Theater Review: 9 Parts of Desire

Baraka — Fri, 3 Mar 2006 08:54:28 EST

A group of us - four young, urban Muslim intellectuals (YUMIs) - went to see 9 Parts of Desire at the Berkeley Repertory Theater on Tuesday. The play takes its name from a saying attributed to Hadhrat Ali about sexual attraction - namely, that of its 10 parts, God gave nine to women. The desires dramatized in the play, however, range far beyond the merely sexual to desires for love, home, safety, autonomy, and representation.

Written by Heather Raffo and based on her observations of, and interviews with, women in Baghdad, this series of dramatic monologues (performed here by Iranian-American actor Mozhan Marn�) depicts women who are Muslim, Christian, urban and Bedouin with views and experiences that shake us out of the mind-numbing drone of a war played out round-the-clock on CNN or Faux News, to the beat of drinks clinking in bars or feet running on treadmills at the gym.

Ranging from adolescent Samura who puts her fine ear to use by memorizing Justin Timberlake songs or recognizing every passing armament, to the elderly expatriate Hooda who fled Iraq in the 50s and declares in her Scotch-y voice that young women's return to the veil proves that "their grandmothers were more liberated", to the British-trained doctor who is overwhelmed by the blossoming of unheard of cancers and birth defects in a land riddled with depleted uranium-tipped weapons, most characters are complexly drawn.

When the play fails it is because of less well-defined characters who seem to be there to fill out the "9 Parts" rather than for their insights, when Marn�'s attempts at an Iraqi accent become distracting, and when the play insists on a jarring climax instead of letting the stories speak quietly, but resoundingly, for themselves.

Although the doctor and young Samura are the most poignant characters, the actor's most animated portrayals are the secular and Westernized Hooda and the artist Layal who paints nudes and women transformed into trees as a statement on the rapes and ravages women faced under Saddam and afterwards. In a moving example, the college student covered in honey and then eaten by Uday's Dobermans as punishment for revealing that he raped and beat her is painted as a flowering branch that hovers out of reach above the snarling animals, for "dogs will never learn to climb."

None of the characters has a deeply religious sensibility, which is striking in its absence but also seems plausible in a society ruled first by decades of secular totalitarianism and terror only to be then 'liberated' by war, bombings/embargo, and more war from Bush I, to Clinton, to Bush II. It is perhaps only in few hearts that faith can live in spite of such prolonged tragedy.

The play raises important questions about liberation - from the freedom to choose whom to love, to how to live, to that of selecting one's government. There are no easy answers. The Iraq of Saddam is presented as one of terror and the best academic and medical institutions in the Middle East. The current regime provides an opportunity for voices to be heard through votes and presents a severe lack of security in daily life. Neither is ideal, and for the average person life remains a great struggle.

Raffo and Marn� both succeed in putting human faces to the suffering in a way that the endless news coverage has failed to do. Afterwards, we are left with a sense of profound disconnect. We are a nation at war fought in an unprecedented way - one that has little effect on our daily lives and routine while devastating the lives of people elsewhere, conveniently far away. But at some point, the play implies, we will feel the effects, when the bills of today come due, whether in our lifetimes or that of our grandchildren, whether in this life or the next.

I left the theater feeling like I had blood on my hands.

The work on human rights, the petitions, votes, marches, keeping informed on the latest news, and the sending of money that we engage in as a way of assuaging guilt and supporting what we think is right simply doesn't feel like enough after seeing the play. The complex suffering under the horrors of Saddam's regime and the American occupation are evocatively and provocatively portrayed and whether one is a supporter of the war or not, one comes away shaken out of complacency - for one evening at least.

9 Parts of Desire silenced the audience in its intensity. The Berkeley production closes on March 5th but eight others are about to open - see it when it comes around to your town.

Crossposted on Rickshaw Diaries.

Delicious Desi Aunties

Baraka — Sat, 28 Jan 2006 02:02:23 EST

I will never have a washboard-flat stomach no matter how many sit-ups I do. And these hips are here to stay. I can't help it, I'm Punjabi.

I recently saw a photo of Demi Moore at 43 and a TV advert for some torturous exercise contraption featuring a 50-year old woman (or "grandmother" as they kept calling her). They both had skinny, rock-hard bodies and ageless faces as they strutted in their scanties. It made me droop with exhaustion thinking of the standards they represented as normal for the average woman and desirable to the average man. When is it going to be okay for a girl to become a woman who fills out and ages anyway?

Remember film legends Sridevi & Babra Sharif who enticed us to follow them over the green hills of Bollywood and Lollywood screens? They wore clothes that enhanced and hugged their womanly figures and millions adored their voluptuous beauty.

It used to be that South Asian girls had busts and hips, and, in fact, lived in the hopes of developing them. They filled out a sari or shalvar kameez properly. They saw Moghul miniatures, temple carvings, homegrown actresses and models, and heck, the Aunties all around them and knew that a buxom beauty lay within their reach. Nay, it was their genetic destiny.

But that was before the Murdochization of South Asia and the accompanying pre-adolescent body ideal invasion.

Although certainly not as bad as the Kate Moss rage in the West, desi women from the silver screen on down are feeling the pinch as they try to squeeze themselves into smaller and smaller sizes. Bony socialites and models are in, tall slim beauty queens compete for international titles (the only difference between them being skin color and even then none are too dark), actresses retire just so that they can finally eat, and everyone is perpetually on a diet or exercise machine - most often simultaneously. And to have a bust now is simply passé.

It wasn't so long ago that a little extra weight delighted everyone and was termed "healthy." Oh, Pinkie? Yes, I saw her yesterday. She's become so healthy, na! Give me the old days when a woman dug into her parathas with relish. When Lollywood Punjabi film heroine Anjuman frolicked like a baby elephant around mustachioed, bloodshot-eyed, & equally-large Sultan Rahi. When a girl relaxed into fertile belly posture immediately after marriage out of sheer relief to have got all that over with.

Remember delicious desi aunties? The ones that elbowed you out of the way as they attacked wedding buffet tables with zeal? You can see them on the video afterwards, setting their plates on their stomachs (which double as tables) & throwing gnawed bones over their shoulders with abandon and little concern for the cameras. They revel in maintaining their deliciousness and have the deep satisfaction of offering that much more of themselves to the world to love.

Delicious desi aunties still exist everywhere in spite of skinny desi "blondes." And I'll tell you a little secret: they exist inside of you. You can huff and puff on those machines and deny yourself the dosa but somewhere along the way you too will embrace and celebrate your genetic destiny - just like Sridevi and Babra did.

Now, pass me that chicken tikka - and hold the salad!

-Baraka

Desicritics Author: Baraka

Theater Review: 9 Parts of Desire

Delicious Desi Aunties