DRAWING WITH LIGHT

This happens to be my 5oth post on my blog and so I played a game with myself.50--milestone--journey--life--memories--photos.................
This is where I got stuck and invariably was sucked into memories of life captured in some beautiful photos.
The very first that I have of myself is black and white,dog-eared and fragile.In it I am a fat plump baby in my mom's lap on the famous The Ridge ,Shimla,frowning at the photographer.It attains special significance because I believe it will always give me the warmth of my mom's lap,as long as I live.
Another favourite one from childhood is of a pet goat with my aunt,I still can't decide who looks more beautiful.
Our marriage photos are the no comments category,what can one say about one's over-dressed,stressed and fatigued avatar.
My daughter's first picture is of course special,but it is also differnt cause it was from a phone camera.
Then there are the digital types,the ones we can't smeell,hold or put in a frame on a wall
,but can post them directly on our social networks.The saying a photo never lies doesn't hold true now,we can manipulate and adapt images.should we ,I wonder....



Incidentally the word "photograph" is based on the Greek (phos) "light" and  (graphê) "write" or "representation by means of lines" or "drawing", together meaning "drawing with light".

SILENCE

The silence
is now a constant noise
inside me.

It thrives
on my dreams,
it survives on
my smiles.

Can it empty me completely?
Perhaps someday
when I'll have
no more questions to ask
no more answers to give.

JUST LET THEM BE...

Until a few years ago,summers were synonymous with vacations,family holidays,indoor games and visits to grandparents.Things have changed a lot since then.
Internet and TV are the only constant pals,available all the time at just the touch of a button,games means video games and summers mean even more hardwork at various so-called hobby classes.
To add to this madness ,has emerged a new category of occupation for children - tv shows.Children are all over the place-singing and dancing (the only two worthwhile talents in this form of media).
Anxious and over-excited parents line up for auditions along with kids in thousands.The sweltering heat doing little to deter them from their mission fame.

Nobody thinks even once about how these shows can open the kids to a level of public scrutiny, of shame and of failure.In our desparation for a celebrity status for our kid and  for ourselves we forget the basic rule of parenting :just let them be.
They have a whole life to prove their mettle in some thing or the other,so why hasten the process of being in the rat -race.
We must stop before we completely annihilate childhood,become an all-adult ruthless society and childhood a thing books say tales about.

Random Thoughts this Mother's Day

• In traditional societies like India ,when children are named,mostly they only take the father's family name.
• India still has one of the highest rates in the world of mother's dying during childbirth.
• India is in the unenviable position of 73rd out of 77 middle-income countries rated by the new 'Save the Children' report for the 'best place to be a mother'.
• It is a sham to celebrate mothers in a society that still despisess the birth of a girl child.Surprisingly one of the worst sex-ratio and highest female infanticide rates is of the south delhi district of delhi (the so -called liberal.educated modern and rich.)

SHAME AND HONOR

A budding journalist is allegedly killed by her own family for falling in love with a boy from another caste.
A young man, allegedly killed for having a relationship with a  politician's daughter.

Scan the headlines,and there are growing numbers of honour crimes every day.
So is our better educated and liberal society of today indeed as brutal and archaic as it always was?
Has empowerment of women done nothing towards sensitising traditional patriarchal systems?
Shame and honour are still the only two important words to judge women?

In India still the honour of a household is inextricably linked to the reputation of the women who live there.Shame is an index of female reputation, just as honour is an index of male.
The concept of honor used to rationalize abuse and killing of women is founded on the idea that a family's honor depends on the behavior of it's women; behavior that must be controlled.
Women do not have a claim to honor as individuals, separate from their roles within a family, clan ,caste ,community or tribal unit. Any breach or suspected breach of sexual codes by these women is viewed as a potent assault on the "man's honor", the "family's honor".
To be rid of "shame" and restore "honor", the woman offender must be punished. Submissiveness in these cultures is considered equivalent to sexual purity.
Today when we send our daughters to study and work are we also ready to give them the right to make their own decisions.
The recent Nirupama Pathak's gruesome murder has only brought a mirror to us, to moms especially.
We have to view our shame and honor in new contexts and break the silence and the need to be accomplices in eradicating our own daughters.