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Talk more. Talk aloud to raise awareness for the suppressed.

Who is Tokitiv Singh?

I am Tokitiv Singh aka Gurpreet Singh. I am a first-generation college graduate from UC Santa Cruz with a BA in Theatre Arts. I belong to Punjab, India. My society encouraged boys to become engineers and girls to become doctors, nurses, or housewives. I moved to the United States in June 2011 in Silicon Valley. Where every other Indian I met worked at some IT company. So, I also started to believe that an Indian boy should become an engineer. I started pursuing my degree in CS major. In Fall 2017, I successfully transferred to UC Santa Cruz from my local community college to pursue my BS in Computer Science. As I continued with the degree, quarter by quarter, it started to kill a piece of myself. Therefore, I decided to change my major to do something in Arts, which I also wanted to do. And the day I took this decision happened to be my birthday, 26th November. Since that day, it feels as though I have freed myself from the burden of the social norms.

Social Projects

“Mera Haqq” by Harp Sandhu

“Mera Haqq” is a professional Punjabi song written and sung by Singer/Songwriter Harp Sandhu. The song talks about the biggest ongoing protest, which is taking place at the borders of Delhi (the national capital of India). The song’s lyrics spread awareness about the New Indian Farm Bills’ issues and encourage the Indian Farmers to keep on protesting peacefully for their rights. As “Mera Haqq” means “My right” in the English language. Alongside Harp Sandhu, Tokitiv Singh performed in the music video, who also worked on the song’s script and assisted the video editor for this project.

“The 6ft Cabaret” Quarantine Project – Part 1

“The 6ft Cabaret” was talking about the dance of the social distancing that we all started as the global pandemic in the shape of Coronavirus began to emerge everywhere. Till today it is not losing its grip over humankind. Like many others, I got trapped in a two-bedroom apartment with my entire family. I could not make myself step out of the house for a month. one night, when I did get out of my house, I saw the empty spaces, empty roads, garbage bins full of trash, and the apartment’s leasing office saying, “Leasing office is closed, but you can slide your rent into the payment box.” So, I made myself capture it all on my cell phone.

“The 6ft Cabaret” Quarantine Project – Part 2

As “The 6ft Cabaret” was talking about sharing the experiences of us being in the quarantine. However, instead of looking at myself, I felt like covering a story of someone else around me and how quarantine affects them. I kept the thought to myself for a week, and the next week I visited my in-law’s house. At their home, I met my wife’s nephew. At my first meeting, I played with him for quite a long time, and then I asked him that now he needs to give me some time off, as I need to finish some of my college homework. He gave me a couple of minutes but started asking me again to play with him. I needed to submit that assignment on time, so I raised my voice a little to make him understand that I can’t play with him. My wife took control of the moment and took him outside of the room, and they started playing together. Later, on the same evening, at the dinner table, I asked my father-in-law that my nephew should understand that we can not play with him when we get occupied with some office work or school work. Then, my father-in-law happened to make me know that he is the only child in this household; he has no other child to play with him, that’s why he can be a bit bothersome for the rest of the adults of the family. So, this teaching suddenly introduced me to my nephew’s hardships and made me realize how he is the one who is genuinely suffering from the quarantine.