Dancing

The man nodded at me from across the roof and began to walk towards me. Figuring he was one of Shaina’s relatives, I nodded back, then said hello and asked him some questions in broken Hindi. He responded in a language that was unintelligible and after trying to make out his words for several minutes I realized that his lips were full of paan and that my attempts at conversation were pointless. Silence ensued, one of those bizarre Indian awkward silences, and we stood there listening to the music and staring at the view. Eventually he broke the silence with a garbled question, in which I could only make out one word “dancing.” I figured he wanted to teach me to dance, and since Indians are generally good dancers, I said “yes.” It was a terrible mistake. Before my eyes, the man who had been Shaina’s forty year old pot-bellied uncle with a mouthful of paan morphed into Michael Jackson and began to gyrate and thrust his way all over the roof. I was shocked, but not as shocked as I became when I realized that he didn’t want to teach me to dance; he wanted me, Shaina’s eighteen year old brother and all of his friends to dance with him.

One might wonder how I ended up in this ridiculous situation. Well, the main reason behind my predicament was the fact that it was Diwali. It’s very hard to describe what celebrating Diwali in India is like, but I think Shaina put it best when she said “Diwali is like if the 4th of July and Christmas were being celebrated on the same day in a city that just won the Super Bowl.” Yet even this description understates the dramatic nature of the celebrations and it might be even more accurate to add that the city, in which these celebrations are taking place, is also under siege.

Our group Diwali celebrations began very simply. We celebrated, compared to the rest of the city, in a refined and dignified manner, by lighting numerous small diyas (oil candles), eating sweets and setting off a couple of relatively basic fireworks on our roof. After our brief party was over, I began to head home for a totally dance-free evening, until Shaina called to inform me that her family was having a party on their roof and had purchased an obscene amount of fireworks. This Diwali, the city of Varanasi spent around 2 million rupees on fireworks, and Shaina’s family must have accounted for at least a quarter of that amount. Needless to say, I immediately turned my bike around and headed back across town, unaware of the fate that awaited me.

I was already enjoying many aspects of the party on the roof before I was confronted by the dancing men. For a while, I simply got to relax, observe the view of the unregulated and unplanned fireworks show going on all over the city, and even make my contribution to the show by launching some fireworks of my own. Yet, as you already know, this relative calm couldn’t last forever and eventually my evening was interrupted by Shaina’s whirling dervish of an uncle.

Though I tried to hold out for a while, I eventually I gave in and joined in the dancing circle of men. How long I was trapped I the frenzied circle of flailing limbs I can’t remember, but after what seemed like a very long time, the music stopped and Shaina’s brother and uncle began to argue about what song to play next (an old Bollywood classic or the newest hit) and I quietly made my escape.

Looking back on the event, I still feel slightly dazed. In the end, I’m happy that I danced. After all, I embraced Indian culture, gave Shaina and her home stay sister endless material to laugh about, and ended up having a lot of fun.