It was 5 AM on a Sunday and I was up early, preparing myself for what would be one of the most unconventional days of my life. I started my day by sipping a cup of tea while applying makeup, multitasking between the warmth of the tea and the cool touch of primer and moisturizer. My partner and child were still deep in sleep, their rhythmic breathing calming my nerves as I painted my face. Normally, drag makeup is a process done later in the day or evening, when the world is awake and bustling. But here I was, transforming myself at an ungodly hour, layering foundation, contour, lenses, and lashes. It felt as unnatural as eating Hyderabadi biryani for breakfast, yet there was something exhilarating about it.
I’d never stepped out of my home in full drag before. Hyderabad, despite its progress in many areas, remains conservative when it comes to accepting identities like mine. Drag queens don’t always feel safe in this city, and stepping out in public in full glam was a risk. But I was willing to take it for this shoot. I had watched enough Bollywood movies to know that a good pair of sunglasses could shield both my identity and my makeup from prying eyes. I packed my carefully chosen outfit— flowers handcrafted by my partner, and a wig— into a bag, locked the door behind me, and called an Uber.
The driver greeted me as “bhaiya,” not realizing that in less than an hour, he would be transporting someone who looked entirely different. As we drove through the still-dark streets of Hyderabad, I asked him to stop midway to pick up Manab, my friend and photographer. We had known each other since our school days in Kharagpur, and both of us had come a long way from those simpler times. Now, we were collaborating on something new, something bold and artistic. We were planning a public drag photoshoot, a venture that felt both exhilarating and terrifying, especially in a city that wasn’t used to seeing queerness, or drag queens, out in the open.
Our destination was Gudimalkhapur, South India’s largest flower market, an hour away from where I lived. The market opens early in the morning, bustling with vendors selling fresh flowers in bulk for everything from weddings to funerals. There was no place for me to change at the market, so I did my makeup and final touches in the car, my hands trembling slightly as we neared our destination. Once we arrived, I found a small corner near a public toilet where I could discreetly slip into my saree, corset, and wig.
Manab and I started the photoshoot near a stack of flower baskets freshly unloaded from a truck. He clicked away as people gathered around us, watching closely. Some stared in silent curiosity, while others became bold enough to follow us as we moved from one part of the market to another. We asked shopkeepers for permission to take photos near their stalls, and most agreed, intrigued by the spectacle of a drag queen in the middle of their flower-filled world.
But soon, a small crowd began to form around us. Vendors and passersby stopped what they were doing, their curiosity turning into something more confrontational. In a matter of minutes, we were surrounded by ten to fifteen people, some of them demanding that we stop what we were doing. The tension in the air was palpable, and for a moment, I felt a pang of fear. It was a reminder that queerness and gender nonconformity are still met with resistance in many places, even in a space as seemingly neutral as a flower market.
The crowd started asking for our camera, insisting that we didn’t have permission to take photos there. Manab, ever protective of his equipment, stood his ground. Sensing the situation escalating, I decided to step in. They assumed we didn’t speak the local language and thought I was a foreigner. That’s when I switched to Telugu, explaining who we were and what we were trying to do. In a quick elevator pitch, I introduced them to the basics of gender and drag, hoping to disarm their suspicion.
After a tense few minutes, the market secretary stepped in. He listened to our explanation, and to our relief, he granted us permission to continue our shoot, as long as we didn’t disrupt the vendors’ business. With this newfound approval, we moved more freely, taking photos in more dramatic locations, capturing the chaotic beauty of the market alongside the fluidity of my drag persona.
My costume for the shoot was a blend of Victorian and Indian influences. I wore a white saree adorned with oversized, dramatic flowers, a black leather corset, and a golden cape that trailed behind me. The wig I wore cascaded down my shoulders in a wave of curls, and my entire look was designed to evoke the opulence of a bygone era, fused with a sense of queerness that transcended time and place. I felt like a character out of a Shakespearean play, walking through the market as if it were a stage, with the flower vendors and customers serving as my audience.
The flowers around me took on a deeper meaning as we continued the shoot. Flowers have long been symbols of desire, sexuality, and hidden meanings, especially in queer culture. In the Victorian era, floriography—the language of flowers—allowed people to communicate their emotions and desires in ways that society wouldn’t permit them to say out loud. A white rose might symbolize innocence, but paired with a dark violet, it became a symbol of hidden passion.
The white flowers on my saree were meant to symbolize purity, but their exaggerated size turned that symbolism on its head. They were unapologetically large, just like the queer experience itself—impossible to ignore, unwilling to be silenced. As I stood among the stalls, the scent of jasmine and roses filling the air, I felt like I was part of something bigger, a living testament to the fluidity of identity and the defiance of societal norms.
For this shoot, Manab and I had drawn inspiration from Shakespearean themes of gender fluidity and transformation. In plays like A Midsummer Night’s Dream, flowers are not just decoration; they are potions of change, capable of revealing hidden desires and disrupting societal norms. Similarly, drag is a form of transformation, a way of expressing fluidity in a world that often tries to box us into rigid categories.
After about three hours of shooting, we decided to wrap up. I found the same corner near the public toilet where I had changed earlier and began transforming back into my everyday self. By the time I finished, I was no longer the drag queen who had turned heads in the market, but just another person waiting for an Uber. As I sipped chai with Manab and reflected on the day, we talked about the microaggressions we had faced, but also about how powerful it felt to claim space, to demand attention, and to create art in a place that wasn’t ready for us.
When I finally arrived home, my partner and child were still asleep. I washed the makeup off my face, slipped into bed beside them, and allowed myself a couple of hours of rest. As I drifted off to sleep, I smiled, knowing that for a moment, in the heart of Hyderabad’s flower market, I had been something more than just a drag queen—I had been a living symbol of queerness blooming in a world not yet ready for it.
