Aditi was taking a shower when something that had happened that morning came to her mind. Dropping her daughter off at school and seeing her smiling face as she waved goodbye to her had filled her with joy. So much joy that, from nowhere, a tune had emerged, a tune she didn’t recognise as part of her regular repertoire.
It was a song Aditi had last sung in an audition five years ago. As she dried herself off with her bath towel, she remembered the day she had travelled to Mumbai on a whim after seeing an advertisement in the local newspaper for a singing competition.
She had borrowed money from a couple of friends. She didn’t have any trendy clothes, so she had stolen her elder brother’s sunglasses and his long-sleeved denim shirt to wear over her outfit for the audition. Her brother was out of town, and she had told her mother she was going to the movies with a classmate.
She smiled as she looked in the mirror and the past and remembered all her lies. Looking back at her mischief, everything had seemed harmless. But she knew she had been lucky. Going to the big city without anyone to travel with her; let alone help her find the production house and arrive on time, had been a crazy idea.
She had been known as the “Nightingale of her school.” Wearing the image of that crown proudly in her head, Aditi had gathered all the courage she possessed and gone for that audition. She had reached the compound of the TV channel, Excelsior. She saw the long line that had already formed, stretching around the building to the entrance. She asked for help and was directed to the end of the line. Just reaching this audition had cost her a lot of time & energy.
Now as she tidied up the mess of the morning’s chaos in the kitchen, the aftermath of breakfast and her husband’s and daughter’s rush to office and school, she remembered the time when she was about to enter the main building for her audition. She had freshened up using a handkerchief and some water from the bottle in her bag. She was sure she looked presentable.
But when she reached the counter to go in, the person in charge sitting at a desk asked her to fill out a participation form. When she bent down to write her details, the person said rudely, “Haven’t you had a bath?”. How was she to know that Aditi had travelled for more than four hours in the heat and had nowhere to take another shower?. Highly embarrassed and with a feeling of dread she handed in her form. Aditi felt in her gut that the person in charge wasn’t going to allow her in.
The participants were now waiting in an air-conditioned room, but many people who looked clean and less tired were being called in for auditions. Aditi knew she'd be rejected in that room along with many others without even being given a chance to sing.
She started crying as she was asked to leave. Then, to her own surprise, a tune rose from inside her, the exact tune she had found herself singing in the bathroom that morning. Her melodious voice rose above the sound of the air conditioner and the murmur of other voices. As she walked out singing, one of the judges of the show happened to pass her. Aditi suddenly found herself being asked to follow the official. Soon a small production team was organised. They helped her freshen up, did her makeup and hair, and within the next hour she was auditioning for the show in front of the famous judges.
This morning as she cleaned her kitchen, Aditi remembered that moment. She glanced at the award on the shelf across the room that she had received for winning that competition after going through that audition and several others.Though she wasn’t the huge megastar she had once dreamed of becoming, thanks to that leap of faith and courage, she was living a comfortable life in the city, with a decent income, and the troubles of poverty & village life were far behind her.
#judgements #jobsearch #auditions #beingjudged #poverty #fame #audition
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