 an assortment of macaws and cockatoos but none of the elephants and big cats which were once such a draw. In a world of VR and computer-generated images, simply an array of juggling, acrobat and trapeze acts can seem tame.
The crowds don’t muster in the numbers they once used to. In Chennai, the Great Bombay Circus put on three shows a day, every day, for more than a month. On occasions, the performers probably outnumbered the audience. The show I went to – at 4 pm on a Saturday – should have been the busiest of the week. It was well attended but a long way from full. On top of this, many came bearing coupons cut out from newspapers giving a substantial discount on the advertised ticket price.
Travelling circuses have huge overheads. The Great Bombay Circus once had a retinue – performers and support staff – of 300. In addition to the headache of making ends meet, they now have increasing difficulty finding a space for their big tent. In Chennai, the wonderfully central space they performed in – adjoining Central Station, no less – may not be available in the future – the railways have plans for it.
For those who did come, young and old, the circus still holds an ample measure of magic. Even the cheaper seats were incredibly close to the action. And you get good value: a performance lasting well over two hours with more than thirty acts, costs between Rs 100-Rs 300.
The artistes make repeated appearances in the ring during each show, and must get alarmingly little rest and recovery time. The clowns have been with the circus for decades – and yes, it does show. Their slapstick is tired and the humour forced. The other performers are necessarily younger – groups of jugglers and acrobats from Ethiopia and from Manipur and a women’s troupe from Nepal. A Russian woman rope artist, who tumbled down from the heights of the arena almost like a yo-yo, provided the ‘wow’ moment of my evening, while the sight of a dog on its hind legs carrying a parasol made me wish that all animal performances had been banished from the circus ring.
The Grand Bombay Circus was founded in 1920 and performed mainly in Punjab and Sindh. In 1947, it merged with two other companies to become the Great Bombay Circus. Its heyday came not long after that. Since then, it’s been a slow decline. Most of India’s major circus companies have closed over the past twenty years.
The big tent in Chennai was a little tawdry. The blurred black-and-white photos of famous circus goers felt a generation or more out-of-date. The safety netting for the high trapeze act had been darned and repaired so often you worried whether it was still fit for purpose. The circus’s website has not been updated in the ten days or so since the Chennai season ended; its Facebook page hasn’t been refreshed since June 2017.
Whether or not the Great Bombay Circus survives its centenary year, it probably doesn’t have all that long to go.
In much of Europe, nouveau circus or ‘new circus’ has largely replaced the more traditional itinerant circus. It’s an art form which makes more of choreography, costume and colour, welded into a seamless performance rather than a sequence of discrete acts, and usually dispensing altogether with animals and clowns.
It offers a new platform for the old circus-hand skills of balance, agility and hand-eye coordination, and draws on the dreamlike and surreal to absorb the audience. The leading practitioners of this style, Canada-based Cirque du Soleil, made their India debut a little over a year ago.
But for those of us of a certain vintage, a trip to the traditional Big Top awakens childhood memories and offers moments of awe and delight. I was glad to make a last salaam to the circus.
Andrew Whitehead was a BBC journalist and editor for many years and is currently a visiting professor at the Asian College of Journalism in Chennai. An earlier version of this article first appeared on Andrew Whitehead’s blog.Is bad credit being a bad news for you? Don't let bad credit score or poor credit history become a potent factor for car loan rejection. Do not lose faith because you can easily maneuver bad credit ratings and secure low rate auto financing in your city. This article is going to lead you towards affordable car loans despite your credit troubles.
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Phase one is sharing your story, getting to know your therapist’s style, and setting up treatment goals. You will also be introduced to touchstone events that contribute to current symptoms. Your therapist will ask you to rate from a scale of 0-10 how disturbing those memories are to you.
Phase two is learning about grounding skills, stress reduction skills, state change skills, or creating an image that will make you feel safe. You will also learn about bilateral stimulation (BLS) which is back and forth eye movements, sounds, and tactile sensations to help the right and left hemispheres with traumatic memories. You will also be able to activate your Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) to help access positive experiences, images, and thoughts.
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Phase eight will reevaluate the disturbance levels from your target of the last session to determine if your level is neutral and if your positive cognition is true. If not, then go back to phase four.
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