One of my earliest teenage memories was looking in a mirror as I pinched a fold of fat out. I stretched it out like it was clay. Moulding it into a little hat, and then a bowl. Squeezing the sides till it stretched out from one corner of the room to the other. I played with it, tugging here and pulling there. But when I let it go, it was saggy in its natural form and it felt wrong. It felt as though a little alien had permeated through the melanin of my skin. Adding folds here and there. It felt as though these folds had then been taken over by this alien, who ran around, marking scars of gold, all over, zig and zag. Running up my shoulders, down my back, not even sparing my armpits.
The other early teenage memory I have is getting decked up in my traditional Bharatanatyam wear. Putting on the vociferously coloured pink outfit. Adding layers of gold, to my neck, then my hands, next my forehead and finally my ears. I looked into the mirror, caressed by my mothers hands as she exclaimed “Wow, the gold looks so wonderful.” Personally, I felt I wanted no other decoration. The lines of gold running through my shoulder, down my stomach, all through my thighs, should have been enough. I remember feeling a pang of guilt in the bottom of my chest when she carefully covered those lines, like they meant nothing. Like the alien, running around marking them, had put in all this effort, for nothing. I asked her why. “It doesn’t look nice Nethra. When you dance, you want the world to be stunned by you. These marks and bumps, they look odd in your costume.”
So I went out, and I danced. I danced to leave everyone stunned. I danced to the rhythmic ta ta thai ya, that emulated from the cheap school speakers. I danced with vigour. With passion. Every mudra matched its beat. Every aramandi, perfectly placed. Every smile on cue. Just as rehearsed. Everything was right; it all belonged. But the mudra felt ugly when it was concentrated around the chub of my finger. The Aramandi felt half hearted, when it came from someone already so short. The smile on the tha and the thi, felt misplaced in my braces.
Before I started Bharatanatyam lessons, I remember what my grandmother told me.
“Dance is beauty, and you will become beautiful with it.”
I have been dancing now for 9 years. I didn’t feel any more beautiful. I didn’t feel as though the gold lines that run over my body had twisted and turned with the Pushpanjali, I didn’t feel the Alaripu (even with the impositions it made) had straightened my posture out. It all felt misplaced, like my metal filled smile.
But when I looked at my teacher, she seemed to belong with so much ease. I could never find a crooked spot on her teeth, could never see the arch of her back lost, could never see the extra bulges forming hats and bowls. I could never see the lines of gold tracing her arms, or her legs, or her stomach. Her body matched the grace of the dance, just as well as mine didn’t. Her features fit, no matter what taal the music was in, no matter what raga the dance was performed to. She belonged.
I’ve heard of the Japanese art form of Kintsugi, where an object when broken, is placed back together, by streaks of gold paint running through it. There’s always a certain precision, and niche one requires to complete such a fine task. I felt my body lacking this precision or niche. I felt that the sticking of my pieces had been quite random. The gold from the scars on my body clashed with my silver metal mouth. My small eyes seemed to be overshadowed by the bulge in my cheeks. And because of this randomness, the dance seemed misplaced in my body.
The whole thing felt misplaced.