Dancing, drinking and daring in Delhi

Unfortunately, the Delhi Daredevils are now not going to win the IPL, after losing our last match against Chennai Super Kings. We will play until the 20th of May so that other teams can be knocked out but we will not be making it to the playoffs, which is SUCH a shame. When the team is on form, they play REALLY well. The last match they won, they had a record breaking score. DD has some of the most expensive players in the league but it wasn’t translating to wins. I’m pretty dissappointed as I SO wanted to go back to Mumbai and play in the mind blowing Wankhede Stadium again, where the final will be held. However I will be playing two extra matches now, with the Rajasthan Royals team, as they are down one girl. I’m happy to do more matches but it will be so strange to cheer for another team! Delhi are my boys!! Anyway we’ll have more time for adventures now since our last match will be the 20th still.

Speaking of, we just finshed our first month of living and working in India! As always, when on contract, I feel like I’ve been here forever, these girls are my family and were totally separated from the rest of the world, in our little bubble. So here’s whats gone down in the last two weeks.

First off, we celebrated our lovely Frankies 22nd (!) birthday at home in Delhi. Fun fact, me and Frankie both worked on the On Paper showcase in London right before coming here. She choreographed an incredible piece to This Is Me from The Greatest Showman that had us all in floods of tears when we first saw it in the dress run. We didn’t cop this connection until maybe a week after we got here though. See how small the world is when youre a dancer?! So we woke her up with balloons and presents and a maybe a birthday lap dance (ahem) and we headed off for a chilled out day at the pool. Now Delhi is not a pool friendly place. There is no public swimming pool thats free to use. We had to call a million hotels and beg and plead and use the name of the IPL in vain. But we found one that (grudgingly) let us come hang out for the day. Even though there was a strong undercurrent of dissapproval from the staff (how dare they lie there peacefully without bothering anyone?!) we had a fabulously relaxing afternoon in the sun which meant we were well rested for celebrating that night. Theres an amazing bar on the corner of our block called What A Comic Show and it looks like Sheldon Coopers idea of heaven. It’s all decorated in superhero art and merch. Even the drinks have comic charachters names. It’s super funky, the cocktails are cheap and strong and the food is delish. So we ate, drank and got very merry, then went back to ours for a few more not so sensible beverages and pretended that we didnt have a 6 am flight to catch. Ugh hungover flying is no joke.

We staggered into taxis after three hours of sleep and flew to Bangalore where we had a match against Bangalore Royal Challengers. Now imagine our reactions when 9 hungover and hangry dancers rocked up to our hotel to discover there was no booking for us?! It wasnt pretty. We got a curry stuffed into us and were schleped to another hotel where I passed out for an hour before waking up late for our taxi to the stadium. I wasn’t  looking like an ambassaor for anything excpet maybe a methadone clinic. It was just one of those days man. The lads lost the match and we realized we wouldn’t have time to go back to the hotel when it finished at midnight. So you know what we had to do. Go straight to the airport and sleep on the floor til check in opened. Then sleep in departures. Then almost leave without one of the girls because she slept so deeply and we couldnt find her and she was minutes from missing the flight. A total mess of a trip.

Safe to say we were more then happy to keep our feet on solid ground for a while. Thank God we had our first two home games back to back! We played against Kings Punjab who had already beaten us at our first match and who my friend Sophie cheers for. We wanted a win at home so much but it wasn’t to be. The supporters in Delhi stadium were much more subdued then other crowds we’d performed for. I wasn’t sure if that was just Delhi or if it was because we were languishing at the bottom of the leader board. But holy shit, did that all change during our second game at home, against Kolkata Knight Riders. First of all, we totally hammered them, cricket wise so everyone was super hyped and excited including us. But the fans? They went crazy. There’s wire mesh fence separating us from the crowd but by the last few overs, people were pressed up against it, recording us, taking photos and screaming for us as we danced. There was security there but they werent doing a thing about it, I’m sure it wasnt safe. I’ve never felt more like a zoo animal in my life. Dont get me wrong, part of me loves the attenion and feeling like Princess Diana, waving at kids and so on. But sometimes it can be overwhelming. Sometimes I feel like we’re glorified sex objects. They put us in these tiny white dresses that Indian women would never wear and dangle us in front of the specators to whip them into frenzies like this. My brain is having a hard time rationializing it all. I really had no idea how much of a big deal this job is but cricket and the IPL means so much to people here and is such a huge part of their culture. But so is sexism.

There’s been a little bit of drama in our house (on a contract abroad?! What a shock!). I won’t get into it but it resulted in our boss flying up from Mumbai and us getting new management which has worked out for the best. But we also lost two of our girls, who went home for their own personal reasons and who were both very sick while they were here. So that sucked. But while the boss lady was here, she and our landlord took us out to party Delhi style. We went for pre drinks at our landlords beautiful home, complete with staff, where we were fed pizza, sushi and Chinese food and met a ton of his equally rich and fancy mates. I’ll say this about the class division in India… the rich are feckin RICH! We all bundled off to the launch of a new bar in the Shangri-la Hotel (notions!) where there was an open bar and everything was gold and Gatsby-esque. The place aslo happened to be a fishing spot for Eastern European sex workers so I was warned to be extra careful who I spoke to. We went on to the club next door afterwards and it was VIP access with enough free booze to poison an army. I had jager and champagne poured directly into my mouth and vodka into my eyes, although that was an accident. It was a seriously savage night, we just had SO much fun together but its definitely a weird experience going out with such wealthy people and doing the whole VIP thing. Again, it kind of felt like we were exotic pets, brought out and put on show in order to make other people look good. It’s a dynamic Im not entirely comfortable with.

Myself and two of the other girls, Kat and Dayna, had been asked to Pondicherry, way down the south of India, to work at a corporate gig there for our company. We flew to Chennai two days later, then drove 3 hours to get to the event. We were entertainment for the end of a big tech conference in this hotel and we choreographed five different routines for it. Everything was fine except the audience was pretty much only men. Very drunk men I might add. It was such an unpleasant atmosphere because although our costumes were modest by western standards, they all behaved like they had never seen a collar bone in their lives. I’ve never been in a situation where I felt so objectified in my life. Not even dancing on the bar in Coyotes to lads on stag dos. It was horrible really. A bunch of them also figured out what room we were staying in at the hotel and kept coming to our door and trying to open it with their keys. Nightmare material. They fecked off eventually and me and the gals grabbed two hours sleep before getting up at 3 am for our 7 hour trip back to Delhi. Not keen to repeat that particular job.

Then yesterday, it was our Daynas 22nd birthday. I’m surrounded by youths! We doted on her with cake and prezzies to beat the band, then went out to this unreal Italian restaurant in our square which is co owned by our landlord. Apparently it’s one of the best in all of India, with a price tag to match. But it was so worth it. My chips were cooked in truffle oil and I finally got to eat red meat again after a month! I had pork in my lasagna and I don’t know when I last savoured food like that. It felt like my own bloody birthday!

Then to get back to the cricket, we played Chennai Super Kings in Pune a few days ago, where they beat us by a tiny margin. Raging, but the blow was softened by the incredible hotel we were staying in. Pool, ridiculous buffet breakfast and lunch and my own room all to myself… Yeah we liked Pune! And I’ve just come in the door from our latest match in Kotla Stadium in Delhi. We beat Rajasthan Royals by 5 runs, even though we had to put the game on hold twice for this unholy thunder storm that dropped an ocean on us.

So another action packed few weeks. Planning a ttrip to the one and only Taj Mahal soon, our last away match in Hyderabad and plenty more besides. Stay tuned!