Two gamchhas, a little debt and a few other tools.

I have never been able to exactly explain to people why I do not call myself a feminist. Actually I have not been able to do that to myself very well either. Inspite of considerable and consistent temptation, there’s always been that little voice that says, “Maybe….”

Having done much soul searching, I have my own theories on this and one of them is this:

Feminism left out the nitty gritty. And since I have a practical rather than intellectual bent of mind, I remained skeptical about being told what to do, but not how to do it.

Dont get me wrong, I am a great supporter of feminism, and deeply respect this ideology and its accompanying struggle. I am part of it and it is a part of me. I have lived my life by its thinking. My first encounter with de Beauvoir produced in me the same excitement and fascination as my first reading of Marx. (Like a good Bengali, I had read the latter before the former)

However, while it did radicalize my life, it did not answer all my questions. There were words that set fire to your soul, - ““Those of us who stand outside the circle of this society's definition of acceptable women; those of us who have been forged in the crucibles of difference - know that survival is not an academic skill...For the master's tools will not dismantle the master's house. They will never allow us to bring about genuine change.” 

But where were our tools? Here I was, in strength, support and solidarity with a million other women and a spattering of men, ready to break down things, but our hands were empty. And with empty hands, ladies and gentlemen, the struggle naught availeth. Unless you are a karate expert, of course.
 

Give my practical bent of mind, I shall now discuss two tools as examples of how this impacted feminism and my own classification/non classification as a feminist. These are explained below with real life examples:

Example 1:

For once, they asked before I asked.  Since I always struggled to find a vernacular for this, and since that gave rise to a manner of anxieties and misunderstandings,  I was greatly relieved. My two escorts, with a great air of importance, walked me along purposefully. And  they kept telling everyone they met, where I was being taken. Everyone nodded and smiled and I smiled back uncertainly. I reached the house to find all the ladies of the house gathered to welcome me. Quite nonplussed, I hummed and hawed but everyone else chattered away till someone said, “Orey! Give Didi the gamchhas!”

Before I could recover from this welcome scene, two ‘gamchhas’ were pressed into my hand. And I was  hustled along till I reached the building. The toilets were surrounded by a discreet wall and the chattering women stood aside as  I walked to the toilets.

To my great relief, the group had dispersed by the time I emerged. Not knowing what to do with the gamchhas I left them behind on a shelf in the toilets. I stayed I the same house that night to find that this was the only pucca toilet I the village and was used by no one. But since it was a status symbol for the family, it was kept incredibly clean. Over the next few moths, I stayed over at this village often, or dropped by en route to and fro the interiors. As a development professional in a dairy cooperative project, I spent two thirds of my time in these villages of South Bengal. More often than not, it was the luxury of a clean and private toilet that brought me here. (And I did, eventually figure out what the two gamchhas were for.)

These were my pre-feminist days, and I took the absence of toilets as an infrastructural one rather than a patriarchal one. Rural India, I thought and left it at that. But it was one of the biggest challenges of field work, multiplied a million times during menstruation.   And one of the first things that I thought of when I started reading feminism was “Oh my God, they left out the toilets!”

And over the years I felt a thousand times and more, as to how different life would have been for the women in these villages if there were more toilets and bathing spaces for women. How many more women would be at the markets to sell as well as buy.  Look at the inequality – we can buy in the markets, but are limited from selling. Hundreds of women have told me that they cannot sit regularly at the mandis and aarhats (local markets) as there are no toilets. And bathing? An experiment for anyone of you who, reading this is thinking to himself or herself – too far fetched, this is taking feminism too far, linking markets to bathrooms. I suggest that all such skeptics spend one week in summer having or trying to have a bath in an open space accessible by public.

And when I think of the billion dollar cosmetics industry, and now the fitness epidemic, because that is what it is, I cannot think of the lack of sanitation for women as an infrastructural problem any more. 

And so to my next example –

Like ABBA sang, it’s a rich man’s world. Not a rich woman’s.  In one of her talks that I had attended, Kamla Bhasin had said that in all her questioning of the aspirations of women, no women told her they wanted to be rich. And she rued the fact that there were still so few rich women. As do I, as I rue the fact that if I had learnt to treat money like men do, I myself might have been a rich woman. Money still remains a male bastion. If you don’t believe me, go look at the statistics of female bankers and stock brokers. (Just because I am writing a blog doesn’t mean I will do all the hard work)

While I agree that more and more women are earning better and better salaries, I am not sure how may of them manage their money well.Those who have moey are usure or ucomfortable i handling money. I am myself always unsure of what to do with the little I have. Beyond of the fixed deposit ad a few LICs, I’ve shot my bolt. I do not have a single female friend who gives me advice on money. They give me advice on happiness and self esteem. Only my male friends give me advice on money. And I have always had a sneaking suspicion that the latter is a significant contributor to the former.   

And besides, the world runs on money. The challenge is for us to find a way to understand this running, or to find an alternative to it. As feminists, I believe we have failed to do either. Our arguments and politics around money tends to be moralistic and judgemental, which makes us sound shrill and shallow. This tone does not qualify as a very efficient tool.

And this brings me back to where I started – why not call myself a feminist. I now realize that I shrink from calling myself a feminist because I have failed to be a good feminist. An ideology is just about that – an ideology. Every person who believes in the ideology will have to take it into her soul and interpret it to change her life. I have taken it into my soul, but my interpretation of it in my life is incomplete. The day this is complete, when there are enough toilets for rural women and my financial portfolio is satisfactorily diversified between debt and equity, I shall accept, with great pride, the label of a feminist.   

Why am I grumpy?.

  

There was an advertisement of Saffola cooking oil which used to be screened a year or so back. It had a hero worshipping son and doting wife cheer an obviously overweight father/husband during a parent’s event at the child’s school sports day. The overweight gentleman obviously cannot make it and a pious voice in the background addresses the wife (who herself looks fit enough to run a marathon) – “Now you must choose Saffola.”

What does this ad say to you? It says to me, as it must to any sane, thinking person;

1.       Women stay fit on  their own. Men don’t.

2.      

       2.  Even if women are unfit, Saffola should be brought in only when the men are unwell. It is alright for women to live with cholesterol, pop a heart attack. It is not alright for the men. Why not, I want to ask, since it is the men who cannot take care of themselves.  Survival of the fittest, I say.

3.   3    Men are incapable of controlling their cholesterol and other things that make them drop out of races at their children’s schools. Hence the pious voice addresses the wife, not the husband. Has anyone realized what this means for us – much of our money, our health, our government is in the hands of men. Now if he cannot be trusted to buy the correct cooking  oil, is he fit enough to deal with my hard earned money?

For those of you reading this and thinking that I am a grumpy, cynical pessimist and the wife’s concern is one of pure love, how about you showing me one advertisement where, as soon as a wife gets her premenstrual cramps, a pious voice advises the concerned looking husband, “Now you must buy food with lots of iron.”

Show me. And I might believe. I still want to.

And now, since I have claimed that this blog would be based on my experiences as a woman, a confession is due. I must admit that my angst on the Saffola advertisement above is not fuelled purely by an upright anger over a woman’s secondary place in society. Part of the angst also stems from my secondary place at the lunch table at work. This secondary place is also shared by some of my other female colleagues.

At this lunch table as I and some of the aforementioned female colleagues take out our tiffin cases or bring in a usual ‘thali’ from the canteen, many, if not all of our male colleagues are unpacking elaborate tiffin boxes. The gentleman in front of me takes out a Tupperware box. Large size. This box yields lovingly folded and packed rotis, a little dollop of rice. Some fish, some dal, a little vegetable. A chilli and a lemon wedge. Oh. And even a sweet. And there is a napkin – clean and fresh. And some lassi to wash this down with. I look at my healthy but practical box of sabu dana khichdi. Which is all I have time for making. And it’s healthy, isn’t it?

 My male colleague catches us staring stonily at his lunch box. He has the courtesy to look a little embarrassed, and says, ”Actually you see, I have very high cholesterol, so Meenu is very particular about what I eat,” The Saffola ad comes flooding back.

My female colleague, whose tiffin resembles mine responds grumpily, “I tell you, Malini – there’s not much point in marrying a husband. I think I want to marry a wife now. I also want a tiffin like his.” I agree completely and plod grimly through my sabu dana khichdi. And hold society responsible seating me at the lunch table without allowing me a partner who looks after my cholesterol and lunch box.   

There are So Many Things to be grumpy about.

the yumminess of mummies

We sat reluctantly in two uncomfortable chairs. But it was the whole atmosphere that made us really uncomfortable. The head priest of the ‘faith based organisation’ sat at right angles to us. The room was large and airy. The walls were full of pictures of the farm we had come to survey for our agricultural practices study. The door opposite us sent in a regular stream of devotees. They came in one by one, prostrated themselves at the feet of the head of the institution, held his feet in their hands for a while and crept away.

While they did so, the head priest, quite undisturbed by this foot holding, lectured us – two women who had come to see his farm, on the status of women. It took us a while to get used to the prostrations and he got the head start – we were unable to respond to his starting salvoes like, “Women are their own worst enemies”. And boldened by our silence he continued – he told us that women had two primary roles in life ad they had to choose between them. The choices were between the maternal and the sexual. He knew and was saddened by the fact that the majority of women chose the sexual role. We stared at him, speechless. And allowed him to continue. Thankfully, because if we had interfered, we would have missed this gem -

He then told us about a mother of 3 children he had travelled with in a train. This mother, instead of watching over her children, had handed them over to her husband and maid and gone to sleep. “Sleep!” he exclaimed, shaking his head. Ad then he looked at us and said, “The sexual role (he used the beautiful vernacular word ‘kamayani’) impels women to neglect their children and do such things like going to sleep.”

By now we had regained our powers of speech but that is a different story. I remembered this incident because in many ways it marked a turning point I my life. I was forced to acknowledge my conscience’s now faint voice that I stood in grave danger of adhering to the head priest’s role model of the maternal role of women.  Did I then want to give up that role and adopt the sexual role?  No, I did not. I was realizing that doing any one role to the exclusion of all other roles was impossible and extremely exhausting. And I was also realizing that I wanted it all – a little bit of every role – mother, companion, friend, worker, daughter, daughter in law, political person, and yes, also that of a kamayani. And this realization was not a momentous one.

A few weeks ago, I had had a moment of epiphany. It was the middle of the early morning chaos. My daughters were getting ready for school, looking gorgeous as they always do. I was combing their hair, checking their bags and instructing Rama, my wonderfully efficient housekeeper o the day’s plans and giving my hair a last brush before I left home for work. As I looked into the mirror, I found myself looking at a stranger. She was wearing a yellow salwar set which didn’t fit, had a hairstyle that didn’t suit, wore shoes that didn’t match. And she was drinking Horlicks. Yes, Horlicks. She looked harassed, dowdy and virtuous. My conscience made one of its rare appearances, crying out in pain, “MG!! Not yellow darling, and definitely not that shade!” For a moment I had stared at that yellow suited stranger in horror. But the Rama marched in checking on me – had I finished my Horlicks? The moment passed, I returned to the present. But something had changed. A restlessness crept in and remained. 

Rama looked at my unfinished Horlicks and gave me an odd look.

Life went on – that day and after that. But the restlessness remained. My conscience took to nagging and complaining about yellow and its impact on my children. Irritated, I shut it out and refused to listen. Of course it wasn’t true. I was a good mother, I was. With two growing children what did you expect? That I would look like Demi Moore? Or that I would have time to chill out with a drink or two at Someplace Else? Never. My children needed all my time. Their welfare was my foremost concern. So what if I wore floaters with salwar suits, my children looked like angels. Sometimes, my conscience managed to get in a word, but was quickly put into a box and put away.

But after this maternal-sexual role model conversation today, my conscience emerged victorious. The danger was clear and imminent. My conscience had not spoken to me since its comment on my yellow salwar suit, but now it made a reappearance. It hung around in easy chairs, sipping tea, smirking and saying, “Ha. I told you so.”

“Shoo.” I said, “Go away!”

“Calm down,” said my conscience, taunting me “Have some Horlicks, darling.”

I have believed firmly that there is a time for everything I your life – and that time is when you yourself are ready for it. It had worked for me earlier and hopefully it would work for me now. I knew I would not survive my present mothering role. And probably neither would my children. I returned home from that tour a changed person. I don’t know what was a more terrifying realization – that I had give up listening to my own voice? Or that I was heading towards being a role model for people like this head priest. My ego and conscience were hit hard.    

And I prepared for change on a war footing. I started with Horlicks to find that the wise Rama had already disposed off the bottle of Horlicks. “I thought you didn’t need it anymore,” she said in her usual taciturn manner and that was that. The haircut changed, the shoes were put away, but I kept the yellow salwar suit to remind me how close I had come to disaster.

I now promised myself to be the mother I myself wanted to be. Stress and virtuousness had to go and so they went. Guilt went too. So did sleepless nights. It wasn’t easy but well worth the trouble. Were my children happier? You’ll have to ask them, but I think the answer would be yes. Am I happier? The answer is definitely yes.

Is it easy? No. Do I have detractors? Yes. What answers do I give them? Usually an enigmatic silence, sometimes a glare or a raised eyebrow. And a hope that in spite of all the criticism I face for being a non traditional mother, one day the time will come when I can hang about my detractors in easy chairs, sipping a cup of tea, a smirk on my face and say, “Ha. I told you so.”

Not a virtuous thing to wish for. But then, my brief and unsuccessful stint with being virtuous is officially over.   

--

My grandmother's argument:

I grew up in an argumentative, eccentric family,  both immediate and extended. Some of us were quiet and eccentric, the others voluble, volatile and eccentric. Almost everyone knew what they wanted (at least you were expected to, so that you could argue your point) and mostly it never matched with what anyone else wanted.

I had just left a tiny, isolated, protected colony life and come to study in Calcutta. I was living with my father’s eldest brother, his wife and my grandmother in a large, rambling, unplanned house in New Alipore. And learning my way around the city. I was also slowly beginning to comprehend how different life would be for me in the city that in had been in my last 16 years.

One day, early into my stay, I wanted to go over to the other side of New Alipore to visit an aunt. I was reading the newspaper in the drawing room as was most of the family when my aunt mentioned to the maid that she should add another cup of water – a cousin would be here soon.

Sipping her tea, my grandmother said, “That boy is too thin – he should eat more. Wasn’t he here for lunch yesterday? Why is he coming again today?”

“He’s coming to escort Rupa to her aunt’s house. Rupa is still too new and I don’t think she should go alone, so I have asked him to come and go with her,”  said my uncle.

“Escort?” said my grandmother, and the disapproval in her voice made me nervous.  I let go of the newspaper.

“Of course,” said my uncle, not looking up from his paper, “suppose she gets lost?”

As I looked anxiously at my grandmother, her face rearranged itself into a look that we had all learnt to fear.

“If Rupa has to go, she will go alone. If she cannot go alone, she will not go at all,” said my grandmother. My uncle put down his paper. The battle lines were drawn.

The battlefield emptied with lightning speed. My aunt floated away to the kitchen, marking her presence through the rest of the battle by sending out regular supplements of tea and toast. My uncle’s hangers on (who were a permanent fixture in the house thanks to my uncle’s recent retirement from the state government and his leadership in an upcoming political party) mumbled excuses, called out, “Achcha Boudi, chollam!” and slipped down the stairs.

My grandmother and uncle faced each other over the tea table. “Rupa will go,” said my uncle, “but she will go with an escort. Calcutta is not what it was earlier.”

“Rubbish,” said my grandmother firmly, “ you mean to say, if a place becomes unsafe we should stop moving about? And I think you should stop all this hype about Calcutta becoming unsafe. Look at me – I move around the city – in a bus! No one says anything to me.”

I tried to imagine the fate of anyone who would say anything to her, but was incapable of doing so. And besides this argument was far too exciting already.

“There is a lot of difference between Rupa and you, Ma,” said my uncle equally firmly. My grandmother fixed him with a raised eyebrow. He specified – “She is new to the city, you have been here for the last 30 years.” The eyebrow came down.

“If she is going to stay here, she had better learn to navigate the city soon,” said my grandmother, “And how is she going to do that if there is someone to do it for her? What a ridiculous idea!”

This was too much for my uncle. “Whys should it be ridiculous?! Her father’s left her in my charge, I have a responsibility towards her. What will he say if he knows she is wandering about alone?”

“Wandering alone?,” said my grandmother, incensed, “Why if he was so bothered, why did he send her here in first place? And himself live in the jungles where you cant even put in  a trunk call easily! And why are you thinking of your brother only? What if your sister asks you as to why you are ordering her son about on a Sunday morning to do silly things like escorting cousins! And even if he does escort her, what is he to do when she gets there? Come back? Or hang around?”

The bell rang and the cousin in question arrived. Sensing battle, he quickly joined me in the ringside seats and grabbed a toast while the tray was heading for the table. The battle continued undisturbed.

“I wish you’d stop going on about being a woman,” said my grandmother irritably to my uncle, “Of course Rupa’s a woman. What else would she be? And a woman is a woman.” Pause.

“For that matter a man is also a man.” Pause again. No arguments to that.

“Well, what I meant was, Rupa cant go about changing her life because she is a woman. She will have to learn to do only the things she can do alone. She’s not going to have an escort all her life. I haven’t. And I’m not dead, am I?”

By now, I had figured that such arguments (and there would be many to come) were more about the reasoning than the actual decision. Niether  my grandmother nor my uncle had any intentions of making the decision for me.  Finally I got to choose what I wanted to do and stand by it. As I would be expected to do in future.

I remembered this argument for many years to come. Of the many things I remembered was one critical thing – that I should learn to do the things I can do alone. And if I couldn’t do it alone, I shouldn’t do it at all.

Since this came from my grandmother, I took it for granted. That all women should be independent. And so to imagine a world of independent women: independent women would mean women who make up their minds without whining and griping. Women who wear their clothes with confidence instead  of simpering. Women who take care of their bodies ad their minds. Women who drive their own cars. Women who make their own money, operate their own accounts. Rich women, healthy women, happy women. 

That is probably what my grandmother in all her pragmatism was looking for. Turns out she was in a minority. Its still a minority, but a slowly growing one. A small but determined group of women (never mind what women's rights groups tell you -its still painfully small) and one must duly acknowledge, also men, are working hard, very hard for independent women. Why?

Well, they all have their reasons. As I have mine. And besides, independent women make for a better quality of argument. And as a true Bengali, that is a good enough driver....   

Technically this blog is not about the road. It is about experiences, mainly of women, because I am one. Why this name, then?

One of my favourite travel authors describes an experience where is is told that if he reaches Place X, he will find a bus to the city he wishes to reach. With great difficulty and after 4 long days, he reaches the designated Place X to find there was absolutely no bus. Exhausted and at his wits end, he enquires of the sole villager he can see - "Good sir, isn't there a bus to City Z?"
The villager replies in the negative.
The traveller asks desperately - "But why is there no bus?!"
The villager looks at him sternly and replies, "There is no bus, because there is no road."

Being a woman myself and worked with women's issues for over 21 years, I find the answers to many of the problems and their solutions is as simple as that - we cannot move from where we are, because there is no road. But the travel author mentioned above does get to his destination. And so do many women.

This blog is about circumstances in our lives when we are sternly told that there is no road. And it remains up to us - do we find a road? Do we give up and stay on at Place X? I am sure this happens to men too. But for the time being, I do not plan to include them in my musings, except in their different roles in our lives.

This blog remains a personal space for my experiences and analyses as a woman. Of my reactions and those of the women I know and have worked with (ranging from helpless giggles to complete outrage) to being told, "There is no road."