Alumni continue to connect with their Indian dancing traditions

With long sessions of studying and frequent dance practices sometimes going up to 11 hours on a school night, alumni who are now in college are able to continue to keep in touch with their Indian dancing roots.

2011 graduate Parth Dholakia, who now attends USC, is performing with the school's Zeher dance team. 2012 graduate Vishal Goel is a member of Zahanat at UC Berkeley, and fellow 2012 alumni Sneha Shivkumar is with Zamana at UC Irvine.

Especially with a collegiate workload, the alumni see dancing as a stress reliever.

“Dancing has provided me an excellent outlet for me to maintain some sanity to my life,” Dholakia said. “When you're on stage, it’s literally your 15 minutes of fame.”

All of these alumni began performing at the school’s Bombay in the Bay show.

Dholakia performed in Bombay in the Bay for all four years in high school and was given the position for Indian club president his senior year. That year, the club threw two shows, raising $15,000 for the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation. 

However, the alumni have also noticed key differences between dancing in high school and in college.

“Bollywood dancing in college takes up a lot more time,” Dholakia said. “You get to know your teammates really well and you lose a lot of your other social life. [However], I like that it’s much more intense and much more difficult as well..”

The alumni said practices take up precious time and can go on for hours, especially before a performance. 

“Once we went from 7 p.m. to 6 a.m. on a Thursday night,” Goel said. “[But] it’s a lot of fun.”

Additionally, their college dance teams perform more than just Bollywood dancing. 

According to Goel, his team uses a fusion of dances in their performance, such as Bhangra, a North Indian dance style; Raas, a West Indian dance style; Bollywood and more.

“We don't do the typical Bollywood HFD [Hindi film dance], we spice it up with all our types of dance, and our theme is sick: It's the Joker,” Goel said.

Many college dance groups add humorous elements to their performance.

“Our only goal is to entertain the crowd, and I think we always accomplish that,” Goel said

Shivkumar, on the other hand, has been learning Indian classical dance since he was 4 and has found a dance team that involves classical dance.

“My favorite part is definitely the music and the intricate choreography,” Shivkumar said.

College Bollywood dancing is also much more competitive. The alumni’s teams have been to many competitions.

Even though there are many differences between Bollywood dancing in high school and in college, “some elements of the performance will never change,” Goel said. “[Especially] the adrenaline rush of performing in front of 2,000 people.”