Broken Bangles: Travel, Stories, Thoughts

  ( Statue of Yakshi by renowned sculptor Kanayi Kunjiraman, Malampuzha Dam, Kerala; image source: Ranjithsiji, Wikipedia) Kerala's White-Sari-clad Vampire  Her story is terror-evoking and awe-inspiring. She is culturally tethered to the gender politics of the society in which she exists as a myth and lore. The girls in a small region in south India (the Malayalam-speaking population) grew up listening to the terrifying Yakshi stories and assimilated from them, an odd feeling of empowerment. The Yakshis in these stories are the spirits of women wronged and killed by men. A Yakshi kills men and completes her revenge, not only on the individual who wronged her but the whole bunch of ‘mankind’. Her feet do not touch the earth when she walks. This is how you can know her for what she is. She will wait for her victims in twilight, dawns and dusks, on the edges of dark nights. She has long black hair that almost reaches her feet. Her lips are full and crimson, her eyelashes thick an...

photo source: flickr.com Domesticated and Powerless These are sketches of the lives of Indian women, how their lives still are not their own and how they navigate the man’s world. Irrespective of religion, caste or regional differences, an average housewife in India wakes up very early and makes tea or coffee for the entire family first.  If she is a housewife, she must cook for the children and the adults in the family.  Husbands and other male adults in the family would be seen sipping their morning tea or coffee sitting in a chair on the front verandah and reading the newspaper in perfect reverie.  The wife never gets a chance to sit like that, relax, or read a newspaper, as the first thing in the morning.  She could be seen running around in the house, scolding children and being scolded by her husband.  The gender division is deep-rooted and woven into the fabric of domestic life.  It is so naturalised that no one finds anything odd about it. Often, ma...