 Am I making the mistake of idealizing Indo-Caribbean culture or culture in general and making it into dance and food and outfits versus seeing the darker side of it that maybe is not worth passing on? There is a lot of dark parts of it. I think I believe in Guyana it's the highest suicide rate in the world for the Indo-Caribbean community um so there's clearly something happening that I feel is solvable if we were not so afraid. This is all generational trauma teaching people the culture, maintaining the culture. I didn't I didn't put two and two together until she had passed and now it's like that responsibility of like is this something I can do or is there a different way for me to do this. This video is sponsored by Squarespace, an amazing one-stop shop for entrepreneurs and creatives to get out what's in their brain out into the world in a beautiful customizable optimized diverse way. 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Hi there lovers and friends I have been in Toronto for 40 days and 40 nights right now I'm in New York City I'm here for one day and one night taping watch what happens live with Andy Cohen but for the past 40 days I have been in Toronto and if you've ever been Toronto before you know the one thing is going to gift you with is culture diverse glorious beautiful culture and specifically for me it's the first time in a long time that I have been enriched in my own culture as a Caribbean person as an Indo-Caribbean person reconnecting with family and friends reconnecting with people in a very intimate way especially because we're coming out of the pandemic but more over because this is the first time my kids have gotten to really spend time in Canada and spend time around their family and it's had me very reflective on the role that I play as a mother to pass on culture to my children to let them know where they come from the deep history and the lives that have led to the decisions that led to their life being made and also the practices and the teachings that could actually enrich their life but as an ambiguous person who doesn't neatly fit inside of any culture this has always been a tricky place for me of finding out where I fit in and where I can find my place and find my footing without offending without clashing so I wanted to invite you all in on this conversation that I got to have with Pramika Leo somebody whom was a cultural hub for me somebody whom in many ways I grew up with and whose mother was deeply influential on me and her mom past of Covid during the pandemic so it was a beautiful opportunity for me to connect with her and to look for ways to invite myself into the communities that I love very deeply and yeah that's what you can expect going forward is this weird to say it's a very hard topic to talk about guys so let's get into it hey my name is Pramika Leo I'm the current owner and director of Gisica Dance Company you might have known it as Tarana Dance School if you were dancing back in the 90s and the 80s but this is my mom one of the co-founders of this company and it's actually named after her and me her daughter and if you didn't know Shannon used to be a former student here at Gisica Dance Company along with her mom and her sister and a couple cousins actually so come on let's let's get to know each other a little bit better let's talk about some history and some Indo-Caribbean culture today you were the first person to give me a photo shoot I wore that purple dress my mom was there your mom was there they were off gaffeting in a corner and I went off working in entertainment like western forms of entertainment ever since you know what's so interesting about that is you're younger than me and you're you are little but I've never looked at you as little really because you were my teacher this is true so you have always been somebody who I looked at like you know I've always just looked at you in such awe and reverence and grace and you've seemed like you have an old soul but it never felt like because I know you and your mom well your mom owned the school and she was the head of it but I always just saw the two of you as ying and yang as you work together so collaboratively and beautifully so I want to back you into why I'm here today I am Indo-Caribbean but not visibly so so I don't read as somebody who is Indian or who has that heritage but I've never had to be manual about my culture because it just existed around me so whether or not I visually look at or not I'm at the events I it's my dad's heritage it's my family's heritage it's what we eat it's what we dress it's how we dance it's how we move it's how we communicate so even the volunteer work you did here was all Indo-Caribbean based you would go to like the different Mondayers and you would do these jihaji performances with my mom the plays yes and that was since I was a child yes since you grew up with this and so as I've had my own daughters now and we're in Los Angeles which is diverse but in a very distinct way not the way that Toronto is where it's a mosaic everywhere that you go but coming back here I just realized how out of touch Ryu is with culture and because she doesn't visually assimilate to any culture and because I'm not living in the culture she's not really getting it so I was like well how do I bring the gifts that my culture brought to me to my children and as a mom is that actually my role you are back we were just talking about you and then thinking about this twofold in the role of a mom to pass down culture to her daughters and reflecting on how your mom gave you that gift so effortlessly that it oozed out of you that wisdom that grace it seemed as if you had lived many lifetimes and you were probably only like 12 years old but I think that's because of the way that your mom empowered you and this obviously has more weight to it because your mom passed yes yeah once she passed it really changed my life in the sense of like all this responsibility that she was holding back for me I guess was suddenly dropped on me I didn't realize how many people were coming to her for advice because I remember you know your mom and my mom would sit up in the living room and they would just talk and talk and I didn't realize that was part of the job but when she passed I was like okay well I got to figure out what I do with this information and do people want it do people not want it um you're actually kind of the first person to say I want my daughters to know since her passing teaching people the culture maintaining the culture I didn't I didn't put two and two together until she had passed now now it's like that responsibility of like is this something I can do or is there a different way for me to do this you talked about legacy in the complicated relationship that you have with that you are in such a unique position that I don't think a lot of people in our generation are I mean generations back your parents passed and you take up their work that's just what you do your parents own the steel mill now you own the steel mill yeah and that is somewhat I think the responsibility that was left on you and I'd love to hear about it that was one of the most traumatic things that happened to me actually because people started reaching out looking for her in me and I was trying to tell them no I'm someone very different and so I was trying my best to kind of bring that into the light but I guess people come with their own assumptions of who you are and they stand by that pretty concrete and you can't convince them otherwise that you have use outside of that um so that's what made the legacy for me quite complicated all the pain that came with it and inheriting her pain and seeing now I really see where her comments the things that she would tell me I see where it's coming from because now it's on me but do you think that culture is crippling I think there's space for evolution I think there is space for protection um protection of of the things we love like dance the actual history the oral histories um you know when she was teaching you guys or to see all these things are important but I think there's things within our culture wherever you are in the Caribbean culture that do need adjustment hi can you take me to the party please oh yes you want to go to the party let's go to the party we gotta give a shout out to the sponsor of this video Squarespace now we have been partnering with Squarespace for a couple of years using them for double that time now they have got some new features yeah that I want to tell you about Jared tell me the fluid engine the fluid engine is a next generation website design system from Squarespace it has never been easier for anyone to unlock unbreakable creativity drag and drop customizable fluid design let's go flexible website templates we know about that custom merch so it's a place that people have gone to sell their stuff forever 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our thing yes it could be their thing too all they got to do is go to Squarespace dot com slash shambhudi get 10% off the purchase website or domain say one more time babe go to Squarespace dot com slash shambhudi to get 10% off of website or a domain and as you're talking about sort of the burden of responsibility to represent not just yourself not just your family but an entire culture when you're tied to it so heavily yeah I felt that and there are beautiful parts of my Caribbean is period because my mom is Dominique and Caribbean so that's just a part of my identity that feels unquestionable as somebody who is ambiguous looking and everything is in question the one thing I could say without a shadow of a doubt is I'm West Indian and so that has held a lot of pride for me but there is also some bondage that comes with that that I had to separate myself especially as somebody talks about sex out loud I had to make a lot of aggressive sentences for my culture and to give myself the permission to live the life that I wanted to live when I was starting to kind of live between Guyana and Canada a bit more I learned a lot more about those behaviors and how I really failed it I wasn't good at being a the good Indo Caribbean person or there was something in my genetics that was different about me and it could you know but um I felt really I felt like a failure I felt like I was just failing people because I wanted to talk about our community I wanted to go on tiktok and make tiktok and I had to take all of it down because I was exposing everybody and I didn't mean to I thought it was coming from a place of love and I was hurting people I guess it's an interesting thing that we've been talking to you about the difference too between being visibly identifiably part of a culture where everything that you do whether you say where you're from or not you're representing the culture at all times yes and it's really yeah you're doing this because I don't want to I think there's this idea that Indo-Caribbean dances or something that's based in the Indo-Caribbean community is not accessible and it shouldn't be accessible to other people but I heavily disagree because that is still the fabric of what Caribbean community is right you're wearing madras uh textiles on your head that comes from India right I don't want people to feel hesitant or separated or that they're not allowed maybe because we have been so secretive yeah I mean your parents didn't keep you away from western Indian culture at all they didn't keep you away from the Indo-Caribbean culture you're I mean obviously your dad is Guineas right but we had you dress up you know we gave you guys the costumes we talked about the history a lot and I think that's how it should be yeah I don't feel I don't believe in the gatekeep grow boss mentality right or that it belongs to one person I really would like my to try my best to keep it open that's a personal statement though because they know it's not the same for me what are you so glad that your mom gave you discipline because she wasn't easy on me I was talking to my brother and we were talking about you know all the way she talked to students or even cousins very different to how she spoke to me and I think I mean we talked a little bit about that because we would just kind of bounce off of each other we had a very interesting relationship but she had me training from sun up to sundown like school wasn't really my thing because I was always training I was always here you could always find me in the studio if I wasn't here I was training somewhere somewhere else I was at other dance studios and I was just go go go go go we still have a lot of these costumes people stole some of these costumes so a lot is give them back if you have them give them back I would like them back but the idea that this one woman every year since the 80s with hand sewing all these costumes just so someone's child can have five minutes of their own culture in their own world I think is phenomenal and I think that's something she taught me here where she was like it's this is it it's everything it is you're waking up in the morning you're thinking about this you're trying to do your best and it does come with very abusive parts it comes with people not understanding you it comes with people who are purposely trying to misunderstand you or twist your narrative but you need to stand by who you are and it takes discipline not everybody is meant to do this but you're going to do this you brought it for me oh my goodness I want to ask you about I think for a very long time in our life our biggest nightmare that our mom will die and when it happens are you ever really prepared the way that my mom passed which I told you I wasn't prepared for and I still struggle with it every day I never thought of her passing well because she when if you knew my mom if anybody knew she felt like this eternal fixture culturally you know spiritually she just felt like she was always going to be there and I never thought about it I really didn't it's hard to lose your soul mate and I didn't think she was going to have such an unsatisfactory way of passing it was so upsetting it was so disappointing and it was so I feel like even my students like they were just this is not how she was supposed to go this is not you know she's a regal woman this is not how she's supposed to pass and and it's interesting because I'm thinking about your mom and just wanting to say thank you for the gift of your mom and thank you for the gifts that she gave to you that you have given to me because you were just as much my teacher just as much my mentor and idol as your mom was and when I think about your mom I think about her feet in her hands I think as a dancer this is a natural thing to go to it's something that you hyper focus on when you're a student yes what is someone's feet and hands doing so I spent a lot of time watching her in that way and as much as I always saw her in traditional dress and her love for dance came from a traditional place your mom was not a traditional woman like her no humor no she was not that was the thing because I was thinking you know you were talking about sexuality and I think that's the side of her that I represent the shadow self of her whereas like we are going to talk about sex because you can't sit all these children down and then give them a dance about you know Krishna trying to like seduce this woman and not talk about sex right it's important and I like that part of it I really like it it makes me feel embodied it makes me feel present and that's what we connect I think so I think