November 2014: The Village Life

The village life. The rural life. The burst of colours. Scents. And textures. We romanticise everything, from the smell of crowding to the taste of fresh food. Even the poverty, seen through city eyes, is exotic- wood fired stoves never look as good in urban slums. 

Do we look beneath? At farmers depending on the rains; at others depending on the farmers. One bad harvest can wipe out all chances of repaying loans. With the only way to create wealth being dependent on factors beyond their control, is it any wonder the menfolk all migrate to urban slums?

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2014: The Year That Was

January 2014: They fall through the cracks

Multi-storied residential towers coming up. Intelligent homes, infinity pools, marble lobbies. Residences as luxurious as five-star hotels.

Building sites teeming with migrant workers. Labour camps built out of corrugated metal tiles and tarpaulin sheets, held up with coir ropes, and a prayer. Half naked men straining their muscles, emaciated women carrying loads heavier than their weight.

Glitzy hoardings branding tomorrow’s project. Next to it, caution messages, reflecting the reality of today.

In that nowhere land between fantasy and reality, a generation grows up. Ignorant, illiterate, un-informed. Their parents  sweat to give shape to our dreams. They fall through the cracks.

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This picture was taken at the construction site of an upmarket high-rise coming up near our place in January
2014: The Year That Was

Jugad in Healthcare: day 34 of #100happydays

With paperless offices becoming the norm, the paper clip should find itself on the endangered list. But not in India. Surgeons here are using them to hold back the skin flap while operating. Kitchen strainers, honey, rubber tubes, mosquito nets. All have been used in the operating theater, to bring down the cost of surgery. In a nation where the government is unable to provide quality healthcare to the poor, this has definitely made surgery marginally more affordable.

Much has been spoken about the Great Indian Jugad- when you don’t have something, you improvise. This is Jugad at it’s best!

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My younger one proves he's India. When he couldn't find a 'Y', he made one with three 'I's. Jugad!!!!

Can you be happy for 100 days in a row. Sign up for #100happydays
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A day for drawing attention....

This morning, I saw a girl in a mini-skirt telling me to buy a two-wheeler to commemorate International Woman’s Day. While I have nothing against mini-skirts, and I admit that to a woman who has to battle male gaze while using public transport nothing is more empowering than a two-wheeler; I didn’t like how the Day was being misused to sell two-wheelers.

The Day is for drawing attention to the issues that plague women across the globe- gender inequality, lack of choice, economic discrimination, sexual abuse - the endless cycle of poverty and reproduction. That’s what the Day is for.

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A Drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Lantain, a oil lamp

Can you imagine a situation where life comes to a standstill after night falls? Where you cannot cook, or sew, or read or do your homework after sundown. But that is the reality in the millions of villages across India where electricity has not reached. 


Unless you fancy a garnish of insects on your food, dinner has to be had before it gets dark, and all you can really do after that is to sit around in the moonlight and talk or sing. 


It is any wonder that a lantain is one of the most precious commodities in village homes?
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There are words, and there are words. Some words can be easily translated, others need to be described.  In April, I’ll attempt to capture the Soul of 26 'Indian' words in a  drabble of exactly 100 words.

Ghar, a home

The ultimate aspiration of any Indian- four walls and a roof. And rightly so- in a land where the population is high and land is scarce, real-estate prices are unrealistically high. 


Those shelters made by stretching tarpaulin sheets over bamboo poles might look like makeshift accommodation, but families have often been living in them for years. 


Slum housing is little better. A labyrinth of open drains, no running water or sanitation facilities, illegal electricity. Precisely enough floor-space for the eight family members to lie down at night. A plasma TV on the wall. 
It is their own Ghar, Sweet Ghar. 
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There are words, and there are words. Some words can be easily translated, others need to be described.  In April, I’ll attempt to capture the Soul of 26 'Indian' words in a  drabble of exactly 100 words.

Doesn't seem to have done much for her

On a cold, winter morning, long before dawn-break, she was huddled on a park bench. Matted hair, clothes that had seen better days, filthy toe nails. Destitute, and seemingly not in possession of her mental faculties, it was obvious the streets were her home.


One would have expected her to be staring vacantly into space- watching the world through unseeing eyes. Instead, she was hunched over a book, pen in hand, writing something in a neat, if childish hand.

Literate, and interested in words- a rarity in this country. But it doesn’t seem to have done too much for her.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

A livelihood at home

Over 20 million people squeezed into a tiny city. Extended families living in houses smaller than a garage- every inch of floor space covered with sleeping bodies at night. No running water, nor dedicated sanitary blocks. A road network so inadequate it takes hours to commute 20 miles to work. The most overloaded public transportation system in the world- it is a miracle how so many people squeeze into so little space. And yet, people keep migrating to Bombay.

Will a time ever come when people from rural India aren’t forced to migrate to cities to earn enough to survive?

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The Bandra-Worli Sealink is an architectural delight. But the toll is so high, and the approach so crowded, few people even think of taking it. Couldn't the money have been used better? This picture forms a part of my Pictoral Flashback of 2011.

Sarita! Why did she have to die?

Sarita is the daughter of illiterate migrant workers, who used to attend the informal education centre at the construction site.

Four years back, she underwent a heart surgery. A couple of days back, she developed related complications. She was operated upon yesterday, but couldn't recover and passed away.

A brilliant student, Sarita could have accomplished anything she set out to do, instead, she ended up dead. Shouldn't clean water, basic sanitation, and health care a basic entitlement? Why should Sarita have to pay with her life for the crime of being born poor?

When will things change? Will they ever?

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Read Sarita's story here.

Reason to smile

A friend and I were talking about how difficult it is to find domestic help these days. I grew up in a household where live-in full-time help was taken for granted. Today, even if you are willing to pay, you cannot find someone reliable to mind the kids for a couple of hours every day. We spoke of it like it was a bad thing- which it is, for us.

But what it actually means is that women are seeking and getting jobs better than the unskilled ones we want to employ them in. Isn’t that enough reason to smile?
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

How long can the inequity last?

While we sit and debate whether or not to bite into that last piece of chocolate, there are people dying of hunger. Not people going hungry- missing a few meals, eating barely enough to sustain themselves- but people actually dying because their body no longer can sustain itself.

People in the Horn of Africa, people in Somalia, people on the street two miles from where you live.

At the same time, there is wastage. Uneaten food dumped in the garbage bin, food allowed to go bad in the refrigerator, meals ordered and left unconsumed.

How long can this inequity last?
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In case you want to make a donation, every little bit helps- even a donation of $ 5 will help keep a child alive - FIGHT HUNGER! 

One Bride for Three Brothers

One Bride for Three Brothers.

Sounds like the name of a farcical comedy, doesn’t it? But for Munni, it is a harsh reality. Married to a man several years older than her, she is forced to have sex with his unmarried brothers too, and has no idea which of the brothers is the father of her three sons.

When there are less than 9 women to every 10 men, you would expect that women would be valued for the scarce commodity that they are. But apparently not. New ways are found to redress the balance.

How will it all end?
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Still in darkness

When you look down on India from space at night, you find large areas in total darkness. If those areas represented forests or wilderness, it would be reason to celebrate, but most of them are as densely populated as the rest of the country- they just happen to be in darkness.

Sadder still, as this composite picture shows, there are parts of the country which had illumination in 1998, but had lost it by 2003- not coincidentally, those are areas with high insurgency movement.

Can a country call itself “Developed” if it struggles to provide electricity for all its citizens?
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Image from - Science Photo Gallery

I challenge you.....

“I challenge you to prove to me that staying in school = job, … and that by being educated she isn't also ostracized from the social network that can help her survive if she isn't excessively exploited…….Yes, I know "stop prostitution, build schools" is more compelling, but I'm unconvinced …[education]….is a solution.”

Had it been one of my own friends who said this, I would probably have taken her down in a tackle and given her a bloody nose, but since it was a friend of a friend, I took a deep breath…… and realized she was not entirely wrong.

To read on, hop across to my post in Burrowers, Books & Balderdash.
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Are people dishonest?

It’s that time of the year again where every pavement stall in the market starts selling paper lanterns.
You expect to see paper lanterns everywhere, but not early in the morning when there is not a soul in sight. Not shoppers, not salesman, not guards. Just paper lanterns with streamers fluttering enticingly in the breeze.
The salesmen had obviously not wanted to cart the lanterns to whichever street corner they call home. But were they not afraid the lanterns would be stolen?
You and I choose to think of people as dishonest, but they who know, seem to know otherwise.
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Breaking out of poverty, one school meal at a time

Where there is not enough money for food, children are put to work as soon as they are able. Untrained for anything but manual labour, their fate is decided the day they hoist the first load of bricks on their head. Even if they do squeeze in a few hours of informal education, they are too malnourished to really learn anything.

Enter free school lunches. One well-balanced meal guaranteed everyday. An incentive for parents to send their kids to school. Food that keeps children healthy, and receptive to being taught.

A chance to break out of the cycle of poverty.
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Today is Blog Action Day, and the world is talking about Food. Join the conversation.

Review: Stanley ka Dabba

Mindblowing is not a word I use, but that's the only word to describe "Stanley ka Dabba".
A very short movie by Bollywood standards, you couldn't help falling in love with Stanley and all his friends. Every situation was one we could relate to- the portrait of life in a typical Indian school was perfect. There was nothing not to love.
And five minutes from the end, the reality of Stanley's life was revealed- an orphan, he earns his keep working for his "uncle". We meet boys like him everyday, but never look at the person beyond. Now, we will.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

She is Ten. She is going to be Sold!

She's ten. She's won a scholarship to a top school. She dreams of becoming a doctor. The world should be hers.
Her mother is a prostitute. Prostitution is the family trade. She is going to be sold into prostitution.

Poverty is why women are forced to enter the sex trade- voluntarily or otherwise- I always thought. If women could earn a livelihood elsewhere, why would they have to sell their bodies? Education should be the key to their salvation.

But apparently even that is not enough. Selling a girl today seems worth more than what a doctor can earn tomorrow.
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Read Nick Kristoff's article on the girl here

Manolo Blahniks in a tomato field

Tomato is a water intensive crop. You would not expect to see acres of tomato fields in an area which till a few years back faced droughts every year. And yet, that is exactly what you do see.
Why tomato and no other crop, you ask the villagers.
"All those years when we didn't have water to drink, we dreamt of growing tomatos. Now that we get water in our wells, we are living out our dreams", was the answer.

Who knew calling yourself a tomato farmer was as aspirational as owning a pair of Manolo Blahniks? But it is.

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.
This an other cool Water Facts at Burrowers, Books & Balderdash

The lady at the door

She stands at the doorway, chin resting on her palm, the sun painting patterns of light on her lithe frame. The pose she strikes is one of her own choosing- she is aware of being observed, but doesn't react in anyway. She could be a photograph on a calendar, or a watercolour hanging on a living room wall; but she is neither, she is a living, breathing person. A mother, a wife, a daughter, a labourer. Her trials and her triumphs are etched on every line on her face.


I wonder what she makes of the camera trained on her?
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.