This sister, is your power

This week, Shivani Pinapotu, 24, who lives in Bangalore, India, shares a postcard from a moment of doubt.

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Halloween Day, 2018.

I was falling behind.

I came here, all the way from India, because I was considered to be worthy of an opportunity as lofty as an exchange programme in Sweden — but am I really worthy? Does anyone really think so?

The exchange programme to Umeå University, Sweden, was a coveted opportunity to study Architecture and Urban Design for a semester under esteemed practitioners in the industry, open only to students who were consistently on the merit roll for three years.

I knew that I wanted to be a part of this programme ever since I found out about it during my freshman year, so I worked towards it with sincerity. I was diligent with my work and I volunteered for extra-curricular positions to enhance my profile. But now that I was here, I wondered if I was just a straight-A student who happened to chance upon this merit.

I was told that winners were loud and bright and shiny, that they changed the world with their big ideas and buttery speech and devil-may-care confidence. But I care, I’m anxious, and I speak softly, so do I belong here?

At the time, I was selected as part of a four-student group from my batch for the exchange program. Ro and Ash, geniuses of their kind, were working on extra-terrestrial structures, moulding metal and timber to their rhythms, and Dee was challenging the notions of super-structures, proposing an underground atrium of sorts, shaping light and soil with her bare hands.

They were playing the big game, and I — well, I was playing small. In a place where I could be and do anything, all I could think about was the overpass that cut through a local community, one that was built over and housed several generations, in an area called Teg in Umeå, Sweden. The infrastructure was built in the 1970s, and has since then been at the heart of the community. For a local citizen, the Teg overpass had been a landmark as instinctive as their love for Lingonberry preserve with meatballs.

Yet, the municipality intended to tear the historic road down, along with the residential plots alongside, and build a new road network over it that resembled the idea of ‘development’, with glass-walled bus stations and manicured landscapes — a utopian vision of tomorrow that holds no ground in the present.

My proposal was, therefore, a canvas to preserve the infrastructure as is and mould the intentions of the governing body into the existing fabric, to save the sanctity the road held for this community while not dismissing the glorious vision of tomorrow.

Straightforward in its intentions to recognise what was and question what will be, I wondered if my proposal was creating ripples in the water. While my classmates were making loud splashes in the ocean, I was unsure if my ripples were enough to move the ocean.

So I did what I often do when I feel attacked by my own comfort zone — I got out of it. I signed up for a jazz-hop rehearsal class on a whim, knowing full well that I neither had the knowledge nor the bones to pull it off. I showed up anyway.

That night, following an interesting Halloween-themed choreography in the dance hall at the Student Cultural Centre, I went to the kitchen for some refreshments. As I was helping myself to cookies and milk, I heard a roar of laughter from a room nearby. Reflexively, I peeked inside, to find a small student lounge, bustling with energy and joy, with groups of people of all shades seated together, too involved in their board games or study sessions to notice my intrusion.

The foreground of movement was set against a small stage and a mic stand, with a wall behind it that caught my attention almost as immediately as it caught my heart. The words ‘*Quiet, Kind, Vulnerable, Wild, Smart, Funny, Irrational’ were written in a soft pink across the wall, describing everything that I was, and everything that I thought meant small and meek — and I knew at once that I mattered.

I knew when I got accepted into the program that it would change me in ways I would not see coming. I had hoped to outgrow spaces in my mind that closed in on my heart.

This, I knew then, was that moment of my reckoning. This space, that wall.

I felt heard, for the first time in a long time. I wanted to talk to the person who put those words up behind the stage and ask them whether that wall was a cry for validation, to acknowledge that the stage is as much for quiet afternoons as much it is for loud nights, or an act of quiet rebellion, to show the world that the stage is as big as we want it to be?

I had grown up idolising a version of success so radically opposite to who I was — ‘Quiet, Kind, Vulnerable, Wild, Smart, Funny and Irrational’, as it so happens — that I never realised and valued the victories that I held in my hands and worked through on my own. To see a space that honored me, and the many people like me, gave me strength to push forth in my socio-culturally driven project of reinstating the community of Teg. It may not be a big splash, but it was a drop that made a difference and I ploughed through with pride and compassion.

I realised then the effect that spaces can have on us when they fit us and our ideas — they make us feel safe. That room held everything that I was looking for in my endeavor as an architect — to design spaces that make someone, somewhere feel safe and held and heard. It is not a lot in theory, but I know the difference it can make to someone, much like it did to me that night in October.

So I write this postcard to remind you of that Halloween Day, when everyone pretended to be someone else, and you were yourself, and that was enough.

That, sister, is your power.

Meet Shivani

Shivani is an architect with a mission: To contribute to place-making and civic engagement through architecture and storytelling. She reads design, hears poetry, and draws many, many mind maps. A quiet rebel, her weapons of choice are her beloved stationary, earphones, journal and a good cup of coffee.

How long were you in Sweden for, and what has life looked like since you returned?

I was in Sweden for about six months for a study abroad program. The experience was so enthralling, and has added much to my horizons of thought. It shaped possibilities that I did not know even existed before! I do miss my Friday night ritual of Swedish meatballs and lingonberry jam. I cannot wait to go back again!

You’re an architect – tell us more about that: what drew you to architecture? What do you enjoy about your job?

This is going to sound silly but it all started with a pillow fort! I was twelve and on a vacation at my ancestral home in Hyderabad, India, when my aunt realized my disorientation within the bungalow. So she pulled a few sheets over and around my bed, strung fairy lights across, and built me one as a surprise. It overjoyed me beyond belief, how all it took to belong to a place was a space that fits and a story to call my own. To this day, the pillow fort remains the reason why I aspire to design empathetic and inclusive spaces, mapping places beyond their coordinates and humbling the vastness of space through stories and literature. It is a gratifying process to see how people respond to spaces that allow them to just be.

You recently moved to a new city to start a job, what has that been like?

I will not lie, it has been hard. The movies glorify The Big Move way too much. There isn’t a moment where it all falls into place and everything is A-okay, I have found that it is a series of small routines that you grow into, little by little. I’m still growing, still finding my comfort corners in this city. The job, however, is pretty exhilarating in its possibilities! I learn something new every day and I really enjoy my independence (limited as it may be, thanks to the unending pandemic!).

What has life in the pandemic looked like for you?

I’m a creature of habit, so when the world shut down and I had to retreat inside the four walls of a home that was not yet home, I immediately fell into a loop of anxious spirals. But with time, I realized how much I really needed to push pause on my life. Much like everyone else, I was on autopilot ever since I could remember, and the pandemic allowed me to really sit down and reconsider what really matters to me. I’m grateful that I was able to be with my family and share more time and mundane routines with my friends. It’s a matter of great privilege to even see the pandemic as gratefully as I do, given how much it has taken away from most, so I make sure that I count my blessings and really work on what I set out to during this time.

What’s something that you’re excited about and something that’s keeping you up at night right now?

I was really looking forward to going back home next month. I had kept a mental checklist too: I would hug my tiny, annoying brother a little longer, I would take my mom and dad out on a drive now that I have acquired half-decent driving skills and I would go to all my favorite places with my favorite people. The pandemic resurfaced with all its might here in India, so it’s a bleak possibility at the moment. What is keeping me up at night is my self-doubt, to be really honest, and my Spotify playlists. They are too good!

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