Intense sharing

He is a friend whom I have know from my teens. I have shared my tragedies and most happy moments with him. When I was in serious pain, he stood by me and through his comic sharing has relived me of my horrible moments. He has undergone maximum pain in life and still has the power to change it into a comic phase and at the same time can be emotional. And because of this talent of him I decided to interview him. He came and looked calm as usual. I thought he would make die of laughing while the interview is going on. My idea was to do away with victim narrative. He came and made me cry and also cried in the interview. It was definitely not a victim narrative. It was most intensive sharing of his personal life which is filled with pain and pain and pain. This side of him shocked me and brought the reality in front of me about people who sacrifice their lives in the LGBTI communities for their partners. Here one of my close friends to you all, sharing very intense moments of his life.

Madhu - a total surprise

This friend of us really stunned us with appearance, understanding of gender and sexuality and sweet friendship. A senior community, this person changed all the moments of struggle into situations where it would be converted into a surprising situation for people around. So the immediate response is more of an expression of coming to terms with this surprise thrown than severe violence. Here is a small excerpt of our friend who is explaining about gender identity.

 

Happiness is more about ...........

Seethal my dear friend from Kerala - in 2005 I met with an accident and among very close friends who looked after me day and night, it was Seethal who was very sensitive about both our genders and nursed me back to life with other friends. This is not the only friendship we share. We have been together in many political struggles and work. In Kerala the existence of  male born sexual and gender minorities is very difficult and so many trans people who want surgery cannot find the Hijra community in Kerala. The historical existence of Hijras is not present in Kerala as in other states like Tamil Nadu. Seethal is one of the trans person who has seen through this struggle of no space for expression in Kerala and has also received intense ridicule and violence for it.

"I love Gangamma" says Ramya

Instantly we all fell in love with her, Ramya also called as Dayamma. She is called Dayamma because she nurses Hijras who undergo castration and looks after them till they are fit and fine whether they are her chelas or not. Smile never fades away from her face. She narrates intense pain like as though it is a joke. Her slang in Tamil is really something that we found very difficult to translate. 

She was chosen to act in the play Molagapodi directed Srijith Sundaram of Kattiyakkari group. The character she was to play is a feudal land lord woman who is always angry and violent towards working class. Now our dearest Ramya is exactly opposite. She just cannot get angry nor mimic anger. She bursts into smiles the moment she is supposed to get angry. Even otherwise in life she is not a person who can get angry. So she struggled hard and one day cried in the rehearsals that she cannot do the role. All her co-actors pepped her up and gave her courage to do the role. She finally learned to get angry and play the role and then she says "I love Gangamma". Here is Dayamma for you all about her childhood.    

Maraladi - a god's sanction

Maralu is a kind of possession through god and you become god's wife. And in this process a male person with different or women's gender orientation can transition to being woman with or without surgery.

Mayamma another friend who is Maraladi gave us the interview and talked about the struggle of convincing the family and society about her being a Maraladi. She also has the powers to cure many diseases and ailments through her worship and her dedication to the god of Maralu. 

"I am Sowmiya The Great"

I met Sowmiya in Chennai when I went to watch the play "Aanmayo Aanmay" directed by Mangai. The play was yet to begin in Spaces, a wonderful threatre in Besant Nagar. We were just hanging around meeting many friends. Somwiya was also around and I met her. She spoke and I too spoke. 

 
I went to Chennai again to do the video interviews and Srijith our friend and a theatre director of the group Kattiyakkari reintroduced Sowmiya to us. And this is "Sowmiya the great". She is my age. Initially she said that she has training in beauty parlor work. Later we came to know that she is an actor too and has acted in some plays.   

Talking about her work as a beautician she said that because she is a transgender person many people refuse to avail her services and so it is difficult for her to work in a mainstream beauty parlor. She then started going to people's houses to give beautician services. Mangai and friends like Mangai call her home to get services. But that is not enough for her livelihood. She has the strength to keep trying and trying to establish herself as a beautician.  After she acted in a play called "Molagapodi" of the Kattiyakkari group, which got staged in many places, people started recognizing her and came to know that she is a beautician. And now many people call her for beautician work. I wish her all the best in her acting and in her career.

Naan Oru Chindu ......Sankari

Naan Oru Chindu (a Tamil film song).... she sang this for us and said that it relates to her life......Every time we would go to Tamil Nadu for work, mostly crisis intervention of lesbian, bisexual women and female to male trans people (LBT), she is there ready to work with us. She is always pleasant and also relieving us of our tensions. She always says that LBT community is not like our Aravani community. There is no support for them and so she is always ready to help in any worst crisis situation.   The work that she has done for us cannot be called as help, it is this bond of friendship and extension of the feeling of belonging that we share.

Sankari is also a theatre activist and has been part of many plays. She is now working in Nirangal an organization working for peoples' rights. Here is another wonderful friend that you all can know about.