From India to Spain

Since about a month ago Isma and I went to see an exhibit with Indian art, it seems fitting that a couple of weekends ago, when we went to the theater in downtown Madrid, we saw "Bollywoodland," a musical drama that was like a Bollywood movie place onto a stage. It was an interesting blend of English, Hindi, and Spanish languages and Spanish and Indian culture. The Indian actors spoke in English, the songs were sung in Hindi, and the narrator spoke in Spanish.

Upon entering the theater, we were greeted by two Indian men in traditional dress, each with a small bowl resting gently in his hand. As one of the men greeted me with, "Namasté," he dipped his thumb in the bowl and marked my forehead with red paint. I said "Namasté" in return, and entered the theater, mouth agape at the thought that just moments before, a man had left his large red thumbprint on my face. Inside the theater proper, soon after finding our seats, the orchestra took their places in the pit, the Indian singers to the left side of the stage and the narrator to the right. The lights dimmed. The play began. As in these types of dramas, a boy and girl fall in love under impossible circumstances, find each other, lose each other, are forbidden to see each other, believe that the other no longer loves him or her, and then at the end get married and dance and sing with the rest of the cast. Beautiful, a little unbelievable, and fun.

Unlike the majority of the people in the theater, we decided to not wash the red stains from our foreheads before leaving India and heading out onto the Spanish street. The looks people gave us! What fun imagining what the others were thinking, for one day to not blend into the multitude in Madrid.