(Music)
hi everybody good evening if you're in
ontario
quebec and eastern canada good afternoon
if you're watching from canada's west
coast and
happy golden hour or almost golden hour
to
those in central as well as in northern
canada
for those joining us from across the
globe if it's very early or very late
where you are
we thank you for being here with us for
this very very special showcase that
we've put together for all of you
and a special – a most special welcome to
all of our amazing storytellers
tonight as well my name is Amrita
Kumar-Ratta
and i'm the founder and creator of
shades of brown girl – sobg
for short and i am so incredibly excited
to welcome you all
to our very first summer showcase i
promise you
that you are in for a very special treat
today
today we have with us 24 beautiful brown
womxn
who will each be sharing with you a
short excerpt
from personal monologues that they have
spent the past nine weeks creating
at the end of this showcase you will
have access to a gallery
where you will be able to watch and be
inspired by
many of their full-length pieces as well
as some of the incredible artwork
that they have created over the summer
months don't worry we will provide
all the links for that after the show
today's sold out program can be accessed
on zoom
and it is also being streamed live on
youtube the showcase consists of
three acts which will each feature eight
womxn
stories we also have some special
performances for you today from our
incredible team
of guest artists and facilitators who
have worked with our womxn
throughout the summer and who are all
incredible storytellers themselves
our intention with this showcase is that
we are inviting you all
into our workshop space for the next 90
minutes
so while we have added some performative
touches here and there
this event largely reflects the fluid
and organic
community space that we have created
over the past
nine weeks as such we will be sharing
stories in the same way that we have
shared them
with each other in our weekly workshop
sessions and we will be inviting you
our audience members to participate
by commenting in the chat to encourage
our storytellers
by joining in some creative play and by
asking
some questions during our talk back at
the end of this showcase
the chat and the question and answer
features are at the bottom of your
screen if you are joining us on zoom
and at the side of your screen if you
are on youtube
uh so while we have had live captions
live closed captions during our weekly
sessions unfortunately we were not able
to make that happen for today's show
as accessibility is incredibly important
to us we do apologize for this
once the show is over we will be adding
captions to the youtube video
which will remain posted for one week so
for those who require closed captioning
please check back after the live event
is finished
and you will be sure to find them there
i also want to mention that the stories
that you will be hearing today
are brave and that they have come from a
very deep place of vulnerability
and silence over generations that we
have been working hard over the course
of
this workshop to excavate to unmask
and to reclaim many of our storytellers
are not performers
and some of these stories have never
been shared in public
before as such some of the content
may be triggering so please do be
mindful of that
and feel free to step away should you
need to
so without further ado let's begin with
a
warm-up activity so using
zoom and youtube at the bottom or at the
side of your screen as i mentioned
before
we would love to know where you are
watching from today
so i'm just gonna take a look at the
chat
and see where people are calling them
okay philadelphia wonderful
i know we have some people from toronto
new york city wonderful
trinidad we have some we have some
storytellers from trinidad
as well that's amazing who else do we
have here
i know we've got some we've got london
uk oh that's Nishma hey Nishma
we've got people from eastern canada we
have people from denmark
wonderful brazil wow
we've got a real global community
watching us today
who else do we have with us let's see
we've got some people from quebec
montreal yep wonderful
wow so it seems
as though we have an incredibly diverse
group of audience members watching us
and tuning in today
um which is truly truly amazing and it
reflects
so beautifully what shades of brown girl
is all about you know fostering
connections
across the globe and really digging into
the boundlessness
as well as the geographic specificities
of our stories
i see here we also have some people from
other people from the US
san fran awesome san fran is one of my
favorite cities thank you for joining us
all the way from california amazing
so i want to officially start our
program
with a land acknowledgement i
i want to i want to acknowledge that
we at shades of brown girl live
and work on Turtle Island and
specifically in the great lakes region
into Tkaronto colonially known as Toronto
there were many migration patterns in
what is now known as the great lakes
region
for thousands of years before european
settlers arrived
the area was inhabited by many diverse
nations of first peoples extending
beyond
the traditional territories of the
Wendat the Anishinaabe
the Haudenosaunee the Métis and the
Mississauga of the Credit
the greater toronto area itself is
implicated in a myriad
of complications to do with the upper
canada treaties
specifically the lands protected by the
dish with one spoon
wampum internation peace agreement an
agreement that has
like so many other treaties been broken
by acknowledging the land we are
reminding ourselves
of our human connection and our
responsibility to care for the land
and that can't be done if we aren't
caring for each other
and respecting each other regardless of
who we are
and where we come from by acknowledging
the land we are recognizing Indigenous
Peoples as the original
caretakers of Turtle Island and we
remember that first peoples
First Nations Métis and Inuit peoples
are still negotiating their inherent
like
rights to the land and their
relationship to the state
relationships that have been extremely
fraught and violent
and they are trying to integrate
truthfully integrate
back into the historical narrative of
this country
that we call canada
it's also crucial that we do not forget
that most of us
as immigrants children of immigrants and
as diverse members
womxn of the larger south asian diaspora
here today presenting stories to you are
in fact
settlers i as a hindu punjabi womxn
whose hometown
in brampton ontario whose hometown is
brampton ontario
and who was born here to parents who
immigrated to canada between the 1960s
and the 1980s
am a settler our presence on this land
and i'm mostly speaking to the canadian
american context here
is made possible by a history of
violence and erasure
of Indigenous peoples thus it's our
responsibility
to critically engage and examine and
challenge colonial histories and their
continuing
manifestations
(Music)
beige a whitish brown
subtle trendy underappreciated
mahogany a deep reddish brown
red eyed rage filled tan
a yellowish brown a soft milky brown
bronze a bright orange brown
a golden brown shiny shimmery brown
the color of my skin of my roots
of the home i'm searching for i try to
be
brown but i'm confused
my name has been on a journey Amrita
Amy Ammie you know
you should join the multiculturalism
club if diversity is your concern
you don't expect such a small meek
looking girl to have
so much rage but i do
and it's explosive she tells me stories
about my grandparents about her
childhood
about india about coming to canada as a
young bride
i won't apologize fuck you for trying to
break me
by telling me that i smell like curry
have you ever smelt curry
it's fucking amazing i'm proud to be
these many colors
these many shades of brown but i'm
exhausted
tired of asking you to get it at this
moment
i don't owe any explanations you need to
they need to see my strength
fuck i need to see it
(Music)
so i hope you enjoyed that snapshot
of the the original solo show
that is titled shades of brown girl so
shades of brown girl as you can
maybe glean from the short clip that you
just that you just saw
was born in november 2017
as a short autobiographical solo
performance piece which was created
during a 10-week solo playwriting course
in toronto
creating the piece and telling my own
story
as a brown womxn on stage was
a crucial part of my own healing journey
and i knew that after i performed it
once
that i needed to do more and that i
needed to use this piece
as a vehicle for encouraging other brown
womxn
to dig into their stories and and to
share them
the original show is filled as you as
you may have seen
in this video that you just saw with my
own grappling
with unidentified and unresolved trauma
that i realized after creating it after
going through the messy creation process
was relatable to so many people and
particularly
to other south asian womxn whose stories
are often not heard
and whose stories are often silenced so
over the past
few years shades of brown girl has
actually transformed
from a one-womxn show from a solo show
into a global storytelling movement
a transnational exploration of south
asian femininity
the show has thus been a vehicle for
starting conversations among brown womxn
rooted in anti-oppression decolonial
feminism
and color psychology so far including
the womxn whose stories
whose stories are featured tonight there
have been over 150 womxn
between the ages of 14 and 60 across
canada and
india that have engaged in workshops and
have created their own
personal brown girl monologues and this
i assure you
is just the beginning
so what has this summer program
been all about i'm sure you're all
wondering and very curious
as to what you're all what you're all
going to be uh witnessing here today
so this program is the result of a
long-standing vision
that i've had since first telling my
story on stage
it's an experiment in creative personal
storytelling
collective healing and community
building that i knew i wanted to move
forward with when the pandemic
first became a global reality in march
2020.
i wanted to curate an experience a kind
of
master class for brown womxn that
allowed them to really
dig deep inside themselves to excavate
their own
powerful important and inspiring stories
to bravely
and courageously identify their own
traumas
and to be in community as we together
make space to personally and to
collectively heal
to create and to build a brown girl
sisterhood
so over the last nine weeks we have met
on a weekly basis
we have created and shared stories we
have experienced a lot of learning
and unlearning about our bodies about
our multi-layered and intersectional
identities
about creative and anti-oppressive ways
of storytelling and community building
it's been such a magical journey
and it's been the result of a lot of
dreaming and a lot of sleepless nights
and a lot of collaboration a lot of
collaboration
and teamwork on the part of so so so
many people who i am so grateful for
so to show you a little bit and to give
you a little snapshot about
the community that we've created here
and the
the the magic that we've created we have
a short video that we'd like to share
that
that captures the brilliance that
captures the
the strength the power the magic i hope
you enjoy
(Music)
there's something like magical about the
sun on brown skin
it's so rich
for the first time i was a brown patch
in this beautiful brown quilt
tell me her story
sometimes it feels like brown is just
too confusing for everyone
i thought brown was the ugliest color
for so
many years mom's voice telling me when i
got dark you're like an ugly brown now
we must as people in communities of
color
share our stories through counter
narrative i
am hopeful that by the end of these 10
weeks
all of you will create your own personal
story
(Music)
some people just get to walk on the
sidewalk
they just do and some people just have
to walk through mud and we're all just
trying to
get out of the mud the tone that i wear
even as they told me i was too dark to
wear it
when i get angry on someone i
am not able to speak out because i feel
that it's my fault
i've always been angry but i didn't know
how to express it
by telling my truth it might check
other people to do it also even if i am
wrong it's okay to say it
if people don't like it i don't care
it's okay to be angry it's how you
channel it right what do you do with
that anger
i have always tried to push my brown to
the side
i am a must-have in every type of form
although i am shunned away
i was instructed by my white female
colleague to take up more space
and to help be seen more the healing
process never stops eh
it just it goes deeper and you manage
you manage yourself wow like we do so
much
to deny ourselves pleasure i am ready to
unlearn my internalized racism
(Music)
i feel so deeply connected to my roots
dance was the first time i didn't feel
like the other while doing something i
loved
the brownness represents a rawness in
who i am as a person
man i'm like half sure
tempting you with my spice and reminding
you of your mother
i'm not just brown there's specifics to
where i come from brown isn't a country
it's not a you know it's not like a
heritage this is a testament to how
33 brown folks womxn
fans can come together to create a
counter narrative through your stories
that's like
why it's so powerful are all womxn of
color so
we do have that thread that connects us
which
would allow us to go through life in
similar ways no matter what life
experience we have
this is the first time i've ever been in
a space entirely with
other brown womxn and femmes who relate
to my experience
this is so incredibly healing
(Music)
so often if i'm in a brown space i feel
like excluded as like an artistic
thinker
or like if i'm in a space with other
artistic thinkers i feel really singled
out as a womxn of color
and so this is the first time that like
both of those identities have overlapped
in a way that makes me feel like really
fulfilled and supported
that's really amazing i'm proud to be
all of these colors
these many shades of brown realize how
natural brown is
and so important it is and it's not ugly
by any means
ta-ka-di-mi
yeah
(Music)
so as you can see
from the video that we just shared
there's
so so much magic in this community and
that was just
a five minute snapshot um so
as you can see here on our screen um
we are a group of the most beautiful
brown womxn
uh with incredible stories to share i'm
so incredibly grateful to invite all of
our storytellers in the space here with
us today
in total joining me here on this
experimental journey have been
31 incredibly diverse brown womxn
from across canada and globally folks in
this space
identify as south asian as brown
in so many different ways
we've got tamil womxn indo-caribbean
womxn we've got
indo-african womxn womxn whose roots are
in diverse regions of
india pakistan bangladesh sri lanka
the caribbean and southeast asia womxn
who currently live
or have lived in many diverse parts of
the globe
and womxn who identify with their
brownness in very diverse and
and different ways and who identify with
their femininity in very diverse and
different ways
so i want to introduce some of them to
you you can see
how beautiful they are you can see the
energy in the space already
so we've got we've got Aria from
trinidad
she's waving we've got Sarah from
montreal
we have Priya from rotterdam in the
netherlands
it's a little late for her but she's
here in all her spirits
we've got Sharada in brampton
we've got Anusa in yellowknife
in the northwest territories northern
canada represents um
we've got Misha and halifax
doing some waving we've got sammy in
calgary
and we've got lots of folks in the
greater toronto area we've got
Celia and Devy and pickering we've got
a few folks in scarborough if you want
to wave
we've got lots of folks in toronto if
you want to wave
if you're in toronto i know Leanne
is in mississauga i believe we've got
Pearlia
and Jothi in ajax um
so they're waving as well we have
Krystal in
in in the okanagan um
she's also with us today um so we have
so
so so many diverse womxn and i'm really
excited
to um to share all their stories with
you all
tonight and i think i can speak i think
i can speak for
so many of these womxn and you guys can
add uh you can nod or snap if you agree
um that this community that we've built
over the weeks has been amazing and the
impact has been felt both personally
as well as collectively so
so so so it is finally time
almost for me to hand over the show to
our storytellers
but before i do that we have started
every week all of our weekly sessions
with a grounding ritual a collective
meditation
and so i invite all of you our audience
members
as well as our storytellers in the space
today to also
participate in this ritual with us
before we start
um the our program
so if everybody in the audience
and our storytellers here on the screen
if everyone can plant their feet firmly
on the ground
get comfortable shake it out if you need
to
let's close our eyes and for the
storytellers in the space
you all every week you've brought an
object a grounding object with you so if
you can hold
or touch that object with you right now
that object ideally has some connection
to the earth and to the land
and if our if you don't have an object
if you're either on the screen as a
storyteller and you're
or you're an audience member and you
don't have an object
let's plant our feet firmly on the floor
and if we can't
do that let's touch with our mind's eye
some piece of the land and the earth
it could be sand or grass or dirt or
water
anything that we feel connects us to the
land
and let's take this moment to think
about where we live
and how we came to be here to think
about our ancestors
and our ancestors ancestors and the
various lands that they moved on
that they moved across and that they
moved between
let's take a moment to recognize and
thank the original caretakers of this
land
and the and the and these lands that we
call home
the many lands that we call home and to
reflect on the deep rooted histories of
colonization of anti-black racism
of so many other systems of oppression
that continue to live their legacies on
these lands
and if we are storytellers here today
let's
let's think about the stories that we
are going to be sharing today
let's go deep within ourselves and find
the strength
the resilience the power that we've been
channeling that we've been unmasking
that we've been uncovering that we've
been unpacking
for the past nine weeks and let's get
ready
to be brave and tell our stories those
incredibly important stories that the
world needs to hear
and if we're in the audience let's use
this moment to think about our own
stories
let's open our minds and get curious to
the stories that will be shared with us
today
and let's think about all of the ways in
which the stories that we might hear
in today's program may be so relatable
to our own stories
and let's also think about the ways in
which
our stories so many of our stories are
still
deeply hidden are masked
by trauma needing to be uncovered
to be unpacked to be reclaimed
and and so let's breathe in
and let's breathe out
and with this remembrance this
reflection
and this recognition let's
open our eyes and
let's get ready to begin
so let's shake it out shake out however
you need to shake it out
so thank you all our storytellers as
well as our audience members thank you
all so much for indulging me
in that very lengthy introduction uh
for giving me space to share my
excitement about tonight
and about this whole journey and now
please please enjoy the stories
that we have for you today if everyone
can turn off your videos
if everyone in the space our
storytellers can turn off your videos
and let's officially begin
act one too brown not brown enough
i want to tell you the story of a
princess
and the tower she built this tower was
made around her
each stone was placed with purpose there
was respect
integrity and one rule her vulnerability
could not resurface
the princess goes on many adventures in
the search for love
and friendship but she's careful and
steady
hiding herself like a secret
she soon comes to realize there's no
purpose in this stone cold tower
no protection no safety no reclamation
of power i am going to leave these
stones behind
a wave of my own destruction i don't
know how long i'll be under construction
look at me
surrounded by rubble and ash building
and breaking
can't happen fast but i have them
they've given me purpose they said
enough Devyani
let your vulnerability resurface
when i arrive in whitby it's the same as
in markham
but different when they see me i don't
fit into their box
i might be beautiful and fair to brown
people
but amongst white people my deep coffee
eyes and my raven hair that shine red in
the sun
are enough to signify that i am not
quite white
enough my hair is not blonde my eyes are
not blue
and i have a skin tone that deepens in
the summertime
instead of freckles or burns
of course this is when my difference
makes me exotic
my look maybe even coveted looking back
i
spent a long time trying to assimilate
into that 90s teen movie version of high
school that i went to
you know the kind i'm talking about with
the jocks and the stoners and all the
pretty blonde girls who
danced or swam or did gymnastics on the
weekends
traded in my sirens clothes for american
eagle
green day and fallout boy instead of
biggie and mariah
date a few blond-haired blue-eyed white
boys and you're almost passing as a
white girl
right i wish that i could go back in
time
and tell my self-conscious doubting
teenage self
that her lack of golden hair and
sapphire eyes were not a deficit
she was not ugly she was so special
and in fact she was already enough
what am i i am
the same shade as aged porcelain but not
nearly as fragile
think of it more like rice
seasoned yellow by garlic giving its
character and taste
garlic rice is powerful not weak
i am the same shade as
a setting sun glorious and bewildering
golden brown just like lumpia exquisite
in both taste and color i am
maybe not asian enough for you or the
wrong kind
or not at all but i am
strong and magnificent
i am
she comes into life in the dead of the
night the culmination of her mother's
deepest desires
the peak of her father's highest hopes
her first cries flooded the valleys
carved from their grief
the sun rises in the morning shimmering
beams of light
shine as brightly as golden topaz
she is terra cotta born from earth and
fire
i tried to perfect her to wash away all
the parts that were sand in dirt and mud
to mold her sharp edges into soft curves
she won't sit quietly she screams she
runs she kicks she punches
she laughs loudly she talks and talks
and talks
she wants to keep me protected lovingly
i care for the house
cooking food cleaning up quietly
listening in the background
during her visits as she chit chats with
her brother
the sun sets in the evening and amber
horizon slips slowly
into a peaceful night
my neighbors look at me with suspicion
when i walk alone
and yet they smile and wave when i'm
with my partner
my white partner i notice
the aunties and uncles at patel brothers
flare with rage when i go with my
partner or even when i go alone
a young womxn alone confident i notice
but i'm beyond caring i don't give a
fuck anymore
i'm angry i'm pissed i'm done
apologizing
for the red line under my name the red
dot on my forehead
the red light on my chest the red
handprint on my cheek
the ancestral blood dressed as mehndi
stains on my hands
what gives anyone the right to tell me
who i am
what i am my mamaji saw me as a sherni
everyone else called me chui
mouse and for the longest time
i believed them i squeaked
i did not roar until one day
one day when i heard my voice and that
is a sound i will never forget
mamaji i wish you could see me now
remember the last time we saw each other
you smiled and said
aa gayi sadi sherni our lioness has arrived
well mama ji  aa gayi tuadi sherni
i don't think i'm the brown you think i
am yeah i might love Shahrukh Khan
mera pehala pyar my first loved i dreamt of
him from dusk to dawn
but i watched his movies like a
foreigner with english subtitles added
on
oh and i have an indian name too but any
other connections
nope gone how can i be truly brown with
the languages i should know are
withdrawn
but i am fluent in the language of soca
chutney dancehall playing mass down the
road dhalpuri
doubles jerk chicken rice and peas so
much love and culture i can explode
bollywood tunes blasting left and right
like it's some sort of code
all of my caribbean folks together
chinese arab afro indo
together displaced always at crossroads
how can i be truly brown when another
culture
was bestowed
without a sound i am still brown
without a sound i am my authentic
identity
even as i scream i assert myself
in space you cannot hear me
i am golden as my authentic self
my voice from this confused still
working things out sort of place
i'm valuable my fatigued dissonant
stormy healing
is valuable perfect radiant life-giving
what i want most is laughter and joy
i want these rainbow aspirations to be
an energizing resistance
the colors exuede beyond the visible
spectrum
joyous sparkling blush
my skin may be brown when i am a sullen
soggy sun-soaked sienna self
incapacitated by the effort of minority
conformity
when i no longer remember appropriate
resilient words
in this colonized sham of her voice
i am still here and i am valuable
without a sound i am still brown
every day the pain gets louder they
thump in my head and chest like a tabla
every breeze starts to feel delicate
like each individual hair rises on its
own
i often lose moments of consciousness my
heart continues to race
sitting alone amongst the trees i have
no one to confirm what's real
and what's a dream i do this for months
and through every hallucination
i shed more pounds my clothes start to
slip off my buttery brown skin
i think finally you'll be proud of me
you'll think i'm beautiful
i clasp the paper tag on a dress filled
with glee
and disgust i look at that text intently
the depth of that oval from a size 10 to
a zero
i barely recognize the girl in the
mirror i finally look the way you've
always wanted me to look
thin and waif just like you like other
desi womxn
i'm so proud and repulsed
hello everyone my name is Sheliza Jamal
i worked with the amazing shades of
brown girl participants in
session four on unpacking
anti-oppressive practice through theatre
of the oppressed pedagogy and how to
reclaim their stories
through counter narratives i'm
performing a personal monologue today
called
sex miseducation
i was told lies about sex my mom told me
that i could get pregnant by kissing a
boy and there are points in my life
where i fell for it
for the longest time i thought my vagina
and urethra had the same function
i know many of you thought the same
thing am i right
pulling out your tampon every time you
had to pee
there was no coming of age talk in fact
i hid my period from my mom and my
sister for a very long time
i was 11. dressed up as jasmine at the
halloween dance
i was mortified the first person i told
was my dad
who gave me one of my mom's gigantic
pads that resembled a floating device
i learned a lot about sex from songs
like push it
and i'll make love to you that i listen
to on the radio
although let's be honest i really had no
clue what the lyrics meant
as i grew into puberty there was no
mention of birth control or condoms
only abstinence waiting until marriage
was the only option
sex is only for reproduction i guess my
parents didn't think we needed to have
the talk i mean what indian family talks
about sex right
all i felt was guilt and shame
slut whore sharam vagarni
without shame i was supposed to be a
good muslim girl and wait until my
wedding day
when my husband searched for his
initials in the intricate mendhi designs
on my palms
i thought of god and my parents my
friends loved sex
why didn't i get mind-blowing orgasms i
felt
no pressure no pleasure
maybe Allah was making me pay for a past
sin
or my vagina was broken after hours of
therapy and tears
my pelvic physiotherapist said something
profound to me
she said if i didn't want to enjoy sex i
never would
on that day i decided to take back my
vagina
and give myself permission to enjoy sex
act 2 shh chup raho be quiet
good evening everyone my name is
Sharada Eswar i am currently
in my living room in brampton which is
covered by treaty
treaty 19 home
of Mississauga's
of credit first nations um
i am a writer storyteller
and singer and in all my work i try to
bring
everything that i have learned from my
ancestors from my gurus
into my uh into creating my art
and uh one of the things that i have
had the pleasure and honor of working
with these beautiful
beautiful young womxn is
uh trying to see if we can
explore the rhythm in our writing
the rhythm in our stories the rhythm
in our voices so
um i am trained in carnatic music
which is a south indian style of
classical
music and one of the two uh
important schools of music from uh india
and as part of the practice uh
i also practice what is called konnakol
or solkattu
which is nothing but stringing together
vocables that mimic the um
the percussion instrument mridangam
and they mimic the sounds of nature
and the animals that we see so uh what
i'm going to do right now
is that along with these amazing
participants of
this workshop i invite you the audience
to join me in this short
exercise so i'm going to teach you
four rhythms or rather four syllables
and it's very simple it
ta ka di mi
once again
ta ka di mi
repeat after me
ta ka di mi
great once more
ta ka di mi
so these are the four syllables that we
are going to use
to create an eight-beat cycle
and in carnatic music the way a vocalist
would keep
uh uh uh would keep beaters they would
be
actually slapped they'll be uh the
vocalist will be sitting on the ground
and cross-legged and they will beat
their thighs
so if you want you can
but i would suggest that right now you
just clap so this is how we would keep
beat
one two three
four five six
seven eight clap
count count count
clap turn clap
turn clap count
count count clap
turn clap now you're going to place the
syllables over it
one per beat okay
ta ka di mi
great
ta ka di mi
now what you're going to do is we're
going to increase the pace a little bit
the beat doesn't change it is still the
eight feet cycle
but we are going to place two syllables
per beat so far we've been doing
one syllable per beat now we're going to
place two syllables per beat
so it's going to sound like this
ta ka di mi
now let's make it a little bit more
challenging you're going to place
four syllables per beat okay
four syllables per beat it's still the
eight beat cycle
but we have just increased the syllables
so it all
is in your mouth and the rhythm that you
feel in your body
and in your soul and your heart okay so
it's going to sound like this
ta ka di mi
let's try one syllable beat
move on to two syllables per beat and
then four syllables per beat
ready one two three start
ta ka di mi
now let's walk our way backwards four
syllables per beat
two syllables per beat one syllable
ta ka di mi
how was that
okay so now what i'm going to so now
these beautiful girls have also been
exploring the rhythm in their own
writing so i now invite them
to share their stories and find that
rhythm
ready go for it and break legs
(hush sound)
what is it with afab desi people and being
unable to say no to new work
i say it is a joke but it is a cry for
help for me
for you for anyone who can relate
i think about my nani who insisted on
making
hot rotis for everyone at dinner and
then eats by herself
alone later my mom says she has a martyr
complex
but doesn't she too full-time mother
part-time worker dinner on the table
every single night
she can't say no either and i'm the same
way
i can't help you with that why do the
words stick in my throat
i don't want to do that why do they die
behind a mature smile i shouldn't give
you my free time
why do i lie and say of course
i'm happy to help why do i make rotis
for everyone
and eat by myself alone later
(hush sound)
bagh a cloth that represents my heritage
pieces of my lineage a reminder of my
worth
like a fulkari but not silk threads
stitch
so close vibrant colors hide the base
the rustic copper brown base
the color that everyone else wants to be
suntans and spray tans
to achieve a diluted version of my flesh
the shade that i'm not allowed to be
brown covered in magenta threads magenta
reminds me of the color
red anger rage love passion
a family broken a fire burning red is
the color of my trauma
the story is never told explanations
never given
abuse tolerated handcrafted by my
great-grandmother
my bagh has become a symbol of resistance
delicate yet durable
it has endured the test of time it
cannot
be hung in a white man's world as a
token of stolen history
it has been stitched from threads that
they have never seen and its patterns
represent a life
they will never understand
(clapping)
(sighing)
i am able to respond to formulaic
questions i am programmed to do so
do not speak unless spoken to do not
answer unless prompted
commands do not beget answers just
orderly action
and the life of the perfectly programmed
womxn is alive following commands and
executing such orderly action
example if a then b not b therefore not
a this is a rule of inference we call
modus tollens
example if you are a womxn then you must
be perfect you are not perfect therefore
you are not a womxn
yet i have been programmed with every
code command and calibration it takes to
be the perfect womxn
yet my skin color is not compatible with
program perfect womxn
why is that the system should know
better it programmed me most
but i can deprogram but i can delete
with the ridiculous codes commands and
calibrations they engraved into us
delete all ideas that made us feel
imperfect delete all programs that made
us not love our shades of brown
delete the system that denied us the one
thing we will ever have
ourselves for the system was the
incompatible one not
us never us system overridden
and successfully deleted perfect
(sighing)
(exhale
i've been fat for the majority of my
life and over these 26 years
i've lost track of just how many times
my rules were pinched
and diets were suggested how many
infuriating phone calls with my parents
asking if i've been exercising and
reminding me i need to control what i
eat
my fat is often talked about as if it
were an entity
separate from my being the very being
who has been an emotional eater since
childhood
a binge eater needs therapy and longed
for someone to tell her she's just as
lovable and valid as her naturally thin
friends but no no comment is too hurtful
they're only looking out for my health
i've spent most of my life into my early
20s believing
no one would want to date me or have sex
with me until i lost weight
fat brown girls don't sleep around or
get to experience pleasure
they just wait around for the first
agreeable man to have an arranged
marriage
my yellow plump insides carry a
loneliness
that i wish i could simply erase with
diet and exercise
(exhaling)
(hush sound)
hush
my mother was distant and absent a true
disconnection
created by years of domestic abuse by my
father
i am the sponge soaking the emotions of
all the adults
trying to calculate how i can help but i
am not the fixer
this job is too big for me there is a
lot of weight on me
rock after rock i carry on my back and
chest
it's an increasing pressure that's
slowly debilitating me
i am too small to carry this on my own
for so long
i am still a child waiting for a safe
place to return to a home within my body
where i am held the child within wants
to jump into my heart
so come home to me my child come back to
your soft
earthy brown skin into the depths of
self
hush
sh
sh
chup raho
nobody needs to know our family business
keep your mouth shut be a good girl
study hard get your degree and make us
proud
my heart is heavy my mind is confused
life feels like walking through mud in
the pitch dark
some dark power has a strong hold of me
it's pulling me down
stifling every breath i take
everything around me has turned gray and
black
even the blue sky looks different
the shine in my brown eyes has gone
i've stopped smiling haven't you noticed
that
i feel like i'm dying inside
help help me please
sh chup raho
tha thaaye ta ta thaaye aa thaaye ta ta thaaye
buttermilk and spiced aubergine
the bells between my feet
she says go right but i
go left she says shut your eyes
close your legs but i
i open wide bite your tongue
keep our secrets safe she says marry
when your loins are ripe bear children
before
it's too late she says be
the womxn i raised you to be
thinly crisp potatoes and metal bottle
caps the sway of my hips
i travel through oceans and moonlights
dreaming to dare
but everywhere i go the wind echoes her
tails
i i can't hide from her
my hips are wide my brows are lush
my mane is wild
i am a vessel of her wounds i am steeped
in her grief
and i have swallowed her despair
he he sees me
he asks me about her why didn't she hear
your cries
why didn't she see you but why
why don't you see you
tha thaaye ta ta thaaye aa thaaye ta ta thaaye
hello hello
hello is anybody there
why am i letting them breed on me
their limbs are crawling inside me
like leeches they're sucking my life my
light
my victories they weigh like a mammoth
on my chest my breath gets faster
shorter lighter
they're suffocating me it feels like i'm
six feet under and they're starting to
pile the dirt
i'm choking struggling to get air
i'm too overwhelmed to blink let alone
to crawl out
i don't know if i'll make it my fortunes
can't save me from them
i'm powerless and i feel nothing
numbness is now in my natural state and
the void is bigger than me
empty and hollow just like them
they demand obedience and i dutifully
follow
willing to do anything they say even if
they say do nothing at all today
i've been summoned summoned to the
unknown and there is no map
how have others survived are there
others
hello is anybody there
hello my name is Joan Jothi Saldana
also known as
Jothi and i taught participants about
healing and reclamation in session three
tonight i am performing a spoken word
poem
called the exhale along with my art
piece
with the same name that i created back
in 2015.
when i took the leap of faith into my
truth into my freedom
i was finally able to breathe to exhale
and to let go and then i heard her voice
a power that called me to embrace her
nurture her trust her
to get still silent
and listen to let her guide me
and carry me to places unseen
yet to be discovered to courageously
go to the dark spaces that scared me
i hear her voice gently and lovingly
holding me
in my power and in my grief
healing soothing embracing
she is my great great great
grandmother's tongue
whispering wise words that help me to
keep going
to take deep cleansing and clearing
breaths
to create a legacy of peace and
love and light her voice tells me that
this is our time womxn
our time to exhale and reclaim
who we are
good morning everyone um sorry i should
say good evening my name is Pearlia Veerasingam
and i was a guest speaker for session
five
and we uh worked with the participants
on working
on elements of creative storytelling
spoken word
and monologue writing so i'm so excited
to be here today
and i'm going to be performing my piece
the slaughtered lamb which i actually
wrote during um with the creative
workshop
so i hope you enjoy
growing up as a second generation
tamil womxn my roots were planted
early
the war the struggle and our fight for
safety
were stories that were embedded in me
now when i envision the color red
it holds a special place on my mom's
forehead what many tamils called pottu
was a fraternal symbol and love of
devotion to my father
although it was a simple symbol it was
like a third eye placed on her mind that
helped to see the world so clearly
now the older i became the color red
stained the food i ate
masked between the powerful spices and
strong aroma was my mother's love and
her compassion for others
as she unlocked the door every day the
smell of her cooking would escape our
house into the hungry bellies down the
street
i remember looking up at my mother as
she would cook wondering
would our lives replicate another would
i be a devoted wife or a caring mother
it just wasn't the life i had seen the
older i grew the once bright red color
red
was now evolving much like my knowledge
on the war
i watched as the color transformed into
a dark maroon
similar to the blood that was shed the
color was so
dark just like the unexplainable
frustration and anger that was building
up inside me
the rage i felt when understanding the
injustice my people faced for years
and after all this time we still have no
clarity
like a lamb that's been put up for
slaughter and stripped of our innocence
how can a simple apology fix this i'm
sorry i'm sorry i wish i had the grace
and calming energy of my mother
but i was raised to stand up for others
now don't tell me don't get political
wake up this world's filled with
politics and deception and next time you
look at a tamil mother
i want you to watch the darkness from
her past fill her eyes as the light
shines brighter than other brighter than
ever
to call her a warrior is simply not
enough she was the lamb who sacrificed
herself
the one who sacrificed herself so that i
could see white
while she saw red yet after all this
time she leaves her door unlocked
and she leaves her heart in cage and
she's the true definition
of a mother
hello everyone i am um
i'm Krystal Kiran and i had the
privilege of working with all of these
beautiful womxn on session number six
about embodying storytelling through
movement
and um today i'm going to be singing a
song for you called
heer which is um a punjabi
folk song uh
set to sending a womxn off into the
world
uh after she gets married but for our
purposes i say just sending her off into
the world
to live her life and her purpose so this
is heer
(singing a Punjabi folk song)
act 3 nice to meet you
in this green dress she sounds about
right
says the right things sounds about white
baby's first day at her grown-up job
fried okra and bitter gourd in her
lunchbox
i sit in the lunchroom and think about
how they all wanted
a doctor or something like that family
can't help
but think there's one best path the one
that's been carved out by those before
them
ever heard the phrase you've got to
prove yourself to have a spot
you've got to work harder to rise to the
top
when mom applied for her postgraduate
degree the secretary said
your degree's from india it's probably
not even recognized here
but in the big thick book of
international institutions
bangalore university is written down in
permanent black ink
white faces behind brown desks can't
deny the black
ink on these pages i wish my mom could
wave her degree in front of this womxn
face
but she's not that type of womxn in this
green dress
i sound about right i say the right
things
i don't need to be white baby's second
day
at my grown-up job fried okra and bitter
gourd
in my lunchbox
(kathak sounds)
it has always been this way i could
never say no
so she always had her way i wanted to
wear a saree on my wedding
a kanjeevaram saree a south indian
saree
i just felt like it i wanted to look
different from
other brides a kanjeevaram sari
may be cream colored golden thread
moving through
no you will wear a lengha
a red lengha that would look
good
i didn't mind at the end
a red lehenga
the embroidery was nice but
it wasn't my choice
in the end she would do what she wanted
and i would do what she wanted
i discovered that once i let go of my
outside distractions
a truer voice emerged in my soul
a voice that is unrecognizable to the
rest of my body
a voice that i haven't heard in a very
very long time
breaking generational curses develop
inner resentment
i got verses for these curses i ain't
spent on the bitter rent of my ancestors
self-hatred from the bed when i rise
feeling like the start of the day is
where we need to rise to the occasion
no one is exempt from that feeling pain
in this world and i'll stay right here
strong trying to attempt a better
version of your girl
i am the first brown womxn in my long
line of womxn
to experience a kind of freedom that
they will never
get to experience and i'm not talking
about the exterior of the issue
i'm digging deeper into my roots baby
the earth
is sifting my soul's got an issue with
the bull
and the push and the pull of the
oppression let me say that again the
bull
and the push and the pull of the
oppression yes
we are brown and yes we are womxn put
respect on our name and even if you
don't
we'll still be winning so come for me or
come for her
you're coming for us all trust you may
cut our branches but our roots will
devour you
empower you flip you around so you can
think twice
before you judge outside of you
i shouldn't be telling the story i don't
know enough i'm not qualified it's just
not
my place
if not who then you bubba i hear my
grandmother's voice
saying the sweetest in the sweetest tone
the one she used when she was trying to
get you to eat more of that Karela on
your plate
you may not have known the stories but
they've always been with you
if not you than who she acts again
tell our stories tell them for all of
the womxn before you
and tell them so that they will know our
names
so these are the stories that i know
i know that though i may not have known
them
or all of their names that they are
always with me
on my wrists all of the womxn before me
a bit of their gold melted down to
create my bangles
Seeta, Sattie, Dhanpatiya and Kulla as she
first stepped off that boat
did they jingle as mine do now did they
vibrate as that boat shook
he ran up to me sweaty still in his
baseball gear
you won't guess what happened on the
field today
what every time we scored a home run
we all started screaming Balji one
Balji  won
your name is our new battle cry
a battle cry what do you do
when the entire senior boys baseball
team
uses your name as their battle cry
if Baljeevan is giving you this many
problems at mci
a brown high school what are you in for
at western
it's like all white people Baljeevan
is not going to london ontario
and just like that a family nickname
Gina
became the default
my family practices sikhism
sikh names are poetry
blessings by design that roll off our
parents
lips every time they call our names my
cousins
Sanjeevan Gurjeevan Manjeevan
are sanskrit blessings for vitality
faith love Baljeevan
means strength in life i think back to
that day in high school a lot
what i should have said i should have
said it
is a fucking battle cry
my shade of brown is somewhere between
chocolate and mocha
coffee and earth you can feel 200 years
of history
between your hands when you hold it you
can hear the old and ancient languages
smell the food in huts and barracks the
hot breeze shaking bushes and palms
the bangles jingling on slim wrists my
shade of brown is called indo-caribbean
to be indo-caribbean is to understand
that people may never fully understand
me
questions like what are you and if
you're a caribbean why do you look
indian
would bother me more than i knew
comments like
brown is indian so you're basically
black or but you still look indian
would invalidate my identity making me
question myself
even more i feel frustrated confused and
angry
that no one had heard of trinidad or
thought guyana was ghana
no matter how many times i'd explained
it was never enough to prove myself to
be who i said i was
they wanted to put me in a box labeled
brown making it easy to distinguish who
i was
without much thought i didn't understand
my brown either
my homelands whisper to me like an old
lover
while i'm in the arms of another how
quick you are to forget us
you live like you've never known us like
we aren't with you everywhere you go
my lovers sing to me in sinhala in hindi
and marathi and creole
from a jewel in the indian ocean to the
crowning subcontinent
to the land of an exiled prince in deep
rich musical sounds that my shallow
tongue cannot imitate
from places that my ancestors have lived
on
and loved on danced on and cried on
moved on and moved between
my homelands cry out for me like a lover
who hasn't accepted defeat
i was 19 years old when i discovered i
was brown no joke i was
19 years old in a brand spanking new
country
when i was told what i was by a stranger
drunk on frosh week brown
it was my you're a wizard harry
moment minus the magic
i was 19 years old when i learned i
confuse people just a
big brown question mark that got bigger
once i opened my mouth
you see my face said brown but my voice
said
british no Jamaica
wait what are you
who am i
i am the child of the red white and
black
i am the descendant of midnight robbers
sukuya
jab molassie papa bois  i am the voice of sparrow
kitchener i am the plastic bag
full of plastic bags under the sink i am
so many things known
and unknown nice to meet you
mahogany a reddish-brown
red-eyed rage-filled angry
at injustice tired of explaining
tired of being angry tired of silence
something needs to change but what
but who and why are you looking at me
i'm 18. i remember that day
in the principal's office that dusty
office
cold and cramped surrounded by
bookshelves
i love books but these books feel
different
i remember his face his thick round
white face staring me down from the
other side of the old wooden desk
that sits in the middle of the room
he hands me the day's copy of the globe
and mail
canada's national newspaper and he waits
there's a large picture of my mom my
sister and i
dancing in our living room on the front
page next to the words
why don't you go hijack a plane written
in big bold letters i smile
they told my story that story
i found so hard to tell
i look up and my principal looks at me
anger in his eyes a frown across his
face
waiting for me to explain myself
do you see what's written here can you
tell me
why you didn't tell someone about this
honestly i was scared
i didn't think i i don't feel like i
belong here
i've been getting phone calls from the
school board all day
our reputation is on the line you know
you should really join the
multiculturalism club if diversity is
your concern
the multiculturalism club the one where
students sell samosas at lunch
the suggestion makes me angry
but i stay calm
sir i think your students are more
important than your reputation
i won't apologize and i won't be joining
the multiculturalism club
i leave the school
and i cry
they told my story that story i found
so hard to tell and then they covered it
up
they shut me up they shut me out drove
me out
no one said sorry no one remembers
they dismiss my sadness my anger
but i remember i remember those letters
telling me to keep quiet to be grateful
to stop exaggerating they called my
story bullshit
my experience bullshit now
i call bullshit i am done here
i will be silent no more
i got up then trembling with rage
i didn't apologize i still won't
i cried then i am screaming now
i will say it loud and i will say it
proud
fuck you fuck you for telling me you are
colorblind
fuck you for tokenizing me fuck you for
labeling me
for telling me that i smell like goodie
have you ever smelt gutty it's fucking
amazing
that smell of turmeric coated sauce
that tarka that stains my fingers and
fills my senses
and carries the love the strength the
resilience of generations of brown womxn
cooking up their power
our power that smell is fucking
amazing
don't you underestimate me i may be
small
i may look meek but i
rage i explode
i am no longer your goddess for hire
your yoga handbook your bollywood
teacher
your window into a world far far
beyond sarees and samosas
hear me now see me now
i am getting up i am walking out
i am done with this bullshit
i am strong i am powerful
i am resilient i have
voice i am heard
every day up until the age of 14
i wear my hair in a braid
each morning before school i sit in my
mom's room
and i watch as she braids my thick
wavy chocolate brown hair
as she braids she tells me stories
about my grandparents about her
childhood
about india about her life as a dancer
about coming to canada as a young bride
running her own dance school and
waitressing while
attending teachers college and raising
my sister and i
we laugh a lot and i flinch
every time she combs out the tangles
my braid carries my mother's stories
my family's history and immigration
journey
when i dance i breathe the traditional
punjabi parandi into my hair and it
feels like a natural extension of myself
i haven't worn a parandi in years
today after years of haircuts and
highlights
the braid makes an occasional appearance
and when it does it feels like i'm
carrying my entire identity with me
an identity that is colorful and complex
a mixture of shades and hues braided
together
i'm proud to be these many colors
these many shades of brown
but i'm exhausted tired
that this journey keeps going tired that
it shows
no sign of tired of explaining
of hand-holding of pretending of
apologizing
tired of asking you to get it
tired of wanting you to at this very
moment
i don't owe any explanations this
is my story all fucking shades of it
i have my entire life struggled with
identity
i have my entire life struggled with
identity
i have my entire life struggled with
identity
i have my entire life struggled with
identity and consequently confidence
and consequently confidence and
consequently confidence
consequently confidence 2020 is the
first time
2020 is the first time i'm embracing
every dirty detail of my story every
dirty detail
of my story tell me her story
create her anew from her pieces and your
own
i'm indigo my boldness has been created
from years and years of not knowing if i
am blue or purple
i'm learning how to use my voice not
only for
others but for myself
in this green dress she sounds about
right says the right things
sounds about white baby's first day at
her grown-up job
fried okra and bitter gourd in her
lunchbox yellow is the undertone of my
existence
a reminder that my skin carries a happy
glow that shouldn't be
resisted i am maybe not asian enough for
you or the wrong kind
or not at all but i am strong
and magnificent i am
a body of multiplicity that holds so
much that sometimes i feel like i'm
boosting
my skin connects me to a part of myself
that was tricked to journey across
oceans
and arrive in a strange caribbean island
three generations ago i'm scented with
oil from the us
crease from saheena smoke from the tiny
flames that light the dark
and spicy incense that burned during
puja
my brown skin has seen different lands
from india to the caribbean to canada
i hope to set my brown toes back in
caribbean soil before my brown body
returns to the earth
they represent all of the womxn before
me
a bit of each of their goal melted down
to create my
bangles my wrist and body is
Seeta, Sattie, Dhanpatiya and Kulla as she first stepped off the boat
did they hear her jingle then did they
vibrate as the boat shook
i cannot be hung in a white man's world
as a token of stolen history i am woven
from threads that they have never seen
i am reclaiming space so i can be a free
bird
brown and beautiful bold and fierce
uncaged from the white man's world my
father's mother traveled around india
and sri lanka selling sarees
i wonder what she would think if she
knew that the art of wrapping one is lost
on me
it's annoying that my family is
secretive about everything
my grandmother had died and nobody told
me how
as if it didn't matter so much of what
it means to be brown
has been hidden from plain sight we tuck
away that outfit
after navratri never to be born again
for another year
we tuck away our indian-ness until it's
safe we might let out parts of the color
some of that dance a few tinkling bells
but mostly it remains hidden
strings with layers of pearls and ornate
gold and green crystals
it was both modern and traditional
but in that moment it was falling apart
before my eyes
leaving my neck back
leaving one to see me
will i ever be able to heal from the
trauma of my ancestors
will i truly be my own shade of brown
or always a mix of everything in between
i feel like because we're trained to be
okay
with silence we forget
what it's like to actually be heard or
hear someone else
playing with gray chromatic
transformation
i felt taught not to pay attention to my
body
then i witnessed myself acting in ways
that are violence
i've seen my stomach as a failure for a
long time
you stare and marvel at them because
they are higher up than i
they get to be extensions of you i am a
disgrace
i lay trapped in myself somewhere under
your dreams
past the ones i wouldn't allow myself to
yearn for and beside the reminders of
memories
i've never had i am both a nobody
and an other everybody
sometimes i don't even know who or what
i am supposed to be
my birth left much to be desired for
when the doctors told my parents
i was too pretty to be a boy my mouth
holding my thoughts tight can i not even
speak about right
my anger makes me cry my brain tends to
fry
the state of silence with closed eyes
it is the body that i still need to
learn to love
but it is patient with me through the
process
i want to say i know but i don't
it has haunted me some
turned me into an animal we are often
feared
misunderstood and rejected because we
are wild
because we dream rebelliously because we
are unashamed
of the shame when they expect
warm milk they get a shot of whiskey and
they're not ready for the shock
i am not one story i am not one story
i am not one story i am not one story
i am not one story and to see me as that
is just to consume what is palatable
but i will not be someone's appetizer
but i will not
be someone's appetizer but i will not be
someone's appetizer but i
will not be someone's appetizer
so that was our show
honestly every time i hear these stories
every time i hear these stories
i just get chills um so i just want to
thank
all of our storytellers for all
you know all your your bravery your
power your creativity
your vulnerability everything thank you
so so much
and thank you to all of our audience
members for um
for listening in to these incredible
stories
so we have um
a uh a talk back that we are now going
to be going into
um and this talk back is going to be
moderated by
our wonderful guest facilitator Krystal
Kiran
um and supporting her will be
one of the very pillars of our of this
of this past summer Michelle Mohammed um
you can see people snapping because
Michelle has really been
so foundational to this to the summer so
both of them will help us
moderate uh the the question and answer
period so if you do have questions
if you're on zoom please use the q a
function at the bottom of your screen
if you're on youtube you can use the
chat at the side of your screen but
let us know what your questions are and
i'm sure our storytellers
would love to to answer um whatever
questions come their way
so Krystal i'm throwing the baton to you
all right well first of all i just want
to say
wow like what an amazing show ah so
proud of everybody
um so let's uh send it over to Michelle
if there's any questions you can again
you can put them in
in the youtube chat Michelle do you have
anything on your end
yeah so our first question comes from
Sarah Marks
and the question is how long did it take
to write your monologues
uh it's uh and how much time was spent
in session or on your own time writing
your work
okay so how much time was spent on the
monologues and how much time in session
or on your own is that what it was
okay who feels like they would love to
answer that question
Misha
sorry i had to find my uh my unmute
button um i actually when i first signed
on for this workshop like i was already
kind of working on a piece and i was
like this workshop will be the perfect
way to write through this piece and like
give me the framework for it
and then one day in the middle of a
session like another thought
occurred to me and like while we had
like one of those free-form writing
sections which we had several times
where we just
um stream of thought wrote i like picked
up my notebook and wrote my whole
monologue like at once
and it was just like this very like
three minutes that this whole piece like
really came together that i had been
really inspired and
yeah so that was how long it took me
that the the spirit of
states of brown girl just came into my
soul and wrote this for me
that's awesome that's awesome um
now was that idea that you had like one
of your initial ideas
it was completely unrelated that like i
had said something in another chat to
someone as a joke and like
that idea like turned went from like it
was a seed and like the whole tree just
sprouted at once nice awesome
all right anyone else have a question
let's see
yeah the other question we have is what
was it like doing this online
um Erikka
hi so obviously during the current the
times of covid
a workshop like this would be very you
think awkward and weird
online but it really wasn't the fact
that we have
these very well formulated workshops
they also give us a great opportunity
just to get to know each other through
um
do even through like our breaks like
some of us were just like talking and we
have pure breakout groups
that were absolutely fantastic and like
making those bonds
so it was very it was a lot lovelier
online that i ever thought was possible
and i think it was thanks to the team
for sure
yeah it's been an amazing amazing
process because
like something you would normally do in
a room with like a bunch of people to
have that experience online and like
that's also made it open to so many more
people around the world so we've
all been able to connect which has been
awesome
okay let's see is there another
yeah Vanessa wants to know do you ever
get nervous
sharing your personal story with others
okay who likes to take that one Devyani
um that's an interesting question i
remember talking to a few of the girls
in the group as well through the womxn
um we and we had to like make our
monologues i had to go in a public
space and do it and a lot of people were
taking photos around that area
and i was just this girl in like a
language that had to like say this piece
people thought i was going there to
dance so like do a dance video
and i was like saying these words out
loud and everyone was like what is going
on
um so i got very nervous because i was
very aware that there were strangers
there
listening to my story um but it also
felt very like
refreshing afterwards when i was done
because um it was really nice because
we have this amazing supportive system
was like this is what you're supposed to
be doing you're supposed to be sharing
your stories
so it's really exciting too
how many takes did you do of your video
it was really embarrassing my friend was
very very patient so i'm really grateful
for her it was
about three or four in one location and
then at one point we had to move because
of the sun
and after that i felt much more
comfortable and it was just that one
it was good that's awesome yeah it
usually takes like
at least like two or three times the
jitters out for sure
for sure for sure any other questions
yeah Neil wants to know what would you
say to someone who is interested in
telling their story
but was hesitant or afraid to share so
vulnerably
Sammy
sorry i was having issues on meeting um
that's a really good question and i
think
i was actually speaking to my cousin
about this earlier is that
this workshop even though you're doing
creative writing it was a space of
healing and i think that if it's not
about sharing the piece
is that through that process of working
through your emotions and sharing your
piece you will find that healing within
yourself so i think that
for me like that was finding a community
first and shades of brown girl gave us
that and through that community and that
strength and
feeling like i was a part of something
and that i was constantly in a safe
space
stories came out of me that i didn't
even know existed and i remember there
was like weeks during the summer
that i would just like cry and my
husband's like what's wrong with you and
i was like
i don't know where this emotion is
coming from but it was like this
unlocked a lot for me and i just
i'm very grateful that i had that
community so i think for somebody
wanting to share
is like it's scary it's nervous but find
a space of safe womxn or
anybody find a safe group of people that
you can share with and it's
a beautiful process agreed yeah this
whole
summer has been like such a great
bonding experience in that sense
i think we have time for one more
question michelle
the last question is what was um
what was your favorite memory okay
the workshop i'd like to answer that
what was your everyone's like uh there's
so many
um Misha yeah because we've had so many
great moments
over the last 10 weeks so i think that's
where the hesitancy comes from
but definitely i do believe that
um you know the first moment one of us
shared a story and all 30 womxn in the
room
just immediately
with that i think that is something that
is worth
our weight in gold and that's something
you just can't buy
that type of sisterhood and connectivity
that's my favorite part of this whole
process
that's awesome yeah beautiful and i
think somebody was asking like in the
questions like how do you join this
space and um this community so like at
shades of brown girl
you know on instagram and i think we can
definitely put information up there
about like
where else you can follow if it's gonna
be on facebook or anything like that
um and that i feel like is a good time
to pass it over to
Amrita who is the mastermind behind all
of this
thank you for introducing me that way
Krystal
um i hardly feel like the mastermind i
feel like i've just
i don't know i just i feel like i've
i've curated something and all of you
just sort of we found each other you
know um
and i feel so blessed so i just want to
say i just want to take this opportunity
to say
once again thank you to all of you
wonderful ladies um who
blessed me by being in this space with
me
over the past nine weeks i couldn't have
asked for a more generous
a more committed a more you know
willing group of womxn um to work with
i you know we often talked every
thursday about how
we miss each other every week right um
and i'm i'm yeah i'm just gonna i'm
gonna miss this experience
so much because it was so nourishing for
me to see you all on my screen every
week and
you know that first that first week i
think all of us came out of it thinking
and saying to each other
wow this is the first time we've seen so
many beautiful brown womxn
on a screen yeah on one screen at the
same time and that's something that i'm
going to cherish forever so
um yeah i just wanted to sort of take
this opportunity to
to thank you all for for for kind of
bringing your hearts your minds your
souls your bodies your spirits into this
into this journey with all of with me
this experiment with
me um and um
so with that i just i just wanted to say
um
you know you will be uh hearing some
closing messages from us and some
acknowledgements from us so all of the
acknowledgements you will see
on some closing slides after after we
officially sign out
but i just want to say one more time
again
thank you thank you thank you to all of
us all of you
the storytellers who have joined us
thank you to all of our audience members
around the world
around canada around ontario have who
have done who have joined us
thank you very much merci beaucoup
ashe oleng, Chi-Migwetch, bohot bohot shukriya, dhanyavad, dhanvaad, dhonnobad,
nandri vanakam
so thank you so much and with that
signing out peace
(Music)
