Pimped!

I didn't realise it, but it had been more than six months before I'd been in a venue where males and females mixed together in nothing but dance. If I think about it, it was a tame thing compared to others I've been to: the boys and girls were relatively restrained teenagers, there was no alcohol and a couple of parental figures were present.

I remember being shocked at the arrival of a couple of black boys to a party thrown by an Arabic girl; I wasn't similarly shocked by any black girls (no whites present, though, unless you count the white-looking extremely westernised Arabs). It was a primitive, incomprehensible reaction: from their carriage to their clothes, they were fulfilling my notions of the hypersexualised wannabe gangster built up from my UK school days and the media.

Overall, I was experiencing acute anxiety and discomfort. I'm not sure of the cause: probably a combination of my recently bad experience with males and the presence of my mother and aunt. I was wearing clothes that I felt were incredibly revealing: a strapless short ruffly dress with tights, black patent leather boots with chains plus steel heels and an inadequate scarf to cover my bare shoulders and arms. This was topped off with the trademark heavy make-up Arabs around the Gulf area tend to favour, which I don't even know how to apply myself; my aunt plastered it on me and I have to admit I look much better with it on. I had been yelled at earlier in the evening by my mother which tended to put me in a rather anti-social, sensitive mood.

As soon as we had walked in, my mother expressed contempt for the girls present, who apparently held no candle to the flame of my charms and beauty (you've just got to love the peerless objectivity of a mother), after which she instructed me to win the admiration of all males present. That's not wholly accurate: the literal translation was that she instructed me to, rather appropriately, 'hang them' (ah, the glorious connotations of the Arabic language are worthy of their own post). Talk about pressure, as well as an idea that didn't sit well with me. What was I supposed to do with all that attention, badly misdirected from their deserving, more age appropriate peers?

Since all notions of acting naturally had been quashed by the self-consciousness induced by the combined factors discussed above, I commenced to sit down and not move. With musical selections that swung between Akon and Arabic instrumental bellydancing beats, I pondered my situation. Dance? In front of mixed company? With boys who were apparently worthy of 'hanging'? No way. The shame, the sexuality of it and the vulnerability of it were paralysing. I thought of my father: oceans away, no help to me here. What would he think?

No matter how much I didn't want to, I was going to bury my feelings about it and I was going to dance. I knew it. If my mother was there and she wanted me to, I would. That's how it always happens. And that's how it did happen.

The final worsening was when my family members fixated on one particular boy. They urged me to go over, they told me to 'trap him', they told me to go show off my dancing skills. Looking for support from my brother, he only told me 'I would.' This was all based on the boy's looks and apparent Arabic country of origin. No personality analysis, not even speaking to him, nothing.

There was only one boy who'd caught my attention and it wasn't him. I remembered this boy when he was coming in and he was standing in the doorway, shading the lower half of his face in what appeared to be a shy gesture. It grew apparent that what he was actually doing was surveying the field; he walked in and introduced himself straight to the parentals with confident handshakes. Excellent move in an Arabic setting; establishing respect with the father figure is always a good move and charming the mother is also equally important. He was introducing himself to my family figures but I made myself scarce using my aunt (who ironically was only calling me over to urge me to get myself introduced to this fellow).

Overall, every tactic used by family to market me backfired majorly. No idea why they want me marketed, except that it's the norm for Arabic culture; a common equivalent of wishing a person well is expressing the desire to see 'The day of your wedding!'.

I can also conclude that I am worse than ever in my discomfort about sexuality and males. Even if they're just boys.

Spring Awakening; Novello Theatre, West End Play

I managed to catch Spring Awakening on its first night at the Novello. It's a play about exploring sexuality as a teenager in an oppressive environment. It displays through its characters how a teen might have to react in this environment, and essentially what choices they have. This is perfectly captured in a quotation by Hanschen -- "the gay one" -- which I can't find. To greatly paraphrase, it says: rebel against the system, be defeated by the system or use the system. Due to its subject matter, it's got some very explicit scenes; I did have to look away! It is a controversial play that has been banned as well as causing theatregoers to simply walk out on it (I observed this personally).

There're some usual takes I share on it and some I don't: oft commented on is the anachronistic soundtrack. The -- definitely not safe for work! -- soundtrack itself (click to hear some samples) is a perfect antidote to the saccharine High School Musical experience. The song which embodied the concepts of the play: comedy which can be quite dark, rebellion and emotional suppression is "Totally Fucked" especially within the context it appeared within the actual play [semispoiler] One of our characters had to face the authoritarian opressors and their punishment [/spoiler].

The original play (and this is a musical) was written in 1891, but as you can see by the soundtrack, loads of changes have been made. To a modern audience, it reminds them of the cost and the reasons for the protection of their current freedom. Its puts into words through the songs what those in 1891 might say if they could speak with the voice of 2009. Or even those who're living in countries right now, where this opression and suppression is the norm.

This play went for the heartstrings and the throat: it goes for the bloody sensationalistic subjects. Even though you'll laugh, the play deliberately leaves you with a Hamlet-esque depressive emotion with the same inevitability of disaster. Hopefully: a lot of modern teenagers won't have too much to empathise with, except if their sexual discovery was tortured. It was painful personally for me due to that, as well as dealing [semispoiler] with talks of suicide, abortion and child abuse [/spoiler]; all of which have affected people I care about in my life and through them, me. Tears were drawn unwillingly out; I was teetering for a while but the moment of breakdown was [spoiler] when Moritz' father broke down too [/spoiler].

I'm a conservative person in many ways. I am the target for the messages of this play ( as well as the solidarity it gives to those who've experienced teenage problems including its aside to homosexuals, although I do have a question mark about the use of them for comic relief. Exclusion of this category was subtle, unlike the other subject matter in the play). It highlights to me that -- regardless of the consequences -- there will always be rebels against the status quo especially if you apply this to such issues as sex and religion. The choice by any society is therefore this: what do you do with them? Kill, imprison, hide them, give in or compromise? Another thing that it highlighted was how freedom of information is a good thing. Giving people the right information is important: the way you protect them is by telling them what this information means and how to handle it, not by suppressing it. A huge inevitability with this is discovering the wrong fragments themselves and applying it with horrible results. Always understand the full possible pros and cons for anything you're doing, for yourself or when you're making the choice for someone else.

There was a Shakesperean quality to the play, which should be clear with some of the observations I'm going to make and have made. The cast was sixteen strong, not including three of which were backing vocals which didn't have any official roles if I remember all this correctly. Out of these, two of them played the various adult figures (assorted parents, teachers, a priest, headteachers, healthcare professionals) wearing practically the same clothes; their ability to differentiate the characters despite this spoke for their fantastic acting ability. No doubt using the same actors was to impress the sameness quality of all authority figures's opression into the audience. The stage and props were minimalistic: the band playing was live on stage as well as some (possibly lucky) members of the audience with chairs on either ends of the stage for them. The chereography and placement of the actors was visually engaging: very symbolism-filled and symmetric, sometimes completely absurd and plain wierd (just like teens!). The actors themselves said miles with their movement and expression, the quality of the singing itself seems fantastic.

The protagonist of the play (Melchior) who is portrayed by Aneurin Barnard is no doubt going to get a fair share of female fans (as implied in the beginning of the play itself, through the female characters), with his emotionally wrought performance of his sexual and rebellious role. Those cheekbones don't hurt either. As an aside: Hanschen for some reason resembled Draco Malfoy (perhaps no coincidence for "the gay one") and Wendla resembled Hermoine from Harry Potter. It wasn't just me. I'm going to blame this on make up. Feel free to disagree!

With coverage by the BBC today and a 14+ age warning, this unique play will probably do well in the West End for a while on the caveat that the younger audiences are motivated to come see it as well as that older audiences aren't alienated by its -- perhaps lowbrow and "indierock" for some? -- presentation. Let's see if it does engage us young peoples, who no doubt think we've seen it all...

Whatever Spring Awakening is, it isn't boring.

Wrecked Rectum

This article about the purpose of the rectal exam is amazingly helpful; the inevitable jokes are of course excruciating. Seeing as how such intimate examinations are so critical, I'm wondering how well I'm going to cope with this. I've only been doing exams that involve exposure at the chest and abdomen; I've seen nothing yet.

I have not been focusing too much on that and I'm wondering how much my reservations about physical contact are keeping me back. Will I be the type of practitioner who will examine physically only if I think it's necessary rather than if it might be helpful?

One of my OSCE stations last year was a disaster: I was so distracted by the examiner's questions while I was examining that I pressed too hard and hurt the poor volunteer. This is the gravest sin when doing a physical examination: as a student, you are allowed not to know the correct answers but you are never allowed to cause discomfort to the patients. Even though not much clinical teaching is happening in this year of study, it is evident that I need to practise if I want to be competent later. Yet, I haven't been doing this, using lack of clinical teaching as a justification for my avoidance of "unnecessary" physical contact.

Have your personal reservations ever held you back in your chosen profession?