Goodbye Bangalore, And On What Lasts

My parents are sweet.

 

It’s the small things that trip you up, at first.

Dad turning onto the right side of the road. The discomfort of seeing people use their left hand to eat. The liberating feeling of sitting back in the driver’s seat. Reminding myself to not spell favorite with a u.

The small changes.

The sleek, new water dispenser in the kitchen. Seeing that the Christian Science Reading Room has been replaced by the Barber’s Den on Trapelo Road. The new photo frames on the small chest of drawers in the living room. How smooth the main road is now that it’s finally been repaved.

But give it five days.

And I’m back driving my mother’s Volvo on the right side of the road past The Barber’s Den like I haven’t even spent the last eight months speeding around Bangalore on the backs of motorcycles and autos on any damn side of the road that there was space.

I’m continuously awed by the adaptability of human beings. How easily we can slide back into old routines. I’m intrigued by how forgetful we can be, but also how strongly we can hold onto our memories, and what a curious bundle of contradictions this makes us.

My family dropped by my grandfather’s office last week. He’s a shy, gruff chemistry professor, and he told me that as long as I got what I wanted out of my trip, he was happy. I don’t think I quite knew what I wanted out of my eight months in Bangalore. I didn’t go to India with any strong conviction knowing that this was the right decision. But I did feel challenged during my time in Bangalore. I felt conflicted, I felt excited, I felt confused, nervous, excited, overwhelmed, content, whole. I felt like I lived it. And that I had let the experience mold itself into what it needed to be.

I don’t know how long the relationships I established in Bangalore will last. I don’t know when I can go back and see my students or my friends. I don’t know how long this feeling of acutely missing the city will linger. I don’t know how long I can wear the pink and green kurta that I bought on Commercial Street until the sleeve rips or the sequins fall off. The mehendi I got on my second to last day has already faded, and all that is left are a couple of barely recognizable light-orange swirls on the palm of my left hand.

But while the memories, relationships, souvenirs and the like may eventually fade, my experience in Bangalore will always remain with me. One of my favorite bits of wisdom from my boyfriend has been that every single experience makes you who you are. So the damage has been done, Bangalore. You’ve changed me, irreversibly. And that’s what remains.

…

I thought how lovely and how strange a river is. A river is a river, always there, and yet the water flowing through it is never the same water and is never still. It’s always changing and is always on the move. And over time the river itself changes too. It widens and deepens as it rubs and scours, gnaws and kneads, eats and bores its way through the land. Even the greatest rivers- the Nile and the Ganges, the Yangtze and he Mississippi, the Amazon and the great grey-green greasy Limpopo all set about with fever trees- must have been no more than trickles and flickering streams before they grew into mighty rivers. Are people like that? I wondered. Am I like that? Always me, like the river itself, always flowing but always different […]

― Aidan Chambers, This is All: The Pillow Book of Cordelia Kenn

 

I was rewarded with an EVEN LARGER Totoro when I returned.

Silver Linings Appendectomy (Or That Week Life Was Like, Let Me Throw A Bunch Of Shit Your Way And See If You Can Deal).

Today, September 15^th, was the day I was supposed to leave India. But instead, here I am still in Bangalore, eating a made-to-order tomato and bacon omelet at a high-end Swiss hotel, whose breakfast buffet includes sausage and beans, dosa, fresh fruit juice, and an array of adorable mini-pastries. The waitstaff keep calling me Miss. This is not the kind of lifestyle I’ve been living for the past 8 months here. So what happened?

Quotespics

 

It all began last Thursday.

Or, to give it a little context, let me start on Wednesday night. I thought I was giving a pretty awesome second-round Skype interview for a position at a company in San Francisco… until they gave me a 30-minute exercise. When I went over it, I had to fight the urge to go into panic-mode because to finish it in half an hour seemed impossible. I went to bed that night pretty upset because I knew I hadn’t done a good job with it and felt that I’d blown my chances, which is a pretty big downer when you’re on the trying-to-find-employment struggle bus.

SEAS

But the next morning, I woke to up an e-mail telling me that they had accidentally sent me the final round exercise, which was supposed to take a couple of days to complete. They apologized, and also let me know that they wanted me to advance to the final round.

Talk about emotional rollercoasters.

That afternoon, I had a bit of a stomachache. My boyfriend thought that me, being the fatty foodie that I am, was just suffering from an empty stomach and offered to get me some food. So him and my housemate, Rosie, rode off to the good old main road. But the stomachache kept getting worse, until it got to the point where it didn’t matter what position I was in, it hurt. There was nothing that could distract me from the pain, and I sat on the bed, clutching my stomach and looking around the room like there might be something, some way to stop the hurt.

And that’s how Nitin found me when he came back, maybe 45 minutes later. I was not in good shape, and could only respond by nodding or shaking my head. He made the executive decision to take me to the doctor, and told me that I should stay over with his family that evening. I packed my backpack in silence and we set off on his bike.

By that point, it was already getting dark. I sat behind Nitin, squeezing the pillion rider handle, knuckles white, face twisted in pain as we rode on flyovers and past brightly illuminated, oversized billboards, weaving through the evening rush hour traffic to get to the doctor.

Okay, this might be a slight exaggeration.

When we finally arrived at the doctor’s office, I wasn’t exactly comforted by the nurses’ fearful looks as they took in the expression on my face. Maybe they’re just not used to foreign girls in golden sandals limping painfully into the clinic. But then, I walked into the doctor’s office, only to find that he’d been browsing motorcycles online.

Srsly.

Anyhow, Nitin and I told him the situation. The doctor did an abdominal check, ran some tests, injected a painkiller into my lower back, and suggested we go to a Diagnostic Centre to get my abdomen ultra-sounded (yes, that’s right). After looking at the scans, Dr. N tells me I have “suspected appendicitis.”

At this point, it became clear that I would have to miss out on the road trip to Masinagudi, a tiger reserve about 5 hours from Bangalore, that several friends and I had planned. Because, you know, excruciating abdominal pain in the middle of the forest wasn’t really something I was willing to risk.

Womp 😦

My friend Pranav suggested that I get a second opinion on the appendicitis, which seemed like a good idea. I didn’t know if I could trust Dr. Let Me Browse Motorcycles During Work Hours, so Nitin and I went to Columbia Asia Hospital the next day. The doctor and surgeon whom I consulted both diagnosed me with appendicitis, referencing the abdominal scan and the rebound tenderness of the appendix that I was exhibiting.

I asked the surgeon what his advice would be in terms of moving forward. He suggested surgery “of course, because I’m a surgeon” (Really, like really? That’s your professional opinion?), but he said the final call was up to me. Which kind of threw me off as a 23-year-old Hispanic Studies major living in a foreign country with absolutely no medical experience. But you know, thanks for thinking I can handle things.

After considering all the options and consulting with my parents, it seemed that surgery was indeed the best option. Although appendicitis can be safely treated with antibiotics, apparently 20% of patients have a recurrence within a year, and need eventual appendectomy anyways.

So now, I had to face one of my greatest fears, which, oddly enough, is general anesthesia. I’ve dealt with my fair share of anxiety, and control has been an important aspect in dealing with it. Anesthesia meant being put to sleep and not being able to control anything that was happening to me during that time. Also, it’s pretty evident from my Insomniac post that I have a complicated relationship with sleep. For years, I avoided any kind of medication that made me drowsy (even Nyquil) because I didn’t like losing control over how and when I went to sleep.

But, if anything, this week has made me a master at finding silver linings.

On Sunday, Nitin took me to check into Columbia Asia. I’ll never forget waiting to get a pre-operation blood test, and seeing Pranav, Sunny, and Philip literally stride into the hospital on their way back from Masinagudi. I’ll never be more grateful for having a personal entourage as I entered the elevator to go to the inpatient ward. The four of them lined up, leaning on the nurse’s station counter as the nurses checked my height and weight was a sight to behold.

Anjali and Pranav stayed with me before the surgery, and Anjali was there until I was wheeled out the door and down to the operating wing. I wasn’t allowed to have my contacts in or bring my glasses. The most nerve-wracking 10 minutes were probably when I was left by myself outside the operating theatre, waiting for it to be prepped, blind as can be and left alone with my thoughts and fears. Once I was wheeled into the OR, it was back in action with a bunch of medical people milling around me, poking needles into my hand, doctors asking me questions and then–

Nothing.

I had a laparoscopic procedure, which means they poked three small holes into my “tummy” (-Dr. Kumar), in order to observe and remove the appendix. It probably didn’t take more than 2 hours, and then I was wheeled to the recovery room where I woke up to beeping monitors and drowsy-looking people in surgical caps. And the rest is history. Well, at least my appendix is.

Someone got real cozy in my hospital bed.

Newspaper from the hospital. I’m a Taurus. Seriously.

2 days later, I had a final round interview for the company in San Francisco, which meant I had to do some serious prep and also complete a presentation during recovery. The perfect end to this post would be that I got the job, but alas, life is not all marshmallows and flowers.

Or unicorns pooping rainbows.

Sadly, I had to cancel visiting my family in York this week, because I can’t lug around two heavy, elephant-souvenir filled suitcases around England. So that’s why I’m here. But hey, I’m enjoying another silver lining, which happens to be a made-to-order omelette by a chef who looks straight out of a Pixar movie and a room with a serious view, where my parents have put me up for my recovery.

Hello, Bangalore.

And it’s also knowing that people have my back. So thank you, Nitin for supporting me through it all. Thank you Pranav and Anjali, for being there. Thank you Rosie, Shruti, Amulya. Thank you, Roopa for figuring out my accommodations. Thank you to my boss and her daughter for the advice and putting in a word at the hospital and even offering me to stay with them.

So there’s a lot to be grateful for, that’s for sure.

Small Curiosities, Part 3: The Sari

India overwhelms the senses. I remember the first week that I arrived here, my senses were inundated: loud traffic, pollution, spicy food, the smell of the city, the chattering in Kannada that I couldn’t understand. But after I got over the initial shock, I grew to enjoy the stimulating environment, and instead of concentrating on the negatives, I began to see the overwhelming beauty and liveliness of the country. For me, this kind of frenzied beauty and liveliness is epitomized in the sari, with its incredible variety of colors, fabrics, embroidery and patterns.

Craftmark

 

The sari (or saree) is a long strip of cloth, usually five to nine yards, wrapped around a woman’s waist and over her shoulder, and worn over a cropped, short-sleeved blouse and a petticoat skirt. There are many ways to wrap a sari, depending on region, social class, and personal style. The word sari is a corrupted version of the Sanskrit “sati” meaning strip of cloth. The word “sattika” was also used to describe women’s attire in ancient Buddhist Jain literature, called the Jatakas.

Cotton saris are usually worn for everyday use, while silk saris might be saved for special occasions. Women who work as maids or in construction sites (manual labor) may wear synthetic fibers that are lower quality but do not get easily crumpled and are easier to move around in.

Although saris are still a common sight, the younger generation (in Bangalore, at least) usually wears western clothing or something less complicated to put on, like kurtas, churidars, and pants or leggings.

Every sari has a design theme. The main part of the sari usually has a decorative border on three sides: on the two longitudinal sides, and then on the end piece (the pallav/pallu that goes over the shoulder) which builds on the two border designs in a sort of amplification or “climax” of the design.

 

IMShopping

 

The patterns on a sari often have symbolic significance. For example, paisley symbolizes fertility, elephants for water and royalty, rudraksha (a seed from a tree grown in the Himalayas) for the eyes of Lord Shiva, and fish as a symbol for abundance.

The sari highlights the traditional Indian concept of a beautiful body type: a slim waist with large bust and hips, which is perfectly highlighted by the style of the sari. The midriff is left bare because it is believed to be the source of life and creativity; the Hindu thesis of creation states that when the cycle began, Lord Brahma, the creator, was born from a lotus flower which came out of the navel of Lord Vishnu.

 

Fashionlady

 

There are a multitude of ways to wrap a sari, but the most popular form in contemporary India is the nivi-style drape with a long line of pleats at the front of the waist.

…

The sari was first mentioned in the Vedas (Rig Veda), the oldest Hindu text dating back to 3000 B.C., although it is possible that in their original form, they were worn even earlier in the Indus Valley Civilization. Statues from between the 1^st and 6^th century A.D. depict female priests in a sari wrapped in the ancient style, draped in a way that created a trouser-like form (called an Odissi Fishtail), which allowed for free-flowing and easy movement, which was especially important for dancing.

 

Fibre2Fashion

 

Sari-like garments are also mentioned in the Mahabharata, Silappadhikaram, Kadambari, and the Natya Shastra, an ancient treatise describing dance and costumes. In the Mahabharata, the sari appears in the story of Draupadi, where Lord Krishna saves her dignity when the King’s noble men try to strip her of her sari, and he transforms it into an endless cloth and her honor is saved.

The sari was originally just a strip of cloth wrapped around the body, as Hindus believed that stitched clothing was impure. A blouse (choli) and petticoat are worn now, but its origins are unclear – perhaps it had to do with the arrival of the British or the Muslims, and their concepts of modesty. In ancient times, the upper body may have been left bare, or just covered by a breast band.

The dhoti, which is traditional attire for men, is believed to be the forerunner of the sari, which was worn by both men and women until the 14^th century.

I’d like to end with the folktale origin of the sari, which goes as follows:

The Sari, it is said, was born on the loom of a fanciful weaver. He dreamt of a woman, the shimmer of her tears, the drape of her tumbling hair, the colors of her many moods and the softness of her touch. All these he wove together. He couldn’t stop. He wove for many yards. And when he was done, the story goes, he sat back and smiled and smiled and smiled.

Gaatha

 

References

http://www.didiswardrobe.com/history-of-the-indian-saree-(sari).php

http://www.bhangrakids.com/info/sari.shtml

http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Sari.aspx

http://factsfashion.wordpress.com/2011/06/28/the-sari-meanings-behind-the-cloth/

http://nishamadhulika.com/en/568-history-of-saree.html

http://lifestyle.iloveindia.com/lounge/history-of-saree-1949.html

http://www.fancy-indian-saris.com/sari-history.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sari

http://www.sarisafari.com/how/nivi.html

http://www.culturalindia.net/indian-clothing/sari.html

http://thestoriesfromindia.wordpress.com/tag/origins-of-indian-saree/

http://www.didiswardrobe.com/history-of-the-indian-saree-(sari).php

Small Curiosities, Part 2: Dignity of Labor

When I was 17, I got my first job at a small Japanese bakery (with “a French twist,” aptly named Japonaise) in Cambridge, MA. I’d take the local 73 bus, which clattered its way to Harvard Square for 20 minutes, and then I’d take the Red Line one stop to Porter Square, from which the bakery was another 5 minute walk. I was still in high school at this point, so I mostly worked 7- or 8-hour shifts on weekends.

bakingmehungry

I was usually the only one who worked at the Porter Square location, so I’d arrive in the morning to open up the shutters, plug in the showcases, wipe down the counters, help unload the day’s bread from the delivery truck, and get set on twist-tying bags filled with fluffy, sliced loaves, all the while my early bird customers would begin to trickle in for their morning caffeine and pastry kick. I remember that in the bakery’s heyday, I’d ring up about $800 USD a shift. I felt a sense of competency in taking care of this small shop on my own during my shifts, interacting with all kinds of customers using both my English and Japanese (even my Spanish at times!), and a growing amount of independence from earning a small salary (even though financially, it wasn’t necessary for me to be working, and I was earning only $0.50 above minimum wage per hour).

…

Dignity of labor is the idea that all jobs should be respected equally regardless of whether they are intellectually or manually based. The word dignity originates from the Latin dignus or dignitas which means “a certain respect or worthy of esteem and honour.” However, my experience in India has been that if a young person is working a “menial” or minimum wage job, it means that their parents are unable to financially support them. The attitude seems to be that working a job at a place such as McDonald’s or a Café Coffee Day is “below” certain members of the population.

IZQuotes

This attitude towards menial work appeared, for example, in right-wing critiques of Sonia Gandhi. They put her off as a “waitress and au-pair” who actually had to work to put herself through school, and how could someone like that hold a position of power in a country of over a billion people? This attitude is problematic if people wish to improve their situation but feel as though the jobs that are available are “below” them simply because they are manual-based or not held in high esteem. In my experience in the U.S., working your first job is a rite of passage in some ways, and a step towards independence. Perhaps, this division of labor and status may be a hangover from the caste system in which different occupations (Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, Shudras) eventually came to signify a hierarchy in status, rather than simply signifying someone’s livelihood. It is important to understand that historically the caste system was not necessarily strictly hierarchical.

Nowadays, the Dalit class (formerly “untouchables”) are stuck with “polluting” or socially taboo tasks such as garbage collection, cremation, leather-working, etc. which receive little respect and have low economic returns, leading to a cycle of poverty. Furthermore, with the existence of huge informal sectors, many of these workers are not offered formal protection or have enough political clout for collective bargaining.

As a small aside, the concept of a “polluting” occupation was the topic of a Japanese film, which won Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars in 2009, about a man who prepares the dead for cremation (nōkanshi), and is the subject of prejudice from his colleagues and his wife, who at a point refuses to touch him. Distributors were reluctant to release it on the similar basis of the public bias against those who handle the dead:

The organization that I work at in Bangalore employs maids, who are often the mothers of children enrolled at our Learning Centres. I admire the fact that our organization employs children’s parents who find it difficult to find stable employment due to lack of education. However, the word “maid,” for me, is rather loaded with hierarchical connotations (perhaps due to the fact that back in Victorian England, for example, maids were at the bottom of the domestic servant pecking order). It’s a rather alien word for me, coming from a country where domestic workers are typically employed only in single-parent families, or one with two working parents, or wealthy families. I’d say domestic workers are often hired out of necessity rather than convenience, and I’m used to hearing the words “cleaning lady” or “housekeeper.”

In the U.S., many parents expect their children to start helping with household chores as they get older (cleaning their room, helping with dishes, washing their own clothes), which is symbolic of their growing independence. Perhaps, in this sense, familial interdependency is a crucial aspect of Indian culture that affects a child’s work ethic. It is normal for children to live with their parents during and after their university education, and at times until they are married. This is vastly different from their counterparts in the U.S., where the cost of higher education is exorbitant to the point that parents may be unable to pay fees, and many colleges require students to live in dormitory housing, which is an additional cost. Therefore, individuals may start living independently from their parents as early as age 18, which often also means they start thinking about their financial independence earlier as well.

globalgujaratnews

At the organization I work at, there are subtle and not-so-subtle differences between employees and “the help,” as it were. It is very common for people here to share food, whether it is their lunch, a pack of cookies, or something they bought at the store. However, this kind of food-sharing is never done with the maids. One incident that I heard from a teacher and friend also revealed to me an aspect of the social divide. A maid poured a bucket of water that she had been using for cleaning from the second floor, which was taken by the wind and accidentally splattered onto a teacher’s sari. He said that she reacted in an extremely condescending way that made the maid feel ashamed, yelling at her in a language she did not understand (probably in front of her child, who would be enrolled at the Centre), saying she would take pictures of her splattered sari and send it to the CEO, who should then fire her, while the maid was apologizing profusely without quite understanding. He said it would be unimaginable for the teacher to behave like this to a fellow teacher.

…

I’m not saying that dignity of labor lacks only in India, but it’s a recent realization that I’ve had that’s been made more poignant through the lens of cultural difference. Especially because I personally believe in the dignity of labor, and its absence means a lack of social acceptance and respect for those who work hard in order to give themselves and their families a chance at a better life.

Meetville

“What’s the scene?”: 6 Factors of Dating in Bangalore

We’re in the book section at Landmark in Orion Mall. Being the nerd that I am, I’m getting pretty excited about this 3-for-2 book sale that’s going on and browsing happily through the titles, when a white hardcover catches my eye. It features a big red and yellow balloon heart, and reads India in Love: Marriage and Sexuality in the 21^st Century. I sometimes suspect that the universe is quite the conspirator because I had just decided a week ago to attempt a blog post on dating in urban India. I happily show my boyfriend, who gives me a look, and tells me I better not use it to psychoanalyze his actions. I assure him I won’t.

The inside flap explains that India in Love explores the love, marriage, and sexual revolutions occurring in India today. I flip the book over and the back cover features the mesmerizing Ira Trivedi, and I’ve decided she’s just the woman who can give me a little background on the anecdotes about dating and relationships I’ve been able to glean from my friends here in Bangalore.

But first things first…

Before I delve into talking about dating in Bangalore, I’m going to be completely honest about some prejudices I might have in writing this post. During the past six months, I’ve received unwanted attention from men who either ignored or were unaware that I was not interested in their advances, which made me rather frustrated about male-female dynamics here. I’ve experienced an unfortunate episode in which a certain former friend of mine dealt with some unrequited feelings for me in a rather reprehensible way, and left me very upset and pissed off. After spending four years at Brown where people were extremely socially and politically conscious, I felt thrust into a world of cultural difference and gender relations that I was neither familiar nor comfortable with.

However, these experiences made me curious about what I didn’t understand about the social scene in Bangalore. They’ve also pushed me to be more assertive; to stand tall(-er than I already am) and to voice my opinion. My dear Bangalore, over the past six months, you have molded me into quite the feminist.

And by feminist, I mean…

Setting the scene

In addition to casual conversations I’ve had about relationships, I was able to talk to five of my friends, both male and female, about the dating scene here. They’re all in their 20s (except for one who is 19), and were able to give me some insights into the relationship dynamics of India’s Silicon Valley.

The reality is that the people I talked to belong to certain socioeconomic groups (namely middle- and upper-class) and had views on dating that aren’t shared by everyone. However, I’m sure that even if I interviewed 100 people, I would still get a wide range of opinions on the matter. Even Trivedi, the author of India in Love, admits that after interviewing over 500 people across India, she came to the conclusion that vastly different kinds of dating and relationships coexist in a culture with evolving social expectations. Joan Robinson is on point in declaring that, “Whatever you can rightly say about India, the opposite is also true.”

However, Trivedi does make an interesting point in her book about why she personally focuses on the middle class. She reasons that the “Great Indian Middle Class” will greatly influence what kind of behaviors and attitudes will become the norm in the future. Although only 3.5% of the population in India is estimated to be part of the middle class today, it is projected that by 2027, India will have the biggest middle-class population in the world. Furthermore, ties between the middle class may end up being stronger than what was traditionally seen as some of the great social ties of the past: caste and religion. India is also one of the world’s youngest countries, whose youth are growing up in a period of great technological, political, and economic change, which hints at the possibility of great social change as they come of age.

So what’s the scene? 

1. Acceptability. One of the first things I was curious about was how acceptable dating was in today’s society. Everyone I talked to agreed that it’s definitely more acceptable now than it was even one generation prior, but it still largely depends on the family. A family might be totally cool with their kids dating, or insist they date someone “appropriate” (perhaps of the same caste, religion, or class) or preferred if their kids didn’t date at all until they finished school because the parents felt dating was a waste of time when one could be studying.

2. Family influence. J explained to me that dating often comes with the specter of marriage, which has traditionally been about the joining of families, and thus brings up the importance of family compatibility. What if one side of the family feels uncomfortable that non-vegetarian food has been served at a family gathering, for example? Or that certain rituals or prayers are performed that they are not familiar with?

Therefore, she explains, some families still put significant weight on similarity – of caste, creed, and religion, in terms of a match. J told me about her aunt and uncle who felt they had to elope because even though they were the same religion and caste, their families spoke slightly different dialects of the same language, which was an upsetting signifier of difference.

D told me the story of her brother and his girlfriend, who have been together for nine years, but have kept their relationship a secret from D’s parents. This is because her brother’s girlfriend comes from a difficult family situation where the father has been remarried multiple times and also struggles with alcoholism, and her brother is afraid that his parents would make them separate because they wouldn’t want their son to be exposed to such a “bad” family situation.

The reality is though, that the dating scene is not about to shrink anytime soon. And if a young couple feels unable to confide in their parents about a romantic relationship they have chosen for themselves, a significant portion of their emotional support network is cut off. Perhaps the success of romantic relationships is also affected by parents’ willingness to be supportive, or at least provide a listening ear. Additionally, I know that many of my friends feel as if they have to lie to their parents about their whereabouts when they are actually with their significant other, which can strain the familial relationship.

3. Personal space. Something I realized personally is the large influence that the U.S.’s culture of dorming has, in terms of young adults moving away from home and family, and therefore moving away from those factors directly influencing their relationships. Another was the significance of personal space in terms of determining the culture of dating and relationships. I think a 20-year-old with his own apartment versus one who shares a room with several siblings may have a different kind of (physical) relationship with his significant other.

4. Community influence. I was struck by the large influence that family and the community at large had on young peoples’ relationships. P talked about how community had a lot of positive things to offer, like support in times of need, but also how neighborhood gossip meant that people’s private business was not very often kept private, and that one had to be aware of the public eye. He also affirmed something that I had heard before, which was that until recently, if a guy and girl were seen walking around together, it was assumed that they were either siblings or a married couple.

S told me about her neighbors’ reactions to her live-in relationship with a German expat. Although they lived in a nice apartment in an affluent neighborhood, she felt that her neighbors still looked down on her for living with a man who she wasn’t married to, and one neighbor even tried to talk her out of the relationship. In fact, it was just recently in 2010 that a verdict by the Supreme Court finally legalized live-in relationships in India. However, it still stipulated that the couple needed to meet some requirements such as holding themselves out to society as being “akin to spouses.”

5. Peer pressure. Another aspect that came up time and again was how couples were also very conscious of the opinions of their peers. R told me that her friends would question where her boyfriend was, especially if she was out and they weren’t together. They sometimes asked rather prying questions about their relationship as well. D also talked about how her friends would judge whether her boyfriend was “socially acceptable,” in terms of what social groups he was a part of, and how “cool” he was. I myself have felt how superficial “the scene” can be at bars and clubs, and how looks play a significant role here. It seems that grooming yourself impeccably here is a must. Even my boyfriend asked me once, “Why don’t you shave your arms, is that like a hippie thing?”

I was all like, damn, girls here must feel the pressure.

Just be pin-up pretty. NBD.

6. Gender dynamics. Something I was very curious about was the male-female dynamic in romantic relationships. Something that both J and D talked about was that either they themselves or their friends had felt the pressure to conform to how their boyfriends wanted them and expected them to be.

Another aspect was the pushiness of male suitors, which I myself have been rather frustrated by. In her book, Trivedi casually mentions, “Most Indian girls I know, including myself, have dealt with obsessive Indian male behaviour” (43). She ventures to say that aggressive male pursuits may come from a culture where the avenues of love and romance have not yet quite matured, and where people imitate the attitudes and behaviors present in pop culture.

For example, a typical Bollywood scenario may unfold as follows: “the hero aggressively pursues his love-interest, teasing her, chasing her, harassing her, displaying his love for her in front of her friends; the hero, who is usually an obsessive romantic will not accept no for an answer, and eventually wins her over” (44).

Over these past months, I’ve felt lost and angry in a culture where a woman’s ‘no’ is not accepted as a definitive ‘no.’ How does this come to be? Is it because women feel that asserting their desire is socially unacceptable and men assume that therefore they need to be forceful to get past this initial ‘no’? This dangerous norm of male entitlement has been extremely troubling for me.

Getting personal

I wrote this blog post because I had a hard time understanding the differences in dating culture between the U.S. and India. I hadn’t realized it at first, but this had caused me to fixate on finding and understanding difference. But, I had this revelation when I was talking to J over coffee. She started talking about how she cares about what her friends and family think about her boyfriend, how she felt it was important whether her and her boyfriend were compatible, if their lifestyles matched – things like that. Things I honestly wasn’t interested in because they were things I already knew; things I would question and consider myself in a relationship. And it hit me. I had been so single-minded in trying to find differences in dating culture, when at the core of it a lot of us have the same considerations, anxieties, and questions when relating to someone on a personal level. It was an important reminder for me to keep an inquiring but open mind.

Where do slums come from, ma?

As I’ve mentioned before, I work on the fundraising and marketing team of a nonprofit school, the Parikrma Humanity Foundation. Our four branches provide education to over 1500 children from 69 slum communities and 4 orphanages in Bangalore. Our office is located on the first floor of our Jayanagar School, which is merrily ambushed on a daily basis by blue-and-green uniformed children during recess. I love that my job environment includes the hustle and bustle of children learning, joking, playing, fighting, and radiating happiness. As Nandini, the Asteroid Class teacher once said, “It’s a whole different world once you step into the gate. You forget all your worries, they just fly away.” And she’s right. These kids never cease to amaze me with their energy, curiosity, and confidence.

A sweet smile

The Asteroid Class being rowdy

The self-proclaimed “C.K. Brown”

But scratch the surface and you begin to see a daily struggle. When I look up from these students’ smiles, I often catch in their eyes glimpses of the intense cravings for attention that they do not receive at home. I’ve seen students come in with raw wounds on their legs from dog bites. Others with burn scars on their face and across their arms. Many of them are underweight. Others struggle with attention and behavioral problems most likely stemming from their home environment. 

But Parikrma works because it’s modeled on the understanding that our students exist outside of our gates, and that this existence is often one of struggle. We provide our students with two meals a day (and an evening nutritional supplement), healthcare, and community development services. We understand that success for students from slum communities with many barriers to overcome requires a holistic approach, along with an attitude that does not discriminate against children whose circumstances are a result of structural poverty.

In May, before the beginning of the school year, I went with some teachers on a community visit to see the environment our students live in, which was just ten minutes away from where I stay. In front of almost every house, women were doing laundry on the street with water from a couple of communal taps. Half-opened doors revealed one-room houses featuring a bed and a TV. We passed by a row of tents made of blue tarp, which were supposed to be people’s permanent shelter. And although it was mid-afternoon, we met a student from our school that hadn’t yet eaten that day.

The teachers go on a community visit

A 10-minute walk from my house

And my reaction was, well, someone really needs to step it up (I edited out a lot of swearing in this sentence). I knew some of our students lived in even more difficult situations. How could people live happy, healthy existences in such a crowded, under-resourced environment? Then I wondered, how did these slum communities come to be? And how do they continue to exist? What kinds of environments are actually considered a slum? I felt that even as my eyes captured these images, my mind struggled to comprehend what I perceived.

What is a slum?

The UN-HABITAT defines a slum household as lacking any one of the following five elements:

• Access to water (safe, sufficient, and affordable)
• Sanitary conditions (including infrastructure such as waste disposal systems, sewers, etc.)
• Secure tenure (protection from eviction)
• Durable housing (safe, which can withstand natural elements)
• Sufficient living area (no more than 3 people sharing a room)

The Indian Census defines a slum as “residential areas where dwellings are unfit for human habitation by reasons of dilapidation, overcrowding, faulty arrangements and design of such buildings, narrowness or faulty arrangement of street, lack of ventilation, light, or sanitation facilities or any combination of these factors which are detrimental to the safety and health.”

To elaborate, slums are informal settlements which develop illegally on vacant land, and are thus constructed sans zoning regulations. Overcrowding is common, with many people sharing one room in which to cook, sleep, and carry out their daily activities. Due to lack of policing and municipal services, slums have higher incidences of violence and crime (with slum dwellers often being the victims) as well as risk of disease. And as I mentioned before, the quality of life in slums can greatly differ.

Today, its estimated that approximately one billion people in the world live in slums. In the developing world, one out of every three people in a city is a slum dweller. Okay. Pause for a second because I need to repeat that. Approximately one billion people in the world live in slums. That’s the kind of mind-blowing number that changes the way I comprehend the world. The UN-HABITAT projected in 2001 that if no concrete, organized action was taken, this number would reach 2 billion by 2030.

So where do slums come from, ma?

A significant reason for slum development is urbanization (including rural-urban migration). Slums are created when there is a significant amount of migration, with people coming to cities for better job opportunities and educational systems, coupled with insufficient governmental ability/willingness and infrastructure to accommodate such a large influx of people. The idea that urban centers have more job prospects developed with industrialization, and the first slum was actually the Five Points in New York City. 

Another reason has historically been colonialism and segregation. When colonialists expelled polluting industries (i.e. tanneries, etc.) and did not invest in any kind of infrastructure for these resettled businesses and the communities built around them, slums began to develop. A classic example is Dharavi in Mumbai, which is now one of India’s largest slums (and where the western world’s good-ole-favorite Slumdog Millionaire is set… although I’m not going to get into the controversy of how this film portrays India at the moment).

How slums thrive

The informal sector is a part of the economy that isn’t monitored or taxed by the government or some kind of regulatory agency. This sector often appears and grows as a result of opaque and disproportionate government regulations concerning business along with rigid labor laws and corrupt and inefficient bureaucracy. Therefore, informal businesses begin to flourish in an environment where it’s difficult for a business to become registered or licensed. This “shadow economy,” with substandard working conditions and wages, frequently employs individuals from slums who may lack the skills and education to be competitive within the formal sector.

There can be both licit and illicit parts of the informal economy. Licit activities include street vending, domestic work, shoe polishing and repair, construction, and trash picking (although they may require bribing local officials and police), while illicit activities include substances trafficking, prostitution, gambling, etc. The informal sector continues to exist because it provides services that aren’t easily found in the formal sector, and the formal economy is actually rather dependent on its informal half.

What are some measures being taken in response to the issue of slums?

Governments have tried to remove and relocate slums on the grounds that slum dwellers do not have rights to the property, but bulldozing huts and/or resettling families in cheap one-room apartments far away from the workplace has done nothing to improve slum dwellers’ lives.

Yerwada Slum Upgrade

Another approach has been “slum upgrading” in which slum areas are provided with basic infrastructure such as safe drinking water, electricity, water drainage systems, etc. while simultaneously legalizing the status of inhabitants on the land. The hope has been that giving slums this kind of infrastructure and security of tenure will lead residents to take more care of their area and engage their community to be productive. However, most slum upgrading projects have produced mixed results. Petty political conflicts, government corruption (including dependence of voting blocks in slums), and street violence often interrupt and impede the upgrading process.

The Executive Director of the UN-HABITAT admits that even slum upgrading does not address the underlying issue of poverty, and that there should be more policies which directly address the livelihoods of slum dwellers. In the future, a more holistic approach needs to be made looking at macro-level trends and challenges.

Slums are of course a much more complex issue, and poverty in each country comes with its own specific elements that confound the matter further. In India, for example, Dalits (formerly called “untouchables”) constitute 90% of the poorest of the poor and comprise a significant portion of the slum population due to historic caste-based discrimination and social ostracism. I’ve noticed that many of our students’ files denote that they come from a Scheduled Caste or Tribe.

Slums and the poverty cycle

Slums risk the institutionalization of poverty where hard-working individuals with a great deal of potential simply do not have the resources to break out of a cycle of poverty. On the first ride to the Jayanagar School in my boss’ car, she said one reason that poverty continues to exist in this country is because people have become used to its existence. I know she doesn’t speak for everyone, but I do think it’s true that we stop questioning our surroundings as we grow older because it’s human nature to habituate, and a necessary survival tactic to be able to adapt to our environment.

However, it’s critical to pause once in a while and question the world around us. I remember being struck by the sincerity of my graduation speaker’s words in that its really, really hard to keep caring about difficult issues like poverty, substandard educational systems, environmental degradation, racism, lack of adequate healthcare, etc. that seem insurmountable. It takes “courage and endurance and unflinching vulnerability” to keep caring. But it’s individuals that question, that care, and keep on caring even when it gets hard that can create change.

I’m not trying to be the girl who goes abroad and guilt trips people about the quality of life around the world. I’m not saying you need to give up your personal passions to go out there and fix the planet. For me, I personally felt the need to understand our students’ circumstances because I’m passionate about my mission-based work in education.

I’ve always believed in the wisdom of Dr. Howard Thurman: “Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” In the end, though, I do think we owe it to ourselves to be informed about our world, to explore, to inquire, and then perhaps, we’ll discover naturally what makes us come alive.

 …

References:

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bangalore/Slums-increasing-in-Bangalore/articleshow/21962048.cms

http://www.citiesalliance.org/About-slum-upgrading

http://ww2.unhabitat.org/mdg/

http://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/211/44579.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slum

http://greaterpacificcapital.com/transforming-indias-slums-a-critical-step-in-creating-the-new-india/

www.censusindia.gov.in/2011-Documents/Slum-26-09-13.pdf

Understanding Indian Jewelry and Solah Shringar

There is a small child across the street who jingles. Which, I assure you, is not another one of her quirky qualities (I tried to start a friendly conversation with her once. She adamantly held her tongue. Literally, she held her tongue between her point finger and thumb and refused to speak). I can hear the tinkling of her anklets from my second-floor apartment when I leave the window open as she runs between the hair salon her mother runs and the mobile recharge store her father runs next door.

…

A couple of months ago, I went out to buy myself some jewelry at Commercial Street. I don’t know if the salesmen were trying to bamboozle what they saw as a somewhat naïve foreigner, but they refused to sell toe rings in anything but pairs. Apparently it was bad luck. So I ended up buying myself a pair of braided silver toe rings.

…

“Akka, akka” a young student points at my toes, “Akka, are you married?”

“No.”

Apparently, in the Hindu tradition, silver toe rings on both feet symbolize a married woman.

So, finding that it was stylistically acceptable to just rock one toe ring, I took to this instead. No more marriage questions, I’d hoped. And yet, at the supermarket,“Akka!” I hear a voice down at my feet. An old sari-clad woman restocking the shelves points at my foot and then looks up concernedly. She doesn’t quite understand why only one of my toes is ringed.

Damn it, you just can’t win. I assure her it’s not a problem, I try to communicate through imaginative gesticulations that I’m neither married nor widowed nor something else…

…

Anklets and toe rings, bangles, bindis, flowers ornamenting hair. A visual richness blossoms from the kaleidoscope of multi-colored accessories complementing the already cheerful hues of sari-clad women. It’s a sight I’ll be sure to miss when I leave India. Although I think the younger generation appreciates a more minimalistic style, one can easily find all these accessories adorning just one individual of the older generation without a modicum of gaudiness.

Examining the solah shringar, the sixteen adornments that make up the ‘beautification process’ that a Hindu bride should observe on her wedding day, includes the many types of jewelry worn thereafter on a regular basis, and also gives compelling explanations as to why they are worn. I love the layers of meaning I find here, even if they are often lost in modernity and distilled to simply, because it looks nice.

 So why 16 adornments? Because historically it was believed that the 16 phases of the moon directly affected a woman’s menstrual cycle, and  that any negative effects of these phases could be nullified by the solah shringar, which would be favorable for conception.

According to Hindu mythology, the solah shringar is a celebration of the beauty of the woman. Nowadays though, a woman may not wear all  of the 16 adornments, especially those who appreciate a more minimalistic approach to fashion as I mentioned before. Now, what exactly  these 16 adornments are change depending on what source you read. These were the ones I saw recurring across various sources.

Many of these adornments worn by women are thought to bring luck, ward off evil spirits, and maintain health (and it was oft mentioned  that if they broke or were lost, it was a bad omen for the husband/marriage).

1. Anklets and toe rings 

Toe rings are usually worn on the second toe of each foot and are a symbol of a married woman. They are usually worn in pairs to symbolize a woman’s status as a sister and wife; if her brother or husband dies, one set is removed. If her husband were to pass, then her brother would offer her protection. Toe rings been around since Ramayana times, where it was mentioned that Sita, when abducted by Ravana, left behind her toe ring(s) so that lord Rama could find her.

You’ll probably never find a gold toe ring because gold is considered a metal of the gods (especially Lakshmi) and its inappropriate to wear below the waist.

From a reflexology point of view, it is believed that putting pressure on the second toe helps regulate the menstrual cycle (connected to conception) and the rings are worn on both feet to balance the energies being conducted from the earth to the body through the rings.

The wedding payal (anklets) usually have bells so one can hear the bride coming.

 2. Wedding dress

The dress can be a sari, lehenga, salwar kameez, etc. and is often a bright color (red and maroon are seen as auspicious) embroidered with gold thread.

 

 

 

3. Hairstyle (Keshapasharachana)

Keshapasharachana is the way the hair is worn for the wedding. Kesh means hair, pash means flock, and rachna means arrangement. I’ve been wondering for a long time what the significance of the braid (or the plait as it’s called here) is, and it seems like it symbolizes various trinities: the rivers of Ganga (Ganges), Yamuna, and Saraswati; the trinity of Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva; and another theory relating to marriage is the bride’s father’s house, her in-law’s house, and herself (who will unite these entities).

4. Flowers

The bride’s hair is adorned with flowers and accessories (usually the fragrant jasmine flower).

5. Mangtikka

Mangtikka is an accessory worn on the central parting of the hair on the forehead. The center of the forehead, often where “the mind’s eye” is depicted, is believed to house the ajna chakra which is home to intellect and intuition. This chakra also stands for preservation and is shown with two white petals and sometimes with the deity Ardhanarishvara, a hermaphrodite form of Shiva-Shakti, therefore symbolizing the union at many levels of man and woman.

 

6. Vermillion (Sindoor)

This is applied on the central parting of the hair, and it is sometimes mandated that a married woman wear it at all times. The groom puts sindoor on his wife’s hair parting for the first time during the wedding rituals (or perhaps his mother will, welcoming the bride to the family). It is believed to symbolize the energy of Parvati or Sati (the most devoted wife of Lord Shiva), which wards away bad spirits and safeguards her husband.

7. Bindi

The bindi replaces the mangtikka as an adornment worn on the forehead (remember: agna chakra) after the wedding. In the present day, it is worn by women of many religious dispositions and also as a purely decorative item. There are many different styles of bindi. My favorite style I’ve seen so far is worn by the Head of Academics at Parikrma where I work, and it looks like a small, black lightning bolt. Bindi comes from the Sanskrit word “bindu” meaning “point” or “drop.”

8. Kohl

Kohl is used to line the inner and outer rim of the bride’s eyelids, accentuating and highlighting her eyes. It was often homemade.

9. Nose ring

The practice of nose piercing and nose rings (nath) came about as part of cultural exchange when the Mughals spread their reach through India, as Muslim brides were mandated to wear them. It began appearing in Rajput paintings around the 15^th or 16^th century. In fact, ‘nath’ in Hindi includes the meanings of husband or master. In the past, single or widowed women could not wear the nath, but nowadays it’s a common sight on anyone here in India.

10. Earrings

Karn phool (earrings) is a Sanskrit word meaning flower of the ear. Earrings were often worn as visible indicators of a woman’s wealth, and the resulting elongated ear lobes from the heavy jewelry were also considered a sign of both wealth and beauty.

11. Necklaces and Mangal Sutra (“Holy Thread”) 

Necklaces worn at weddings are mostly gold, and sometimes embellished with precious stones and elaborate designs. There is a specific kind of necklace, often with gold and black beads, that the groom puts on the bride called the Mangal Sutra. During the ceremony, there are 3 knots that are tied into the necklace, sometimes by the groom or his sisters. The knots are meant to signify obedience to the husband, to her in-laws, and finally to God.However, the Mangal Sutra is not an integral part of the wedding ceremony across India, and there are also many regional variations in the design of the necklace and the knot-tying tradition.

Because necklaces are worn near the heart, they were thought to affect emotions. From ancient times, protective pendants and necklaces were worn to bring good luck and avert the evil eye.

12. Henna (Mehendi)

The bride’s hands and feet are decorated with intricate designs and patterns using mehendi paste. Once the mehendi is dried and washed off, it leaves behind an orange-red color, which symbolizes many things such as fertility, strength, and emotional and sexual connection between the bride and groom. One popular belief is that the darker the color of mehendi, the deeper the love between the would-be couple (aww).

13. Bangles and Armbands

Armbands are worn on the upper arm of the bride, and are usually made of gold with precious stones encrusted. The bangles, which hang by the wrists, are made either of gold, glass, metal, ivory, or lac in varying colors such as red, green, white, or gold depending on custom and tradition.

14. Thumb rings

Traditionally, many brides wore a dupatta (a cape/veil which would also cover her face) as part of her wedding attire. It would hinder her from seeing her partner, so the thumb ring was often embedded with small mirrors so she could catch a glimpse of her soon-to-be spouse.

15. Kamarband

Kamarband is an ornament tied around the waist. It is a beautiful belt, usually made of gold with precious gems, and aids in holding the sari in place (it also does a marvelous job in accentuating the waist of the bride 😉 ).

 16. Fragrance

Ittar is an all-natural perfume oil made from botanical sources, which keeps the bridge smelling fragrant throughout the long ceremony. Ittar is highly concentrated, devoid of alcohol and chemicals, and have been used in the East for thousands of years.

Crash, or Advanced Hydroplaning for Teens

 

Photo courtesy of Manas Saran

 

The warm drops of rain that intermittently drip from the sky soon begin to fall in more frequent splatters that polka dot the ground. Charles and I squeeze under the black and silver-lined umbrella that I’d just bought, but our shoulders dampen quickly. We decide to take an auto-rickshaw rather than walk to the main road for dinner, which is what we usually do when we get too lazy to cook for ourselves. Before even negotiating the price with the auto driver, who is still chatting on his phone, Charles slides in and asks, “Meter?” The driver shakes his head, but we quickly agree on a price of 50 rupees. Not bad in this weather. The auto driver, rather young and in a soft red t-shirt, cradles his cell phone between his ear and shoulder. He turns on the engine and we rattle down the road in the rain.

He heads toward the path that runs parallel to the train tracks, slowly, the three of us bumping up and down roughly on the wet, pebbly road. The engine stops once, twice, and finally refuses to start again. Charles and I huddle in the middle of the back seat, staring at the pouring rain slowly flooding the lane from within the cocoon of the auto. The driver turns around and tells us he’ll call someone else to pick us up soon. We’re stopped on the left-hand side of the quiet road by a concrete wall. Lightning flashes overhead and the rumbling of thunder quickly follows, but we’re in no rush and our conversation remains silly, something about Charles’ imaginary waterproof cellphone. He’d lost his unimaginary touchscreen one almost a month ago.

As we’re talking, a white car speeds by much too quickly, and my line of vision is drawn towards it. It suddenly runs off the road to our right, and catching an impressive amount of air, it totals and ultimately lands on its side about 20 meters away from us. The three of us in the auto stare, uncomprehending, for the eternity of several seconds. An object that large shouldn’t have done a barrel roll so easily like a plastic bag caught by the wind. And an object that large with people inside should definitely not have been doing any rolling at all. Finally, Charles declares in a calm voice, “We should help them.” There’s no one else in sight on the road. I’ll admit, I was dazed for a moment, thinking That could have rammed right into us.

I open the umbrella as Charles and I walk toward the car. We have both watched too many movies and secretly fear that the car might explode like in some action flick. Of course, it doesn’t. I see a boy in a blue t-shirt with white lettering through the sideways windshield standing in the car, unable to get the door open, which is now above his head. It feels awkward and uncanny to be in such close proximity to this scene. No airbags were deployed in car. And I would bet that these boys weren’t wearing seatbelts. No one here really does. Charles manages to unlatch the door, and the boy climbs out. He then opens the back door and manages to help the other two boys out of the vehicle. They can’t be much older than 18 or 19. The one with the plaid button-up shirt from the backseat has lost his specs, his wallet, his phone, his slippers, which he keeps repeating to everyone. He emptily tells his blue t-shirted friend, “I told you you were going too fast man.”

Other men begin to gather, eight or ten of them maybe, a biker with his helmet still on, a tall man with an umbrella who begins to scold the boys, “You should be ashamed, going too fast….” A couple of men stare with equal curiosity at the foreign girl with the umbrella. I move back slowly from the car. Traffic momentarily slows. The boys look harried and peer around anxiously.

My first instinct is to call 911, although that doesn’t apply here and my phone is out of credit. But it seems the boys are anxious to tip the car back over before the police come and they get in trouble. Five men push the car back onto the muddy ground as the boy who lost his specs wanders over and asks his other friend, “Am I cut? I got hit by my specs.” “Here,” I interject, “let me see.” I softly move his face to the left and cover him with my umbrella. “Just a scratch. Are you okay?” I ask him. He tells me he’s fine and looks a tad annoyed by my unhelpful question.

I look for Charles, who by this point is rather drenched. It looks like someone dunked him upside down into a swimming pool. We look at each other and understand that it’s time to go. We walk back to the auto driver and tell him we’ll just walk home, Charles needs a change of clothes. He’s too soggy and muddy to be comfortable. As we walk back to the apartment, we decide that tonight, we’ll eat in instead.

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If you want to know more about Bangalore traffic, take a glance at my first blog post.

Small Curiosities, Part One: Kolam

Lately, I’ve been working at the Parikrma office close to my apartment, which is about a 10 to 15 minute walk away. As I enter the more residential areas near the office (which is in the basement of my boss’ huge stone house), I started noticing designs in what seemed like chalk decorously adorning the ground in front of the gates of many houses that I passed. There are a lot of small curiosities that I’ve come across here, and I thought blogging might be a nice chance to investigate them a bit.

These designs are called kolam in the south of India, specifically in Tamil Nadu where kolams hold significant cultural value. They’re known by varying names in different states: alpana in Bengal, chaukpurna in Madhya Pradesh, rangoli in Maharashtra and Karnataka, puvidal in Kerala, etc. Apparently, the traditional ritual is that every morning before sunrise, the ground in front of the house is swept and cleaned with water by a female in the family (back in the day, and perhaps still in rural areas, it’s also cleaned with cow dung, which is believed to have antiseptic properties). The kolam is then drawn on the damp ground so the design will stick better. I thought these intricate designs were done with sticks of chalk, but they are often made with rice flour or chalk powder (and sometimes red brick power for contrast against the white), which is dropped in a controlled manner between two fingers, which takes quite a lot of skill.

These designs are impermanent and are often smudged out during the day by people entering and leaving the house, or by the rain or wind. Therefore, drawing a kolam is a daily ritual. I read that drawing a kolam forces the woman to crouch and balance on the ground (a type of yogasana), therefore serving as a form of exercise to strengthen her back for the day’s work, although I’m a bit skeptical of that.

I would categorize kolams into two main types, by technique. One are line kolams, created freehand with various geometrical patterns. The other are pulli kolams, in which any number of dots, ranging from 4 up to 108, are placed in a specific sequence (rectangular, triangular, hexagonal, etc.) and then the dots are either joined by lines to make a decorative patterns, or the lines loop around the dots to create a design (this is called kambi or “wire” kolam).

The significance of the kolam

As I explained, kolam was often drawn with rice flour, which served as food for insects and small birds, and therefore the kolam symbolized man’s co-existence with and consideration for other creatures. Rice flour is also an offering to Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, love, and prosperity, and the kolam is drawn in hopes of welcoming these elements into the home.

Mahalakshmi

Kolam designs are closed, meaning they look like they are drawn in one continuous motion and composed of one, unbroken line. This closed line is supposed to prevent evil from entering the home. Furthermore, these lines are associated with the eternal cycle of life, fertility, and death, as well as “continuity, totality, and eternity.” Also, it’s said that the dots in kolam represent men, and the lines women, because women weaves their lives around men.

Since one crosses a kolam entering from the outside world into home, it is said to bridge these two worlds (the public and the private), and also the human to the divine. There are also different types of kolam for different occasions (nalvaravu kolams for welcoming guests, thottil kolams for the naming ceremony for a baby, etc.). The kolam also signifies the well-being of a home; if someone has recently passed, there will be no kolam in the entryway.

However, nowadays, kolams have become more of a decorative ritual rather than a religious or spiritual one, especially in the urban context.

Where does kolam come from?

Once again, there’s a lot of conflicting data on the history of kolam, and on floor designs in general. One source says that it dates back to the Mahabharata (from 800-900 BCE), in which gopis (milkmaids) would draw kolams to distract themselves of the pain when Krishna was away. Others cite the Kama Sutra (compiled sometime between 200 BCE and 200 CE) and how kolam was one of the 64 arts to be mastered by women. Specifically to kolam, a researcher on this topic, Dr. Gift Siromoney, says the earliest references appear in Madurai Meenakshiammai Kuram in the 16^th century in Tamil literature. Others talk about its appearance in the Chitra Lakshana, India’s first treatise on painting.

Aside from clues in literary texts, the retired Professor Venkataraman of art history (he’s adorable!) from Madurai Kamaraj University says that kolams originated from people who lived by the sea and saw these designs in constellations and the general pattern of stars. He notes that people in the Indus Valley civilization were familiar with kolams.

So basically, who knows.

Kolam, mathematics, and science 

Kolam has recently garnered interest as being applicable to mathematics as well as computer science. Marcia Ascher calls Kolam an “ethnomathematical” activity (ethnomathematics looks at the mathematical accomplishments of various, usually nonwestern, cultural groups). There are online math units using kolams to examine symmetry as well as aiding in the of teaching geometry, graphing, and algebra.

No, in fact, I don’t know anything about math.

I wrote about Gift Siromoney before, and him and his colleagues have explored the mathematical quality of kolams and written computer programs to produce various families of kolam. Kolam families have common geometric characteristics that can be derived from each other. Mathematicians have also looked into the links between kolam and high-level concepts such as fractals and knot theory, and computer scientists have also come to appreciate their algorithmic nature.

As I mentioned before, there are many traditions which eventually become absorbed into the culture and are passed down without necessarily communicating their significance. It’s a fun thing to try and dig up and understand them, though.

Kolams found on the interwebs 🙂

The Fairness Fixation: Being Beautiful in India (and Asia)

The truth is, I’m still an outsider to Bangalore and India, so I don’t know how relevant this is (to today’s reality, to certain age or social groups, etc.). I’m just writing from my observations and some research. If anyone can enlighten me further on the realities of beauty, please, let’s have a conversation.

…

Cast your eyes upwards in Bangalore and gazing back at you, larger than life, is Aishwarya Rai’s milky-white countenance inviting you to buy L’Oreal Crème. Drive another block, there’s Kareena Kapoor’s fair complexion ornamented with Malabar gold and diamonds. A pale-skinned Caucasian beauty modeling the new Levi’s. It’s as if these serene, seductive billboard faces high above the city have attained some sort of heavenly status.

And unfortunately, this may not be too far from the truth. In India, it seems that whether it comes to hiring practices, matrimonial prospects, or the entertainment industry, a preference for fair skin prevails. Scanning the matrimonial ads in The Hindu, skin color is described amongst other details such as family background, academic degree, and horoscope. Looking at the first hundred ads, about one-third either sought a fair bride, or self-identified as fair, reflecting its importance in the marriage market.

Bollywood also has a serious lack of darker-skinned actresses. Nandita Das, the current spokeswoman of the Dark is Beautiful campaign (launched originally by Women of Worth in 2009), reveals that directors suggest that makeup artists lighten her skin tone if her role is an educated, middle- or upper-class woman, reflecting the bias against those with darker complexions. She says that even darker-skinned actresses will eventually alter their skin tone to look lighter as they spend more time in the industry.

“Dark and dusky” Nandita Das

India’s fashion industry is seeing a growing number of Caucasian models from Eastern Europe. In addition to being a reflection of a globalizing economy, this also reveals the preference for fair skin perpetuated by a globalizing media presence, in which western features and fairness are linked with the ability to attain “the good life” in terms of beauty and affluence. I’ve seen brands such as Woodland, People, Reliance Trends, and Megamart in Bangalore all featuring Caucasian models on their billboards.

Indian editions of international fashion magazines also feature Caucasian women in Indian-style clothing. The fashion features editor of Vogue India admits:

When we put the white model in Indian clothes, it is a cultural exchange. It shows India’s economic self-confidence […] Of course, it also caters to the general feeling that ‘fair’ and ‘beautiful’ go together. For a rickshaw-puller who earns $2 a day, seeing a fair-skinned woman is an escape, a fantasy.

Preference for paleness across Asia

The preference for fair skin is not limited to India, but exists as part of a trend that appears across the continent of Asia. A 2004 study by Synovate revealed that 38% of women in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Philippines, South Korea, and Taiwan used skin whitening products. In India, the fairness cream market has surpassed $400 million a year, and people spend more on skin lightening products than on Coca-Cola and tea. In Asia, people spend about $18 billion a year to appear lighter. And with the introduction of products such as Fair and Handsome, the target audience is no longer just women.

Now, take a look at this advertisement for Unilever’s Fair and Lovely:

Every Fair and Lovely ad features a segment where a despondent, darker-skinned woman is transformed into a beaming, pale-skinned version of herself. Fair and Lovely sells the procurement of social capital (via fairer skin) through the use of its product.

Skin whitening, however, can be dangerous. There are many creams that are not regulated by any government entity, and these products can include dangerous chemicals such as mercury, hydroquinone, and/or corticosteroids. In 2002, for example, two whitener creams in Hong Kong contained mercury levels that were between 9,000 and 65,000 times above the permissible dose, causing a toxic outbreak that affected over 1,000 people. However, there seems be no indication that these creams will lose their popularity any time soon.

The fairness fixation and colorism

So why this fixation? Colorism is an important factor to consider. It is discrimination that occurs within a population of people of color, in which people who are darker-skinned are considered inferior in various ways. Colorism, among other “-isms,” is a systemic issue, spanning across economic, political, and cultural systems. Ruby Hamad explains it well:

Colourism is oppression within oppression within oppression. This internalisation of white as the beauty ideal, as the most intelligent and desirable form of humanity, has led to communities (which many outsiders would presume are united), facing their own battles with discrimination and alienation in a bid to access the few privileges white society is willing to grant them.

Dr. Radhika Parameswaran, from the Cultural and India studies program at Indiana University, explains that for girls and women, colorism manifests itself in a multitude of ways in everyday life: being teased at school for their complexion, difficulty finding an office job or a partner, causing them to feel deficient and marginalized.

Looking back: Origins of the preference for paleness

Although we may look at the fairness phenomenon in the current day through the lens of colorism, it doesn’t quite explain how this trend began. As I tried to gain a clearer understanding of the origins of why pale skin was desired, I found various theories that at times competed or curiously intersected as to why the preference exists in Asia.

In some countries, such as China and Japan, it may have stemmed from their agriculture-based economies, in which pale skin meant that a person belonged to an aristocratic class and did not have to labor in the fields. There is even an old saying that states: “A fair complexion hides seven flaws.”

Among the articles I read concerning the preference for fairness in India, The Atlantic made the claim that, “While racism runs deep in India’s history, its roots intertwined with caste and colonialism, in today’s India, it finds expression in consumer behavior and corporate advertising.”

While I do agree that colorism may be propagated in the present day by the media and other sociocultural institutions, I found it problematic that the majority of articles simply referred to the caste system as the origin of colorism. I didn’t have enough of an understanding of the caste system, so I decided to investigate, and I was surprised by what I found…

Complex relations: Caste, colonialism, and color

Looking into the relationship between these three topics, I was astounded by the amount of misinformation and conflicting data that I found from so-called reputable sources. An article by Justice Markandey Katju of the Supreme Court of India touted the “racial origins” of the caste system by referring to the Hindu term for social classes, varna vyayastha, and how varna in the initial Sanskrit meant color. He also employed the Aryan invasion theory as a contributing factor to the dominance of white skin: that lighter-skinned Aryan invaders from the northwest conquered the darker-skinned native Dravidians inhabiting India.

Unfortunately, it seems like explanations like these are an oversimplification. For example, varna does not merely mean color. The root of the word is derived from the Sanskrit vr, meaning “to cover, to envelop,” and the full meaning includes “outward appearance, exterior, form, figure, shape, and color” (thank you Wiki). Furthermore, the Encyclopedia Britannica’s page on race ideologies also asserts that the caste system was not based primarily on color or a concept of race, which is something that is also backed by Murali Balaji, Director of Education and Curriculum Reform for the Hindu American Foundation, who cites that there is absolutely no archaeological or scientific evidence that any such Aryan invaders came to conquer darker-skinned indigenous groups and put a “colorist” or racist system into place.

Therefore, it does not make sense to equate or correlate caste with color, and use them as a simple base for explaining present-day social discrimination. Even looking at a single family unit, there exists a spectrum of hues, making a caste system based on skin tones hard to imagine. However, although color was not inherent in the caste system, it is possible that similar to Japan and China, those with higher status and not involved in manual labor could avoid darkening their natural skin tones by staying out of the sun.

I do believe though, that the long history of colonialism (especially by the British) did significantly contribute to an intertwining of color and status. Colonial conquerors tend to favor those who are similar to themselves, i.e. those with fairer complexions, and would hire them more readily and perhaps even include them in circles of power, therefore linking fairness to the possibilities of affluence, influence, and wealth.

Of course, there are many more subtleties in relation to this topic, and I know this is just the tip of the iceberg, but I felt it was important to understand the origins of the phenomenon of skin whitening beyond the plain legacy of “caste and colonialism.” Although Nandita Das says: “I don’t believe we have to keep going back into history […] We’re not just a product of our traditions: we’re also part of the globalized world. Today, the fact that such discrimination continues to exist is a function of consumerism. The market is waiting to cash in on people’s hidden aspirations,” I did feel the need to go back in time and attempt to disentangle some of the reasons why this fixation developed. Sometimes, it’s important to look back, at least briefly, to understand how to move forward.