The South Asian Student Association’s annual cultural show two weeks ago elicited positive and emotional reactions, tackling the issue of sexuality within the context of South Asian identity, tradition and culture. The show’s large center was a play called Shaadi (meaning marriage), which concerned the reluctance of its main character, Asha (Pooja Rangan) in the face of her impending arranged marriage to Rahul (Gautam Gotterkeri), an Indian from America whom she has never met. She expresses these indecisions and fears to her friend Sapna (Alexa Punnamkuzhyil) in the first scene, in which she explains her feelings of duty and love toward her parents (Ishaan Pohoomul and Manasi Bhate) as reasons for her desire to carry on with the marriage despite her anxieties. However, as the play goes on, and the audience is introduced to Rahul’s parents, the overbearing mother (Kamala Puligandla) and the greedy stockbrocker father (Ali Najmi), Asha only becomes more anxious and inexplicably disturbed. She acknowledges that Rahul is a very nice boy, and yet there is something deeper going on than anxiety about an arranged marriage.

On the surface, the play mirrors the basic plot of such Indian arranged-marriage movies as Monsoon Wedding. In fact, clips from that movie and others were played at intervals throughout the play. The twist, however, comes toward the end of the play, when Asha realizes the truth: she is in love with her friend Sapna. At this point in the play, the action is broken up by a series of monologues taken from various sources. Several are news reports concerning such topics as the controversy surrounding the movie Fire (a film about two lesbians living in India), gay marriages in India, and the banning of homosexuality. The text of another monologue was taken from a woman’s suicide note to her father, and was particularly powerful and effective. Two other monologues included a queer Muslim and a graphic spoken word performance, which used the image of Lavinia, a character from the Shakespeare drama Titus Andronicus, as a metaphor for the sexual violence that occurs in India.

The play was also broken up by various music and dance performances, providing a break from the heavy topics of the action in the play. These included a rap performance about poverty in India by Anwarul Uddin, a beautiful Bharatnatyam performance by Anya Desai, a variation on the Sufi song tradition of Qawwali, among others. There was also some comic relief in the form of Rahul’s friend Gary (Adam Vogel), who is supposed to be a caricature of the “typical” American tourist and continually makes ignorant (yet hilarious) comments throughout the play. Additionally, there was a funny interlude during which a “professor” (Nayeem Mahbub) appears to explain the correct use of the word “chai.” These interludes were not only used appropriately but also were a welcome breath of fresh air in the face of the dramatic scenes at the end of the play and the emotional monologues.

In the end, Asha’s parents, though admittedly confused about her decision, decide to support her, an ending that, while audience members such as third-year Ashley Suarez found a bit unrealistic, was also, “an example to work from. It was important that her parents stood by her. I think it’s something that parents in general, not just APA or southeast Asian parents, need to think about even if it makes them uncomfortable.”

Second-year Kimberly Meinert added, “I thought the play touched on some good issues dealing with Asians and Asian Americans in general that need to be discussed.”

Akshat Singhal, a first-year who participated in the Qawwali sequence, echoed such sentiments. “The play was significant because [the topic] was something that in South Asia you’d never think about because sex is so taboo, and therefore sexuality is under wraps. You don’t talk about those topics.”