And There Shall Be Light

It is the end of the road and I get down from my car. A cool gentle wind envelopes me and with it, brings the smell of the fishes and the indication that the sea is nearby.

Coconut trees gently sway and ahead of me is a small bridge, wide enough for a scooter to get by. Beyond it are the Sayhadri hills. Towards my left is a four storey building, looking slightly neglected as the paint is peeling off.

A woman wearing a salwar kameez waits for us to disembark and walk towards her. With a smile she welcomes us and informs, “It’s on the fourth floor.” For more, hop over to my new blog here.

Why Delhi Needs A Slut Walk arthart Besharmi Morcha

The first time I came to know that Delhi was planning to host a Slut Walk, I was sitting comfortably on a couch in a London home, browsing online and reading about Slut Walks being held across the ‘Western’ world. And then I read the name of my city in that list. I thought I had read it wrong, so I re-read it, shaking my head in disbelief.

To read more, click here.

Belligerent China, Meek India

While China understands the importance of soft power and cultural integration, India doesn’t really care:

 

The great-grandson of Mohandas K. Gandhi said Monday that he has launched a fundraising campaign to buy a rare collection of the Indian independence leader's personal items that are up for auction and bring them back to India.

 

China on the other hand, does this:

 

It has issued orders making it difficult for Christie's to do business in China after the auction house sold two Chinese cultural relics on Wednesday. 

And that, my dear friends, shows the difference in the attitude of the two neighbouring countries.

 

Still Enraged But Back With The Pink Chaddi Campaign

For those who think that women should not have equal rights as men, should be treated like cattle, if possible, someone had to tell them they got it wrong. They have got crusaders on the internet and in this age of information 'warfare' I proudly jump into the fray with support for the 'Pink Chaddi Campaign'.

I won't be able to send mine, being so far, I will definitely be a part of the 'Pub Bharo' action. And all the people who read my blog, most lurkers who never comment, or if you just landed here somehow, please become a part of the campaign.

What happened in Mangalore can happen in your city. For men - this could happen to your girl friends, wives, sisters. Let's show 'em that Ram Sena isn't the answer to 'eroding of culture', it is the cause of it. Because what culture teaches you to be disrecpectful to women?

Also check out

Blank Noise

Mad Momma's Blog

Bohemian Rhapsody

Broom

Silvara

Within/Without

Thirty Six and Counting

And which century do we live in?

What happened in Mangalore is not just despicible, it is shocking. Since when do we need a moral police to tell us what is right or wrong? Isn't India a democratic nation? What's the brohuaha about being the 'world's biggest democracy' if you can't let people, adults at that, decide whether they want to sit in a lounge bar and have a drink.

If you are so concerned about being moralistic, is this how you treat women? Are they meant to be beaten, pulled by their hair and called a whore? Since when did this become right?

And you might think, have a little hope that the moral brigade (who assume they have a right to molest and traumatize women - being a democratic country and all) might be brought to books for this dastard act. You are wrong. Democracy in India, it seems, doesn't work both ways. It only works for political elites. Pramod Muthalik, who by the way got arrested for 'inticing communal violence', a case pending from years ago, had this gem to add - "It's a small incident and we were only working against obscenity in public." Yeah right.

I rest my case.

Updated: Mumbai bleeds again...

as does my heart as I sit in a far away land watching things unfold.

Update (27th Nov):

A cousin was in Taj Hotel and has managed to get out alive. A friend was in Mumabi and he's fine. The worrying thing is a we can't contact another friend and she has been with me in school since we were three years old. No news is good news - I keep telling myself. Everyone please pray.

Mumbai bloggers - TD, Malini, Pesh & PBH, Maxx, Punky - anyone please let me know if they are okay.

Images on a TV screen flick in front of me as I see people dying, blood, gore, bombs going off, grenade attacks, random gun fire shots, bodies, buildings going up in flames. This is not Iraq, not even Afghanistan, not even closer home - Kashmir. This is Mumbai. The financial capital of India. A throbbing metropolis. A safe city in a democratic nation. Not a city in a war zone. But it has turned into one in the past 24 hours.

Update (28 Nov):

Its not 24 or 30, its 48 hours. Of carnage. Of bloodshed. Of death. Of gloom. Of despair. We have managed to contact my friend. She is fine. But for some the news is bad as fellow blogger Chandni tells about her friend's father.

Update (29 Nov):

From 48, it has become 62. 62 bloodly hours of hell. Almost 200 dead and 300 injured and plans to blow up the Taj, making it India's 9/11.

Since words fail me, I bring these images of the last three days. A mumbai based blogger Arun Shanbhag captures the ordeal of three days through his lens (Day 1, Day 2, Day 3).

Update (30 Nov.):

This account by AP sums it up.

Here are pictures, courtsey TD's blog.

For live coverage watch here.

Baby, I am on fire!!

So today was the first day I actually cooked! I made rice for the first time and no it didn't get burnt. I totally rock or what!

Being a closet feminist I have this great fear that for the rest of my life I'll have to thanklessly cook not just for myself but for a future husband and kids (Hint: Any chefs out there? Maybe I can marry you). I don't want to get stuck in the cycle I was hoping to delay my foray into the kitchen as much as possible but well I had to do it someday. And today it was.

Anyway, the date for leaving is coming closer. Its exactly a week now. And like all desis my suitcases are full of things like pressure cooker (of which I am intensely afraid of) , masalas and ladoos (which my cousin made for me).

And my ex-colleagues who very sweetly gave me a farewell party and loads of gifts like an ipod Nano and a beautiful wrist watch which shows dual time and the support staff gave me a wonderful parker pen.

And no, the gifts don't stop there. My friends gave me a gorgeous blue top and a collage of our photographs.

And my shiny new laptop is waiting for me in London.

And i'll update this post as more things happen.

Till then adios!

Update (Sept 3, 9.00 A.M): Leaving in 24 hours :O

Random funny incident of the day

I was going to Gurgaon for work and I stopped to ask a thulla (police man) for directions.

Me: XYZ constructions kahan chal rahe hain?

Thulla (Very eager to help a journalist): Madam, yeh Erection (Eriksson) ki building key samney Contraction (Construction) chal raha hai.

Me (Ready to burst into peals of laughter): Thank you

In a Banana Republic...

... this will happen one day after this has happened.

Update: And this will happen a day later.

Untitled

Oh Mother! Look I killed my brother
You taught me this
When I was born
You said he was the enemy
And now they tell me – he was my friend

The hatred you taught me
And the colours – saffron and green
You said they were meant to be apart

I did it in Ayodhya
And in Bhagalpur
I went to Ghodhra
While passing through Mumbai
I did it in Benaras and Jaipur too

And now we point fingers at each other
And kill each other without blinking an eye
Oh Mother! Is this all you could teach me?

History books say we fought against each other centuries ago
But together 60 years ago
And now we are fighting against each other again
History repeats itself – some admonish me
History teaches – others say

But isn’t it a losing battle
Eye for eye makes us blind, Gandhi said
Oh Mother! Aren’t we blind enough already?

Are you waiting for the day, when in darkness we can’t see
Will you be filled with glee
Or will you be angst ridden
Are you waiting for us to learn another lesson
Or have we come too far already

--------------------------

Update

There are many people who we interact with, who don't just keep the prejudices in their hearts but systematically spread them too. Only if they were given the power to see what lies on the other side, were given unbiased information, they would be able to decide what they want to believe in and discard propaganda.

A movement called 'anti-tags' stems from that idea. It is anti-communalism, anti-extremism and anti-polarization and pro-information. Some might also call it secular, liberal or even pseudo-secular-liberal. It believes tags don't matter because it just wants to be the bridge that closes the gap between the 'real' and the 'assumed'.

How Can You Help?

Tell us your story. Did you face communal backlash? Did an incident change you? What do you think of propaganda in media and politics? How is it ruining our social fabric?Share it on 'anti-tags'. Age no bar, gender no bar, religion no bar, caste no bar. Leave you name or send it anonymously. Our email is antiDOTtagsATgmailDOTcom

Link: http://anti-tags.blogspot.com/

India Travel Diaries: Random Travel Tales

After the previous post, I have been meaning to give an update of the latest travel tales but the grueling schedule has kept me from doing so. Travelling from MP-Delhi-Bihar-Delhi-AP-Delhi-Mumbai-Delhi (excluding all the towns and the villages I went to) for 45 days makes you realize how much you can really miss home. And it’s still not over!

-----------

Because when you bump into walls, tables and beds in different hotel rooms, purple bruises pop up. And then you fall down the stairs and you knee gets injured and you hobble around with purple bruise and a swollen knee.

-----------

And then you come home to sleep in your own bed, wake up in the middle of the night and see the door is open and think someone has entered your hotel room and you need to scream and call the reception. Then realization strikes you that you are in your own home.
-----------

And then you ask to eat karela, tinda, lauki, tori and salivate at the thought of eating kichdi. Since you are home for a day or two, you can’t eat it all. So when you go to your next destination and stay in a fancy hotel and your colleagues go out to eat super specialty Far East Asian cuisine, you politely refuse and order kichdi for room service and it tastes like heaven.

-----------

In the middle of it all, in an obscure village in Bihar, the drunk ex-sarpanch and his cronies will threaten you and the current sarpanch will jump to help you and tell you to register a police case. So yeah, you start getting visions of you getting killed in a local village-politics war and the fact no one will come to know about it. And before that happens, you will have to think quickly on your feet, diffuse the situation, work quickly and get out of there alive!

-----------

The condition of the roads will be terrible, as if no roads exist in that particular district of Bihar. The potholes are mini craters and travelling for an hour and a half (one side) every day would mean that 1. Your food gets churned (and digested?) really fast 2. You get a full body massage 3. You intestines jump up to meet the brain, the pancreas gets lodged in the liver, the spleen decides to switch over and go to the other side of the body. So for the first time, you take a day’s rest before moving to the next destination.

-----------

In MP, you will go to a village where all the curious kids will surround you. And to beat the heat, you will stand under a mango tree laden with raw, green mangoes. Of course the kids will jump up and pluck the raw mangoes and eat them nonchalantly. Then they will ask you to eat, you will refuse but their bright smiles will melt you. The sour taste will hit you hard, really hard. And they will grin and laugh at you and you will join them and have a good laugh at yourself.
-----------

While in a village in AP, tribal men with spears will surround you and you will think that since you are pint sized and don’t have much meat, you wont make a nice meal for them. Since you can’t speak their language, you will have no way of communicating that thought. They will peak into your car and when you get down, follow you. That’s when you will spot your translator at distance and wave frantically at him. He will then come and tell you that these are village guards and messengers. It’s their job to know about any new ‘happening’ in the village. Then they will pose for your camera, get their pictures taken and you will shyly join them for a photo, inwardly relieved that you are not their dinner for the day.

-----------

Of course you will also get to touch a real tortoise and fishes and goats and cows and new born calves respectively in all the states. By day 40, the smell of cow dung won’t make you crinkle up your nose. In fact you won’t even notice the smell.

-----------

In the midst of this, bird shit will fall on your notebook. Which will be an ice-breaker for village kids in AP. Through sign language, they will produce water and a cloth to wipe it away. And in broken English-Telgu, they’ll tell you it’s a sign of good luck.

-----------

And in all the villages, the village elders will ask your age and wonder why you are not married as yet. Then they will be scandalized that you travel and work with men. And that you belong to a mixed caste. And they will nod wisely and say, “Yeh sab Dilli may hota hai.” It’s a very foreign concept for them.

-----------

You will meet a girl, the first from her village, to go and study MCA and with dreams of working in the IT industry. You will go to another village where a 20 year old girl is a mother of a one year old child. And in another, she is in a ghoonghat which covers her face and neck and she won’t talk to you at all.

-----------

While in Mumbai traveling in front of a slum, a child will suddenly jump in front of your car, the driver will slam the brakes, while the child will grab a pigeon and put it in his shirt. The driver will turn back to you and say, “He will go home and cook this.” you are not sure if you should believe him.

-----------

I still have a few more days of travel. More travel diaries might pop up if something interesting happens. Meanwhile, there has been a development on a personal-professional front. Pray that things fall in place for me while I keep my fingers crossed.

-----------

Madhya Pradesh Diaries - II

One day we ask a villager why he wants to buy a colour television, his first, in the 45 years of his life. He replies with all seriousness, “Because my wife told me too.” All the men – different strata, culture, society, country - errupt into a laughter, their private joke of hen pecked husbands and nagging wives.

----------


Yet another day, a woman separating chaff from wheat calls a child to sit next to her as we film her activities. The man standing next to me says, “ These women. They have no sense. Uski photo keech rahe hai aur who bacchey ko bula rahi hai….” He suddenly stops as he realizes I am standing next to him.


----------

Another day. We meet a farmer who earns about $3 a day to feed his family of eight. He rues why he toils so hard to grow wheat if the government is filling its buffer stock, when he has to eat two meals a day because he can’t afford three. His eyes heavy with emotion, helplessness, he turns to ask, “Main yeh dharti kyu cheerta hoon? Sirf isliye ki bebas reh saku?”. At first I am moved and then a thought crosses my mind, if his dialogue is a story set for us journalists. The cynic in me peeps out and I feel ashamed.

----------

A man in starch white kurta payajama stands in the middle of a field, the hot winds - loo hits us but there is a smile on his face. His 82 acre land produces so much of wheat, gram, pluses and soybean that he will earn millions when he sells his stock. The land, which he stands on, is worth billions.


----------

While in Bhopal one day, staying in my fancy 5 hotel, travelling in the stuffy official car to all the villages, I desire to break free. As I hop into an auto rickshaw outside the hotel, the manager spots me and asks “Madam why did you walk till the gate? We could have called the auto inside.” He tells me it’s a regular thing. I am amazed they do that here. The fancy hotel in the city is not like the ones in Delhi.

----------

I go to the Old Market in the city. It is like walking in the bylanes of Old Delhi, men with skull caps and women in burkha mill around. I am an anomaly there, an outsider. But I enjoy it. And there is a Jama Masjid and a chor bazaar just like Delhi. I am homesick again.

----------

As the heat rises from the earth, bare trees spead their branches, like arms raised towards the sky, a plea for the sun to stop beating down so mercilessly, for rain gods to pour down.

----------

After a tiring day, I recline in the seat of my car, I look outside and find electricity transmission lines running along, the cables playing a game, meeting at the poles - coming together, falling apart, almost teasing each other and playing catch. It reminds me of my childhood - watching the electicity poles, the sugar cane fields, sitting in the backseat, staring at the horizon as both merge into one another, while going to visit my grandmother in dusty heartlands of Uttar Pradesh.

----------

On the highway, I pass by a school building under construction. Th name of the school - Campion School. If the school authorities meant to write 'champion' then I am really worried what the childen will learn in a school whose name is spelt wongly. If it isn't, then I am worried that the name of the school has no meaning. And then I wonder why I worry so much!

----------

Madhya Pradesh Diaries

As I travel through dusty heartland of Rural central India, the landscape bathes in the summer sun and blue sky. The wheat which has become yellow golden, the green sugarcane fighting the sunrays, becoming yellow, the trees stark, stripped of their leaves, brown bark, yellow dust swirling upto the branches. And then suddenly, a green palm tree, which has survived the harsh environs.

---------

I meet some farmers, bodies darkened, hands callused, their sweat and grime in my hand- the golden wheat, which is on my table every night because of them. I can see the elements have worn them out, weathered faces, hard luck, dependence on the climate, they still welcome me warmly.

---------

At 41 degrees temperature, as they harvest the grain, suddenly one farmers pipes up, telling his ghoonghat clad wife, "Look how smart this city girl is, she even talks to men. You should learn something from her." And they break in peals of laughter.

---------

In another village, we ask if the women go shopping. No, the reply. Not even saris? No. House hold items? No. Anything? They shake their heads and say, "But they are not the decision makers, madam. They stay at home look after everything here."

---------

Another evening, there is a wedding in the village. Suddenly, our arrival means, the bride and the groom are relegated to the sidelines. We are the new celebrities and we have to make polite conversation with the thousands of guests present there. The women are in another corner, in their bright colourful saris. I walk upto them and take a picture from a digital camera. They shyly come forward to see it. And then there is a stampede to get their pictures clicked - from the old grandmother to the 6 year old girl!

Later, the village sarpanch and elders sit around me at 1.00, I chew on my batley (a local delicacy) and drink the purest aam panna, I have ever had. And in that night, as I am thousands of kilometers away from home, under a star studded sky, discussing politics, wheat prices, inflation and culture with them, they are in awe of me. "Aap itni door yahan baithi ho, koi darr nahi lag raha, ghar sey itni door?" I shake my head, "Its my job."

And then one of the farmers sings this song, inspired by his land-

Chali rey chali,
Kisan ki lali,
Bhariya rang ki chunariya,
Oodh kar chali,
Kisan ki lali,
Khet khaliyaon ko chali...

As I leave, the moon spreads its light, the cool breeze envelopes me, the darkness hides the starkness of the farmland. I trudge back to the hotel in the city at 5.00 A.M

---------

Halfway through my trip, I am suddenly homesick. A person who is ever ready for the new adventures and quests, I am suddenly missing my home, my room, my bed. It's strange. Or maybe its because I am working with the ogre.

---------

For the Nth time I am really irritated. yet another person had taken me to be a tourist guide. Yes, I work with foreigners. No, I am not a guide. I am a journalist. I wish someone would ban that RIN/Surf ad with the girl-tourist guide!

--------

One summer evening, my driver Khan Sa'ab, a frail old man touching seventy, turns to me and speaks to me in perfect English, "You are a great lady." Why, I ask. I have never seen a woman go so deep in the country side. And that too, to tell the story of our farmers. Who really cares about them? I tell him, "I hope, I can change that a little bit."

--------
This diary (blog post) will be updated in the coming weeks as I travel more. Stay tuned and keep checking back here!

Where Are We Heading

Where are we going wrong as a society when 8 year olds plan to stab their teacher without realizing the effects or the enormity of their plan?

In another case, 16 year olds, in a pre meditated plan, attack a fellow school student so that they can upload a video of it on a popular video sharing site. (Video Here)

Instead of bully-like behaviour, these are cases of mob mentality. Earlier, we saw this behaviour during wars, riots, unrest or a similar situation but not where children or youngsters were involved.

Now in a changing world, we are seeing cases, unusual scenarios where slightest of provocation are triggering off events. These are alarming cases of herd mentality, cases of assumed power over the victim and with no signs of remorse.

It’s a very scary place to be right now. As we become developed, are these indicators of eroding human values? Or are these societal issues of the developed world? Or there are deeper reflections of images influenced by the media? Whatever the answer may be, as a society, we need to check such behavioral indicators.

Because, I think, it won’t take long for others to replicate it. Like school shootings in US, incidents like Gurgaon school shoot out have started to haunt India. Is this the future staring at us?

-------

Cross posted at C-Splash (a citizen journalism initiative)

Marriages are made in… banks

Ever since the ‘marriage season’ has begun, almost every day I get to hear stories of marriages been stopped because the dowry demand increased on the wedding day.

I was talking to someone yesterday who told me how for 8 lakhs they were getting a groom who was only in a Government job and not that good looking. And they couldn’t ‘afford’ a groom for 15 lakhs even though he was an engineer and quite decent looking.

This bit of information left me quite disgusted. Now really, are marriages equivalent to trading? Or maybe it’s a bit like an auction house. You bring out the goods and people start naming the price till the prized possession is bought.

I pity the parents of the girl who want to ‘sell’ her to a good groom and I pity the groom’s family who greedily extend their hands to get some money. Though this trend is prevalent across the country, I can’t imagine why educated people should restore to this? NRI grooms to HRD Minister Arjun Singh to common man.

Anyway, while doing research for a news story I came across this wonderful website. Do check it out. Maybe all hope is not lost…