THE BROWN SOCIAL MEDIA SPACE

I feel like sometimes I'm caught in the middle of this social media realm. My agencies and my clients couldn't care less if I don't post because there has not yet been a modeling agreement where you're like, okay, you are shooting a brand campaign It’s not like, “You're going to be on set for 12 hours, but also, we expect you to do a post and three stories ” That's just not how our job is structured and how our payment is structured in any way When you are on set as a model, you have no expectations to post that because they don't care about your following. In fact, they prefer that you don't post any of that because you're now giving out their secrets of what their setup might look like or anything like that. So, I feel very conflicted. A lot of times, as a model, you are not to have your phone out on set. I don't have my phone out even here. Despite this being a little bit more of an intimate setting - so I do feel kind of caught in the middle

I am loving that so many of my content creator friends have brought so much positive light to the South Asian space In that part, you can see I can't fight the smile because that makes me really excited and really happy. What I hate is when people are like, oh, ‘why is she posting? She thinks she's all that ’ I think we can be less judgy We definitely have a lot of that.

WHAT IS YOUR DUTY?

I love this question so much because I think of duty as my personal mission When I was in my first job, my mentor said to me, 'Whatever it is that bothers you, go for that, follow that, and let that kind of inspire your career path ' So for me, and because of my past, in 2015, I changed my Instagram bio to “Wherever you go, bring sparkle ” That is my duty Wherever I go, I want to bring sparkle to the room I want to uplift those around me. I want to hear about their stories; I want to get hyped up; I want to get energized I want to hear what their life has been like because there's nothing that enriches me more and makes me feel more alive than hearing about someone else's life, what they're doing, what they're wanting to go after, what they're interested in I think just bringing that side of my personality out is really what my duty is

WHAT IS YOUR DUTY TO YOUR CULTURE?

This is a huge one for me because I went down a "traditional" career path with med school and then flipped my whole life around with modeling I want to break generational toxicity as much as I possibly can in my personal life or even through helping & advising others. I think it's important to be in this space and also lend that hand back down to anyone that wants to be in the creative space If there's someone that I know or if there's something that I could personally do, that is a huge part of my mission I've had a few people reach out to me on Instagram and ask, “Hey, how can I get more involved in modeling? How do I break into the space? How do I talk to my parents? How do I deal with the judgment from the brown community of me trying to pursue this ” This is what fuels me: I get so excited to help more people because, again, it goes back to fighting that unconscious bias that people may have when they see a brown person

I don't want us to be a directional choice, and more South Asians in this space means that we're fighting that every day I don't see any competition I'm not a gatekeeper If a client likes you and me, they're going to book both of us That's just how it is Maybe not for the same shoot Maybe you'll get picked this month and I'll get picked next month, but we're both going to end up winning and I think there's space for all of us, and every South Asian in this space can succeed

I think that's a huge duty to my culture; continuing on with this kind of boldness and this bravery I always look to my grandparents My grandpa's sister was the first to leave their village in Gujarat Like, she lives in New Jersey and wears a two-piece swimsuit Like, what Baa do you know that does that right? That is bold, that is brave, and that is who I want to be like when I'm older. I don't want to care what anyone thinks Go after what you want, and the rest will follow