Driving force to pursue my part time dance career is my definitely my husband. It is his support finally, which give me that bit of time to take it slowly forward. I learned a lot during past years, about how to take time and to put myself into opportunities and challenges if priority changes.
I have had a phase around 2012/2013, where I thought to quit dance, because I was not sure if I would ever become or name myself a Kathak dancer. Why should I struggle? I never had that opportunity to take some time off to study dance or at some point not brave enough either, to leave the comfort zone. There were some key experiences of demotivation as well, but overall I was also finding myself in a situation, to establish myself at work, setting priorities and arrange and find time.
I was wondering, how I should put the effort of making Kathak popular in Switzerland (Basel area) and Germany (Cologne/Bonn). It is not only just about learning, practicing, getting to a level where you might consider start teaching Kathak to beginners. You need to find them, those aspirants and dance lovers, who want to try something new in the first place, which is really a difficult task. I don’t belong to any associations. So without that support, budget and back up, you struggle. My dreams started to pain me so much, that I stopped dancing for a while.
My husband asked me to continue dancing, because I seem different and unhappy while I stopped. I have been engaged in a lot other things of course, but still something essential was missing. He is a bass guitar player in a band, so he does understand, how it is like, if you suddenly stop carry on your passion.
2015, our first baby was born. I was limiting my dance sessions at that time but managed to participate in a Kathak choreography workshop, end of 7th month pregnancy. But then, you concentrate on your new role of becoming and being a first time mother, which I considered as one of the greatest gift in my life.
My baby turned 2016 winter 1,5 years, and my husband encouraged me to go to Kolkata to restart my dream of becoming a Kathak dancer again. There he was, giving me a birthday gift, a beautiful notebook to write down the bols and the novel “Kolkata” by Shumona Sinha. He convinced me to visit my Guru, and come back renergerized. And while I am in Kolkata, he convinced me our daughter will be in best hands, in his hands. WelI, it didn’t take me 2 days, to book a ticket and that was the best decision I took!