Ek Kahani - A real story

”Ek Kahani” is a story of the problems immigrants may face in their new homeland, a story of friendship without boundaries and of strength to overcome all difficulties, but also, it is the love story of an Indian man and a Finnish woman.

This story is based on real life events. And I got to meet the charming couple behind it. I interviewed Ilona on a break between the play practices. Aditya, unfortunately, couldn’t come, but sent his greetings through his wife.

Ilona has lived all her life in Finland, whereas Aditya comes from Hyderabad, India. It is a true miracle – destiny or coincidence – that these two persons born on the opposite sides of the world ever even met. As Ilona tells me their story, I feel more and more as if I would be listening to a fairy tale or the plot of a film rather than a real life story.

”There are many scenes in the play which were written exactly after what actually happened. But for the sake of a good play, we also have changed lots. Not everything that works in real life would work in a musical. For example Pappu’s character is entierly fictional”, Ilona explains. ”However the scene in which the two protagonists meet happens in the same place as it did in real life.”

Ilona and Aditya met one evening in 2009 at the Central Railway Station of Helsinki. That already is a very bollywoodish location. Aditya had come to Finland for his work. Ilona had just returned from a two month trip to India she been on with her friends, a proof of her fascination for foreign cultures. That evening, our hero and heroine ended up talking for hours, and later met again. And again, and again, and again…

I asked Ilona how her and Aditya’s story was chosen to be the base for the whole play.

”Oh, it just happened,” Ilona laughs. ”I have been dancing with Bolly Beat Dancers since last year, and last autumn while filming the promo-video, someone asked me about how I met my husband. I told them, and they went like: ”Oh, that sounds like a Bollywood movie!”. Then we started joking about making a Bollywood play out of our love story, and it happened the joke became reality.”
The director of ”Ek Kahani”, Reetta Flink, had already been planning a Bollywood event for Caisa. It wasn’t a hard choice for anyone to convert the planned dance event into a dance play.

However, like all good stories, Ilona’s and Aditya’s love story faced difficulties due to not only cultural differences but also the problems a long distance relationship might cause. Aditya’s work in Finland was almost done and he would soon be forced to leave Finland. And Ilona.
”Well, it was a situation in which we had only two choices. To break up, or get married”, Ilona remembers. ”We didn’t want to break up. So we chose the latter option.”

Ilona flew to India for a month to meet Aditya’s parents and to get married to her hero. Her parents had to come too, but because of a series of unfotunate events, their flight was delayed. They arrived a few days after their daughter, in time for the wedding.

”It was that winter during which there was too much snow for the planes to start. I was horrified to go to India all alone. Also, I didn’t have any choice but to stay with Aditya’s family. Fortunately all went well, in spite of a few cultural differences that would have surprised any Finnish person”, Ilona tells me. ”Before the wedding, I couldn’t to stay too long out in the courtyard or else the neighbours would have seen me. And not under any circumstances was I allowed to go out together alone with Aditya, my fiancé.”

Now Aditya and Ilona live in Helsinki, Finland. Do they dance together? Yes, of course, though Ilona might be a bit more inclined towards dancing, the couple took bhangra lessons together in the autumn and performed in the same Christmas show. They both can be seen on the Bolly Beat Dancers’ video. And they both will act in our ”Ek Kahani”.

In the end, I must ask the couple the classical question relating to cross-culturality. What does Aditya think of Finland? And what does Ilona think of India?

At first, coming from the enormous Hyderabad and having worked in Tokyo before, Aditya didn’t feel like Helsinki was a city at all. It was very small for him. He was most annoyed that he couldn’t read anything; English is not much used in Finland, for example in shops, all information on merchandise is written in Finnish. Now he is taking Finnish lessons. He enjoys that everything is rather simple and works so well in his new home country. He has grown to like the easiness of life and he feels at home. Ilona answers for herself. ”To me, India is original, strong and colorful. Beautiful.”

Text by: Laura Kunnas