Not able to write the posts, one a day as planned as many other interesting things take precedence..
Our original plan was to be on an all evening tour of the city the day we landed. Given the weather, we moved to be a longer morning tour the following day and spent the early evening walking.
We still had the night and given Buenos Aires is 5 hours ahead of California, we were not going to sleep anytime soon. We did drop the little one at the hotel to sleep and myself, San and Jr. went to watch a Tango Show at the Placio Tango (Tango Palace). The original request from me was to take San to a Tango lesson. She passed on it and Jr. refused to be the backup. Guess I should have asked her first and maybe she would have signed up.. moot point now.
We were going to see an amazing show. Tango is close to my heart. It was a favorite during my dancing days. No other dance brings out emotion the way Tango does.. the Rumba is a close second. It was a 90 minute show that started late. The theater was amazing. We did not order food ( you can get tickets with drinks only.. if you don't drink alcohol you are paying a lot for lemonade and coke but the tables sell out fast!). It was a packed theater with no empty tables when the show started.
We did get a souvenir picture with some of the artists..
The performances were breathtaking. I was congratulated by both San and Jr. for picking a winner. However, we could not get a return Uber from the place to our hotel close to midnight and there were some unruly street urchins who were chasing us for money. Eventually we hailed a taxi and got to our hotel. The entire area near the theater district is beautiful.
Enough with the words.. just watch the video!
strongly recommend this show for a late evening entertainment. When in Buenos Aires, don't miss watching an Argentine Tango show.. or if you are lucky, go take a lesson!
It has been a great weekend! Months of preparation went into Jr.'s Arangetram. First time she is doing a solo dance performance, in front of a large audience with a live orchestra. It is a new beginning for her to take her Bharathanatyam (form of south Indian classical dance) to the next level.
Jr. has always loved dancing. Like most kids, she first performed THE CHICKEN DANCE! She would spontaneously dance to movie songs.. She then wanted to learn Bharathanatyam and tried out a local teacher, but she dropped it after a few months. Mostly ten year olds were substitute teaching her, as the teacher had to go to India for a family affair. Kumon took precedence and she stopped dancing. The next year she bugged us again and we decided to take her to Meena teacher in Sunnyvale. She loved Meena teacher. She has been learning from Meena teacher ever since.
Have been pretty much dropping her at the dance teachers house, once a week or twice a week, over the last eight or nine years, go do groceries, or have an occasional chai samosa at Bhavikas and go pick her up at the end of class and drive back home. It is a 20-25 minute drive, which was done with monotonous ease over the years.
There was a time, when I would go in and sit down to watch the lesson. That was when she was around 7 to 8 years old. Soon she declared that she doesn't want me sitting there and watch as she will "thappu panni" (make mistakes). So daddy was banned from coming to watch. She would practice at home, mostly with her sister competing for the mirror in her own cute way!
The only time I have seen her dance, is once a year during the Pushpanjali dance academie's annual day function or the occasional dance performance as a group in some temple or other. The costumes went from various paavadais to a borrowed dress , another borrowed dress, finally to her own dance dress three years ago!
If you read the posts in the links you will see three themes:
1. I keep missing my sister everytime I see Jr. dress up in a dance costume.
2. We are very critical parents, grand parents, relatives when it comes to her dancing
3. In spite of everything, Jr. loves to dance and she does it for herself more than anyone else
The dancing has also improved over the years. Last year at the annual day, I finally got to see her dance very differently from the previous years.
She wanted to do her Arangetram (solo stage debut) last year, but we sent her to India for an entire summer so she could spend time with my parents and brothers family. The event was pushed out to this year.
Meena teacher and Jr. put in a lot of effort in taking her dancing to a higher level so she could do the arangetram. Given Jr. is a bold girl and I have no stage fright, was confident that somehow she will manage the stage part. I had never seen her dance a single song from her Arangetram at any practice. So I had no idea what was in store.
There were only two things, that kept me up at night the last few months.
1. Her ability to hold one legged poses (my mom would eventually watch the video and she is a stickler for kids holding the Nataraja pose in an arangetram)
2. Her eyes getting irritated with the eyeliner.
Jr. has ended up in a hospital thrice with her eyes getting so irritated after an annual day performance because of an allergic reaction to the eyeliner. Was praying that it will not happen durng the event. She never wears it during regular class, practice or even the full practice she did the entire week before the event. Fortunately, she got no reaction this time. Her eyes were red, but not to the point where they had to be shut for hours.
The first time I saw her dance the numbers was last Friday at a rehersal with her uncles. Yes.. there is a flashback in this post, that tops all other flashbacks.
Many years ago, when Jr. was a year and a half old, we visited Melbourne for the first time. San's cousins who were little kids then, went to perform on the Mridangam and Violin at a local music school function. We were in the audience and at the end of the event they said "if Jr. ever does her arangetram, we will come and accompany her!".
We have talked about it many times and Meena teacher agreed to have them accompany her, after we showed her videos of them performing at events in Melbourne area. Practice tapes were sent and things co-ordinated and I was oblivious of all the effort that San and an army of people supporting this were doing. Continued to play chauffer..
Last Friday, at the practice, was blown away by the improvement in her dancing. Had no words.. just sat silently in the car on the way back home with a realization that :
1. my daughter was no longer a kid
2. if she could switch her face from anger to scared to happy to sad, I should be very careful with her going forward.. this is a girl who would put a puppy face and bat her eyelids, to get anything she wanted from me at 4 years old, but that was her only method.. now she has some acting talent, my brain went on high alert!
3. I don't have to worry about the event
On Saturday evening, she got on stage and danced. She did it for herself more than anyone else. She made us very proud that evening. Then she told us "we should tell Meena aunty that I want to come back to the regular class schedule".
Dancing on stage for the first time alone is all well and good, but it takes a lifetime of practice to improve at anything. Was very happy to hear her say that. As long as she keeps it up, we are happy for her.
The first step in her dance journey was finding Meena teacher and Pushpanjali dance academy. The second step was this Arangetram. The next step is scheduling the first class after the arangetram. The step after that, is to keep going...
Do not have photographs from the official photographer / videographer yet. It will come in a week. Did walk around with a camera, during the performance, through a side door that goes to backstage and took some shots..
A big thanks to her uncles Venkat and Narayanan (aka Varun) for coming all the way up from Melbourne to accompany her,
Smt. Jayanthi Umesh and Sri. Ashwin Krishnakumar for supporting her with the Vocal and Flute
and Meena teacher who is nothing short of a miracle worker.
Sometimes I wish Meena teacher would teach Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics etc. also..
Jr.'s aunt Aditi was the MC for the event.
Was too tongue tied at the end of the performance and opted not to speak. So I get to thank everyone in this blog for posterity.. the voluteers from the dance academy, friends and family who came from near and far, the folks we hired and the folks who volunteered for every aspect of the event, makeup, stage set up, decorations, sound, lighting, compering, taking care of the dancer, the artists, the attenees, video, photos, a very long list of things that I did not know, that have to work perfectly for an event of this magnitude to happen, our entire list of guests who came to the event or sent messages that encouraged Jr. on this event.
After my wedding, this was the first time we had my brother, sister , San's brother and sister all be here in one location. Some of them made it with their families. We had 20-21 folks stay in a house where normally 4-5 of us are there. Now we have an empty house effect after everyone has gone. The silence is deafening.
Two photographs that never saw the light of day.. they were taken during the still shoot for the invitation..
San doesn't get enough thanks from me, for making me see what could be, because she knows what our kids are capable of, has a wider imagination, and she is not soft on them like me.. THANK YOU SANGEETHA!
You were right, again! The girl can dance!
Here is to Jr. and her continued dancing journey...
For the longest time, this niece of mine really had no competition when it came to being my favorite!
So you can imagine my surprise, seeing her be all grown up and emote so well at her Arangetram in Chennai two months ago, not to mention do a solo on stage for two hours to a packed audience in a city that is not her own.
Had just landed in Chennai the previous day and thanks to AirAsia, my entire lens kit was a mess and I did not even want to put everything back together. Throughout her dance performance, was missing my camera. Then I managed to get it cleaned and fixed in Mumbai.
They say life is all about second chances. Second chance I did get last evening, when she did a solo performance for all her bay area friends and family, most of whom, did not make it to Chennai. This time, I had my camera.
She did an amazing performance again! More than her performance, I was so happy to see her respect her teacher the way she did. That is something you simply cannot teach a child with ease in the US of A. It comes naturally to kids in India from a culture standpoint. It does not come naturally to kids here. Even Indian parents here suddenly start seeing teachers as service providers. Guess that whole "maata, pita, guru, deivam" (mom, dad, teacher then god) thing disappears in a uber capitalist system!
The way she talked about her teacher was what impressed me the most. She did a great job dancing, and I did take lots of pictures. I will post only three here..
1. with the star of the show!
2. to put it in current teen speak, "she simply slayed it"
3. If she can hold poses like this, chances are she is already a Yogi!
Looking forward to many more performances. It is not easy to do this without a significant time commitment from the kid, teacher and parents.
Given the number of friends who are having their kids do Arangetrams (getting on stage to do a solo), the Indian dance art forms are definitely thriving in the US!
Had happy tears watching this kid make us all proud, for the second time!
The first planned event on our India trip was to attend the arangetram of Kavya. I have never been to an arangetram in India, but have attended two dozen or so of these events in the bay area.
It was a treat to watch Kavya dance. Sat there wondering when this little kid we are so used to seeing got so mature in emoting! The audience in India is more of an untamed beast. The average age of the crowd that attended was a good 20 years older than the audience in the US, which in itself is not a bad thing. They do not have bladder control though and there is a constant stream of people walking in and out of their seats to hit the restroom.
So here is a tip if you are used to seeing arangetrams in US and you go watch one in India. Get to the front seat!
We also got to hear a few words from the Legendary Chitra Visweshwaran on art forms that have gone to foreign lands and are kept alive and well. She talked about the challenges kids face both in India and abroad but how the parents abroad give that extra priority to keep things going to get to an arangetram or a stage performance and not give up because of "board exams".
Thought of recording it, but then switched the camera off and just listened to her talk.
Hearing that I realized that we put our kids through a lot here in the US and they also push themselves hard because of peer pressure.
Hoping that BB will post pictures or videos of the event in his blog. I am still getting goosebumps going back to that evening.
Promptly after the performance ended, we ran out to find an auto! Yes, that was a real challenge as autos are not easy to find after 9PM in that area and we had to catch the first flight out in the morning to Mumbai!
We had to transcend to another space in short time.
After reaching Mumbai, our plan was to go straight to see San's cousin and her new baby! We had no idea that the supposed 45 minute commute will become a 2 hour plus ordeal! Lunch plan became tea plan and we were exhausted by the time we reached her cousins place.
Then a cute baby made us forget everything!
That was again transcending time. They say you can see god in a baby's smile! There may be some truth to it...
After another 2 hour ride in rains and traffic, we made it to the in-laws place by dinner time, and that was day 2!
Mumbai might drain faster after a quick rain but when it comes to traffic, it is a lot worse than Chennai. At least that was our experience.
Another year has passed with Jr. continuing to learn Classical Dancing.
Here is a short clip from her groups dance performance at Pushpanjali Dance Academy 20th annual day celebration.
She has come a long way since her first steps. While she will continue to get a barely passing grade from her mother and grandmothers and all the women in the family who have danced before her, I have only adoring eyes for my little darling.
She makes me so proud..
be it on the stage while smiling away..
and having fun or
off the stage at home posing for pictures..
and still having fun!
It is our sincere hope that she continues to practice and get better as time goes by!
Saturday, January 20, 2024 at 9:40PM ;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)