Ma and my Aunt (Soni Yaoye). They were best friends and they still are! :)
I particularly love these pictures...the playfulness and the letting go!
My aunts (Mother's sisters) and Ma.
Playing Dress Up
The first game a girl truly enjoys playing and indulges
herself in it as a woman is playing dress up. No matter whatage oridentity or
stature you have , fantasizing about what you aspire and trying to imbibe the
same in your physical appearance, even for a little moment, gives you the kind
of joy which is incomparable to any other.
The same feverish excitement was shared by my mom and her
play mates, who were mostly her own sisters and cousins. They dressed up not
for any function or occasion, but they dressed up so that they can fantasize
and let their imagination run, and they dressed up for the sake of dressing up
and letting go.
What i love about the pictures are the amalgamation of the
so evident Chinese roots through her looks and the typical Indian-ness of the
50’s and the 60’s through her clothes. This is the aesthetics ihave personally
followed since i have started to understand individual style.
I do somehow feel this is the true representation of our
identities as Chinese born and brought up in India through clothes. It’s
fascinating how the land you are born in can stay with you for life.
My Grandmom who never wore a salwar kurta or a saree all her
life (she was born in China), never stopped her children from wearing what
their heart desired. Keeping in mind the conservative surrounding the girls
were not allowed to wear revealing clothes such as short skirts and tube tops
but they were given the freedom inside the house where they could play dress up
and get clicked by my grandfather. It was my
grandmother’s way of not restricting her children’s imagination and still
keeping them safe from the society around. As i has mentioned earlier, it was
like living the best you can in the given circumstances without letting go of
the dreams and aspirations.
