Dark skin is a curse in Indian society.
But tonight, the crowds attending Dheli Fashion week were put under the spell, and it was sexiest curse this country has seen.
Laimi, a twiggy, midnight-toned model from Namibia just made her second run on the catwalk as the first black woman to crunch the fashion carpet in a major fashion week in India.
And get this: her effortless pump down the runway was only outbeat by another black model, Millen, a Tanzanian Goddess. Watch them warm up for a set organized by the rock-n-roll Namibian Jan. When Laimi pulls out the smile -- you can see why she's put up front.
Laimi was prepping for a set designed by Tarun Tahiliani when we met. Confident about her first-ever status, Laimi talked about her hope for African girls. She wants to show them they can only assess their success once they've tried succeeding. For this, Laimi said she wants to be Africa's top model. And who can blame her. Her black-crystal stare could freeze a lot of competition. And it has.
Sitting with her, I felt the chill. Her beauty was so divinely composed, an adrogenous mirage.
But also, what really frosted our encounter was the feeling that I was looking in the mirror.
Like Liami -- I am a Black-to-India first.
I am the first black American journalist to work for the largest business paper in Asia.
And too often, it's easy to feel like I'm the only black woman in Delhi.
When Indians see me, they just don't stare. They imprint a tattoo of their curiosity on my body. The everyday Indian knows that Africans live in Delhi, but they don't work or communicate with these Africans.
Walking around Delhi, I feel like a visual-wiki for Indians, where they gain a quick glance at what black people are all about. So accordingly, I walk tall, erect, and hard.
Maybe that explains why Laimi and the South African model Millen performed so radiantly-- I mean so drastically better than the other models, that the catwalk looked more like a walk-off between Tyra Banks and her newbie understudies on America's Next Top Model.
Fittingly, the designer Tahiliani chose Liami and Millen to execute an exercise in futurism. India can't survive on the world market clinging to its most damning social signage: NO DARK PEOPLE ALLOWED.
Tahiliani is a balding, middle-aged designer but his perspective on color is neither balding or middle-aged.
Tahiliani said the privilege of lightness --and Indians' skin-whitening fetish --is all wrong.
What's fascinating about the fashion world is that it understands that to make a political point, you just can't trump the right notes.
You got to show bodies in action.
The challenge of India -- and this is across industries -- is how it'll embody, not just talk up, its claim to modernity and its call for equality.
This fashion week is the slickest progress I've seen since I got here.
Front-staging black models in bright, contrasting colors is not only daring, it could have been a career disaster here in India. The risk is a rare, but righteous one.
Yet and still, I am a tad skeptical.
A big part of me is tired of black bodies forming parts of political speech. I'm tired of us being used as symbols of this and that. As representations rather than representatives.
The talk I had with Liami was telling. So engrossed by her presence here, I doted on her symbolic value, the frame of her purpose here, and not the textures of her canvas.
When really, by the end, all I wanted to ask was...so, how do you like India?
****** PART 11 ****** For readers like Brittanie who are obsessed with Fashion *****
Delhi Fashion Week is a rebel splinter faction of India's Fashion Week, the 11-year-old event that features name-drop-able designers, but overall, fashion that hard appeals to India's sari sensibilities.
A sari is a traditional wrap around dress worn by women and of course, cross-dressers. I met one on the side of the road and he begged me for money.
Saris are utilitious outer-wear, but after seeing nearly every woman outside the office wear one, the sari wears thin on uniqueness and thick on India's obsession with tradition.
I haven't figured why --in their words-- a bunch of designers decided to form a separate coalition.
I'm working on this story.
--
COME BACK for VIDEO!!
Annnnd, for my extended talk on saris.
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1 comment:
i am not inviting any african to india, if they are so uncomfortable, why do they come at all here in india. they should stay in their miserable ghetto in the name of a country, they only come here to scam, to do drug trade, and indulge in illegal activities.
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