Dear Friends:
Perhaps within the week, I shall bid farewell to New York Times just as I did to the Times UK a couple of years ago as the authorities desire to stop their free online newspaper. It is understandable because it is an white elephant to pay a dozen or more highly paid stringers abroad and then maintain the commercial operation overseas altogether.The esteemed tabloid assured to publish 20 India-based articles on average but as you could see they exceeded that limit. However, not to worry, as the world press is by and large still toll free. The article below escaped the blockage this morning (31 03 2012). Enjoy. -bhuban AM South Asian Talent Showcase at ‘SubDrift’ By SARAH KHAN Courtesy of Hrishi Poola Nazir Ahmed, a Nigerian rap artist who goes by the stage name Ziriums, at the Subcontinental Drift NYC in Manhattan. A Nigerian rapper, a braces-wearing would-be Whitney Houston, and an Indian-American psychiatrist/stand-up comedian walked into a bar one Friday night. But what ensued was far from a joke — though more than a few hilarious ones were told over the course of three electrifying hours. Talent manifested itself in myriad forms as a crowd of more than 80 swelled in Brooklyn’s cozy Two Moon Art House and Café for the latest installment of Subcontinental Drift NYC. Started five years ago in Washington, D.C., as a forum to allow creative South Asians to thrive in a casual, nurturing environment, “SubDrift” has becomesomething of a nationwide movement, with open-mic nights springing up in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, and Boston. When I attended a SubDrift NYC event in Manhattan last summer, I was blown away, not only by the diversity of talents exhibited on a tiny stage once graced by Lady Gaga, but by the diversity of backgrounds — doctors who had released multiple CDs; MBA students with crazy guitar skills; banker-poets; debut novelists. South Asians with high-powered day jobs were capable of being this creative in the after-hours? Never had I felt quite so unaccomplished. I resolved to perform something, anything, at a future SubDrift, and so here I was, months later, in New York’s artsy hub of Brooklyn, ready to fulfill that promise. “We always knew that people have the talent, we’re just giving them the forum to use it,” said co-founder Nishant Shah, 28, an emcee for the evening. Fellow organizer Nupur Chaudhary, 29, added, “It’s really a simple concept, it was just a matter of putting it out there. We’re not professionals, so it brings a lot of people out of the woodwork — like, ‘I may be in finance, but no one’s going to judge me here.’” Courtesy of Hrishi Poola Hrishi Poola participates in the Subcontinental Drift NYC in Manhattan. And come out of the woodwork they did. There was Sruthi Sadhujan, an extremely passionate poet whose words were alive with vivid imagery; Shubha Bala, who silenced the audience with a powerful piece about her horrifying memories from the 2002 Gujarat riots; and Hrishi Poola, whose facetious mash-ups of hip-hop songs — Nelly’s “Ride Wit Me,” Taio Cruz’s “Dynamite,” and Nicki Minaj’s “Super Bass” — on his turquoise acoustic guitar brought down the house. Sandip Buch, 36, the psychiatrist by day, stand-up comic by night, started off a little slow, but when he got into his groove, the uniquely Indian-American brand of humor he purveyed had a relatable quality that resulted in most of the audience convulsing in laughter: “My parents found each other in 30 minutes,” he commented on the topic of arranged marriage. “These are the same people who go to four different stores to find the cheapest milk.” Though he’s performed at open-mic nights before, Mr. Buch said this was his first time in front of a predominantly Indian audience. “I was worried about making jokes about Indian gods. I did notice they laughed less than white people do,” he said. The acts weren’t limited to the South Asian diaspora — the audience saw an Angolan musician, an Australian and German duo doing impersonations, and an ethnically ambiguous country singer. Performances were interspersed with fun exercises, like a five-minute break to introduce one another to fellow audience members and a matchmaking session, in which the emcees invited single people to the stage to make a pitch for why someone should date them. As we went deeper into the night and my turn approached, I was surprised to find myself growing less nervous, not more — the vibe was mellow and convivial, and the room was buzzing with supportive sentiments, so I figured there was no better venue to stage my reading debut. Courtesy of Hrishi Poola Poet Sruthi Sadhujan at the Subcontinental Drift NYC in Manhattan. Mr. Shah reeled everyone back in after intermission with a hilarious hip-hop/spoken-word ode to the Indian latrine, that much-maligned hole-in-the-ground toilet — “You’ll begin to love the hole/ Sitting on your haunches/ It’ll stir your soul/ Even the staunchest hater/ Will see the hole’s role” — setting me up perfectly for my own reading. “Spitting Distance in Jodhpur” is an essay I wrote last year about an unpleasant encounter I had with a boy in Rajasthan who spit on me, for reasons that remain a mystery to this day. I narrated the story a bit faster than I would have liked, but thankfully, the crowd chuckled along. What could have been a nerve-wracking experience turned out to be unexpectedly easy — as though I were recounting an anecdote to a group of friends, not performing bathed in a spotlight in front of nearly a hundred people. The aforementioned Nigerian rapper closed out the show. Nazir Ahmed, a political rap artist who goes by the stage name Ziriums and said he was banned in his home state, told the audience he sings about education and other problems in Nigeria, but often chooses to set his Hausa-language lyrics to Bollywood tracks because “this is the only way I could get people to listen to the message, by setting it to a popular song they recognize.” As performers and audience members mingled over drinks after the show, people seemed inspired by the broad mix of talents they had seen, and viewers began echoing the same refrain: “Next time, maybe I’ll do something,” they murmured. I remembered that feeling all too well. Sarah Khan is an editor at Travel + Leisure magazine in New York. You can read more of her work at www.bysarahkhan.com or follow her on Twitter@BySarahKha _______________________________________________ assam mailing list assam@assamnet.org http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org
