Planning Post 4

Update from Planning post 3
 If you are planning a visit to India before your arangetram here are some tips.
 1. Dresses: I already mentioned this (see planning post 3). Some tailors are quicker/prompter than others. I went with Mr. Ponnurangam in Chennai. He was super nice and great service. Promptly delivered my dresses in 7 - 10 days which made it Recentpossible for me to get my photoshoot done in India.

 2. Jewelry: Your biggest purchase after the dresses is jewelry. This is a big ticket item (or small depending on what you want). I went for 1 set of temple jewelry for my daughter and artificial for everything else. We needed 4 sets for the two of us. Actually let me rephrase that. You don't NEED 4 sets at least not completely. Because the headset you dont change (haven't seen a change so far in any arangetrams. It's a pain to change it and the interval won't be long enough so we just let that be)
Here's what you will need

1. Head set: This includes the 3 way nethichutti, chandran, suryan. Additionally rakkodi and jadavillais (braid jewels- optional). Out of this it is best to have the nethichutti chandra suryan and rakkodi in temple jewelry if possible. The silver base makes it super light otherwise it might weigh you down. If you are debating about buying temple jewelry and are tight on budget, this is one thing you should consider. 
2. Necklaces: One short and one long typically. The short one is a choker/addigai type. The long one can be pearls or regular manga malai. Recent times, people have gone with golden beads for the chain with a nice kemp padakkam. 
3. Earrings and maatal: This is again something I would recommend in temple jewelry. Again for the same reason. Also temple jewelry can be polished and reused for a long time. 
4. Bangles: Artificial is fine. Get some gold imitation bangles for filler. Too many bangles won't work great. 2 stone bangles with about half dozen gold in between will work nicely for each hand. 
5. Belt: Stone ones or recently there are plastic (yes plastic) ones with gold polish that are super lightweight and look great on stage. 

Out of these #1 is constant for the entire program. #2-#5 can be changed during interval. Note however that each change adds roughly 3-5 mins extra to get ready so plan accordingly. 

Disclaimer: This is my personal opinion and list. Please use your judgement as well as consult with your Guru for any inputs. 

Hindsight is 20/20. After the dancing the tassles of the necklaces get all sweaty and sticky and most often than not end up being cut. So when you purchase please get yourself some additional tassles or go for metal chain link clasps. These are easier to open and won't be damaged. It's a little more irritating on the back of the neck so weigh your options. In any case get a few extra tassles so you can refinish your jewelry after the event. 

For people wondering if you should deck your daughter in gold simply because you can, DONT. Gold is one of the softest metal (which is why we add copper to make the jewelry stay in shape) so it can be easily damaged while dancing. Plus it's a madhouse during arangetram, you don't want the added responsibility of taking care of your gold. Do yourself and everyone else a big favor stick to temple or artificial jewelry. As an added bonus, these look much better in photos than gold. 

Budget: Again similar to sarees, this is as much or as little as you want to spend. To give a rough costing I bought the following in temple jewellery - 1 headset, rakkodi, jimikki, maatal, choker and manga malai. This cost me about 65K INR. The artificial sets were about 2-3K. I opted for kaasumalai type for one of the sets and that cost about 5K (1gm gold types). The pricing depends on rate of silver etc so plan accordingly. When picking artifical jewelry try to pick bigger stones and maroonish shade so that it doesn't look very different from the real deal. 

3. Accessories: Vijaya stores is da place. You will need - false hair, donut ring (for the rakkodi),  kunjalam, artifical flowers (usually the semicircle and the hotdog). I also bought a lot of u pins, bobby pins etc but didn't end up using them since it was taken care of by the makeup person. 

4. Bells: You will need 2 sets of 4 row bells. GJR in triplicane has good sonorous ones with soft backing. You will use one for practice and most likely will use the same for dancing. the second one is simply to be blessed and handed over. It's simply a backup. It is best to dance in the bells that you are used and broken into. 

Ok this post became much longer than i intended to. Will stop here for now. rest in next!