but speaking to Aunty's son he explained why some of them weren't yet professional, it was interesting because I hadn't even noticed the things he had. At the end of the morning session Anurekha Ghosh performed. I've been a fan of her YouTube channel for a while and have looked into her London-based dance company, but I never imagined I'd get to see her live! She has a unique style of Kathak but I love it and she always has interesting costumes. The afternoon session ended with Parwati Dutta who is a disciple of Pt. Birju Maharaj, who is basically the father of Kathak. I loved her performance because she's trained in the same school of Kathak as me; Lucknow Gharana. The evening session ended with a spectacular performance; Ashim Bandhu Bhattacharya, who is an extremely well-known Kathak Guru here in West Bengal peformed along with Sandip Mullick who is one of the top performers in Kolkata and West Bengal, as well as Souvik Chakraborty who is on a par with Sandip Mullick. They performed one piece together, then a solo each and then they came together and did a huge improvisation together. The atmosphere was amazing because these guys are the top of the Kathak scene here in Kolkata and watching them just improvise with the tabla player on stage was phenomenal. Oh, I should mention that these three dancers are all men, as a male dancer I enjoy watching other male dancers more than female dancers because I can identify with them more. Throughout all three sessions there were only three male soloists, as in not the three at the end. My favourite performer of the whole event was Manab Parai, he's a first year Kathak MA student at the Rabindra Bharati University in Kolkata.

Anurekha Ghosh!

Parwati Dutta

Manab Parai

Ashim Bandhu Bhattacharya, Sandip Mullick and Souvik Chakraborty

So let's move on to how things are generally. To be honest I can't really tell from one day to the next. If we start with dance and class. That is so much better, I'm enjoying it most of the time now. I have loads more energy, I can sit in araimandi (demi-plié) so much lower now and without too much pain, I don't get as thirsty. So all of that is good. Mallabika Sen even complimented me the other day! I've completely finished the Natesha Kavutwam, which means not only being able to dance it but also dance it well, know the song off by heart and be able to count the beat whilst singing it. I'm now learning the Shiva Panchakshara Stotram and after that I'll be learning the Shivashtakam. Also the girls that are often there during my class, the ones I have to do class in front of, are learning to sing the dance songs properly so now I often dance whilst they sing, it's quite fun because we're all working on something together then.

The thing that isn't so great here is when the language barrier leads to misunderstandings and anger and irritation and offence. I find the best way to deal with this is to block it out of my mind, because if I think about too much, it makes me stress and then that effects my dancing. I've decided to assess my situation here at the end of December and decided if I want to stay longer and how long for. I'm not saying I'm unhappy but just that I have a lot of questions about this experience and I feel that at the end of December I'll be able to address them properly. 

In other news Aunty took me to the World Yoga Society today and I am now an enrolled  member and have special classes three times a week. The doctor there has instructed that I get special care because he's a friend of Aunty. So we'll see how that goes! Initially I was dreading the idea of yoga but the doctor was so nice and enthusiastic that I'm feeling better about the whole thing. I've also written a timetable of all the classes at Ekdalia and Gariahat campuses during the week so that I can get myself to them to watch and don't have to spend too much time alone. 

So things aren't bad, but I do feel I have a love-hate relationship with India. 

(If you're reading this and you have me on Facebook, there are loads more photos from the Kathak Marathon on there so check them out!)

Rituranga and Independence

Hello,

Another update from Kolkata :)

Yesterday I went to a performance of Rituranga. Rituranga or Riturongo as it's pronounced in Bangla, is a dance programme about the seasons based on Rabindranath Tagore's music and poetry. The programme is mainly made up of Bharatanayam. There are Kuchipudi and Mohiniyattam elements throughout and one of Aunty's students is also trained in Kathak so she performs Kathak in a few of the pieces. The whole thing is choreographed by Guru Smt. Thankamani Kutty aka Aunty. Rituranga has been around the world and most recently did a tour of Australia. Yesterday's performance came at the end of some kind of conference. It was held at the Swiss Hotel in New Kolkata. It was really surreal going from the outside world of New Kolkata, which is basically miles and miles of construction sites because it's still being built and into the swanky, air-conditioned hotel. It could easily have been in the middle of Paris or New York.

Now I am in no position to critique the work of such an infamous Guru but I do have my own opinions on Rituranga. It was a stunning performance with so many beautiful colours but personally I am a bit of a purist when it comes to Bharatanatyam, I like the classical items from the traditional repertoire, I like the classical carnatic music. Rabindranath's music, although beautiful, only really appeals to Bengali's in my opinion. There were also a few pieces performed in Mohiniyattam costume because they had a lot of Mohiniyattam elements in them. To the trained eye the elements were obvious but even so I, personally, would have liked to have seen some pure Mohiniyattam in there. Either it was a spectacular performance and I had front row seats again, along with Senjuti Sengupta's father. (Senjuti is the dancer from Pratibha Utsav I wrote about)

On the weekends I don't have dance class, instead I go to Ekdalia and spend the morning there sleeping, resting and doing my own practice. I did do practice but it's never as hard as what I do in class because I don't push myself enough... clearly something I need to work on. This evening I went to Girija Aunty's Gariahat class again. They're not the best dancers but I like watching Girija Aunty teach and they do items I particularly like. I then stayed for class afterwards, the one that had those three amazing boys in the other week. Sadly only 4 out of 10 students turned up tonight, but two of the guys were amongst the 4 so no complaints!

So independence. Well, basically everytime I go to Ekdalia or Gariahat these days, I walk there by myself. I've started to walk with my iPod as well now. This allows me to take in everything around me more, I like being about to switch of the sounds of the streets and add in my own soundtrack to what I'm seeing. There's always something to look at, this morning there was a woman jogging along with a door on her head, that made me smile. On the way to Gariahat there are some really good sari stalls which I get a glance at whilst walking past. It feels good to be walking somewhere with a goal, it makes me feel less like an outsider.

In other news I've stopped taking my malaria tablets for now because they may have been the reason for my negative moments. Depression is often a side-effect of them. So we'll see if I feel more positive in general now, I think I do. I still have to struggle with everyone thinking I'm, in simple English, too fat to be a dancer but I try not to let it bother me because I don't really care what others think, I can't. I need to get to a point in my mind when I can ignore the exhaustion, the tiredness and the pain and just keep pushing and dancing. At the moment I barely get to the pain because my body fizzles out before it gets there. Something just needs to click in my head when I think, enough is enough. I can't keep giving a half-hearted effort, I have to ignore the limitations of my body and listen to what my heart wants to do, which is dance.

Here are some photos of Ekdalia for you, I know I have been talking about Ekdalia for ages but haven't uploaded in any photos! So here you go

Ekdalia branch of Kalamandalam Kolkata

Ekdalia again, this is where my classes are usually held. That door you can see on the right is where my suitcases are.

Ekdalia again, this is where my classes are usually held. The room to the right is the second, smaller classroom. 

The smaller classroom at Ekdalia

The smaller classroom at Ekdalia

Pratibha Utsav and Dance Motivation

Hello!
I went to see another performance last night. It was the first day of a two day performance called Pratibha Utsav. Half of the performance was Bharatanatyam and the other half Kathak. The Bharatanatyam was performed by Senjuti Sengupta a student of Aunty and the Kathak was performed by Debjaya Sarkar. It was a beautiful performance held in an open-air stage, like a mini Colosseum. Watching performances are always inspirational because you realise not just how much work you have to do but also where you could one day be. I love watching performances and thinking that one day that could be me, in the silk costume with the temple jewellery, performing an art form thousands of years old in front of an audience that believes in all the stories I'm telling. Having watched three performances of Mallabika Sen now, the one think I noticed about Ms. Sengupta was that as much as she is an amazing dancer, she is not a performer to the same level as Mallabika. You could tell when she was tiring, and you could see her technique ever so slightly beginning to loosen, those things you don't see with Mallabika. It just shows you how much of a difference there is between being a good dancer and being a good performer.

The Kathak half was breathtaking, it confirmed to me that Kathak is and always will be my first love. I just can't get over how beautiful the subtlety is. The technical side of Kathak also takes my breath away every time, I just love the sharpness of the footwork and head movements but how the arms and torso move as gracefully as running water. I also felt a strange closeness to the Kathak performance, like it was a part of me, it was almost like home, a place where I felt comfortable. I haven't gotten to that stage with Bharatanatyam yet. Of course the performance did again show me how much I still have to do, the dancer had an excellent knowledge of Hindustani music and worked in unison with the Tabla player. She also made quite simple movements tell the most intricate story.

So now let's talk about serious stuff. Life here in India and how I'm struggling. I'm not entirely sure why but for some reason I can't handle being by myself for long periods of time here. More than an hour alone and I just can't handle it. I hate seeming weak but I'm not going to deny how I'm feeling to the people around me here. Today things almost got to breaking point because it seemed like Aunty was easing me back into spending more time by myself at Ekdalia. If I'm to be honest then yes I was fighting hard to hold back the tears when I actually spoke to Aunty. I managed to get my feelings across and she understood. I had to explain that for some reason I am still not completely settled and I might never be. I can't handle being alone right now, that might change in the future but I can't say right now. I am working really hard in class and pushing myself constantly and I know I'm overweight and I don't have a dancer's body, but although I'm working on that I cannot change it overnight and therefore I need to ease myself into more practice, I'm not physically capable of doing 4-5 hours of practice a day yet. Aunty it seems did understand, and she told me that the only reason she wanted me to use the afternoons to practice was so that I didn't waste time. She said she wanted me to practice so I could lose weight and go back a better dancer. She said she didn't want me to go back with nothing to show for my time here. So things are back to being ok. I am ok.

What I do find though is that I have a surprising ability to motivate and inspire myself. Despite everything that may happen from day to day I am able to stand back up, dust myself off and look forward to the next day. I listen to a lot of music, some that reminds me of home and some that has always inspired me to dance. I watch a lot of dance videos and documentaries on YouTube, I find Ballet is especially inspiring. I've started to put together a dance motivation folder that I look through daily. It's reassuring and surprising just how much I find myself able to do emotionally. There is no-one here to push me back up when I'm down, no-one to tell me I can do it, but I find I am able to do those things myself. I don't quite know how I'm able to build a wall around all of my negative thoughts and actually look deep inside myself and find not only inspiration and motivation for the next day but also an actual sense of looking forward to it.

I don't want you all to think I'm having a bad time here but it is true to say that my experience here is 50/50 at the moment. There are good things of course. I am making progress in class, I am building muscle and stamina. My technique is getting better. I am getting to experience some of this immense country. When I walk to and from class I get to walk through the streets of stalls selling sari's, clothes, food, jewellery and everything else under the sun. I get to see a huge array of colourful people all around me. I couldn't ever live here because it isn't my country and it isn't where I feel at home but it is one of the most interesting countries in the world. Despite everything you may read into from this blog I will say this, in the words of the fabulous Édith Piaf; Non, je ne regrette rien. No, I don't regret anything. 

World Pain Symposium and the power of self.

Hello everyone,

So firstly I want to tell you about another amazing opportunity I got last night. Being a student of Kalamandalam and staying with Aunty means I get to go to loads of dance programmes as part of the artists' team, which means I get good seats, I don't have to buy a ticket and I get to go backstage. Last night I went with Kalamandalam's secretary, aka Somnath Uncle, who is Aunty's son and Ilina to the World Pain Symposium 2013's WIPF 2013 Symposium Dinner. It was held outside in beautiful grounds, with a water feature in the background and tables set all over the lawn. There were three performances; Tanmoy Bose, a famous Tabla player, performed three songs with his group. They mix western music with Hindustani classical music. This was followed by two Bharatanatyam items and a Kuchipudi item by the one and only Mallabika Sen and then finally a breathtaking Kathakali performance by the head of department and one of his teachers from the Vishva Bharati University of West Bengal.

I got to sit in one of two rows of seats right in front of the stage. The Hindustani parts of Tanmoy Bose's compositions took me right back to my Kathak classes in Reading. There is something about Tabla and Hindustani music that is very comforting, it makes me picture Kathak in my head. Mallabika Sen was, as per usual, amazing. She performed Sangeetham and Kali Kavutwam in Bharatanatyam, both pieces I have seen her perform on the two other occasions I've had the chance to watch her performances. In between the two she performed Krishna Shabdam, my all time favourite Kuchipudi item. Krishna Shabdam tells stories of the young Krishna and it is an absolutely beautiful piece. Then finally there was a Kathakali performance. Kathakali is a dance-drama from Kerala, South India. It's beautiful and the amount of history behind it is amazing. I've never seen it performed live before. Traditionally a Kathakali performance is spread over 3 nights, it'll start late in the evening and go on until the early hours of the morning. For last night's programme though they had condensed it to a short half an hour performance. It was still amazing to watch. It's only when you see Kathakali in the flesh that you can understand beyond doubt how someone can devote their whole lives to it. It's an art that has thousands of layers, there is no limit to it's expression and beauty.

My seats :D

Tanmoy Bose and group

Kali Kavutwam in Bharatanatyam by Mallabika Sen

Kali Kavutwam in Bharatanatyam by Mallabika Sen

Krishna in Kathakali by the head of the Kathakali department at the Vishva Bharati University of West Bengal

Krishna and Arjun in Kathakali

It's funny you know, no matter what happens in my life, no matter how happy or sad I am. I always find that, in time, I realise that I am by biggest power. India thus far hasn't been easy and I've made no secret of that but I find myself able to pick myself up again and find the deeper meaning within what I do. I think the first time I realised that dance was a permanent part of my life, the first time I realised I wanted to do something with dance was whilst co-running a henna stall with a friend at a tiny outside fair in Leighton Buzzard. There was a local dance school; Leanne Hughes Theatre School. They performed a number of items but one of them stuck with me. It was a contemporary dance to the song When Mermaids Fly. A male dancer started and was later joined by mermaids. There was something about it that struck a chord in me and I have remembered it ever since. 

Each day is a challenge, not just for me here in India but for the entire world. In Islam followers believe that this entire life is a test given by God. I like that view. People often question me when I say I'm a dancer because I don't have a dancers' body but then that is not all there is to being a dancer. Being a dancer is about letting your body express you innermost feelings about the world around you. Bharatanatayam began as a temple dance form and today much of the repertoire is based on Hindu mythology but it is much more than that. The stories in Hinduism have one message underlying all of them, the victory of good over evil. The idea that no matter what may come our way it is a pure heart, good intentions and truth that will ultimately win, you don't have to be a Hindu to relate to that. Bharatanatyam allows me to connect with a history of over two thousand years but also connect to a inner part of myself.

Every time I watch a class or go to a performance I am inspired to work harder the next day. Not to please those around me but to give myself piece of mind. When I work hard I feel good about myself, dance is not about others primarily. It is about yourself, your power, what you can do and what you feel. Other dancers inspire me to be a better person not just a better dancer. Until I have pushed through the boundaries and limits of my body to feel the beauty and spirituality of dance I am not giving up. No matter how much I miss home, or how much I'm learning here about who I am, or even the new things I'm seeing and experiencing, dance is the thread connecting everything I do. Dance is what makes it all make sense. 

"We learn by practice. Whether it means to learn to dance by practicing dancing or to learn to live by practicing living, the principles are the same. One becomes in some area an athlete of God." - Martha Graham

Autos, Lungis and Me.

Hi guys.
I don't really know where to start with this blog. There are some exciting and interesting that I've done and found out but there are also a lot of things that have made me feel out of place. So this blog, as my mind currently is, is going to be a mix of emotions, a mix of ups and downs.

So training is still rigorous. I'm learning a choreography called Natesha Kavutwam. I started it briefly back in England. Here I'm expected to pick it up much quicker than I am back home. I'm also expected to spend every breathing moment reading over the song, learning the words and meanings off by heart, keeping the beat and rhythm and doing all of the moves. Or at least I feel as if that is what is expected of me. I often feel that every minute I'm not doing something dance related I'll come under attack. I often have to tell myself, that I chose to come here, I paid to come here and therefore technically the final decision on how much I do is with me.

Yesterday morning though I got to meet a male student of Kalamandalam. A guy called Sandip (or Shondip if you're Bengali), he's obviously studying Bharatanatyam but he told me he had studied Kathak for 5 years when he was younger. It was nice to talk to someone nearer my age, but he wouldn't have said a word if I hadn't smiled at him first. I'm learning that about Indians, or at least here, they tend to wait for you to make the first move. I also bought two nalla's, which are like drawstrings that you put into trousers and a lungi. A lungi is basically a loincloth. It's worn by men in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Bangladesh, India and Pakistan to name a few. In Kolkata it's generally worn by Muslims and poor people in public, but apparently a lot of Bengali men across the city wear it at home. Traditionally they're blue or green and are printed with a checked pattern, but being English that design reminds me far too much of a tea towel, so I got a more modern design. I actually wanted one to wear after taking a shower because there are no shower cubicles here, you just shower in the bathroom with a bucket and jug and the water goes down a drain, which means the floor is always soaked so putting on trousers is a pain, hence the lungi.

my lungi :)

When I say I bought, I mean Ilina bought them for me. Ilina is the other student that lives here with Aunty. She's been here for 7 years. I have no idea how old she is but I'd guess early twenties, when I first got here she was quite quiet but now we often chat. We always speak Hindi because she speaks it very well and I feel more comfortable conversing in it here than English. Anyway, whenever I want to buy something and she's with me, she never lets me pay. When I asked her why she said that when she came to my country then I could pay. After the lungi and nalla shopping me and Ilina went to buy some fruit, during which the banana vendor insisted on giving me a free banana. On the way back she kept grabbing my arm when we crossed the road and when I pointed out that I had by now crossed the roads in Kolkata by myself countless times, she said that even so she was scared of anything happening to me because I was her brother. N'awww.

I also get to learn some cultural things from Ilina. Whenever I walk anywhere with here there are times when she touches her forehead and then heart three times in succession. I knew that when walking past a shrine Hindus did this as a way of paying their respects to the shrine without out physically stopping to offer a prayer and I knew that Hindus also did it whenever they passed a funeral procession for similar reasons but the other day Ilina did whilst walking past a beggar, so I asked why and the answer was really quite beautiful. She said that by doing that it was a way of saying to the beggar, that she had nothing to give, a plea almost to the beggar not to ask because she couldn't give. It's like three-way conversation between you, the beggar and a sense of spirituality, really quite beautiful I thought.

Some things though are still hard to deal with here. I sometimes feel that I am outstaying my welcome at Aunty's, which with all due respect seems ridiculous because I am paying. She prefers me to go to Ekdalia, where all of my things are instead of sit at her house, which is where I sleep. The thing is that although the bedroom at Ekdalia is perfectly adequate, it's unbearably lonely. You just sit there with two empty dance classrooms, a smelly, poor excuse for a kitchen, a usable but dirty bathroom and the quite pretty bedroom. So if Aunty has got it in her head that once I'm more settled I'll move back there, she might well be very wrong. I need human interaction to survive here.

I have also realised that I'm living in a dance cocoon. I go from Aunty's house to dance class, to Aunty's house to dance class. I don't get to see much of Kolkata at the moment. It's quite surreal really to be in a world where Bharatanatyam is the utmost norm. I watch 2 or more classes almost everyday, I practice everyday, I hear about and talk about Bhartanatyam all day long. In many ways I'm loving this little dance world in the middle of a Bengali city but there are times when I feel I'd like to see a bit further. So I've organised with Ilina to go shopping in the week or so break that we get in December, we'll go with Aunty's daughter-in-law, who is lovely and apparently a sari expert. I feel I need to go shopping, to experience a bit of the fun of India I've always dreamt of.

Lastly I thought I'd tell you about taxis and auto-rickshaws. I have now experienced both. Taxis are more expensive, expect to pay a minimum of Rs. 25 (roughly 25p) for a journey. They work the same way taxis in London do. I have to say they're not as crazy as many people would have you believe, in this part of Kolkata drivers generally do stick to a civilised road manner, or maybe I've just become used to it! I have however found that taxis here, the famous Kolkata yellow taxis, are dreadfully uncomfortable. Auto-rickshaws however are my new love. They generally cost a minimum of Rs. 7 (roughly 7p) and they work like buses. They can take up to 4 people and much like buses, if you're already in the rickshaw then another 3 people can also get in along the way. The also have stops just like buses, so they won't take you door to door. The reason I love them is because other than the roof there aren't really any sides, they're completely open and they dart in and out of the traffic. I feel like I lose myself in the hustle and bustle of the city and get a 5 minute pause of anonymity and freedom in a rickshaw, it's almost like flying in my opinion.

I'm sure there is much more I could write but for now I'm going to bed because despite the fact that tomorrow I don't have class, Aunty still wants me to get up in the morning and spend the morning at Ekdalia not here. So I do still need to attempt to get some sleep!

I shall leave you with some photos of the Gariahat campus :)

The Laments of a Linguist

I believe that blogs should be a true representation of life and I want this blog to truly represent every aspect of my life in India, for friends and family but also for potential travellers or dancers thinking of doing what I'm doing. So here are a few things I've picked about India and also about languages.

Just after I got to India, an Indian friend of mine told me that Indians were some of the nicest, friendliest people on earth but that they might be shy. I have to say I didn't at all believe him. Alas I've now seen it is indeed true. When I walk the streets of Ballygunge, South Kolkata, everyone stares at me. I am a white face in Pakistani clothes in a part of Kolkata not generally seen as touristy, so stares are to be expected. The thing is that it can be incredibly intimidating, the trick however is to smile because once you smile, you'll get such smile back that it just warms your heart. Someone once said that the thing about India is that there is life everywhere and this is so true. In every aspect of day-to-day life people here find time to smile and to laugh, they find time to get angry and to cry, they find to discuss the latest develops in Obama's career and the recession in England. There is never not enough time, never any time when things just stop. The thing I find most beautiful are the little shrines tucked into every little corner of the city, everyone here at some point finds time to pray, even just for a second. Life here is a gift and that is something you see all around you here.

Something that is often hard for westerners to adjust to is that nothing ever stand still here and nothing is monotonous. The streets of Ballygunge in the evenings are quite simply an attack on the senses. There are so many smells that you couldn't physically identify them all, there is colour on every corner and the amount of people that manage to squeeze into one path never ceases to amaze me. I think that in England we like our peace and quiet every now and then, we like a little moment in our day to just think and breathe and reflect but here every moment is a reflection, there is endless time and yet no time. It's very hard to adjust to constant moving, it's like living in a Christmas tree, one with those lights that flicker non-stop.

I will slowly add a lot more to this list as I find out more about this city. Now let's talk language. The one thing that I can now see many linguists in the UK have very wrong is that Hindi is the language to learn if you want to go to India. Hindi quite simply is not enough. I am in Kolkata, the capital city of West Bengal. The language of life here is Bangla, people here might speak Hindi, but most of them in my experience are more comfortable speaking in English. Bangla is the language of education, of publicity, of literature, of life. You can't survive here without Bangla. All shop signs are in Bangla, all posters are in Bangla, everything is in Bangla, Hindi is rare.

If there is one piece of advice I can give someone travelling to Kolkata for a long time it's to learn as much Bangla as possible beforehand. As a linguist when people around me are speaking Bangla, I make a conscious effort to listen to every word they say, to listen to the pronunciation, the intonation, the words. I am picking up a lot but I still don't understand most of what is being said and that creates a lot of problems. Not when people speak directly to me, then they tend to use Hindi or English. One problem is that people know I don't really speak Bangla and so they quite happily discuss me right in front of me, whilst looking at me. Now I know this is their mother tongue but then I would just simply prefer it if they discussed me when I'm not standing right there. The other thing that I find infuriating is that people tend to not bother letting me know what's going on half the time, they'll get ready to go out for example and then tell me about 5 minutes before they leave and I've got 5 minutes to decide what to do and then get ready for the outcome of that decision. If I spoke Bangla however I could perhaps latch on to what's happening from day to day because it is of course discussed in front of me. The quicker I pick up Bangla the better. 

Indian High Society

So today I went to I had the opportunity to go a dance performance of the wonderful Malabika Sen again! The event was hosted by a ladies study group in Kolkata, mainly by the rich and well-to-do Marwari business women. The show was held in someone's house, how on earth this mansion was a house is unbelievable. It was held in their garden, a really beautiful setting.

The show began with a boring introduction in bad English (more about that to come) and then a song by a lady who, I kid you not, had had trainers made of the same fabric as her kanjivaram silk sari! Then the hostess began to introduce the first dance act, a dance by the women of the study group, supposedly comprising of kathak and bharatanatyam, unsurprisingly it was awfully done, pretty much an insult to classical arts. That was followed by a lovely Odissi performance, sadly I can't remember the dancer's name. The only annoying thing was that her music stopped halfway through which must have been awful for her. Aunty however thought she was only mediocre.

Then came the wonderful Malabika Sen with a Bharatanatyam piece, Kali Kavutwam, with a couple of Kuchipudi movements mixed in. She was perfect as per usual, and everytime she enacted the Goddess Kali stabbing a demon you felt like she was stabbing you. This was then followed by the hostess giving a long speech on the history Kathak and then introducing three women from the study group to perform Kathak. Kathak my bum, it was an absolute insult to the art form. That was followed by a performance of dandiya, the Gujarati folk dance, which was quite fun and then finally there was a Manipuri dancer accompanied by some Tangta fighters. As Aunty explained she used to be a wonderful Manipuri dancer but she's a bit old now to perform, it was a tad lifeless.

Some photos from before the show...

Ok so now let's talk about these high society women. The first thing you notice about them is that being overdressed quite simply doesn't exist. Then I noticed that they were all speaking in English. No Hindi, no Bangla, no Marwari; all English! They all held themselves with an heir of arrogance and all of the hello's, long time no see's seemed so forced. One woman behind me came up to talk to some people and I heard her say "I forgot they weren't talking to you", it was like an Indian Eastender's except there was so much about it all that wasn't Indian. Yes they had incense constantly burning, yes they were all in Indian clothes, but there was very little Indian language, very little Indian anything in the way they acted. 

A few things annoyed be about this high society. One was that the introduction to every performance went into great deal about classical dance and Hindu mythology but in truth none of them had a clue about the classical arts at all. They were Indian and didn't appear to know the first thing about their thousands of years of history. The pathetic example of so-called Kathak proved that. The other thing I found irritating was what I interpreted as a denial of all things Indian. I will never understand why someone can think their own language is beneath them and how the language of the people that oppressed them for hundreds of years is better. The whole programme was presented in English too, again this I will never understand. I know for a fact that everyone sitting there understood Hindi perfectly. From what I know everyone in India except in the South, studies Hindi at school and takes exams in it. As the national language, nearly all Indians (again except in the South) can read and understand Hindi, if not speak it well. Why then would you choose to read from a script in a foreign language? It had to be read from a script because it was clear they didn't understand half of what they were reading. They couldn't pronounce any of it, they used words we never use in English. I'm not saying this to be arrogant about the English language, I think it's great that they can all communicate in English but what I have a problem with is when they put English above another mutual language that everyone can speak, understand and pronounce better. 

In other news I didn't dance today because to be quite frank my body can't handle dance every single day just yet, so I've decided to do 5 days of dance and then 2 days of just watching and following other classes. 

Here Come The Boys

Hello!

Ok so let's go through today shall we? So I was up at 6:30 this morning... yes that's right on a Saturday morning! Kalamandalam has a big building near Salt Lake, from what I could tell it's not entirely finished yet. I went to join in with two of the classes going on, so I slaved away in the first class and the other student who is living with me said she was impressed with how much I did, and apparently Aunty said so too (if my understanding of her Hindi was correct!). I did really push myself today, and just kept going. After that class I got to have a break during another class and then I was back to dancing to learn a choreography I had started learning briefly in England. Girija Aunty was assigned to teach me this with the rest of the class while Aunty went to teach elsewhere. Girija Aunty is very strict and when she'd finished teaching the class and I the first few minutes of the piece and had taken them through the rest of their class while I sat and watched, she called me up again as the rest of the class were leaving and made me go through it again and then learn the next few minutes D: So I was dead by lunchtime.

The afternoon passed quite leisurely, after lunch I just said and lost myself in a book for a few hours. Then evening came and Aunty changed into a sari which always means she's going out somewhere. Tonight she went to a children's carnatic music concert. Since there was no dancing she didn't think I'd want to go, so I had the choice of staying in the flat alone for a few hours or going with Girija Aunty to her evening class. Naturally I opted to go and watch her class. There were about 6 girls roughly my age in her class and of course I loved watching.

Then the best thing about today happened. In the class after Girija Aunty's, taught by another student-come-teacher of Aunty's, there were three male students! Other than myself I've never seen another male Bharatanatyam student. It was so amazing to watch them! They danced with such strength and precision and it was just great to see other guys. Sometimes always being the only guy in the room can get lonely but three in one class! I didn't actually get to speak to them, although they did say bye when I left. I am planning to make sure I get to go and watch next Saturday and then try and pluck up the courage to talk to them. I do know the basic greetings in Bangla actually so I could try actually speaking some Bangla for once! Seeing that class tonight is pretty much enough inspiration to last me weeks, so I am now very content :)

I'm planning to walk to Ekdalia tomorrow, aka the place where I shower and where all of my stuff is. I'm braving the walk alone! Then I'm back at Aunty's for breakfast and ready to go to Sunday morning classes! I'm also hoping to go back to Ekdalia in the afternoon to finally get some decent Kathak practice in. Until next time!

Inspiration and Motivation

Hey everyone!
Ok so umm really I should be writing about everything that has happened in the last two days but.............. I can't remember anything and I'm tired so you'll have to just live with me leaving some stuff out of this :P

So to start with I thought I'd tell you quickly about my confusing and irritating visit to the Foreigner's Registration Office in Kolkata. If you're staying in India for more than 6 months you have to register. Since I'm planning to stay for 7 I went to do just this, but after having spent ages getting all the paperwork together, I was told that because I was only in Kolkata for 5 months I didn't need to register here and if I extended my visa for Lucknow then the part of my stay over 6 months would be there and I'd have to register at the nearest office there, which would be Delhi. After leaving the office I then remembered that I have to apply for a visa extension 3 months in advance. So now I'll have to go back in 2 months to extend the visa and then I'll see what they say about registering then. Welcome to India!

Now let's talk about this inspiration and motivation. I didn't dance yesterday because I wasn't feeling well. If I'm honest I'm pretty sure half of it was imagined and I'm pretty sure I played it up so I could take a break from training. I was so frustrated that I was letting myself do it and I was extremely disappointed with myself. I still think that not dancing was the most sensible idea because if something had been up then making it worse would have been stupid and I really did just need a break. Missing class made me determined to dance today. I went to bed absolutely resolute in dancing the next day and alas I did. Two things happened in class today. Firstly there were loads of other girls there for their class, most of them have been learning for years. Doing class in front of one or two of them is normally intimidating enough, but a whole class of them! But something had changed in my mind this morning, no doubt because of how angry I was with myself from yesterday. So I thought to myself, yes these girls are more experienced, yes I might make a fool of myself but I came here to study Bharatanatyam because I love it, I came here for myself, not for anyone else. So I worked my utmost hardest and at some points the others joined in and at other points they stood and watched but I just got on with it because that is what I came for. I actually found that when they saw I was trying they were quite encouraging.

The second thing that was different in today's class was that my energy levels seemed to be slightly higher, I wasn't thinking about when I could next take a sip of water, or when I could take a break. I was just thinking about getting the move right. By not focusing on what my body could or couldn't do and just pushing myself to do what I was being shown I actually enjoyed class, I finally got to enjoy Bharatanatyam for the dance and not struggle out of breath, not to say I wasn't out of breath! I just wasn't thinking about it :P

So all in all today was really great. Aunty also insisted on taking me to a doctor, and I've got another two sets of tablets and two bottles of cough syrup. Yay!

Watching classes here is really the biggest inspiration, I love watching other students dance, especially more experienced dancers than myself, which is most of them! I become so lost in what I'm watching, it's so beautiful and it pushes me to work harder so that I can become as good as some of them one day.

So tomorrow I have class again and I'm actually looking forward to it, alas sleep calls, so until next time!

England and Dance

Ok so hi guys. I could use this blog to talk about today and yesterday, not a lot happened in all honesty but I'm not going to do that. I believe that blogging is also a way of expressing oneself and that is what I want to do today.

I want to write about two things; homesickness and dance. India is a vast country, full of sights and sounds, colours and smells, people and cars. There is so much to see and experience, so much to learn and appreciate. But. It isn't home. I have been here 9 days roughly now and in that time India has taught me a few things. Firstly, that England is my home, it's where I'm from, where I was brought up and where I identify with. Secondly, that actually there is a living, breathing culture in England that we take for granted as English people. I have worked and lived for short periods of time in France and Germany, but they are still in Europe, some things are the same as in England and I only stayed for 6 weeks maximum. In India nothing is the same. The people are different, in the way they act, talk, walk, sleep, everything. The language is different, I'm surrounded daily by mainly Bangla and Malayalam, neither of which are my own. I notice small things a lot when I'm away from home, things that are insignificant but things that remind me I'm not at home. The doors here are different, the locks here are not built into the doors as they are in England, but rather there are huge padlocks everywhere. Front doors here tend to open directly into a room, there is no hallway as it were.

India is teaching me to appreciate where I come from. I feel very English here and I feel the need to be English. When I speak English here I speak with an Indian accent because the people I'm with understand it better, but when I speak to someone from back home I want to speak in my regular accent, in my mother tongue as it were. One tip I read about dealing with homesickness is trying to build some kind of routine in your new country, perhaps based on what you did at home. I am trying to do that and I feel an urge to try to preserve anything English I can. India is a wonderfully interesting country but I couldn't live here, they say home is where the heart is and I can confidently say that my heart is in England. That's not to say I'm not enjoying my time here, just that for me this couldn't ever be a permanent change.

The second thing I wanted to write about today was dance. My training here is hard, really hard. I do not have a dancer's body, I'm not fit and healthy and it is a major barrier in my training. I can't do the amount of practice others can, and it's not because I don't want to but because I physically can't. I can't change my body overnight, and I have no doubt that in 5 months it will change, but for now it is a barrier I can't control. Training is also hard because there are other, better dancers around me, watching me and it is easy to feel as if I shouldn't be here, as if I was naive in coming. But, I am realising that such feelings won't help.

I have been forced to ask myself if this is really what I want to be doing. Dance came into my life very late and for years now I have felt like I couldn't live without dance, it became a need. Here though I have questioned that need. Here it is not something that is rare and fascinating in the sense that it is in England. Here it is something you either devote your entire self to or you don't. Training is gruelling and on top of that you're expected to do hours of your own practice daily. Discipline is a big part of training here too, I am not supposed to drink water whilst dancing, only after training has finished for the day, so far I'm not managing this. I have had to sit and imagine life without dance, could I be happy just as a dance lover rather than a dancer? The truth is that when I day dream and think in my head of ways of coping with difficult situations, dance is always my answer. When I think of what defines me I think of dance. There is a quote by Albert Einstein I'd like to share here,

I am a dancer. When things get tough dance is my solution. I turn to dance in times of need. I can't leave it. I have to dance because dance is a part of my existence. I do of course want to study the technique and the theory but the essence of dance in my life is none of this, it is simply expressing myself through movements that speak to my soul. This is what I have to remember when I'm in class feeling dizzy, sweating enough to fill buckets and generally on the verge of collapsing. Dance chose me. This hard work is for me a way to a better understanding of myself. 

So I shall persevere because I am human. I can do nothing else. I cannot give up because I have to live with myself and the decisions I make and if I gave up I couldn't do that. I have to be me, I have to be as loud or as quiet as I am at home. I have to be my own little weird ball of cultures and languages, of dance. I have to transport that ball wherever I go, because the one part of home that is always with me is myself. I shall talk to Aunty about how I'm doing and about how I feel because I am someone who speaks their mind and I have to do that here too. I shall learn, appreciate, accept, work and be inspired because this is life. Then I shall return home to England, because it really is home and I shall have stories to fill a library and I shall have an inner strength for life. 

Dhotis, Combs and Chapals.

Hello!
So today is Diwali and not a great deal happened. Breakfast was freshly cooked dosa, again a South Indian delicacy, and then a bit later on it was off to practice again. After practice I went with my teacher's son to do a bit of shopping. I would be shopping a lot more but all the things I want to take home would spoil in my suitcase if I left them there for five months so I'll buy them nearer to when I leave. I just bought a few things that I want to use now. I got a dhoti, it's a Bengali one, relatively long, to wear for dance practice. It cost me Rs. 240 so roughly £2.40. I also got some hair oil since I left mine at home, Rs. 34, so 34p! My last purchase was two combs because in England large plastic combs are very hard to find but here everyone uses them and I wanted a wide-toothed one, Rs. 20 each (20p) :) I was also looking for some chapals, (Indian flip flops) but none of the cheaper shops had my size so one shop, in a desperate attempt to get me to buy from them, has actually sent an order off to their supplier to have a pair made especially for me!

Other than that I haven't done much today. I'm spending my non-dancing time studying from some books my teacher has given me on the history and theory of Bharatanatyam, the stories of Shiva and Hinduism. All stuff that's helpful for any Indian classical dance.

So I shall leave you with some photos of my thingggsss :D

Happy Kali Pujo!

Hey everyone!
Ok so today was another eventful day,

It's Kali Pujo today which is a festival dedicated to Goddess Kali. The story goes, or so I was told, that Kali was in love with Lord Shiva but her father hated Shiva because he was a hermit and wandered around without a home or a profession. He tried to force Kali into marriage with someone of his choice. She instead went to Lord Shiva. Her father then insulted Shiva in front of a large number of nobles which sent Kali into a furious rage. The only way to stop her rage was for Shiva himself to place himself under her foot so that she trod on him, only then, feeling terrible for having tried to crush her love, was her rage ended. So because of the festival my dance school was closed today, meaning no training! But I still had to practice so I walked to Ballygunge campus with my teacher's son. This was my first time walking anywhere in Kolkata and it was so much fun! The sights and sounds in India are just the way people describe them; never ending. Wherever you look there is something new and exciting and totally different from England. We passed all kinds of stalls and shops. I also experience crossing the road in India first hand!

At Ballygunge I practiced for half an hour, my unfit, unhealthy body can't yet cope with more than that. At the moment my thighs just burn all the time from having to sit in a half-sitting position called araimandi all the time whilst dancing. Then when I was finished at Ballygunge we went to buy some henna cones because tomorrow it's Diwali and I wanted to have a little mehndi for it. Of course there are hundreds of street henna artists, all male I should add, set up for Kali Pujo and Diwali but if you didn't already know, I'm also a henna artist so I wanted to do it myself. I got two cones for Rs. 40, that's about 40p. They're £1 each in England, if not more. After my first Kolkata purchase I was shown around the shopping area in Ballygunge/South Kolkata. We looked at the hundreds of sari stalls and shops, the abundance of kurta shops and of course the chapal shops! There are also loads of stalls selling handmade candle holders aka diyas for the festivals. Walking around was amazing not just because these are all the kind of shops I've dreamt of visiting for years but also because it was the first time I've actually walked around Kolkata and seen how life functions. We also walked past an ashram.

My Henna :)

The cones I bought

So for Kali Pujo all over Kolkata there are huge and small shrines set up, on literally every street corner with a huge idol of Goddess Kali stepping on Lord Shiva. Me, Aunty and a relative of hers, went around and looked at some of the biggest and best shrines in South Kolkata and I also took photos of all the smaller ones from the car, our driver, stopped every time for me to take a photo! Later we went to a firework display that was technically in celebration of Kali Pujo but since Diwali is tomorrow it was kind of an all in one event. The fireworks were of course amazing, there really is nowhere like India when it comes to Diwali. It's midnight and the fireworks haven't stopped yet! The display was held at DKS Sports Complex and after the fireworks we went upstairs to a large balcony type area overlooking a swimming pool with my teacher's son and his wife.

Tomorrow the school is still closed so I don't really know what's in store but today was a really great Kali Pujo experience and I now can't wait to start shopping! For now I need to sleep because it's past midnight here.

So I leave you with some photos...

Upma, Loochi and Coal India.

Hello again,
Ok so I have a lot to write about today but I'll try and condense it!

The morning started with... blowing my nose because yes that pesky bloody cold is still here. I then got to try Upma for breakfast, another South Indian delicacy. After breakfast it was back to Ballygunge campus (where my stuff is and the room is that you can see in my first blog post) for day two of training. Yet again I struggled and my half-sitting position is only quarter-sitting apparently. I'm hoping that eventually I manage an hour of practice without having to stop every 10 minutes! It must be so irritating for my teacher! I am also constantly being told to drink less water, which is not something I am going to find easy!

Anyway after training I was to practice by myself for another half an hour, then shower and be picked up to go back to Aunty's house for lunch. Oh I should mention that Aunty is what everyone (and I mean everyone) calls my teacher here. After lunch I got to try Shondesh, a typical Bengali sweet. That stuff is good. After lunch I attempted to fill in my online form for foreign registration in India but alas it failed (shocking) so that will have to wait until Monday or Tuesday now.

This evening I went to Coal India's 39th Founding Day Celebrations because one of my teacher's senior students was performing a Bharatanatyam solo. I went with my teacher's son, who is also a musician. He went to help out and so I got the guest ticket and sat in between VIP and Press! It was an amazing performance! So inspiring. When she was portraying one of the Gods killing a demon I was genuinely scared and when she was showing utter bliss in giving herself to the Gods you could feel it.

The event was held at one of India's top Science museums. It's an amazing building from an architectural point of view. Sorry no photos though! After the show, which was on the other side of Kolkata, we went to the dancer's parents house. Her parents are absolutely lovely, the fed me some Bengali specialities namely Loochi and fried aubergine. Her mother doesn't really speak Hindi so alas I got some more Bangla practice. I'm beginning to understand so much more Bangla than I thought I would in 4 days!

So then we drove through Kolkata back to Aunty's house in Ballygunge. The city is currently preparing for Kali Pujo, a festival that is particularly celebrated in Bengal, and then also Diwali is happening at the same time. I'm yet to work out if Kali Pujo has something to do with Diwali... Anyway the city is covered in fairy lights and way more than in England at Christmas. I'll try and take some photos tomorrow. Also for Kali Pujo there are these huge shrines that have been set up all over the city with huge idols of Goddess Kali inside. They're like one room houses really, and some have long walkways leading up to them, and they're all covered with lights. Some also have these huge almost gate-like structures of lights depicting scenes from Hindu mythology and folk images in fairy lights. And of course amongst the daily car horn discussions there are now fireworks that sound more like the Blitz!

That's all for now! I might be going to a Kali Pujo tomorrow which should be fun! For now here are a few photos...

Lights ready for Diwali, later I saw the mother and daughter of this house putting candles all along the balcony.

This photo to me just sums up night-time in Kolkata, taken in Ballygunge, South Kolkata. 

My guest ticket!

Backstage...

Ok so this my dears is a soap dispenser. Basically it twists completely upside down and from that thing you see at the top the soap pours out. I took a photo because I've never seen anything like it... shhhh don't judge me. 

Anyway Happy Kali Pujo guys!