A cat sized hole in my soul

Small feet make big impressions
they taught me life's hardest lessons
to risk loving when nothing's certain
not even permanence or a return of affection

seeking him out in the night's shadows
searching corners for his noisy presence
crying over things he left behind
his favourite toy, a footprint on the wall

My cat my hero my soul companion
you are and will be missed forever...

I will never be able to explain or put in words

just how and how much I loved you

i wonder why i make this mistake again
of loving fleeting images of security
when in truth none exists
except the knowledge that I am here and I love

Pig!

As I mentioned in my earlier post, I'm feeling a bit fluey at the moment and I'm hoping that I haven't caught the exotic variety of flu doing the rounds at the moment. My earlier post which was supposed to be an ode to pigs turned out to be a rant about the insensitivity of Indian society (how do I do that?), so I decided to write about pigs in a separate post.
The city I'm living in at the moment has quite a few of them. Sludge grey porkers with their snouts constantly buried in a garbage heap. They're quite intelligent actually! If only they took their snouts out of their food troughs we could get a glimpse of this famous intelligence of theirs.
I watched a TV show a long time ago that sought to demonstrate how intelligent pigs were by getting them to move cursors across computer screens in exchange for treats. After performing several tests on them, researchers deduced that pigs were the most intelligent domesticated animal in the world. Don't believe me? Read this: http://mammals.suite101.com/article.cfm/the_intelligent_pig. This flu must be their way of "trying to take over the world" Narf!
They may be intelligent but I doubt they're intelligent enough to discern good food from bad. Thats pretty basic stuff which even my cat knows. Randomly shovelling junk into your mouth is not the behaviour of an intelligent, discerning animal (said the 'higher mammal' while stuffing herself with haldiram's aloo bujia). But seriously, no wonder they have tapeworms and god knows what else. They're not too bright otherwise either. I recently saw a pig with a bottle cap stuck to its foot. It walked miles without making the slightest effort to remove the cap whereas it doesnt take my dog more than a second to remove the sweater I put on her in winter.
Whats my point?... Good question. I don't have a point. Just thought that I might as well cash into swine hysteria. The internets abuzz with talk of the dreaded and deadly swine flu. No harm in my itty bitty blog getting a bit of publicity. Muhahahahaha! I honestly believe pigs are alright. Their shenanigans add a bit of interest to an otherwise boring sidewalk (especially how they do the most disgusting things without any morally upright person being able to stop them. Ha!). In a sense pigs are a really cool metaphor for human hypocrisy (I'm not stealing from Charles Manson). We do the same things they do ( haldiram's being a case in point), we just hide it better.

Losing touch with my humanity

*Sniff. I've got the flu. Considering that I stay in Pune, I'm hoping that it isn't the porcine variety. I'm talking about the swine flu. Its all the rage in the media these days. I can just imagine what newsrooms across the country must be like. "Dying child's parents on line one. I think we've got sunday's front page story!". " A stampede you say! Only 4 dead? Call us after an hour." Alright, thats probably not what its like but I couldn't resist throwing in a little black humour to make my point which is, why do we need a celebrity virus to get our country to talk about the abysmal state of public health care? The only answer I can come up with is that we have become so immune to seeing people suffer that their plight has just faded into the background and assumed less importance over our own. And when I say we, I'm talking about myself as well.
I was walking down a crowded street yesterday when I was accosted by a small girl in her early teens with a little steel lunch box minus its lid. It was crowded, I was feeling sick and I really just wanted to catch a bus and get back home. So I decided to ignore her. She wasn't the type to admit defeat and walk away. As I started to walk away, I could hear her quick shuffling steps that weren't quick enough to overtake me but were quick enough to maintain an annoyingly close distance to me as I tried to walk away. I stopped and tried to cross the road and to my surprise, the little wild cat took a shot at me, lunch box and all. Glaring at her after I crossed the road I realized that she had a big rock with her as well (no wonder my arm hurt so much). When she saw me looking at her, she lifted her hand and pointed at me all the while hurling abuses at me from across the road. I was so surprised. I hardly expected her to attack me. Should I have felt angry with her for expecting neigh demanding money from me? Like it was her birthright... I don't know, but I found myself feeling absolutely wretched instead. Would it have taken me all that much time to just give her a coin or two? Probably not. Why didn't I? That one rupee coin may have made a big difference to her day. I realized that I didn't giver her money because to me she was just a concept. Just another nameless, faceless poor girl. I would surely find another poor girl over the week who would allow me to assauge my guilt over this little incident. Like theres just one little girl in this whole country. That was a pretty pathetic reason.
Everyone talks about poverty so we're tired of hearing about it?... Movies about poverty are so 'inconvenient'... Look away, there's other 'good stuff' happening in this country... Look away, our actors are walking the red carpet at the oscars... Look away, I can't believe Dhoni asked us to cheer for Pakistan. How could he?... But DON'T look away. Our poor are vulnerable to being indoctrinated with Naxal ideologies, they are vulnerable to being indoctrinated with islamist extremism, they are working with countries like China to bring about the downfall of their own country... and they don't even know it. All they want is a little attention. Some development. A voice.
Forget the poor, today finding a way to relate to another person has to be a conscious effort. If we don't make that effort, we just settle into the rat race and risk losing our humanity. We have so many avenues that encourage hyper-individuality but none that balance it out. If we continue ignoring the problems the people of our country face, we're going to be caught with our pants down. Do you really believe the rebellion in the forests of AP are not going to reach the streets of Mumbai soon? Think again. The poor don't stay powerless forever. Every order changes.

Holy Dog

Who are we kidding?

There's such a dearth of visionaries in Indian politics. Under-represented communities have to settle for the next best thing... megalomaniacs with a severe chip on their shoulder who ruthlessly claw their way to the top. Once they reach the top they don't seem to know what to do. Having political representation is undoubtedly a quintessential aspect of social mobility but what are we settling for? At the expense of what?

Its not as if this peculiar malady has escaped the other stratas of India's chaotic billions. Getting access to power by hook or by crook comes first. When the time comes to execute power, most of India's politicians fail the peter parker test. What they are great at, is acting offended. What professionals! Their most common refuge is to act incensed at the 'violation' of their culture of which they know scant little. Culture and religion (read Hinduism) are such efficient masks for inefficiency, the lack of talent and colossal apathy. It's a shame that so many supposed future leaders of India are firm worshipers at the altar of identity politics. They don't spare us their rhetoric even during times of crisis.

Hinduism as a religion has ceased to exist. All thats left in its place are caste and shallow morality. When I hear about the kind of caste related atrocities that occur in India I can't help feeling that Hinduism wasn't all that ahead of its time like so many people claim it was, if its fathers found it necessary to differentiate people on the basis of their work, what they ate and their colour. Apartheid takes place in India. It's somehow managed to remain one of India's best kept secrets. The world community is still quite oblivious to the inhuman treatment of dalits in India. If you're a part of the upper caste and you don't think you're biased think twice. Racism is ingrained in everyone in India.

I still believe in Indian democracy. There are some really good people waiting for a chance to make some real change. For them to make a difference in our fickle society requires us to be patient so as to let their decisions bear fruit.

If you've read this post and you're Indian then you've already typecast me as belonging to a particular community. My only answer to you is to say that I don't belong anywhere and I don't want to belong anywhere. Identity is a myth. We're all same.

A Diseased Society

This article was written last year on December 1 to commemorate World AIDS Day. It is in need of a lot of editing and is probably tedious and boring but I hope someone is able to actually read all of it and give me feedback as well...

It’s that time of the year again, a time when the issue of HIV- AIDS is brought into in order to debate the possible remedies that can be undertaken to curb this crisis. World AIDS Day, observed December 1 each year, is dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of HIV infection. Governments, International Organisations and charities all over the world work towards increasing AIDS awareness with renewed fervour on this day. They set goals in advance to reduce the incidence of infection as well as to increase awareness, and create themes for each year. From its inception in 2004, UNAIDS has spearheaded the World AIDS Day campaign choosing annual themes in consultation with other global health organisations. In 2005 this responsibility was turned over to World AIDS Campaign (WAC), who chose Stop AIDS: Keep the Promise as the main theme for World AIDS Day observances through 2010. The theme this year is ‘Stop AIDS. Keep the promise – Leadership’. Considering that 95% of people infected with HIV live in developing countries of which India has the second largest population living with the disease, we must be thankful that at least one day out of 365 has been dedicated towards spreading awareness about the disease. Woefully, the average Indian remains completely ignorant of the disease most of the time until it’s brought to his/her attention - for a brief period may I add- by a celebrity working for a global AIDS awareness organisation or when World AIDS Day is observed. In some cases people are made aware of the disease when someone they know contracts HIV. For the rest of the year people feel that AIDS is a disease that affects only those people who live on the fringes of society, those ‘other’ people who are condemned because they do things that haven’t received social sanction. Social responses to people with AIDS have been overwhelmingly negative in the few studies that have been conducted in India. For example, 36 per cent of respondents in one study felt it would be better if infected individuals killed themselves; the same percentage believed that infected people deserved their fate (Ambati, Ambati & Rao, 1997). Furthermore, in this same study, 34 percent of respondents said they would not associate with people with AIDS, while about one-fifth stated that AIDS was a punishment from God. A hostility index developed in this study revealed that almost 90 per cent of respondents harboured at least one hostile view, and more than half held three or more such views.

Such reactions make it impossible for a person with the disease to even attempt testing themselves for it, leave alone making their condition known to the people around them. This hostility limits the effectiveness of AIDS related awareness programs in India and can be attributed to the general levels of knowledge about HIV and AIDS and in particular to the causes of AIDS and the routes of HIV transmission. Most people are aware of how serious the illness is. They are also aware that as of now, there is no cure. What they do not know is that it isn’t easily transmitted, that with the right medication, people can live out their natural lifespan with HIV and die of natural causes. HIV isn’t the death sentence it was 10 to 15 years ago. The possibility of finding a cure is imminent. There is no need to fear it to the extent of neglecting, rejecting and denying the existence of people with HIV. Nevertheless, it is a disease to be extremely wary of, a disease that commands constant vigilance. It’s a single act of imprudence that alters your life forever.

Owing to the extra baggage that comes with being HIV positive- that of why, how and when-, coping with the disease is emotionally very difficult. People with HIV have to face discrimination from quarters they never expected to turn against them. Studies have documented HIV/AIDS- related Discrimination, Stigmatization and Denial in contexts such as the family, the community, the health care system, and the workplace. Discriminatory restrictions have also been reported in relation to travel, migration, insurance and health benefits. Family responses to infected relatives are heavily influenced by the community perception of the disease. The family may fear social isolation and hence may insist on concealing the diagnosis thus straining relationships within the family as well affecting the overall analysis of the extent of the epidemic. People with HIV are incorrectly perceived to be a source of infection to others by just being in their presence. Such myths are fuelled by misconceptions regarding the transmission of the virus. Many people believe that mosquito bites, sharing toilet seats and swimming pools with people with HIV would endanger them as well. These beliefs are completely misconstrued and should not be encouraged.

The internet is replete with websites offering every sort of information about HIV and AIDS, from the initial symptoms, to the means of contracting the illness to counselling for people infected with the virus as well as advice columns that answer every bizarre, outlandish and farfetched anxiety of people who are afraid that they have HIV. In India, government hospitals in every state provide free counselling and guidance for people who fear they have contracted the infection or people who are trying to cope with it, under the guidance of the National AIDS Control Organisation.

And yet HIV/AIDS remains a very real threat to the survival of the human species, if global warming, nuclear warfare and terrorism don’t kill us first. The speed with which it is spreading is of growing concern to governments all around the World. In India alone, the incidence of HIV infections is projected to be around 20- 25 million by 2010 (UNAIDS, 2002). India has the second largest population of individuals with HIV/AIDS although it lags behind Sub-Saharan countries quite substantially in this regard. What could possibly be the reason behind such an epidemic? In my opinion, this epidemic has been primarily caused by the inability of the average Indian to talk about taboo topics such as sex, infidelity and drug abuse. Even sex workers find it difficult to talk to each other about sex and HIV. They find it easier to talk to an outsider as they feel that foreigners aren’t restricted by the same social mores and rules (Interview with Raney Aronson, Frontline, June 2004). Such denial discourages people from getting tested thus endangering all the people they get involved with at later dates, from talking about their infection and from leading normal lives if they are indeed infected.
It appears that HIV is an infection that exposes the hypocrisy of society. The HIV epidemic in India has brought out several issues in Indian society that have always been known to have existed but have never been acknowledged. One such issue is that of the sale of young girls into prostitution. What sort of desperation and poverty would force a father to sell his daughter into prostitution? If we are to combat this epidemic we have to acknowledge several negative aspects of our society that though unpleasant, exist nonetheless. Once we overcome this barrier we may be able to contain the spread of this deadly disease that robs a person of their dignity and peace of mind while forcing them to face the reality of their existence, that they have lived in ignorance of, for all their ‘healthy’ life, – that of their inevitable death, from AIDS or otherwise. In actuality, HIV isn't really a death sentence, it's just a way to make a shorter period of your life count for more.

by Shivani Bail

The Indian dream

It’s every teenager’s dream to board a gleaming plane to study in a land far away where students from all over the world come to study. The United Kingdom, The United States of America or Australia are the study destinations most students prefer. Developed countries hold a lot of allure for students from the third world. They represent a standard of living and an obscene level of affluence that the youth of all third world countries aspire for and hope to bring to their own homeland. Despite this prevailing trend, we find that a large population of students choose to come to India for further studies. You heard me right! India, with its corrupt officials, spit streaked streets and steady supply of impoverished villagers crowding city streets, who resort to begging in their desperation to survive, is the desired destination for students from Mauritius, Srilanka, Iran, Iraq, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Afghanistan and several African nations apart from others. But why India? “We have heard that it’s a good country to study Law, Medicine and Business Studies in, besides, I have two elder sisters and both of them have studied in India. They are doing very well back home,” says Stephen Kimundi of Kenya who has spent several years in Pune and has enjoyed his stay here considerably. Wahid Hamidy of Afghanistan came to India on an ICCR scholarship and plans on finishing his MBA and returning to his country to help rebuild it. Says Kazi Asaduzzaman of Bangladesh, “I came to India because there is a lot of student politics in my country. Here there’s a lot more freedom.”

As I discovered on the unique occasion of International Student’s Day celebrated by Symbiosis University on July 31, Pune city plays host to a multitude of cultures of people from all over the world. Dr S B Majumdar, the president of the University, decided to put aside one day of the year to celebrate this diversity and to give students, far away from their home, a chance to feel welcomed and taken care of. Says Hamidy, “Dr Majumdar sees everyone as equal irrespective of race, class or caste. In fact the name of his institution itself signifies this mindset of his. In a society we have to respect each other since we are a part of each other.” Mr Hamidy, has resided in Pune for several years now and was awarded the Most Outstanding International Student award for this year. Apart from Symbiosis, several colleges in the city attract international students. It isn’t for nothing that Pune is called the Oxford of the east.

However, does Pune live up to its reputation? Is it hospitable to students? Says Kimundi “I love Pune. I have visited Mumbai too but I didn’t like it as its pollution, crowds and traffic were too much for me to handle.” Although Pune may be marginally better than Mumbai when it comes to traffic or pollution, do the citizens of Pune treat foreign students like outsiders or do they exhibit an attitude of atithi devo bhava to their foreign friends?

Carrying the hopes and dreams of their countries, most of the time these bright students tackle more than just their studies when they land in India. It’s a struggle to get the smallest of things done. Getting themselves registered at the police station, finding a decent place to stay or even catching an auto becomes an ordeal since they look different and talk differently. People try to cheat them at every step. Unfortunately racism isn’t just a phenomenon in the west. Our obsession with fair skin (as made evident with just a perfunctory glance at the matrimonial column in our local paper) has made us adopt a superior attitude, (akin to that of the British towards us) towards people from African nations who as a race are darker than us. “We do find that Indians favour fair skinned people. Sometimes people stare at us but we have learnt to ignore people who taunt us and talk negatively. Every society has its pros and cons. The positive aspect of India is that we also have many friends from all over the city, who are willing to help us out,” says Kimundi. While students from Africa face a problem of looking different, students from Bangladesh and the Middle East are discriminated against because they talk differently. “Language is a problem for us in the beginning. Even our pronunciations mark us out as foreigners. The more time we spend here however, the less trouble we get into,” says Asaduzzaman. Hamidy has given some thought to this issue. He says, “Most often, people who are ignorant about who we are and where we have come from, treat us differently. Rickshaw drivers, policemen and landlords try to cheat us but our classmates and professors treat us very well.” These seem to be problems every student faces when they go to a new place. In fact, Pune seems to be quite in tune with the culture and needs of an international student community. Is the rest of India the same way?

Pune is a city that accepts the cultural differences of an international student community, hence it can be said that it consists of a tolerant society. However, our tolerance is always under threat. If a person finds a headscarf offensive today, they might find jeans offensive tomorrow. The narrow line between discipline and dictatorship is often trespassed in the name of morality. As global citizens we mustn’t try to enforce our views on people. We must understand, empathise and refrain from making a judgment for as along as possible.

We live in a globalised world. Boundaries are becoming meaningless. Warfare can take any form and often economic sanctions prove to be more fatal than a war with tanks and missiles. In such a situation it is important for us to be sensitive to and aware of the differences we share with people all over the world. Although racism in our country stems more from ignorance than from malice or hatred towards a particular race, as a society, ignorance can’t be our excuse anymore.

by Shivani Bail