Ep 57: ‘Nautch Boy’ Manish Gaekwad: On growing up in a ‘kotha’

https://is1-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Podcasts221/v4/62/47/f9/6247f98d-57f2-2fd1-f9b7-5a65b532012d/mza_3650865082833422172.jpg/600x600bb.jpg

Swishing Mindsets with Anuradha Varma

Anuradha Varma

60 episodes

4 days ago

Listen in to conversations that "swish" or shift your perspective! Journalist and Mindset Coach Anuradha Varma interviews a diverse cast of people who share their expertise and experiences on a range of themes, across spirituality, inclusivity, entrepreneurship, mythology, and popular culture. Follow and share to stay updated and grow the conversation.

Anuradha is a journalist with nearly three decades of experience, having worked as head of Parenting for Indian Express Online, editor of interiors magazine Casaviva, as well as with publications such as The Times of India, The Pioneer, etc. She is also a certified Mindset Coach with expertise in Mindfulness, EFT and NLP.

Follow her on LinkedIn | Twitter | Instagram
Email: swishingmindsets@gmail.com

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed are personal. Listener discretion is advised.

Self-Improvement

Education,

Religion & Spirituality,

All content for Swishing Mindsets with Anuradha Varma is the property of Anuradha Varma and is served directly from their servers with no modification, redirects, or rehosting. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by Podjoint in any way.

Self-Improvement

Education,

Religion & Spirituality,

Spirituality,

Health & Fitness,

Mental Health

https://d3wo5wojvuv7l.cloudfront.net/t_rss_itunes_square_1400/images.spreaker.com/original/e6cff78c0f55940064decf2829f91fab.jpg

Ep 57: ‘Nautch Boy’ Manish Gaekwad: On growing up in a ‘kotha’

Swishing Mindsets with Anuradha Varma

1 hour 10 minutes

2 months ago

Ep 57: ‘Nautch Boy’ Manish Gaekwad: On growing up in a ‘kotha’

Life outside the kotha is really quite drab, remarks Manish Gaekwad, son of Rekha bai, the subject of his book “The Last Courtesan: Writing My Mother's Memoir”. Here, he chats about its sequel “Nautch Boy: A Memoir of My Life in the Kothas”, giving flashes of a life that sounds straight out of a Bollywood potboiler.

The radio, according to the journalist-author-scriptwriter, never stopped playing at the kotha, with strains of Lata Mangeshkar and Mohammad Rafi songs filling the air. As a child, he recalls learning to move his hips like his legendary mother, with the other tawaifs cheering him on. He was also named Monty after Rishi Kapoor’s character in “Karz”, where his mother saw the name lit up in disco lights as an extra on the film sets in Mumbai.

He describes life at an elite boarding school, while spending vacations at Kolkata's infamous Bandook Gully, and living part-time with relatives in the slums, feeling like an outsider everywhere but in the kotha. He also talks about his “illegitimate” father, how he got his surname, and not coming out as queer to his mother in her lifetime.

Listen in!

Timestamps:
02:00 Dispelling myths about “kothas” and how they’re not brothels
05:16 His mother Rekha bai’s signature acrobatic dance move
11:44 How moving was dancing for him; music was in his blood
15:50 The radio never stopped playing in the kotha
18:00 Tawaifs don’t teach their children to be a girl or a boy
21:10 His mother didn’t know how to raise a boy
25:20 The Bandook Gully connection; living in the slums
31:37 How he got the name “Gaekwad”; when his mother and his father’s wife crossed paths
38:00 How he introduces himself to people; his “illegitimate” father
43:30 Mothering his mother through her illness; his relationship with his mother
46:55 On not coming out as queer to his mother
49:10 On being surrounded by sex in his adolescent years, “like a warm embrace”
53:30 On leading a solitary life, how it has shaped him
01:00:00 Being named Monty after Rishi Kapoor in the movie “Karz”
01:03:00 Growing up away from Mumbai’s glamour
01:07:23 Life as an author

Follow Anuradha on LinkedIn | Twitter | Instagram
Email: swishingmindsets@gmail.com

Disclaimer: Views and opinions expressed are personal. Listener discretion is advised.