Drag addresses so much more than gender: Lush Monsoon
Meet Lush Monsoon, a drag queen, who in her day job is Ayushman, a 27-year-old housing rights lawyer in Delhi
It wasn’t until 2017 that Lush Monsoon understood drag. It was the reality show RuPaul’s Drag Race that reworked one of India’s now-most- popular drag queen’s (mis) conceptions, which was until then informed by an over-the-top, cabaret-loving trans-character on the American sitcom, Friends.
As a child, Lush — aka Ayushman, who is now a housing rights lawyer in Delhi — would dance to pop-music, imitating actor Madhuri Dixit’s moves. Friends and family used to cheer and encourage him too.
Then one day, seven-year-old Ayushman dressed up in his mother’s salwar-kurta and bindi. He was overjoyed at what he saw in the mirror; his mother though, was shocked.
“She didn’t scold me or anything, but there was a fear in her face. Slowly, I began to censor myself completely, because I started to recognise more such cues — that if I talk or walk a certain way, I’d get bullied,” Lush recalls. She’d just finished a book-reading session with six to 13-year-olds at The Lalit in Delhi on the occasion of the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia on May 17th.
Nearly two decades of ‘normal’ living later, Ayushman graduated from the National University of Juridical Sciences (NUJS) in Kolkata. That didn’t quell his raging discontent: of not being true to oneself.
Lush never made any concerted attempt at doing drag. A theatre group that Ayushman was part of would continuously reject him for roles, saying he wasn’t masculine enough. Instead, for fun, he and a friend, Khush (now also drag queen Khushboo) would play songs, and try on make-up that they’d hesitantly bought together. He’d sometimes try out online drag contests.
The turning point though came when Ayushman decided to de-compartmentalise his virtual and real-life identities. In 2017, at the 2017 Delhi International Queer Theatre and Film Festival, he finally debuted as Lush Monsoon.
“I think everybody should do drag at least once in their lives,” says Lush, shaking back her bright pink hair, as it falls against her deep purple dress. “You shouldn’t deny yourself the experience.”
Waving back at an eight-year-old who screams an enthusiastic goodbye, Lush talks about what drag really is, and how it opens up a whole new way of looking at life. Edited excerpts.
Lush, do you have a preferred pronoun?
Call me he, she, they, it. Whatever you prefer!
There are different motivations to do drag. What was yours?
I found drag at a time when I was in the last years of my law school. It was a very heteronormative space, and I needed to do something creative. I fell in love with drag watching RuPaul’s show, but the idea of doing it was a whole other journey. I thought I’d get so much hate. But quite the opposite! As an artist, I felt validated for the first time.
“People ask why I behave differently in drag – if it’s a split personality problem. But wear something beautiful, and you will too. You will sit differently, and walk differently.”
A lot of boys have ‘embarrassing’ pictures from their childhood when parents would dress them up in frocks. How do parents go from this, to shock or disapproval of drag?
Small town parents are much more open to certain things. They’re not caught up in pink and blue. They have no ideas of colours and clothes in binaries. But then, as long as it is for fun, as long as it doesn’t have any consequence, it’s okay.
You’d earlier said that with drag, you want to go beyond breaking gender stereotypes. What do you mean?
We know gender itself is a construct. We create this whole paraphernalia around it, to keep it going. The moment that starts breaking, gender does too. Drag overall is about not taking life or labels too seriously. Even with class and caste for instance, it tells you to not get caught up in identities so much that you can’t accept anybody else’s. We are all just playing roles. In that sense, it addresses so much more than just gender.
What’s the best way to get people out of thinking in narrow binary terms?
The most effective way is to bring about the change subconsciously. Like, some men, who’d see me as Lush, would probably be attracted to me. Then, they see me after I’ve taken off my drag. It makes some uncomfortable, but also some get nicely confused. It makes them realise that they are attracted to a person, not their gender.
How has doing drag affected your life?
Drag has made me relaxed about things. I see that everything is an illusion. I mean, I take hours to put on my make up. It becomes so real when it’s on. But when I take it off, the whole fantasy goes away. I remember a quote from the show Orange is the New Black: ‘Work hard to make something as beautiful as you can. And when you’re done, pack it in and know it was all temporary. You have to remember that it’s all temporary.’ That’s really my major insight from drag.
This interview was first published here