Ode Rosset climbs up the pole, stops, turns her face downwards while stretching her legs skywards. Then she turns again and goes to the top of the pole. Accompanying her are four Kalaripayattu artists, all moving to the haunting music by French musician Jerom Cury, who uses drums as well as Tibetan bowls, and vocals by singer Fatima El Hassouni.
All this took place on a street at Kottayam in Kerala, recently. It was a public performance. Watching the act titled ‘Via’—which means travelling by way of—was a delight for the bystanders, performing it was a dream come true for Ode. Master of the Chinese pole dance, Ode had been learning Kalaripayattu at the Jai Sankar KJV Kalari, Puthupally, for the past 12 years. Last year, she began teaching the Kalaripayattu dancers on how to use the Chinese pole. And the outcome was a fusion performance. “I think it worked well,” she says. Ode is now planning to have an exchange project between the Kalari and two French circus schools—Academie Fratellini, Paris and Circus Pole, Amiens.
Though she is looking for sponsors right now, Ode plans to take the show to other parts of the world. “Not many people know of Kalaripayattu,” she says. “I want to popularise it.”For Ode, the discovery of Kalaripayattu happened by accident. She had come to Kerala to attend her brother’s wedding to a Malayali woman. Both had met in Jordan, where he worked as an engineer and she was an air-hostess in the Royal Jordanian Airlines.
“I saw Kalaripayattu for the first time then, and got fascinated by it,” she says. At that time, she was a student of The National Circus School at Châtellerault—100 km from Paris. “I got special permission from the school authorities to come and learn Kalarippayattu,” she says.
Asked about the charms of the martial art form, Ode says, “The flexibility of the art form is great. And the movements are fluid and elegant. When I am doing a Kalari move, I feel that I am in a temple. My mind becomes open and spiritual. In France when you are learning, you don’t give much respect to the teacher. But in Kerala, people are aware of the teacher’s contribution and respect them.”
In fact, Ode’s teacher Dr Baiju Varghese Gurukkal is all praises for her. “She has become a very good kalari artist,” he says. “I admire her dedication and devotion to our traditional art form.”
Meanwhile, just before the Kottayam performance,Ode had an unusual experience. She had placed a cover on the pole. When she took it away, minutes before the start, a snake moved away. When she told Baiju, the latter said it was a good sign. “In Kalarippayattu, snake is regarded as the symbol of spiritual energy,” says Baiju. The Kalaripayattu master believes that the fusion can be deepened to turn it
into something great. “This is just the beginning,” he says, with a smile.
Kalaripayattu
A martial art form, which originated as a style in Kerala, is one of the oldest surviving fighting systems in existence in the world. The word kalari first appears in the Tamil Sangam literature to describe both a battlefield and combat arena.Each warrior in the Sangam era received regular military training. Kalaripayattu techniques are a combination of steps (Chuvatu) and postures (Vadivu).