Daily Report

Day 1 - March 15th

We started the session with the actor from the Philippines, Felimon Blanco introducing
his subject to us. He first gave us a detailed outline about how he started to look for a
subject. Things were rather difficult in the beginning as most transsexuals in the
Philippines are not very comfortable with sharing the private side of their lives. In fact he
recalls that he had started to get worried when a friend suggested that he meet Leslie.

Leslie is 51 years old and presently facing charges of drug peddling. She has already
been in prison for almost three years and her case is still going on. Felimon had to go
through some rigorous government scrutiny and get certain permissions to be able to
meet with her.
She herself was a bit wary when she met him for the first time but after he explained why
he was there she actually was happy to know that someone was interested in her life. He
was only allowed to meet her for an hour everyday, but at least he had finally found a
subject!
Today Leslie is a complete woman with breasts and a vagina, but her journey to get there
has been long and testing.
Right from childhood she recalls being aware of her sexuality, how in the body of a boy
she loved dressing up like a girl and played girl games. Her family found these things
very entertaining and probably had no idea where their son was heading at that time.
Leslie left home at the age of nine in search of an exciting life.
She went to another city in the Philippines where she worked as a dishwasher in a beauty
parlor for many years. Over there she loved to sing as she worked and really enjoyed
watching customers beautifying themselves. One day the owner of a beauty parlor from
Manila offered her a job and she moved. It was here that she began to gradually give into
her feminine side as the other gays encouraged her to cross dress. She started consulting a
doctor and took hormone tablets to grow breasts. She also put in hours of practice to train
her voice so that she could speak like a woman. In time she discovered that she had a gift
and could sing really well. She decided to start singing in bars to earn her living and this
turned out to be a lucrative business for her. She would perform for a small slot in one bar
and then take a cab to the next and to the next and so on. During all of these
performances Leslie was faking being a woman but it was very awkward when men came
onto her and wanted to use her sexually. These embarrassing situations made her realize
that she could not go on like this so she started considering the option of undergoing a
sex change.
The first operation that Leslie went in for was to straighten her nose. The procedure took
only 45 minutes, after that she went in for silicon implants in her breasts. Having
achieved this she was quite happy but somewhere inside of her she was constantly aware
of being incomplete physically. Her greatest fear was that she would die during the
operation but her doctor was very supportive and convinced her that it would make her
very happy; he told her that it was safe to do the surgery in Taiwan. Of course the
reassignment surgery was going to cost her a lot but she was allowed to pay the amount
in installments.

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Eventually Leslie made up her mind and went in for a penile inversion to acquire a
vagina. Her long cherished dream had finally come true in 1993 and she was now a
complete woman who could use her organ for sex.
In she returned to the Philippines and opened her own Karaoke Bar. She also started
living with her boyfriend Edison and they had been staying together for ten years when
things fell apart one day. The police raided her bar and found drugs; Leslie was arrested
and taken to prison. Edison used to visit her in the beginning but after a while his visits
stopped. Leslie now has a nineteen-year-old boyfriend in jail.
We watched the interviews that Felimon had managed to record with his hidden camera.
In jail Leslie obviously does not dress up! Her face looks tired and rather male, she
speaks really fast in but with ease. Her disposition is warm and when Felimon asks her to
sing she is at first a bit hesitant but when she does the magic happens. She suddenly
transforms into a woman singing from the depths of her soul.
“I want you to love me for what I am…”
The words echo in our minds and seem to have a strange significance as we watch the
transformation happen.
Today no one knows how long it will be before Leslie can walk out of those prison gates
to sing of her own free will, to show happiness and embrace life the way she’s always
done…
We are only grateful to be able to share her life through this project and hope that she will
be free one day.

In the next session it was the Indian actor Sanjay Gautam’s turn to introduce us to his
subject. Coincidentally it turned out that Sanjay also had a lot of problems while trying to
find a subject as eunuchs, being a very marginalized group in India are simply not willing
to talk forget trust a complete stranger.
In fact it cost Sanjay more money to talk to them than for sex, a shocking but sad
revelation. His search was not easy as most of the younger eunuchs don’t want to waste
their earning time talking to someone. They are very evasive and become extremely
suspicious so most of the time he only managed to get one-syllable responses. Luckily for
him it turned out that where his uncle resides in Delhi, there is a whole gharana of
eunuchs living in the same locality.
This is where Sanjay met Aarti, she is 55 years old and a Guru (Head of a gharana) now.
Aarti is a eunuch from birth and as a little boy loved to play with girls and dress like
them. His father and brothers used to beat him for this. He also used to sneak away and
spend time with the other eunuchs in the village as he loved to watch them sing and
dance. This became a matter of embarrassment for the family so eventually they called a
Guru and gave Aarti away.

Ever since then Aarti has lived within the eunuch community moving with them from one
place to another and finally settling down in Delhi. There are seven different categories of
eunuchs in India and Aarti belongs to the sect, which earns its money from singing and
dancing at various Indian family ceremonies. Eunuchs are completely loyal to their Guru
and she in turn takes care of all their needs. After a Guru dies the eunuch who is the
eldest member in the group takes on the title.

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As a Guru, Aarti holds a position of absolute authority. She can now finally sleep on a
bed and have a room of her own, things she probably craved for all her life but which are
not allowed to eunuchs. Today all the eunuchs in her gharana are at her beck and call and
she is their sole provider. She seems very content with her life accepting whatever has
come to her as part of her destiny.

Day 2 - March 16th

Before we left for the venue we watched all the video material that the two actors had
brought of the two characters and most of the morning was spent in that.
Today was the first the day the actors were going to start working on the floor and I guess
all of us were excited and a bit nervous as well.

Upon reaching the venue, the first thing we did was to put up photographs of both Leslie
and Aarti on a board so that the actors were constantly in contact with them and they on
the other hand could watch what we were doing with their stories.
After this we had a short discussion on some of the similarities and differences shared by
these two characters after having got to know many of their details the previous day.

Differences:-
Leslie Aarti

Speaks really fast Speaks very slowly

Moves quickly and with energy Moves very slowly
Loves to talk about her life Does not divulge information easily
Follows her heart Accepts her destiny
Is poor now Is wealthy now

Similarities
Present age - Both are in their fifties.
Both left home at the age of nine.
Both have held positions of responsibility – Leslie as the owner of a Karaoke bar and
Aarti as the guru of a gharana of eunuchs
Both are very religious.

After this we began our work with a warm up session. The music flowed slowly through
their veins and soon their bodies began to take on a rhythm. They began to relax and the
music work its magic… at a point when I thought they were into themselves I gave them
an instruction to start thinking about their subject, to start recalling the all the times they
had interacted with her and whenever they were ready to slowly try and transform their
physical selves into the character they had studied. This they did one at a time so that
they had their own space in which they could make that transition from actor self to
character self.
Felimon immediately brought out a hand held fan which he had bought because Leslie
had one with her every time he visited her in prison. Needless to say he had problems

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with the handling it as this was the first time he actually tried using it. He had also picked
up one of Leslie’s gestures where she very elegantly picks flicking back strands of hair
that keep falling on her face.
Sanjay on the other hand was busy with two objects that Aarti constantly keeps adjusting
when speaking, that is her very male design watch and a big gold ring she wears on her
finger. Sanjay had also managed to imitate the tone of her voice and spoke a few lines
that he may have heard her spoken.
I knew that getting into the complete physical self was going to take more time so I
stopped the exercise here and decided to move to another area of exploration.

Depiction of a scene from childhood

I asked both the actors to enact or play a short scene on how they imagined the childhood
of these characters. They did their exercises individually.
Felimon – The scene started with high energy and Felimon appears from behind the door
making gun sounds playing a war game with his friends. Suddenly he gets shot and falls
to the ground with a loud cry. He then gets up and calls his friends inviting them to play
what is obviously a Filipino version of ‘House, house’. He dons a scarf on his head
which becomes his long hair and takes on the role of the Mother. The other children are
also given roles, one is the ‘father’ and the other is the ‘son’. The ‘Mother’ then goes
through the task of preparing a meal and then serves the food on cd covers used as plates.
She shows them how to eat and then asks the father to go and work on the farm and tells
the son to go out and play while she stays at home to wash the dishes. The exercise ends
with the whole family praying together and then falling asleep.
Sanjay - He has laid out his props in the middle of the room. A ladies handbag, a scarf
and a bra. Sanjay enters the room very cautiously making sure that no one is watching
him. He then quickly locks the door from the inside and then walks towards the items
placed on the floor. He picks up the scarf first and slowly ties it on his head. After that he
opens the handbag and takes out a compact powder. He opens it looks at himself in the
mirror and then powders his face excessively which makes him look quite horrendous.
After this he takes out the lipstick and puts that on too, messily. Still not satisfied he picks
up the bra and is trying to figure out how to get it on when he imagines that someone is
knocking at the door. He gets up petrified dropping the bra to the floor, he then tries to
quickly wipe off the powder and lipstick getting more and more frightened of the
knocking on the door. Finally he walks to it and opens it forgetting to take off the scarf.
Someone comes in and starts to beat him, once, twice, many times and then leaves.
He lies crumpled on the floor trying to protect himself from the blows but no such luck.
Finally he gets up, screams and kicks in the air out of anger and defiance but the hurt
wont go away and he left crying alone.
What was interesting is that in both the exercises all of this is done in complete child like
fashion and you can’t even imagine for one moment what the implications of these games
are.

In the discussion which followed the Felimon revealed that for Leslie there was no such
thing as taboo when she dressed like a girl in childhood, in fact her family enjoyed this
aspect and it was something they found very entertaining. However in Aarti’s case it was
not so, her brothers used to beat her up and obviously her family found this behavior of

15
very embarrassing. It is evident that both of them were in touch with their feminine side
right from childhood but obviously society in the Philippines is a lot more accepting in
terms of such cases whereas in India things are very difficult for such people right from
the start. What is also interesting is that Leslie left home at the age of nine because she
wanted an exciting life, while Aarti had no choice in the matter. She was given away by
her family to live with the eunuchs; this main difference is probably what is responsible
for the course their lives took….

Day 3 - March 17th

The actors began the session with a vigorous physical warm –up and then I instructed
them to slowly start mirroring each other. It was important to get the actors to start
developing a trust so that was the main thrust of the mirror exercise.
The first eye contact is very crucial and must begin with sincerity. With Sanjay and
Felimon this was never a problem, both of them as actors were extremely willing to relate
to each other. The mirroring is magical, the movements are fluid, graceful and inviting.
Felimon leads at first and then Sanjay takes over. Both are in complete communion and it
is almost like watching a beautiful choreography in which thier minds and bodies are
fused as one.
Very gently trying not to disturb the wonderful chemistry I ask one of them to transform
into the character and continue the mirroring. Felimon strikes a pose and then slowly bit
by bit you begin to see Leslie emerge from within, palms clasped together, neck held
high. Every now and then a hand flicks some stray strands of hair back with mesmerizing
elegance. Sanjay goes with the flow, a short walk side by side and then Felimon faces
Sanjay waiting for him to take over. Here suddenly for the first time the communication
seems to snap and the waiting becomes heavy and I wonder if I will have to make them
stop, but then Sanjay as Aarti takes over and soon both are sitting on the floor holding
their faces in their hands, speaking a silent language, seeking answers in each others
expressions. I let this soul searching go on for a bit and when things appear to get
somewhat repetitive ask the actors to relax.

When we discussed what they felt, both agreed that it was a bit difficult to suddenly
transform into the character self from the actor self. The transition is not yet easy to make
so I knew that this was one area that required more work. The one thing that both actors
definitely felt is that there could be a strong bond between these two people but how and
from where would it emerge or begin was a question we could not answer just now. We
would have to wait and see.

Letter Exercise – The next thing I asked the actors to do was to write a letter that the
character may have written to anyone at any point in their life. Here was a chance for
them to move into any time of the character’s life and try to explore the circumstances
which may have brought on the need to communicate or reach out to someone in such a
manner. They were given 45minutes to think and write the letter.

Felimon – Felimon had written a letter which Leslie wrote to her boyfriend who stopped
visiting her after a year that she was imprisoned. She had lived with him for ten years and

16
he felt that this was most definitely the person she may have tried to reach out to. He read
it out with amazing sincerity and feeling. It was truly moving and all of us shared a bit of
Leslie’s loneliness in jail that afternoon while the letter was being read.

August 23, 2004

Dear Edison,

How are you my dear? I hope you are doing good. I am doing fine here
in the jail, but I feel lonely. I miss you a lot. Do you miss me too?

Life inside the jail is so hard. I couldn’t believe that this will happen to
me. I have had such a good life then. Who would imagine that this would
happen? Why me? I had such a nice life with you. Ten years of living with you
were my most treasured moments. But what happened between us now?

It has been more than a year that I am imprisoned inside the jail. And
for these times, you have visited me 3 times only. The last visit was like 6
months ago. I have bee wanting to see you here more often. But it seems to
me that you are now leaving me. No letter, no word, no news, no visits from
you. You know that you are the only family that I have. But where are you
now?

I am feeling lonely here. When I sleep during evenings, I was hoping

that you are beside me, that I can hug you the way I used to do. I missed
pinching your nose, caressing your ears. Do you still giggle when someone
tickles you? You used to giggle a lot when I tickle you. You would look so
lovely. Papa bear, I miss you a lot. How I wish that I could be with you again.

By the way, how is our house? Please take care of it. Please visit me
here again. I would love to see you, hug you again.

I will be waiting for your visit. Please find time Papa bear.

I miss you. I love you.

Take care because I care. I have to end now because the guards are
now calling us for our regular headcounts.

Bye.

Lots of love,

Leslie

Sanjay wrote a letter that Aarti may have written to her mother after a few years when she
was sent away to live with the eunuchs. It is the innocent voice of a young child trying to
understand trying to understand its new way of life, but more than anything it is a voice
that is lonely, desperate and misses home.

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Ammaa rI,

ko ilaKU AaOr ko naa ilaKU.kuC naa baora mauJao. Ammaa torI

yaad… bahut Aava mauJao. kBaI kBaI tao mana kre saba kuC CaoD,k
tore Qaaore Baga Aa}M. pr rsta hI naa pta mauJao.

Ammaa jaba maOM yahaM Aa[- naa tao Sau$ ma bahut AcCa
lagaa mauJao. laoikna Aba mana naa lagae.skUla yaad Aavah. vaao
maorI saholaI yaad Aavah. baabaU jaI AaOr pUra Gar yaad Aavah. yao
laaoga Gar sa Baar naa jaana doto. yahaM KUba iflmaI gaanaa p naaca
kravaoM hOM \ naacanao maoM majaa tao Aava laoikna vaOsaa nahI
jaOsaa skUla maoM Aava qaa. yao laaoga Dramaa BaI naa krnao doto.
maora KUba mana krh Dramaa maoM naacanao gaanao ka.

Ammaa yahaM p maOM naa jamaIna saao}. plaMga p basa gau$

jaI hI saaovaM.kmar duKh. Kanao pInao kI kmaI naa hO. pr toro haqa kI
raoTI sabajaI ko svaad jaOsaa kuC naa hO. ABaI prsaao naa maOM ek
naaca ma ga[-. vahaM laaogana na maora naaca gaanaa bahut psaMd
Aayaa. KUba pOsao vaaro maoro p. kao[- saat saaO $.magar saba gau$
jaI k Qaaore gae. jaba maOM AarI naa tao kuC laaogana na maoro
gaOla gaMdI baat krnaI caahI. khna lagao ihjaD,a tao haovao hI [sa
kama ko ilae hO.

Ammaa tUna @yaaoM na mauJa laDkI banaa k pOda ikyaa. @yaa

ihjaD,a [saI kama ko ilae haova hO.

English Translation

Dear Mother,

What should I say I don’t know. Mother I think about you a lot. Sometimes I just
want leave everything and come running back to you but I don’t know the way home.

When I came here, I really liked it in the beginning, but now I don’t like it that
much. I miss my school, I miss my friends, I miss father and everything at home. These
people don’t allow me to go out. They make me dance to film songs. It is fun to dance but
not the way I used to dance in school. They also don’t allow me to act on stage. I really
long to sing and dance on stage.

Mother here I am made to sleep on the floor, only our Guruji (master) is allowed
to sleep on the bed. They feed me well but nothing tastes like the food you cook at home.
The day before yesterday I went for my first dance. The people loved my performance.
They gave me a lot of money, nearly 700 rupees but all of it went to Guruji. On my way
back some people made fun of me and passed rude comments. They said that hijras
(eunuchs) are born to do this kind of work.

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 Mother why didn’t you bring me into the world as a girl? Is it really true that
hijras are born for this kind of work?

After both letters were read the atmosphere became a bit gloomy, mainly because of the
content but one cannot deny that the emotions expressed were real. I guess as human
beings it is always easier to talk about our pain rather than pleasure and the actors also
couldn’t resist giving into that side of the characters.

First Make-up Session

Now that we were all feeling a bit washed out from the letter exercise I decided to break
the serious air by throwing the actors into a basic make-up exercise.
It is a common feature among transsexuals and eunuchs to dress like women, of course
the final make over is very different because the transsexuals are in pursuit of attaining
perfection when it comes to acquiring feminity on the physical level whereas a lot of
eunuchs are quite content with looking masculine in female attire and their make- up is
also usually rather garish. It was interesting to find out from Felimon that there is this
category of transsexuals in the Philippines who dress like our Indian eunuchs but they are
mocked for not being ‘perfect beauties’.
And thus began the actors’ first contact with things like nail polish, eyeliner, lipstick and
blush. The session was rather funny and long as neither of them had ever imagined what
it is to dress like a woman and found it extremely difficult to apply these various things. I
had to help them quite a bit, demonstrating how to use certain things and it was hilarious
to watch their hands shake as they did a really bad job at make-up. I knew that this was
another area they needed practice so it became vital that they do the make-up exercise
everyday.

Day 4 - March 18th

First interaction as characters.

After our usual warming up session I instructed the actors to slowly transform into the
character first in their own mind and physical space after a point I told them to slowly
become aware of each other’s presence and said that they could start relating to each
other.
It was very interesting to see that each of them was very comfortable in their own space
but when they had to become aware of each other’s presence things got a bit awkward.
Felimon as Leslie glanced at Sanjay who had transformed to Aarti a couple of times but
Aarti was oblivious to these interactions as she was lost in herself. Finally Aarti decides
to sit down on the floor switches on am imaginary television set with an imaginary
remote and then and starts eating her imaginary oranges. She peels them slowly and eats
even more slowly spitting out the seeds right next to her. Leslie meanwhile has moved
closer to Aarti’s space and watches her now and then, fanning herself intermittently. At
one point their eyes meet, I am delighted, that is the moment I’ve been waiting for, they
look at each other and suddenly there is an invitation from Aarti’s side to come share the
orange. Leslie sits down slowly not sure of exactly of Aarti’s intentions but when she is

19
offered the orange she reaches out and takes a piece. Leslie’s body language is very
different from Aarti’s. She is shy, her hands move gracefully, she sits with her knees
clasped close to her chest. After some time Aarti gets up and goes in to the other room,
Leslie is left wondering what happened, but not for long as Aarti reappears with her
wallet in her hand. Leslie waits while Aarti gropes through its contents to find something.
She finds the object and hands it to Leslie. It is a visiting card. Leslie looks at it and then
moves towards Aarti who has walked away to another part of the room.
Over here the interaction moves to another level, they first touch each others hands, and
the Aarti takes off her bindi and puts it on Leslie’s forehead. Leslie in turn takes off her
hair band and puts it on Aarti. She also offers her, her fan and then Aarti picks up a scarf
and puts it around her head. After this she picks up a mirror and shows Leslie what she
looks like. At this point I begin to sense that the chemistry has dwindled and this may end
up being a dressing each other exercise so I ask the actors to return to their own personal
spaces.
In the discussion which followed Felimon and Sanjay both confessed that it is difficult to
remain in the character all the time, especially when instructions are given because
usually that is when the actor self starts to think and so maybe sometimes the interactions
are not purely as characters. For me the truly real moment in this exercise was when they
reached out and touched each others fingers.

Image of character loneliness

Felimon enters the room as Leslie and sits down in the chair. The music fades in “I said
goodbye to love… slowly her hands begin to feel the packet lying in her lap and she
opens it, puts her hand inside and takes out a few photographs. She looks at them and a
small smile appears at the corner of her mouth as she stares into the distance. A happy
memory maybe…she remains like that suspended in time, lost in a dream and then
suddenly a return to reality. The moment is over. She puts the photographs back into the
envelope and then leaves the room.

Sanjay used a lot of properties to try and convey Aarti’s loneliness but somewhere it
ended up being more of an atmosphere of her room. These were a mirror, make-up stuff,
a saree draped on a chair and oranges in a plastic packet. There seemed to be just too
many objects for him to handle giving them no meaning for being there apart from being
objects which she uses everyday probably. There were no insights into the psyche of the
character and Sanjay was not able to communicate the aspect of her life in which she
feels lonely.

In the discussion which followed we felt that Sanjay needed to think about this exercise
and so I asked the actors to do an abstract image of the characters loneliness the next day.

After this it was time again for make-up session two!

We had bought some more materials and these continued to baffle the actors. Of course
they needed the practice.
After they finished doing their make- up we went one step further, they tried to get into
women’s clothing for the first time. Sanjay got all knotted in the saree he tried to drape
and Felimon kept stomping around in a skirt and spaghetti top trying desperately to walk

20
like a lady to only end up doing a terrible job of it. We then decided to go out and buy the
rest of their costume so that they could practice wearing it during the process everyday.
The things bought included brassieres for both, a pair of high heeled shoes each, a salwar
kameez for Sanjay, jewellery for Sanjay and stockings and false eyelashes for Felimon.
This sure was going to be fun!

Day 5 - March 19th

As the actors did not want to start with the abstract image of loneliness after the warm-up
session I decided that we would do another exercise first and keep this one for after
lunch.

Happy moment or Pleasant dream

Felimon – Using tracks by the Carpenters became a prominent feature in Felimon’s

exercises because Leslie used to sing these songs when she was a performer in Taiwan. It
was also amazing to see the kind of meaning most of the songs took on in the exercises,
invariably the words would seem to echo the emotions of the situation or the music
would end at the precise moment in an exercise, for me that is the magic of the theatre,
when things fall into place and you know the moment could not have been more real than
this.
For the exercise he used a pillow and bed sheet. He lies on the floor and then covered
himself with the bed sheet and closed his eyes. The music fades in “Only Yesterday’ by
Carpenters. Slowly we watch as he comes around and opens his eyes. Then little by little
the image becomes clearer as he takes in his surrounding, and feels his body as if to
check if this is true, then a hand travels lower to reach his genital area and he slowly lifts
the upper part of his body to try and see under the sheets. The music grows louder and his
happiness knows no bounds, the tears start to roll down his face and he can’t stop
smiling. Leslie is finally a complete woman but more than anything else she is glad to be
alive!

Sanjay used a saree for the exercise which he first pulled over his sleeping body as a bed
sheet. The music fades in; slowly his body begins to move under the saree. The saree is
gathered on top of him while moving and suddenly it disappears under his vest. His legs
fold and suddenly you find yourself watching a woman in labor. His cries are guttural,
heart- wrenching and the image is powerful. He is clutching his stomach and then the
saree transforms into a baby that comes out from between his legs. He gets up slowly and
brings the baby to his breast and just when it seems like he has found peace, the dream is
broken and he wakes up in cold sweat to find himself clutching a bundle of cloth. He
shakes himself as if to bring himself back to reality, spreads the saree over him like a bed
sheet and goes back to sleep.

In our discussion we realized in Leslie’s case it was not the fact that she was finally a
complete woman after her sex change which was her happiest moment, rather for her it
something more basic, to wake up and find that she was alive. This was something that
she was really worried about when she decided to go in for a sex change operation and I
think that Felimon was able to show that emotion with absolute honesty in the exercise.

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What stood out in Sanjay’s exercise was the different ways in which he used the saree
and how the images transformed with each change. Felimon also mentioned that Sanjay’s
pleasant dream could have turned into a nightmare when he woke up to find no baby.
As far as the longing to have their own children goes with eunuchs we were all not so
sure at that point of time so we couldn’t really dwell on that issue but as far as Sanjay’s
conviction went, we were convinced.

An embarrassing moment in the character’s life

Felimon did an improvisation based on Leslie’s life when she used to perform in Taiwan
pretending to be a woman. There things used to be very awkward for her when customers
tried to come onto her because she was terrified about being discovered. She had
mentioned such an incident to Felimon which became the foundation for his
improvisation about how customers would tease her when she refused to go with them.

Sanjay did an improvisation of Aarti when he was a little boy and had to undergo a
physical examination by a doctor. He was simply embarrassed to take off his pants when
the doctor asked him to do so.

In our discussion the one thing that became clear to us is that life is always a struggle for
such people. Our sexuality is something that defines our very existence and when we are
deprived of this or things are a bit different as in the case of Aarti and Leslie, living a
normal life becomes a nightmare as the majority of people who are supposedly normal
don’t understand and cannot come to accept these differences.

Abstract image of character’s loneliness

Felimon – Leslie is seated in a chair with her back to the audience. The music fades in,
builds and with its beats we see Leslie getting more and more restless. Her body starts to
writhe and one can see she is obviously very uncomfortable. Finally she gets out of the
chair and goes to a stool on which there are a mirror and some cosmetics. She starts to
put on her make-up but then stops halfway losing interest as if wondering why she is
going through the exercise; she then continues to do her make-up in despair until she
looks quite grotesque. She then goes back and sits in the chair locking her wrists behind
the back, she struggles to unlock them but can’t seem to. After a long struggle she finally
gives in to fatigue and doubles up in the chair.

Sanjay - This time Sanjay took away most of the things he had used the last time. He
retained the chair draped with the black saree. As the music fades in and grows louder a
handful of tissues is thrown into the air. They flutter in the breeze of the fan and then
come scattering to the floor. Sanjay does not enter the space at any point and the image is
over.

In our discussion when we tried to interpret Sanjay’s exercise we felt that somewhere
there was a missing link. Sanjay had not been able to get into that space of Aarti where

22
she may have revealed her dark moments. Whenever he had tried to ask her questions
related to such aspects in her life she had been non-committal in her answers. This is
what caused problems for Sanjay as an actor. He had no information to build his
explorations on. Felimon on other hand was luckier. Leslie had no problem talking about
her life.

After this the actors did their make-up practice and also wore their new clothes for the
first time. It was nice to see that they were not struggling as much with the nail polish and
eyeliner now. They seemed to be enjoying the exercise more now. Sanjay experimented
with new colors everyday while Felimon’s garish tones were getting duller. The
transformation seemed to finally have started....

Day 6 - March 20th

Cracking the physical plane

The actors spent half an hour warming up after which I gave them a long list of things
they had to do as in character. These were:

Start with the walk

Standing posture
Sitting posture
Relaxed posture
Posture of waiting
Lying down posture
Speaking posture
Thinking posture
How does the character pick up something from the floor
How does the character listen to music
How does the character smell flowers
How does the character look at herself in the mirror
Expression of happiness
Expression of anger
Expression of love
How does the character greet a friend
How does the character react to a stranger

After each of the actors did this exercise individually we sat down to discuss the problem
areas.
Felimon was still struggling with the walk, he also sometimes forgot his relationship with
parts of his body for eg. his breasts something that Leslie is aware of all the time, he also
struggled with picking up something from the floor, greeting a stranger and smelling
flowers.
Sanjay was able to establish a very interesting relationship with his ring, watch and
anklets while exploring different postures. Somewhere he also seemed to struggle with
the walk. At one point in the exercise when he was looking at himself in the mirror, he

23
untied his hair to comb it, one could see that the texture of his hair and Aarti’s hair are
very different so it was very difficult for him to convey the texture of Aarti’s hair when
combing his own.
Both actors felt that it was difficult to keep the physical and mental connection at times.
They also felt that sometimes there was a different language between character and actor.
The whole idea to make the actors do these things was to get them to get out of their own
skin and breathe life into the character they were playing. This transition is not an easy
one especially when you are trying to get two males to transform into their female
counterparts. By throwing them into something like this one was forcing them to evolve a
different body language and discover a new physicality.

Character’s Nightmare

Felimon – The image starts with Leslie being asleep. The music fades in and after a point
she starts to become restless. Suddenly she wakes up and walks with her wrists locked
behind her back as if she is been led somewhere. Slowly it becomes clear when she sits
down in the stool and then takes a stand to say something that she is appearing in a court
where a verdict is passed. From her expression it is evident that she has been found
guilty and will never be able to get out. She comes back to her cell and what follows is
an image of absolute despair. She is in uncontrollable grief and the tears will not stop.
She knows there is nothing she can do now and all her chances of ever going back to a
normal life have vanished. She sits there helpless, defeated and lost.

Sanjay’s image as I can recall it was extremely physical ad bordered on brutality. He

starts writhing in his sleep and then suddenly it seems like he is struggling to get out of
his own body. After this the sheet that covers his body suddenly disappears inside his
clothes somewhere and suddenly emerges from between his legs like a very long penis.
His mouth is wide open in pain and one can see that something strange is happening to
him but it is very difficult to comprehend the image. Finally he gets up in shock and is
glad to find that it was only a dream.

When we questioned Sanjay about his image he said that he was trying to show a dream
in which he was being brutally raped by more than one person. It was supposed to have
been a dream within a dream.
Both Felimon and I had made our own different interpretations from what we had seen. I
thought that he was struggling to shed his eunuch skin and try to take on a normal human
body. Both of us felt that there were too many layers and Sanjay got trapped in trying to
convey them.
I asked Sanjay if Aarti had ever spoken about any such incident but as she hadn’t one
could see that it was Sanjay’s actor imagination that was working here rather than the
character’s life.

Discussion on GRS

That afternoon we had a very interesting discussion which Felimon led on GRS – Gender
Reassignment Surgery. He had been able to find some material on the net about the

24
different ways in which it is possible to get a sex change done and wanted to share this
with us.
Leslie has been made a woman from a procedure called ‘Penile inversion’. By this
method the doctor basically inverted what used to be her penis inwards to form a vaginal
passage. The doctor had also asked Leslie if she wanted to retain her testicles so that she
would be able to have sexual urges so these have also been folded in such a way to form
the sides of her female organ. The surgery took about 6 hours and then it was a long wait
of one year before she was able to use her organ for sex. During this year she had to go
regularly for check ups and also undergo painful procedures to get her vagina to work for
sexual purposes. They would insert things inside her to keep the opening from closing.
Despite all the torture involved Leslie was very happy to be a complete woman. Today
she has to take care of herself because if she ever has unprotected sex she has to clean
herself s that she does not get infections.
Her operation was performed in Taiwan and cost her 60,000 Taiwan dollars. We were
amazed at the cost and I immediately knew that people like Aarti could never dream of
getting a sex change done. There are several other methods of surgery but we could not
understand them as clearly as the one Leslie had undergone simply because she had given
Felimon a detailed account of what her operation involved. It was also interesting
however to find out later that the Indian Medical Council has never thought of absorbing
such practices in Indian medical procedures.
Felimon also mentioned that these surgeries used to be carried out up to 1990 in
Singapore but are now banned. He mentioned seeing a documentary called ‘Shocking
Asia’ in childhood in which they showed how these operations were being carried out in
Singapore. I really wanted to get my hands on that video.

That night when we returned home we surfed the net hoping to find clips of the
documentary Felimon had mentioned and as luck would have it there appeared a short
clip in which an Indian doctor by the name of Dr. Ratnam spoke about how he had come
to start doing these operations on men who longed to be women. The clip was rather
graphic and one could see that it was quite a major operation but there were so many
willing to undergo it so as to be happy. Dr. Ratnam mentioned how all the people he
operated would keep coming back to thank him.

Day 7 - March 21st

Today the actors had been asked to bring a bag containing five or six objects belonging to
the character.

Felimon
Red color handbag
Contents – Comb, cell phone, a small bottle of perfume, a packet of condoms, a lipstick.

Sanjay
White handbag with pink flowers
Contents- Wallet, Diary, compact powder, a strip of bindis, cell phone.

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After their warm –up the actors were asked to do one improvisation as characters wherein
they will use all the objects in their bag.

Felimon – Started the scene with a conversation with Edison on the cell phone and told
him to hurry up. After that he sits down in the chair and waits but no sign of Edison. He
then takes out the comb and runs it through his hair impatiently, then he takes out the
lipstick and applies a fresh coat. Calls Edison again and informs him where he is waiting.
He then takes out the tissue and dabs his face now and then avoiding invitations by other
passers by. Finally Edison arrives and they go to the park where Edison wants to get
naughty so Felimon ends the improvisation by taking out the packet of condoms saying
‘’I know what you want so …’’

Sanjay – At the start of the exercise he is seated in the chair as Aarti and takes out the
strip of bindis. He looks into the mirror and changes the one he is already wearing. After
that he takes out the cell phone and diary and looks for a no. which he dials. The
conversation reveals that the eunuchs have been invited to someone’s house for a
ceremony. He hollers to ask if the others are ready, then calls out to the driver and gives
him money from the wallet saying “Take out the car and fill some petrol, I’m coming in a
bit.” He then informs the others that he is leaving, puts on his slippers, picks up his bag
and goes out.

It was nice to see that the actors had thought about most of the objects they had
purchased. I had wanted them to choose every item as the character and was satisfied
with most of their choices.

Make your bed like the character would.

Both the actors were made to do this exercise to again break away from their own body
language.
Felimon’s movements were brisk and he finished quickly putting away everything neatly.
His hands did convey something but the walk was still tricking him.
Sanjay made his bed like Aarti would if she was forced to do it now because as a Guru
she actually does not ever have to do any work. He moved slowly and just picked
everything off the bed and threw it to the ground sitting in a chair all the time. His moves
were heavy and one could see that he was not happy that he was being put through
something like this.
I of course instructed Sanjay to repeat the exercise and do it as a younger version of Aarti
and that’s where we got somewhere. It was interesting to see Sanjay making the
transformation and breaking the slow dead energy he normally associates with Aarti. This
time things were different as he was forced to get out of the chair and move around in the
space.

Dressing up as the character

The next area for exploration was to dress like the character. Normally the actors would
dress like two males putting on female clothes but this time each of them had to come out

26
in their underwear and put on each piece of clothing as they imagined the character
would it.
They did the exercise individually and it was interesting to see how both had a very
different style. Of course Felimon dressed up to songs by the Carpenters, singing and
dancing as he went along. Sanjay on the other hand was more matter of fact and business
like, his movements deliberate and steady. Both of them struggled while putting on their
brassieres. They needed to practice so I showed them some ways of putting on the
garment and they were able to choose. They also needed to practice walking in their heels
as they found it very painful to keep them on for long.

Day 8 - March 22nd

Enactment of Character’s first performance experience

The actors had been working on many aspects of the two characters so I thought it was
now time to start exploring the performance side of these two characters as Leslie had
been a singer for many years of her life and Aarti also earned her living from performing
at ceremonies.
We decided that each of them would select a number to perform to.
Felimon went first and did a lip sync to ‘Goodbye to love’ by the Carpenters dedicating it
to an imaginary couple in the bar. He had a wonderful energy and mimed the words with
true emotion. He also managed to sway his hips and used his hands a lot, in one hand he
held a mike and with the other he kept tune as he sang.
Sanjay danced to a hindi song and as it was his first time was a bit off beat sometimes but
he did manage to do an excellent job of the expressions. The dupatta he wore caused him
some distress at times as it kept getting entangled around his arm as he danced. He tried
doing some innovative steps which were rather amusing.
Overall both performances were very entertaining and different in style.

Relationship with a particular object.

Today I thought of carrying the object exercise to another level so after the actors had
finished their warm-up, we put out Felimon’s objects on the floor.
He was then instructed to enter the room in character, pick up any one object and tell us
any memory associated with that particular object.
Felimon chose the mike and what followed was an emotional rendering of how Leslie
was selected by chance to go with a band on tour. At the start it seemed like he was
talking to himself but slowly he started to establish a relationship with the audience as he
went deeper into the incident. The emotions flowed smoothly and at no point did he get
stuck in his narration.
Sanjay decided not to pick an object from the floor. He chose one of the necklaces he was
wearing around his neck. The ‘mangalsutra’ to be more specific. This necklace is worn by
women in India as a symbol of being married. All eunuchs usually wear one as they
fantasize being wedded to someone in their life.
Sanjay’s relationship with his object was conveyed non-verbally. He took off the necklace
and laid it on the ground. After fondling it with affection a few times he pulled it close to
his body and covered himself and the object with his dupatta. He then got up and put it

27
back on again with a happy grin on his face. Obviously he was trying to convey a
relationship that Aarti probably had or was offered at some point in her life. Sanjay had
mentioned that there had been a young man who proposed to Aarti but she had refused
him saying it’s not worth it to break someone else’ home.
Somehow we felt that all of this was not conveyed in the handling of the object.
Something was a bit too mechanical and the body of the actor did not express the
emotional memory. All the actions happened too soon and we had no time to absorb the
moment of love that Aarti may have experienced or the trauma of the difficult decision
she made to decline the offer.

Expression of the desire for womanhood using body.

In this exercise the basic idea was to get the actors to use their bodies to create images
revealing the longing they experienced to be a woman or feel like a woman. I regularly
threw such challenges at the actors simply because sometimes during the work their
bodies would go back to being the actor body rather than the character body.

Felimon’s image started from him looking out and watching other women from his
window. Slowly his hands begin to wander and he puts his hands inside his jacket feeling
his chest, one can see what he is imagining and then suddenly he takes off the jacket and
goes to stand in front of an imaginary mirror. Here he begins to feel himself again, very
sensually, fondling, caressing his imaginary breasts, feeling their weight, loving the feel
of them and then suddenly the image comes crashing, he realizes that none of this is real
so pulls himself together, puts on his jacket again and leaves the room.

Sanjay’s image was very different right form the start. He lay on the floor and slowly his
body began to respond like a woman who was being loved. He moaned continually
surrendering to the love making. One could visualize the different ways he was imagining
how it must be to be loved like a woman. Slowly his legs spread and he gave in
completely like a woman consumed by the passion she yearned for so desperately. Then
slowly when the spasms ceased his body fell limp onto the ground and he opened his eyes
to find himself in his own incomplete body, if only…

After this we went into a really long discussion and debate about whether for these kind
of people being a woman is only about having breasts and a vagina. Felimon certainly felt
that in his culture the yearning for the physical aspects came from the psychological
desire and cannot be separated. Take Leslie’s example alone, she had to acquire breasts
and a vagina to feel like a complete woman. So many of the other transsexuals he had
met were also trying to save enough money to take that final step of a sex change through
surgery.
Sanjay felt that as far as eunuchs go they are not as keen as the Fillipino transsexuals but
that it was more important for them to be seen as a woman and accepted by society as a
woman even in their imperfect transformation to try and look like one. Sanjay also
mentioned that some of the eunuchs he had met had breasts, and that one of them had
also mentioned that she was seeing a doctor for such treatment.
I myself was a bit perplexed and wondered if that really was the truth, why did they not
want to look as beautiful, was it only the cost factor or was there it defiance and a need to

28
establish hijras as a different group that look different? So many questions were
beginning to arise and one really wanted to get to the bottom of what belonging to this
particular sect actually involved. It became more and more crucial that we meet someone
who has had a real insight into their lives rather than just build on our own imagination.

Day 9 - March 23rd

Again in our first session for the day I decided to throw the actors into a physical
exploration of the characters.
We started with both Aarti and Leslie in their separate spaces waiting to take a cab. They
then get into the cab and upon reaching a destination pay the driver and alight the vehicle.
After this they were to enter a mall and start shopping or simply look around. After a
while they get thirsty and decide to go to a restaurant for a drink. They order it or buy it
ad then sit down to drink it. At this point t was very strange but the two actors ended up
sitting opposite each other so I wondered if any exchange or interaction was going to take
place. Sanjay did in fact at one point acknowledge Felimon’s presence by glancing in her
direction a couple of times but Felimon was lost in his own world. I decided not to
instruct them to interact as this point. After they had finished their drink I told them to
leave the mall and ended the exercise.

In our discussion which followed it became clear to all of us that one area continued to
baffle us and that was how do these characters meet? We realized that geographically it
was almost impossible for them to ever come together and so what was that artistic space
which would finally allow them to enter each others world? We had already tried to bring
them together at various points, once they ended up exchanging things from their
handbags but things never seemed to get to that point where they needed to ask questions
about each other. One could not deny the chemistry that happened whenever these
characters had interacted before but it was essential that they meet for the first time as
complete strangers. So we decided that instead of discussing the matter further we would
plunge into an exercise and try to find that space.

Ist meeting of characters – Each of the actors had to do an enactment of where and how
they met for the first time.

Felimon - The improvisation started with Felimon entering the room with some female
clothes in his hand. He stands there staring at them for a really long time and soon it is
evident that he is in a dilemma, to wear or not to wear them. He manages to put on the
skirt and then with great effort pulls the spaghetti top over his head and down his torso.
The brassiere is still I his hands and he keeps looking at it, he slowly raises it and brings
it to his chest but by then he is overcome with emotion and the tears start rolling down his
face. He drops into the chair and the bra falls to the ground. He cannot stop crying.
Suddenly like a vision from thin air Sanjay appears as Aarti from behind Felimon. She
stops for a few seconds understanding the situation and then approaches the chair. Slowly
she reaches out and starts to run her hands through Felimon’s hair. It feels good to have
someone and he enjoys the sensation for a while and then suddenly becomes aware of
Sanjay’s presence so turns to get a look at who is this person. He is horrified! He cannot

29
comprehend what he is looking at. He jumps out of the chair shaking with fright and says
“who are you?”
“I am a hijra” Sanjay replies. He then picks up the bra from the floor and comes walking
towards Felimon who has backed into the wall and is cowering with fear. Upon reaching
him he pulls him forward and puts the bra on.
“Will I look like you?” asks Felimon
“No, you will look very beautiful.”
After having clasped the bra on at the back, Sanjay begins to pull the spaghetti top over
from under the bra and then slowly leads Felimon back to the chair. After making him sit
down in it, Sanjay sits down on the floor and reaches out for a stocking that is lying
inside a shoe and rolls it up Felimon’s leg, he then picks up the heel and puts it on his
foot. By this time Felimon has calmed down and watches while all this is happening.
Sanjay then stands up and suddenly disappears just like he had appeared. Felimon gets up
and tries to figure out where Sanjay has vanished but is unable to find him. He then sits
down in the chair and starts to put on the other stocking….

The entire improvisation had been very moving and we were all taken completely by the
magic of it. It had gone on for over 20 minutes but one hadn’t felt a single empty
moment. When we discussed it Felimon explained that Aarti had probably appeared in
Leslie’s imagination at the time Leslie was having difficulty with taking on her real
identity. The other gays in the beauty parlor where she worked had been encouraging to
dress like a woman but she was scared of what people might say.
Now we had to see Sanjay’s version and then we’d know where things were going.

Sanjay started his exercise as Aarti watching television, Leslie appears in an interview as
someone who has become a celebrity after undergoing her sex change operation. The
interview starts and Sanjay grows interested. The host of the show asks Leslie all kinds of
questions and she is a most happy and willingly gives all the answers. Finally the host
asks her to sing a song before he leaves and she does. While the song is going on Aarti
falls asleep.
Suddenly Leslie steps out of the television screen into Aarti’s space and watches her
sleeping. She then comes close to her sleeping form and that’s when Aarti opens her eyes.
Leslie gets up and gives Aarti an inviting look and then begins a game of seduction
between the two, Aarti keeps coming close to her and Leslie keeps running away. Aarti
stops after a while and that’s when Leslie comes close to her and picks up her hand,
running it down her body showing of her newly acquired parts. Aarti is mesmerized and
one can see that she is completely taken in by Leslie. Slowly she starts to undress her as
if taking those parts for herself and puts on Aarti’s clothes one by one until finally she felt
complete. Leslie leaves and then Aarti goes back to sleep satisfied with her new self.

I felt that in Sanjay’s exercise the contact remained at the purely physical level. In fact
Aarti the way Felimon saw it was rather selfish and just seemed to go about greedily
taking whatever she wanted. There was no relationship built during the interaction and
one could see that Aarti was completely in control and Leslie was quiet surprised at her
raw aggression.

30
Eventually it made sense to go with Felimon’s idea of Aarti appearing in Leslie’s
imagination as it gave us a wonderful theatrical device for the characters to meet and
form a friendship.

The second meeting

This time Felimon decided to continue from where he had left off, returning home after
the first time he dressed as a woman. He entered his space feeling very excited that he
had managed to do it finally and starts calling out for Aarti to tell her about his day. Aarti
finally appears but somehow from that point things didn’t go in the exercise the way
Felimon wanted. Sanjay seemed to be in some other state of mind and was not giving the
kind of responses that Felimon was looking for so that didn’t make things easier in terms
of the two characters sharing information about themselves.
We tried another approach where the two characters sat down and tried to chat like two
strangers who were trying to get to know one another but the entire exercise became too
mechanical and informative.
Sanjay chose to speak only in metaphors which complicated things quiet a bit and basic
questions that Felimon asked remained unanswered. Felimon also felt that it was difficult
to trust somebody unless you have some background and since he was unable to get it, it
was getting difficult for him to take the relationship further.
One could see that there was no warmth or spark of friendship and both of the actors
were forcing themselves to carry on a dialogue as something that had to be achieved from
the improvisation.
We tried again this time asking them to carry out some activity while talking but again
they seemed to get stuck somewhere and the connection was lost. At this point things
began to get quiet unbearable so we stopped the exercise mid way and realized that we
would simply have to find another way out.

To relax and change the mood we did a performance exercise of both the characters.

Day 10 - March 24th

The next day we decided to let sharing information take backseat and concentrated our
energies on establishing a friendship. I thought it would be best to put the characters in
certain situations where they would be doing things which would give them the space to
share information as they went along.

The first situation was to cook together. Aarti appears in Leslie’s imagination and is
hungry so Leslie decides to make something for her and Aarti also decides to teach Leslie
an Indian recipe. The situation started well and both were very excited to get to the
kitchen and start but things became funny when Leslie offered to cook meat for Aarti who
announced that she was vegetarian. Now this was information that had not been shared
earlier so Felimon was taken completely by surprise and realized that there was not much
he could do but make a salad!

31
Aarti on the other hand took out whatever vegetables she could find in Leslie’s fridge and
started to teach her how to make mixed vegetables Indian style! The entire process took
its own time and what really added to the mood of the exercise were the Carpenter songs
playing in the background. Leslie kept imagining that she was watching them on
television so kept stopping once in a while to sing or dance as she helped Aarti with her
cooking. At one point there were some wonderful moments when Leslie stood in front of
the telly imitating the singer and Aarti stood behind her trying to copy her movements.
When Aati’s vegetables were ready, Felimon taught her to make some fresh salad with
mayonnaise and then laid the table for them to eat. However by then Aarti had lost her
patience and appetite so she suddenly left when Leslie went to bring the rice. Leslie did
not make much of her disappearance and ate alone while she continued to enjoy her
music.
The actors seemed to have enjoyed this exercise and did not feel any pressure while
trying to communicate.

In the next improvisation Leslie and Aarti had to share their thoughts on what kind of
partners they wished to find.

It was interesting that both started out on the assumption that the other was already seeing
someone so it ended up being more of a comparison of partners and the probable futures
of these relationships. Leslie was very cheerful right from the word go and had love
written all over her face. She may have burst if Aarti had not prodded her to reveal what
was going on. She immediately went into this story of how she had started seeing
someone after a previous broken relationship. She expressed how her present partner was
very different from the previous one and how much he seemed to care about her. This in
fact was worrying her because she had already started to wonder how long it would last.
Aarti asked her if her boyfriend knew everything about her and she replied “Of course.”
They spent a few moments feeling happy for Leslie who then threw a question at Aarti.
“How about you, are you seeing anyone?”
Aarti starts to say something but stops.
“Hey tell me, what’s going on. Stop being so secretive.” Probes Leslie
Aarti goes on to reveal that there is someone who seems to be showing an interest in her.
“What does he do?”
“He is a truck driver.”
“Truck driver!”
Aarti is a bit hurt but doesn’t bother to make a scene. She continues to narrate how she
was dancing at a house and how he kept watching her all the time. Leslie watches as Aarti
face lights up with the memory of this attention she received.
She asks “Are you going to marry him?”
Aarti sighs and responds with a “It is not possible for us to do such things.”
“But why not, what if he asks you, will you accept?”
Aarti says “We are not allowed, I do not have the courage to break away and live alone,
what if he leaves me one day, then nobody will accept me after that.”
Leslie is perplexed; she cannot fathom why Aarti can’t have a relationship or be happy
with someone.
Then suddenly Aarti says “will you speak to him? I’ve told him about you.” Even before
Leslie can digest what is happening, Aarti takes out her cell phone and dials a no.

32
She speaks to her lover and hands the phone to Leslie.
“What, can he speak English!”
She takes the phone and says “Hello” and that is about all she can do, she immediately
hands the phone back to Aarti who is laughing at Leslie’s plight.
Aarti finishes her conversation after which Leslie says she has to go somewhere and
leaves.

After this we also did two individual exercises. One in which Leslie had to come and tell
Aarti that she was going to be living in with her boyfriend and the other in which Aarti
had to tell Leslie about the proposal for marriage she had received.
I was hoping to get a deeper insight into why Aarti had declined. It was obvious that for
Leslie there were no problems as far as relationships went. She enjoyed being loved and
was completely loyal to all the people she had dated at various points in her life. After her
operation she had lived with Edison for ten years but somehow when it came to Aarti’s
life the pages remained blank. I’m sure she would have loved to be wanted as a woman
by a man but what was it that stopped her from accepting her emotions?
The improvisation however failed to provide answers as Aarti had never expressed in any
way why she had refused so Sanjay just kept saying that this was how their life was
meant to be.

Day 11 - March 25th

Aarti and Leslie go out to a club in the Philippines.

The improvisation was aimed at trying to see how Leslie and Aarti feel when someone
makes fun of them or tries to embarrass them.
It started with Leslie rushing into the room, calling out to Aarti and then telling her that
they are going to go out as it is Leslie’s birthday.
They walk into a pub and are about to settle down when a customer notices Aarti and
starts to tease her about the way she looks calling her ‘Bakla’ which is supposed to be a
very derogatory term for gays in the Philippines. Aarti of course does not understand the
linguistic connotations but is well aware of the body language of the customer and starts
to rant and rave in hindi. Leslie on the other does not wish to create a scene and asks
Aarti to leave with her. Aarti is rather keen to pick up a fight with the customer but
sensing Leslie’s discomfort decides to leave. Both of them are quiet shaken by the
episode and return home rather infuriated. Leslie can’t stop abusing the customer and
Aarti also keeps saying “if only you had let me show him.”
One sensed a discomfort at the character level to discuss what either of them was going
through at that time and so Felimon immediately changed the mood by saying to just
forget it and starts to play some music. Soon they are able to put the incident behind them
and begin to enjoy themselves.

It was interesting as either of the actors had no idea what was going to happen when they
went to the pub. I of course was hoping that they would discuss some of the deeper issues
when they got home but that didn’t happen. When I asked Felimon why he didn’t fight
for Aarti in the pub he said that as the character he ended up feeling really guilty for

33
having brought her there and so the only thing he could think of doing was leaving. His
protective side took over and he felt that he just needed to get Aarti out of there.
The good thing though from this improvisation was that one could see that the characters
were now drawing closer to each other. They had started to care which was a good
foundation to build a relationship on.

Voice exercises

In the next improvisation Aarti visits Leslie one day to find that she is extremely busy
with something. She asks her what she is up to and Leslie tells her that she is practicing
Feminine voice techniques so that she will sound more like a woman.
Aarti is completely lost and so Leslie tells her to watch and follow.
The rest of the improvisation turned out to be very comical as Leslie went through each
of the exercises trying to explain them to Aarti, demonstrating what was to be done and
poor Aarti looked so funny when she tried to imitate Leslie.
The exercises ranged from the amount one should open their mouth to trying head
resonance rather than chest resonance. Leslie was rather determined in her approach and
took all of this very seriously while Aarti ended up staring at the ceiling wondering what
she was doing there. There were eleven exercises to be done and poor Aarti had to sit
through all of them. The only one she probably found remotely exciting was when Leslie
practiced singing with a Carpenters track.
The exercise was a revelation in terms of the effort made by transsexuals when it comes
to achieving their goal. Eunuchs on the other hand could not be bothered with us tiresome
things. They don’t mind sounding masculine in female attire.

Leslie comes to India!

The next task before Aarti was to bring Leslie to India and show her what her side of life
was like.

The improvisation started with Aarti bringing Leslie to the house where she lives with her
Guru and other eunuchs. The very first difficulty that Leslie faced was to sit on the floor
but she did anyway. Aarti did not sense her discomfort. The other eunuchs were not at
home in the beginning and neither was the Guru so they sat around talking about what
Aarti’s life is here and Leslie realizes that it is only the Guru who has a comfortable life.
Aarti shows Leslie the different idols they worship and also shows her how they do their
prayers in the Hindu religion explaining what the different Gods stand for. Leslie is
fascinated by the ritual and watches in amazement.
Suddenly the others return from outside and Aarti tells Leslie to wait. She goes into her
Guruji’s room and speaks to her telling her about Leslie. Leslie also goes in to greet the
Guru from a safe distance as she is somewhere aware of her apparent authority. This
being done Aarti brings Leslie out to meet the other eunuchs. She introduces them one by
one to her and then sits down to answer questions they may have. Leslie is a bit conscious
but tries to appear dignified and calm.
After some time Aarti decides to take Leslie out to a tourist place. She seeks the
permission of her Guru and then they leave the house.

34
The exercise helped in casting light on Aarti’s life when she was younger perhaps. In the
eunuch community you can’t really be independent and have your own life, your life is
dictated by the Guru and all your freedom is limited to living and working with the other
eunuchs that belong to the same house.
Luckily for Sanjay he had all that freedom while doing the exercises as we were
exploring things in an artistic space.

Day 12 - March 26th

Exchanging Gifts

As usual we started with our warming up session and this time instead of allowing the
actors to do their make-up and put on their female clothes I told them to get into their
characters in their normal male clothes. The idea was to see if they had difficulty in being
women dressed as men.
They started to do the mirror exercise and then slowly moved into character remaining in
the same space. The previous evening I had told them to buy a gift for each other. As the
exercise progressed I asked them to exchange their gifts and play whatever emotion the
gift triggered inside them
Aarti gave her gift first; it was a small hand mike which she handed Leslie with a big
grin. Leslie accepted it and seemed to travel into another time zone. There were many
thoughts that were crossing her mind and finally she only managed to hug Aarti.
After that it was Leslie’s turn, her gift was in a packet which Aarti opened quickly.
It was a small round hand mirror encased in a golden case. Aarti took it out and first held
it to look at her own reflection. After that she put her head to Leslie’s head and held the
mirror in front for her to see. The relationship of the two of them with the mirror
continued for a little more and after that we ended the exercise.
In the discussion Felimon said that he was very surprised when he got the mike, he felt
that Aarti was showing him a way of fulfilling his dreams. That was the thought that
came to his mind and so he had already started to imagine how he was going to go about
doing this.
By giving Aarti the mirror, Leslie was hoping to get her to take a good look at herself and
realize who she was and what she wanted maybe in her life. In some way she was trying
to tell her that she was not very different from her but she needed to come to terms with
that and pursue her dreams rather than just accept life the way she did.

Leslie encourages Aarti to take hormone tablets

This time Felimon decided that he was back in his own space in the Philippines. He
entered the room in his usual Leslie manner running around calling for Aarti most
excitably. When Aarti appears he goes running to her and tells her that he has been to a
doctor. Aarti is worried at first and asks if he is sick, but then he explains that he went to
find out about taking hormone tablets and has now decided to start taking them.
He then takes a strip out of his purse to show Aarti. Aarti looks and them and asks
“What it will do?”

35
Leslie says – “I t will make your breast grow.”
Aarti – “But you already have big breasts.”
Leslie – “Oh but this is just stuffing, I want real big breasts.”
Aarti – “Does it really work?”
Leslie –“Of course! Why don’t you try taking some.”
Aarti – “No, no my Guruji will not allow.”
Leslie – “Why don’t we give some to Guruji, she might like them.”
At this point Aarti takes the strip from Leslie and holds them in her hand.
Leslie - “The doctor says it’s fine to take them, nothing will happen.”
Aarti – “I don’t know…”
Leslie cuts her mid way “Oh come on don’t be afraid, nobody has to know. Imagine how
lovely it will be to have real breasts and walk on the streets. Nobody will tease us then.”
Aarti accepts the strip and hides it in her bra.
Leslie is very happy and gives her a hug.

Police episode in India.

The next improvisation came as a complete surprise to the actors as I had not told them
what was going to happen.
They had been told that they were back in India walking on the street at night when
suddenly someone calls out to them. They turn around and realize it a policeman.
The policeman starts to interrogate them and before Leslie can figure out what is going
on slaps Aarti a couple of times. He asks Leslie for her passport but as it is not with her at
that point of them tells them that they will have to go the police station. Leslie is horrified
at the proposition and when Aarti tries to sweet talk the cop and ends up getting beaten up
more Leslie is forced to quietly follow Aarti. The cop also teases her asking her several
times if she is male or female and even runs his hands over her body to try and figure out.
Leslie finds the whole thing extremely humiliating but is not able to do anything.
Eventually she can’t stop the tears that start to roll down her face but the cop is merciless
and takes them to the police station.
At the police station they are thrown into a cell and the cop asks them to wait there for a
while. Both of them don’t know what to do as he is not willing to listen. After a bit he
comes back and asks Leslie to step out of the cell. Leslie is very reluctant but he tells her
that he will tell her something important and Aarti asks her to go.
The cop then gives Leslie this whole story of how eunuchs supposedly kidnap boys and
chop off their dicks after which they make them prostitutes. He tells Leslie that they may
do the same thing with her so she should not trust them.
Leslie can’t believe her ears but somewhere she for the first time begins to fear Aarti as
well. The cop asks Aarti to ask Leslie to hand over any dollars she may have but Leslie is
not carrying any money. Aarti keeps asking the cop to allow her to speak to her Guruji
but he will not have it. He continues to treat Aarti very violently beating her several times
until she crumples over in pain. Eventually Aarti digs into her bag and takes out a gold
bangle saying this is all she has. The cop seems satisfied once he sees it and asks her to
leave it on the table before they leave.
Both Aarti and Leslie are completely shaken by the episode and return to Aarti’s house.
Here they are crying and one can see that they have been left feeling very vulnerable and
exposed by the incident.

36
Leslie asks Aarti if the police treat the eunuchs like this always and Aarti replies that it is
so. She however is unable to explain why this happens. It is just another one of those
many things that they have gotten used to living with. She cries bitterly while speaking
but Leslie is unable to come near her, to hold her, to comfort her. Some where Leslie is
not sure what to believe and all she says is that she’d like to go back to her own home.

In the discussion that followed one could see that the actors were really tired after the
exercise. It had taken a toll on their emotions and they were feeling rather drained by it.
Felimon said that he was completely shocked at this revelation of India as in the
Philippines the police do not harass any of these groups. In fact he told us that the
transsexuals flirt with the police and they quite enjoy it. He had no idea that things were
so rough for the eunuchs in India. They are not only harassed emotionally but sexually as
well.
Sanjay expressed that he was really hurt when Leslie did not touch him after they had
returned from the police station. He was in fact hoping that Leslie would hold him but
Felimon explained that he just could not bring himself to do so. He was worried about his
own safety and that was the only thing that was weighing on his mind. He was also not
sure if he could trust Aarti entirely at that point which is what stopped him from reacting
to her tears.
This episode had also brought the relationship between Aarti and Leslie at the crossroads.
Things had been very happy but now something had happened and they had parted on a
not so happy note. I began to wonder what would bring them back together again.

Day 13 - March 27th

Talk with Mr. More

Over the last ten days or so there were several questions that had risen in our minds with
regards to eunuchs and somehow we really wanted to get to the bottom of certain issues
so we called in a writer who has done extensive research on eunuchs. He also wrote a
script based on one of their lives called ‘Janeman’ which means beloved. I had watched
this play and was really moved at the way he had depicted their lives. Thus we thought
that it would be good to have a session with him just to clarify all the questions and
doubts that were lurking in our minds.

Mr. More arrived and as he was not really sure about what we were doing we first
explained that to him. I think that put him at ease and he realized that all we wanted was a
few of our questions answered. He was a little bit worried because it has been a few
years now since he did his research. Here I would like to highlight the main points of our
very long session with him.

He started the discussion with one opening sentence which was “To be a eunuch
castration is compulsory.” This of course completely took us by surprise as we thought
that there were many eunuchs who were born that way. However to our amazement Mr.

37
More told us that the eunuch community will not allow a person to continue staying with
them unless that person goes in for a castration.
Of course the first question we asked was what about those who are born with an
incomplete of deformed organ? He told us that all the eunuchs he had seen which was
well over 300, were all castrated.
Sanjay immediately pointed out that Aarti had mentioned that she was born a eunuch.
This he could also not understand but he explained that in rural parts of India, when male
children are born with a deformity in their organ or with a so called incomplete organ,
people due to their ignorance think that they have given birth to a eunuch.
After this he told us his entire journey from his first meeting with a group of eunuchs to
how he started living with them and to try and understand them completely.
According to his research most eunuchs are those boys with homosexual tendencies right
from childhood or even those that were developed or discovered at a later stage in life. As
homosexuality is taboo in Indian society it becomes extremely difficult for these people
to deal with their sexual identity. Most of them leave home then and find love and
acceptance in the eunuch community. The castration part however leaves one cringing
because that seems like such a costly price to pay to belong and be accepted. This is
something that came as a shock to Felimon who for from the beginning had already
figured out somewhere in his mind that eunuchs were actually homosexuals.

There are basically seven distinct categories of eunuchs. Each of them is different from
the others and earns their living by different means. Aarti belongs to the group that sings
and dances. Some belong to the group that earn by begging at shops or traffic signals,
some by prostitution.
They are very particular about hierarchy and possessive about their area of work. Many
fights break out between groups and their Gurus if any kind of trespassing happens. The
Gurus are the only people with the right to dissolve disputes.
Till recently most eunuchs were castrated by their Gurus by a rather gruesome method of
chopping off the entire male organ and then leaving the person to bleed. Once that was
done some oil was poured over the wound for it to heal and if the person survived he
would be initiated into the eunuchdom with much festivity and celebration. Nowadays
however a lot more people opt to go to a doctor to have their castration done.
The next thing we brought up was the issue of a sex change. Mr. More said that quite a
few eunuchs were aware of the effects of hormone tablets and take them but as far as a
sex change operation went it was something beyond their reach so there is no point even
thinking about it.
We also asked him why they were not interested in making themselves perfect in terms of
beautifying themselves as women and he told us that they are more proud of the fact that
they know how to love a man better than a woman and guarantee that any man who
comes to them will never want to be loved by a woman again. This was a revelation
indeed!

When we questioned him on their take on love and marriage he told us about one such
marriage that he attended in Gujarat.
This was a love marriage and had made the news because this particular eunuch was
going to marry a pilot and an obscene amount of money was going to be spent on the
marriage. Mr. More recalled how excited he had been to go to this wedding and upon

38
reaching there was horrified to find thousands of people out on the streets trying to stop
the marriage from taking place. He realized then that people are so narrow minded and
will never allow the eunuchs to lead a normal life.

Missing a friend

After lunch we decided to continue with where we had left off from the previous day so
Aarti and Leslie were back in their own spaces. I instructed the actors to show how they
were missing their friend to see how we could bring them back together again.
Felimon entered his space as Leslie who came in and walked around her room as if she
were looking for someone. She is apparently missing Aarti and sits down in her chair.
Slowly she surrenders to sleep. Meanwhile Aarti I seen in her corner staring at her make
up kit. She pulls it close and then takes out something. It is the mirror Leslie gave her.
She looks at it fondly and plays with it in her hand for some time before putting it away.
After that she looks around as making sure that no one is watching her and then takes out
the pills that Leslie had given her from inside her bra. She swallows a tablet and then lies
down to sleep. After a while she starts to become restless and soon it seems like she is
having a nightmare in the middle of which she calls out. Leslie hears this cry and wakes
up. Within seconds she realizes that it is Aarti who called her and she reaches her side
shaking her from her dream.
Aarti wakes up and hugs Leslie at first, then she pushes her away and says
“You came back.”
Leslie says “Yes, I missed you.”
Aarti says
“I missed you too.”
They both hug each other tightly again.
Leslie – “I’m sorry, I know I was selfish to have left like that but I was so scared..”
Aarti – “Its ok, you’ve come back, that’s enough for me.”

For me it was wonderful to see this reconciliation take place so effortlessly. Nothing had
been planned and everything just seemed to fall into place. Now it would be easy to carry
on with some of the situations I had planned.

Leslie and Aarti find an abandoned baby

The next improvisation was also a surprise situation for both the actors. I told them that
they were walking on a lonely street in India so they entered the room with no idea of
what was going to happen.
We had placed a bundle inside a dustbin on the side and when they came in a friend
started to make sounds of a baby crying. Both the actors reacted immediately and went to
the dustbin. Aarti took out the bundle cajoling it to stop crying, the cries however got
louder. Leslie began to get worried and started looking around to see if anyone had seen
them.
Leslie – “What shall we do? Should we take it to the police?”
Aarti – “No, for what. I’m going to take it home.”
Leslie – But how can you just take it like that, it’s not yours!”
Aarti - “Nobody wants it, that’s why they have thrown it in the dustbin.”

39
Leslie – Are you sure, what if we get into trouble!”
Aarti – “You don’t worry, nothing will happen. Come let us go.”

They reach Aarti’s place and Aarti goes in to tell her Guruji about the baby.
Over here there was a slight intervention and Aarti was instructed by the Guruji to send
the baby with Leslie for a couple of days until they were able to sort out things here.
Leslie was of course completely baffled by the proposition. She first kept saying that it
simply was impossible as she had a job and couldn’t take time off, but Aarti begged and
pleaded saying that it was only for two days.
So then it was Leslie with the baby all by herself in her own space. She was not very
comfortable with the idea at first but then when the baby started wailing had no choice
but to take it in her arms and comfort it. She even managed to put it to sleep and sat there
watching it lie against her breast and for the first time one saw that Leslie felt something.
Of course one couldn’t keep the baby there forever so we sent in someone to Leslie’s
house claiming to be the baby’s father. Aarti had also reached there by now and when the
father came in Aarti gave him a real sounding off. The father confessed that he was
scared to keep the baby after the mother had passed away during childbirth and that was
why he deserted it but afterwards he felt terrible and went back to look for it but it was
not there. Leslie also asked the father certain questions to make sure that the baby would
be looked after, Aarti tried to dissuade Leslie from giving the baby back but eventually
the father convinced them that he was feeling very repentant and really wanted his child
back so they conceded.

From the exercise it was clear that eunuchs have no problem when it comes to maternal
instincts. They are known in fact to adopt girl children, or bear the entire expenses for a
young girl’s marriage. Maybe this is because many of them were forced to leave their
homes at a young age and also because they live in large groups so it not that difficult to
rear a child in their home. They are however not allowed by the law to adopt babies.
Felimon of course showed us a side that is more practical when it comes to the issue of
adoption. Even Leslie wants to adopt a child some day but she can’t imagine doing it
until she has enough money to provide that child with all that it needs.
The improvisation went on for more than an hour and both the actors were completely
involved in the situation and had no problems with belief.

Day 14 - March 28th

Leslie invites Aarti to go to a human right rally

In this improvisation Leslie is preparing a speech which she is going to give at a human
rights rally later in the day when Aarti comes to meet her. When Aarti asks her what she
is doing Leslie tells her that a whole lot of people like them will be meeting to day to
fight for their rights and make themselves heard. She asks Aarti to join her and even
suggests that she speak about the eunuchs over there so that people will get to know
about them and support them in India.
Aarti is hesitant at first because she is not very good at speaking English but Leslie
convinces her that it doesn’t matter. In a little bit they leave for the rally.

40
Leslie is very happy to meet her friends and introduces Aarti to them. She also tells the
organizers that Aarti will be speaking and they are very happy to accommodate her
request.
Leslie invites Aarti to take the stand and Aarti talks to the gathering about how eunuchs
live in India. After that Leslie addresses the audience and reads out a list of things that
they are demanding. Finally the rally ends with all of them dancing and having a good
time.

What was very evident from the exercise was the fire and passion that burned inside
Leslie was somewhere not there in Aarti.
Maybe this is because from time immemorial the eunuchs have been sidelined by main
stream society. Being supposedly void of an identity they are not even considered human
and no provision has been made whatsoever to include them within the existing legal
system.
After a long battle started by a eunuch who decided to contest for elections In India, the
eunuchs are finally permitted to at least cast their votes. Apart from that there are several
issues and concerns that they have started to voice and hopefully they will soon find the
strength to come out and fight for their rights such as wanting to be examined by lady
doctors, or trying to get a job in offices and institutions.
Leslie is luckier to come from a society where there is much more acceptance and
openness as far as people like her go where they are not denied the basic human rights. In
India to get there will take a lot more time but it is important that the eunuchs are
educated in these matters so that they can take things into their own hands.

Leslie tells Aarti she is going to get a sex change

The next improvisation was crucial to the relationship as this was a point when Leslie
was going to be leaving to go to Taiwan to pursue her ultimate dream.
Leslie comes into the room and sits down near Aarti. Aarti who knows her well by now
senses that she wants to tell her something.
Aarti – “What?”
Leslie – “Aarti I have decided…” she stops again
Aarti – “What it is? Come on, why are making so much suspense!”
Leslie – “Aarti I have decided to go in for a sex change.”
Aarti – “What is that?”
Leslie – “It is an operation which will give me a vagina.”
Aarti – “Is it possible?”
Leslie – “Yes, I have spoken to my doctor and he wants me to go to Taiwan to get it
done.”
Aarti – Really! I am so happy for you.”
They hug each other tight. After they separate, Aarti looks at Leslie curiously.
Leslie – “What?”
Aarti – “How much does it cost, this operation?”
Leslie –“Oh it is very expensive, 60, 000 Taiwan dollars.”
Aarti – “How much is that?”
Leslie – “It is a lot.”

41
Aarti – “Where did you get it from?”
Leslie – Oh I don’t have it all yet, I will be living in Taiwan for a year undergoing
psychological treatment and during that time I will perform in the bars there to make the
money. The doctor also said that I can pay in installments so I don’t have to have it all at
one time.”
Somewhere Aarti is lost in her own thoughts.
Leslie – “If it works maybe you can also try it, I can help you…”
Aarti – “How, I only 2000 rupees a month and that also goes to Guruji.”
Leslie – “Just imagine I will be a star, singing in those big bars and making lots of
money…. You will come to visit me there also isn’t it?”
Aarti – “For you, I can come anywhere.”
Leslie – “I want you to be the first person I see after my operation. You know I’m really
scared. The doctor said that I will be unconscious for many hours. What if I don’t wake
…”
Aarti – puts her hand on Leslie’s mouth to stop her from saying more. “Nothing will
happen to you. Come let me bless you.” She puts her hands on Leslie’s head and blesses
her.
Leslie – “Oh my god I have so much to do, I have to resign from my job and pack before
I leave. I must go now. But I will meet you before I go.”
Aarti gets up and watches Leslie as she goes into her own world.
Leslie starts to walk away and suddenly Aarti calls out to her
Aarti – “Leslie…”
Leslie stops and then turns around. Aarti takes out the strip of tablets from inside her bra
and comes and puts them in Leslie’s palm. Before Leslie can ask her anything she says.
Aarti – ‘I don’t need them now.” She then turns and walks away. Leslie looks down at the
tablets in her hand and then leaves.

This exercise in a sense marked the shattering of Aarti’s dreams. Leslie had opened up a
whole new world for Aarti but somewhere it was not for her to keep. She simply did not
have the means to reach for the stars like Leslie. This was her reality and no matter how
badly she wanted, it was not possible to change it.

Aarti’s transformation to a Guru

After Leslie left to have her sex operation, she became a star a Taiwan earning lots of
money. Aarti was left to live her life in India and after many years went on to become a
Guru herself after her own Guru’s death.
In this improvisation we wanted Sanjay to explore the change in status Aarti may have
experienced when this happened.
The improvisation started with Sanjay walking into the room draped wearing a white
shroud. He then sits down and starts to grieve for the Guru who has died. His wails get
louder and louder and he starts to beat his chest in despair. After his cries die down.He
drops the white shroud and then starts to drape a saree. The cloth becomes a symbol of
the new authority he is to assume. After that he sits down in the chair and slowly starts to
put on all the sold jewellery left behind by the Guru which now belongs to him. Little by
little the transformation is complete and he takes on a pose of newly found stature in the
chair.

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The last phase

Day 15, 16, 17 - March 29th –31st March

As we had finished the areas of exploration we were very keen to see what we had
achieved so far in terms of weaving the exercises into a small performance. The actors
also felt that it was time to evolve something and then take a look at it to see if there was
a story to tell.

The first thing we did was to list down all the exercises we had done so far. We then sat
down to try and pick out those exercises that would give us some sort of a rough structure
to begin with it. By the end of the afternoon we had managed to put together a story or at
least we thought we had of Leslie and Aarti.

On the 30th and 31st we worked on the script of ‘My Sister, my friend…’ Several of the
scenes had gone on for a really long time when we improvised them so we had to fix the
dialogues to make them the appropriate length. The actors also needed to learn their lines
because this time they were not going to have the liberty to improvise. This process of
writing out and learning scenes took us two days.

Day 18, 19, 20 - April 1st – April 3rd

Meanwhile we had also started working on the floor on some of the scenes and continued
to do improvisations as we went along wherever we felt the need. For e.g. we needed to
work on the childhood depiction scene to establish that both Aarti and Leslie had realized
at a very young age that they were inclined to a feminine side. To show this we had both
the actors include this aspect in a child like manner within the exercise where they are
playing as children. Felimon had started his scene of cooking using his mother’s make-up
items and his sequence ended with him picking up the lipstick and putting it on in a child
like manner.
When Sanjay had done his child depiction the first time, he had started with dressing up
as a girl so we made him play a game first like Felimon, he then has a fight with his
friends and wanders away after getting angry with them. When alone he reaches into his
pocket and takes out a bottle of nail polish, which he sits down to try and apply for the
first time. Both of these actions of the actors look completely harmless at one level and
say a lot at another.
We also worked out an interesting scene using the mirror exercise for the two actors to
share essential information after their first meeting. This was an area that we had
struggled with even when improvising and the mirror exercise helped as a device to do
away with a lot of the verbal and so ultimately what we have is almost a surreal kind of
scene in which the actors mirror each other and find out how they are similar and yet
different.
Another area that needed our attention was the time it would take the actors to put on
their make-up during the performance. Finally it was decided that only four make up

43
items would be applied on stage during the performance and these moves had to be
practiced to perfection as both actors had to do this sequence in unison.
We also decided to change the names of the two subjects in the performance because our
performance was not at all biographical. Theatrically, we took some liberties to build the
basic structure of the performance so we imagined two characters, Desiree inspired from
Leslie and Vandana inspired from Aarti.
The additions, subtractions, rehearsals, selecting music and recording voiceovers took
another 3 days and we were very excited as we were going to shoot the final product.

Day 21 - April 4th - The shoot

Performance Draft

Scene 1 - Introduction

{Multimedia
Image of Leslie (with name) appears on the screen with the
introduction by Felimon (voice over).}

“Hi, my name is Desiree… 51 years old…Transsexual woman…

living in Philippines…
I was a singer, a celebrity, and a star. Life has never been easy
for me.
I struggled and fought to achieve what I want. But lived my
whole life on my own terms.
My life is a perfect example of “rags to riches” …..and now again
“riches to rags”.

{Cross fades to the Image of Aarti (with name) with the

introduction by Sanjay (voice over).}

“Namste, my name vandana… I’m a Hijra… eunuch… from

India…
I used to sing and dance in the ceremonies at people’s houses
but I was no star, no celebrity.
A hijra is a hijra. For me earning livelihood was never an easy
job. A hijra cannot live life on their own terms.
We have to accept whatever comes our way. No struggle, no
fight, no demands, only acceptance is my life.

{Cross fades to the Images of Leslie and Aarti together (voice

over of both the actors).}

Both: “This is our story.”

{Fade out.}
Scene 2 - Innocence

44
 {Fade in with two spots on stage – both character playing
childhood girl games in their own spaces. During the scene
characters will overlap each other in terms of space.

Girl’s game over laps with desire to be a woman exercise using

objects.

Actors exit and leave their objects behind. As the Light stays on
the objects, voice over of both the characters starts about
leaving their homes.

Aarti’s image appears on the screen.}

I always get pleasure in dance and drama and like to play with
my girl friends.
I like to wear girl clothes. It was different but I enjoyed it.
My father and brother used to scold me, I don’t know why. But
my mother used to enjoy it with other ladies.
One day someone by the name of Guruji came and took me with
her and I had to go with her….

{Cross fades to the image of Leslie}

I knew I was different.

I wanted a different life so I left my village, to fulfil my dreams.
To survive, first I worked as a dishwasher in a restaurant and
then as a cleaner in a beauty parlour.
In the beauty parlour, I was trained as a beautician.
The other gay beauticians encouraged me to dress up like a girl
but…

Scene 3 – First step to being a woman

{Vandana and Desiree enter in their own spaces. Starts dressing

up like a woman (only cloths). Vandana is quite comfortable with
the female costume and enjoying the process of wearing it but
Desiree struggles with the idea of dressing like a woman,
Vandana takes notice of it. She crosses to Desiree’s space.}

First meeting Improvisation.

{After Vandana’s exit, lights stay on Desiree for some time who
starts dressing up by herself.
Fade out.}

45
Scene 4 – So near yet so far

{Desiree and Vandana are sitting in their own spaces and doing
their make up. After finishing their make up, both of them stand
up and walk two steps farword and then face each other as if
they are looking at their own reflection in the mirror.
Vandana raises her hand to her head and Desiree follows her
movements}

Vandana – Hello

Desiree – Hi

{Vandana moves her hand to her breast, Desiree fallows her.}

Desiree – I have no breast.

Vandana – Neither do I… but I feel like a woman.

Desiree – So do i.

{Now both of them together move their hand to their genitals.}

Desiree – But I have a penis!

Vandana – At least you have.

{Vandana takes Desiree’s hand and makes her touch her genital
area. Desiree gets shocked.}

Vandana – I am neither male nor female.

Desiree – What are you then?

Vandana – I am a hijra.

Desiree – Hijra?

Vandana – Hijra is a hijra. A eunuch

Desiree- But you look like a man in a woman’s dress.

Vandana – Just like you.

{Desiree turns to the audience.}

46
 Des – Where did you come from, did I call you?

{Vandana doesn’t say anything just crosses over to Desiree’s

space and takes an exit by leaves her dupatta on stage. Desiree
picks up dupatta and tries to figure out what happened just now.
Fade out.}

Scene 5 – Getting closer

{Desiree’s room. Desiree is sweeping her room, a Carpenters

song is playing in the background and she starts singing by using
the broom as a mike. Vandana enters silently, watches Desiree
singing for some time then she takes out a mike from her purse,
slowly goes up to Desiree and quietly replaces the broom in the
hand of Desiree with the mike. Des continues to sing without
realising and then suddenly she looks at her hand and then turns
to Vandana. Desiree gets very excited to see Vandana and gives
her a big hug.}

Vandana - What are you doing?

Desiree - I’m just practising how to achieve feminine voice.

Vandana – For what?

Desiree – Well, It will be ugly if I dress like a woman and talk like
a man. So I must practice how to speak like a woman. Ok I will
show you.first technique hold your mouth in the right shape, a
slight smile helps. For example Hello Vandana how are you?

Vandana - I m fine desiree,

Desiree - Don’t open you mouth too wide, slight smile.

{Desiree repeats again. Vandana tries to imitate}

Desiree - Oh you’re so male! Ok next technique. Pace your

speech carefully. Start and end sentences slowly and gently.
Women usually start a sentence more softly. “How are you
feeling today?”

{Vandana trying to imitate}

Desiree – You’re so male! Try to be more soft and gentle.

{Vandana tries again}

47
 Desiree – Ok good, good. Next, to gain a louder feminine voice,
develop head resonance rather resonance – open your mouth a
little more, use more air, and ‘push’ it towards the head. For eg.
Do you want to eat now?

Vandana – Yes, I’m hungry.

{Desiree takes notice of the song playing on the radio.}

Desiree – Oh let’s sing this song.

{Desiree starts singing with the mike and gives broom to

Vandana ans ask her to join. Vandana tries to copy her
movements, soon Vandana gets bored, throws the broom and
sits down on the chair.}

Desiree – What happened?

Vandana – It’s too difficult, this is not my way.

Desiree – What is your way then?

Vandana – You want to see my way? Come with me.

Desiree – Where?

Vandana – To India.

Desiree – India?

Vandana – What happened? Don’t be scared.

Desiree – It’s too far

Vandana – Not very far, close your eyes.

{Vandana closes Desiree’s eyes. Fade out}

Scene 6

{Lights fade in - Both enter. Vandana says somethings in Hindi

and orders her other mates to play some Bollywood song.
Vandana starts dancing, after some time pulls Desiree also into
dance, both dance. Desiree gets tired and stops. Vandana asks to
stop to playing the song and then they leave.}

48
 Desiree – Why were you dancing like that?

Vandana- That’s my work. We go to peoples house on birth

functions, marriage functions and dance and bless them and
people give us money.

Desiree – How much did you get from that house?

Vandana – just 11000.

Desiree – Huh, that much, for what? For just one dance?

Vandana – It is very less for our blessings. Our blessings are very
precious. Our god Ram given us this blessing that whosoever we
will bless will be very prosperous. No evil will come near them.

Desiree – Really, then you must bless me also.

Vandana –Will you pay me 11,000?

Desiree – Shut up!

Vandana – (gives her blessings) God will fulfil all your wishes.

{Desiree goes on a side and takes out a mirror from her purse,
gives it to vandana as a gift}

Vandana – Thank you.

{Desiree takes out some tablets from her purse}

Desiree –- Actually I need a glass of water?

Vandana – What is this?

Desiree – Oh these are hormone tablets for my breast

enlargement.

Vandana – What it will do?

Desiree – So I can have big breasts.

Vandana – But you already have.

Desiree – But these are just stuffing, I want real big breasts.

49
Vandana – Is it possible with this.

Desiree – Of course! Why don’t you also try these hormone

tablets?

Vandana – No, no my guruji will not allow this.

Desiree – Guruji?

Vandana – My master.

Desiree – Guruji? Why don’t we give some to Guruji also, she

might like it.

Vandana – will it really work?

Desiree – of course, I asked my doctor. Lot of transsexuals taking

these pills nowadays. Try them to see if it really works.

{Vandana accepts the pills and puts them under her blouse. As
soon as they start to move a police inspector calls vandana. We
will hear police inspector in the voice over. Police officer will
speak in Hindi.}

Voice Over – abbey oye, kahan jaa rahey hoo?

(Vandana looks behind)

Voice Over – haan terray sey hi baat kar raha hoon. Yahan aa.

Desiree – what happened?

Vandana – nothing. Come

{Vandana and des walks towards the voice}

Voice Over – kay chhupa raa hai?

Vandana – kuch nahin hai saab.

Voice Over – kuch na hai? Bahar nikaal,

{Vandana resists}

Vandana – kahay to rahi hoon saab kuch nahin hai.

50
{He slaps van. des got scared. Van takes out the tablets.}

Voice Over – kay hai yoo? Drugs?

Vandana – na baujee , dawai hai.

Voice Over – dawai hai? {slaps} yoo kaun hai? Ye bhi hizra hai?

Vandana – hamari saheli hai, bahar sey aayee hai.

Voice Over – hello madam, who are you? Male female?

Vandana – ladki hai. (he slaps Vandana.)

Voice Over – teray tey baat ki main bahan chood. Chal wahan
khada hoo. Yes madam, male or female? Ok, let me check.

Vandana – kahey to rahey hain ladki,

Voice Over – ladki hai yoo? ladki hai yoo?

{Police inspector checks Desiree and desiree’s clothe comes out

of her breast which she had under her bra, policeman’s
laughter.}

aisa to hamney dekha nahin kabhi, ladki aisee howay hain?

Madam, Do you have passport.

Desiree – yes sir, but I left at home.

Voice Over – salloo, kuch gadbad hai, challo, police station

challo.

Desiree – vandana, what he is saying?

Voice Over – madam you have to come to police station. You

don’t have any passport, and he is a third class prostitute, they
kidnapped kids, cut their dick and make them hizra. Do you
know this?

Desiree – no, no, no sir.

Voice Over – he also brought you here just for prostitution.

Desiree – no actually she was taking me to her house.

51
Voice Over – yes that how they work. He will sell you to
someboby else. Chal bhey. Come madam.

Vandana – hamare guruji se baat kar do.

Voice Over – (slap) karau teri baat abhi.

Desiree – You just go.

Voice Over – Chal {to Vandana}. Come, come madam {to

Desiree}.

{Both of them move to a different area. Lock up.}

Voice Over – madam for some time you have to stay in lock up.

{Silence}

Vandana – oa thandedar saab, ek baar guru jee sey baat to

karwa do hamari. Dhanda karney walley nahin hum.

{No response. Van goes to des. Des fearfully back step and stops
her to come near her.}

Vandana – sit.

Desiree – he said you are a prostitute?

Vandana – you also think.

Desiree – I don’t know.

Vandana – it’s true some of us are prostitute, but not all. You
saw what we do. We only dance and sing and earn our money.
Des: but he said you kidnapped kids and chops their dicks. Is it
true?

Vandana – yes it true, castration is the necessary to come in our

community but we don’t force anyone. We don’t kidnap kids.
People say these things to give us bad names. The family don’t
accept Kids who are not males, not female or who are males but
behaves like females then what can that kid do? He has no place
in society. No body likes him, no body accept him. So what else
he can do? He come to us and become the part of our

52
community. My family also don’t accept me. A child is a child; he
is not a male female or a hizra.

Desiree – than why policeman abused you?

Vandana – they are also part of society. They abuse us; harass
us just to get money.

Desiree – but policeman was saying……

Vandana – you want to believe policeman, not me. you don’t

believe me? you can go!

Desiree – no, I am just scared.

Voice Over – haan bey kuch paisay waisay hain tumharey pass.
Madam do you have some money?

Vandana – paisay to nahin hain.

Voice Over – abbey us tay puuch. Us kay dhooray hongay dollar

wollar.

Vandana – do you have some money?

Desiree – no, I don’t have.

Voice Over – haan bhai kuch hai ya nahin hai?

{Pause}

Vandana – ye ek choori hai.

Voice Over – is tay kuch nahin hooga….paday rahoo….

Vandana – accha achaa,,,,ye ek anguthi aur hai.

{Vandana takes out the ring and bangle.}

Voice Over – theek hai…bahar dey do. Chalo jaooo.

They come out of the prison.

Desiree – I want to go home.

Vandana – yes let’s go home.

53
 Desiree – no I want to go my home.

{Van looks at her, fade out.}

Scene 7 – Loneliness

{Again both characters in their own spaces. Vandana takes out

pills which Desiree gave her. She takes one of the tablets and
sleeps. Vandana has a pleasant dream in which she imagines
that she has become a mother. Desiree hears her when Vandana
is talking to herself in the dream and crosses to Vandana’s
space.}

Desiree – Vandana, Vandana!

{Vandana Snaps out of her dream}

Desiree – Are you alright. Do you need water…

Vandana – No I’m ok, You come

Desiree – Ya I came because I missed you.

Vandana – I also missed you. Are you not angry with me. I
thought you will not come.

Desiree – Of course not. I’m sorry. I was so selfish and ran away.
I was so scared.

{Vandana takes out tablets.}

Desiree – Oh you took it.

Vandana – I just took one.

Desiree – how did it feel.

Vandana – I feel…

Desiree – What…what..

Vandana – I can’t explain.

Desiree – Well actually I just..

Vandana – What

54
Desiree – I just consulted my doctor and I have decided to go for
a final…

Vandana – Come on don’t create suspense.

Desiree – I have decided to go for the sex change. My doctor

said it is now possible.

Vandana – What is that?

Desiree – It’s an operation in which they will replace my penis

with vagina.

Vandana – Is it really possible?

Desiree – Yes. But I’m scared. Doctor has said that I’ll be
unconscious during the operation. What if I will die?

Vandana – No nothing will happen to you. Remember I bless

you. Come let me bless you again. This time I’ll not ask money.

Desiree – Will you be with me?

Vandana – Yes I will be with you.

Desiree – I want to see you first when I wake up.

Vandana – How much this operation will cost.

Desiree – The doctor said around three hundred thousand

Taiwan dollars.

Vandana – How much is that.

Desiree – I don’t know. It’s a huge amount of money.

Vandana – How you will get the money.

Desiree – No I have to pay in instalments for two years. I still

have one year for psychological counselling before operation so
in this time I can work as an entertainer in bars. And then when I
will become a star, singing in big bars, I will earn lot of money. I
will start a new life with my boyfriend.

Vandana – Boyfriend!

55
 Desiree – Yes, actually I didn’t tell about Edison. I love him so
much. I want to do this change so that I can be a complete
woman for him and then we can live together like real husband
and wife.

Vandana – Husband… wife…You are so lucky.

Desiree – You can also do it. I will help you.

Vandana – I earn 2000 Rs in a month that also goes to guruji.

Desiree – In one week I have to go to Taiwan, I’ll be busy; I have

to resign from my job. So I wanted to see you before I go…. But
you can visit me there, right.

Vandana – Yes I can visit you anywhere.

Desiree – Oh I have to go now.

Vandana – Go I’m very happy for you. God bless you.

{They hug each other. Desiree starts to leaves. Vandana calls

desiree.}

Vandana – Desiree.

{Desiree stops. Vandana takes out tablets and gives to Desiree.}

Desiree – What happened?

Vandana – Nothing… I don’t need them.

{Both of them share a look and Desiree leaves. Fade out.}

Scene 9 – Desiree’s final step toward complete womanhood

{Desiree is lying on stage, unconscious. Vandana is looking

towards the screen on which images of a sex change operation
are appearing. Images fade out Vandana turns toward Desiree,
desiree comes into senses, feels her body, fills with emotion and
looks towards Vandana. Vandana extends her hand towards her
and asks her to take care. Vandana exists. Lights fade out on
desiree.}

56
Scene 10 – Living in their own worlds. Vandana becomes the
master herself after the death of her master… Desiree
becomes a famous singer.

{Two spots appear on stage, in one spot Vandana enters (Ritual

of becoming a guru), in other spot Desiree enters and start
singing a carpenter’s song. Both the actions will happen
simultaneously. In the end, fade out.}

Scene 11 – The present… Vandana is a powerful master in her

community… Desiree is in jail, fighting against the charges of
drug trafficking…

{Both of them enter in their own spaces, sits on the chair.

Vandana takes out a letter from an old box, a letter which she
wrote to her mother when she left her home. Vandana reads the
letter.}

Dear Mother,

What should I say I don’t know? Mother I think about you a lot.
Sometimes I just want leave everything and come running back
to you but I don’t know the way home.

When I came here, I really liked it in the beginning, but now I

don’t like it that much. I miss my school, I miss my friends, I miss
father and everything at home. These people don’t allow me to
go out. They make me dance to film songs. It is fun to dance but
not the way I used to dance in school. They also don’t allow me
to act on stage. I really long to sing and dance on stage.

Mother here I am made to sleep on the floor, only our Guruji

(master) is allowed to sleep on the bed. They feed me well but
nothing tastes like the food you cook at home.
The day before yesterday I went for my first dance. The people
loved my performance. They gave me a lot of money, nearly 700
rupees but all of it went to Guruji. On my way back some people
made fun of me and passed rude comments. They said that
hijras (eunuchs) are born to do this kind of work.

Mother why didn’t you bring me into the world as a girl? Is it

really true that hijras are born for this kind of work?

{Desiree’s Take out a letter pad reads out the letter which she
wrote to her boyfriend from the jail.}

57
 Dear Edison,

How are you my dear? I hope you are doing good. I am doing
fine here in the jail, but I feel lonely. I miss you a lot. Do you miss me
too?

Life inside the jail is so hard. I couldn’t believe that this will
happen to me. I have had such a good life then. Who would imagine
that this would happen? Why me? I had such a nice life with you. Ten
years of living with you were my most treasured moments. But what
happened between us now?

It has been more than a year that I am imprisoned inside the

jail. And for these times, you have visited me 3 times only. The last
visit was like 6 months ago. I have bee wanting to see you here more
often. But it seems to me that you are now leaving me. No letter, no
word, no news, no visits from you. You know that you are the only
family that I have. But where are you now?

I am feeling lonely here. When I sleep during evenings, I was

hoping that you are beside me, that I can hug you the way I used to
do. I missed pinching your nose, caressing your ears. Do you still
giggle when someone tickles you? You used to giggle a lot when I tickle
you. You would look so lovely. Papa bear, I miss you a lot. How I wish
that I could be with you again.

By the way, how is our house? Please take care of it. Please visit
me here again. I would love to see you, hug you again.

I will be waiting for your visit. Please find time Papa bear.

I miss you. I love you.

Take care because I care. I have to end now because the guards
are now calling us for our regular headcounts.

Bye.

Lots of love,

Leslie

{Fade out.}

Finally the day had arrived! We had booked a larger space where we were going to shoot
our performance. We did not have enough money to book an auditorium with stage lights
but that didn’t deter us.

58
The actors had learned their lines and were also looking forward to the enactment. They
warmed up and were soon ready to go. It took about four hours to shoot the entire
performance, as we had to stop at times to arrange things for the camera.
When we had finished all of us were a bit emotional, as our journey together had come to
an end. We had really enjoyed bringing Leslie and Aarti together and more than anything
else the thing that remains with each of us is the way they touched our lives.
Ever since the seed for this project had become implanted in my brain I kept asking
myself what was it that I was going to achieve form an exercise of this sort. At that time I
guess I was not really sure myself, the only driving force was a keen desire to get into the
mind spaces of these two kinds of people – The Eunuchs and Transsexuals. I couldn’t
help wondering somehow if the Indian eunuch was an incomplete version of a
transsexual.

I was completely fascinated by both their physical appearances and wanted to uncover
their lives. This I knew would be very exciting to do with actors. The challenge for the
actors would be to try and get inside the body and mind of the character while the
challenge for me was to take it further than that and transform their lives into a work of
art.

It would only be right for me to say that as the project progressed the journey was one of
learning for all of us and continued to be so right up to the very end.

Strengths

A group of strangers came together to exchange important information – We came face to

face with two different cultures which first led to many questions, arguments and then
later to an understanding of one large yet diverse community involving homosexuals.
That information was further enhanced by a process of discovery and exploration in the
creative plane – This was particularly my journey of working with the actors through a
process that I had defined. The actors were open, committed, analytical and most of all
sincere. If they had not been so I would have never been able to study or probe the
different psychological spaces of Leslie and Aarti.

From the process we realized the need to tell their story – Although we were aware from
the start that ANA was not funding a performance, all of us felt that both these characters
have lived lives that need to be shared with others which urged us to work on a
performance based on their lives. We have only managed to come up with a first
performance draft for now, but we plan to take this further which is why we recorded it to
see how it works. I hope that we will be able to continue working on the final structure.

We hope that those who see this work will think about their attitude in relation to how
they deal with such people – The performance seeks to show Leslie and Aarti as the
persons that they are, each with their own hopes, dreams, successes, failures,

59
depravations and achievements like anyone of us and to regard and respect them
irrespective of their sexuality.

Weaknesses

Time frame of the research – As I was not able to find a foreign actor for the project for
almost eight months, I began to run out of time so finally when the actors fell into place I
had to bring down the research period from 45 days to 30 days.

One of the things that dawned on me after having gone through the process was that the
time frame allotted for the research of a subject in these particular groups needs to be
more than a month. Both the actors had to spend a lot of time trying to convince people to
talk to them and get them to be comfortable with the idea of being a subject. By the time
they had managed to find a subject the time left to actually get to know them was not
much and maybe that was a hurdle sometimes when the actors did some of the exercises.
I would have liked Felimon to have been able to follow someone around but in the short
time that he had he was only able to zero in on Leslie who happens to be a prisoner
thereby making it impossible for him to have that kind of access. There were others he
had tried to convince but most of them were very suspicious and flatly refused to be
questioned. Things may have been a bit more intrinsic maybe if they had had more time.

Another problem which I had not envisioned before was the one that Sanjay faced with
the eunuchs in India. They are not very free and open with men but find it easier to trust
women and even enjoy talking to them. I realized later that it may have helped Sanjay to
have had a female companion with him during the research period. He did not really
think so but I know, especially because of some encounters I had with a eunuch in
Mumbai who we used to meet every morning at a traffic signal on our way to the
workshop. She would respond to anything I asked her but was a bit wary when the men
spoke to her. This resulted in a very obvious use of imagination in many of Sanjay’s
exercises whereas Leslie had been very open and honest with Felimon even though he
also had limited sessions with her and so he did not struggle much in terms of
internalizing the character. One really couldn’t help feeling a bit frustrated sometimes
about not being able to really get inside those dark recesses that lay beneath Aarti’s
composed external self.

Sanjay’s subject also never allowed him to shoot her in proper light as she resists the
thought of her life going public, however she allowed him to click her pictures. Felimon
was luckier that Leslie did not mind but he had to be very careful when he was shooting
on the sneak in jail.

Evaluation

60
The first thing that I would like to say is that I am truly grateful to ANA for giving me
the opportunity of working on the project My Sister, my Friend….simply as this is my
first attempt to do something of this sort. My training at the National School of Drama
gave me a chance to see some very innovative work in the field of performing arts and it
is from there that I have been inspired to try and make my own journey and contribute in
my own capacity but this sort of work is very difficult to do without the means and
thankfully ANA has a vision which allows people like me to make my creative dreams a
reality.

The project on one hand has been very successful in the area of creative exploration. My
Sister, my friend…was a title that I had chosen because I had the gut feeling that
somehow the transsexual and the eunuch share an innate bond. The actors had managed
to achieve this in the creative space in which Leslie and Aarti met. On the other hand the
process also made us ask and then seek answers to several questions in the pursuit of our
attempt to unveil these marginalized communities. We were especially saddened by the
fact that Aarti’s story at the end remained one of depravation. That is what is truly sad the
fact that through an artistic journey we were able to give her many happy moments but in
actuality the eunuchs in India are not able to lead a happy life and one cannot only blame
it on their economic background. We are all to blame for their unhappiness, their pain,
and their unaccomplished desires. Maybe if we found the courage to accept them for who
they are they might have a chance to live a life like everyone else and go a long way like
Leslie. It takes a mirror image sometimes to see the truth and Leslie helped us to see
people like Aarti in a clearer light.

61