Category — Rants

A few years ago I read a book and it set me thinking about how culture and society has dealt with menstruation. (Yes, you heard me right )


The book was ‘The Red Tent’ by Anita Diamant. It was a first-person story of Dinah, daughter of Jacob and sister of Joseph of the Old Testament. Dinah was a talented midwife and proto-feminist. The story revolves round the red tent, which refers to the tent in which women of Jacob’s tribe must take refuge while menstruating or giving birth, according to the ancient law.

The Red Tent seems like punishment and expulsion from home, doesn’t it? But it isn’t, the women in the tent rested, talked, found mutual support and encouragement from their mothers, sisters and aunts. This was their “space”; their “me time”.

Now a culture closer home… The Indian Hindu culture. Growing up I saw and heard of women being ostracised when they were menstruating. There weren’t allowed in the prayer room or kitchen; they ate out of plates kept separately from them. They almost became untouchables. But, this wasn’t the initial intention; the intention was for women to rest and not do any hard labour.

A culture even closer – Islam. Muslim women are not allowed to pray or read the Koran during menstruation. They are considered impure and even unclean during this period.

If you look back at any culture, it’s clear that society then understood that women are at their weakest during menstruation; that they are losing blood; some are in pain and almost all are in discomfort. How can any of this be unclean or impure? To me a woman is at her purest when she’s menstruating, it is one of the surest signs of her having a productive womb.

Why am I saying all this, no idea. Actually it was just an idea I felt like sharing and ranting about. So what do you think of some of our cultures? What’s your experience?

Photo Credit: TwitterviewTuesday!

Its a definite sign of bad times when you start to be judged by friends and start to feel alone. They are the ones who are to accept you for who you are. Oh yes! they can correct but don’t you think they should hear your justification too.
Its sad to lose your friends to the other life. They all just seem to slip away and you are left wondering if your destined to be alone. Everyone seems to have so much to do and you are just standing there watching; a silent observer as life passes you by.
But then again, maybe its meant to be that way. Life moves on after all, it’ll all pass.

Happiness… it something I’ve been chasing since I don’t know when. But happiness is like that mirage of a water woman in the desert. I know she holds the secret; its there in her smile, hidden behind the veil. And I follow her as she runs the sand dunes ridges, trying hard to catch up but she’s there, right there, just beyond my reach. I don’t even know if she’s real but everything depends on getting to her. I call out; she stops and as I shade my eyes and look up, the breeze lifts her veil and I catch a glimpse of her smile. I stop in my tracks stunned, the blazing sun seems to have become warm, the sky seems rosy, and the world seems alright again. This is what am looking for but its just momentary for she takes off again and am back in pursuit. I must get to her, else I’ll have just these fleeting moments. All of everything depends on reaching her.

*** The below piece may not be appreciated by some people, I’d like them to know that I don’t care. This is what I think and well if you think otherwise you are entitled to you’re ideas too All religious groups mentioned below are not in capitals coz I don’t think these groups are important, what I think is important is the religious ideas which seem to have got lost over centuries in each religion ***

Some years ago while at college I had had an argument with friends over Islam and Muslims and it had left me fuming. There was no one to discuss the topic with then without getting even more upset and hence I had sat down to write and vent it all out. (The article I wrote then is added right at the end.) It helped, but this whole ‘Muslim Issue’ was not to be resolved so easily; it’s been resurfacing regularly through the years.
I am not a staunch muslim though I believe in Islam just as I believe in all other religious ideas. I am a muslim by chance and not choice. Asked to choose a religion I guess i will never be able to make up my mind, all religions seem just as important and just as loaded with pros and cons.
However, a while ago I noticed that something said about muslims made me jittery and unhappy. I started to wonder if it was just thing muslim thing that upset me and started observing myself. Well, it’s not only muslim but also any other kind of religious biases that upsets me. So, thankfully am still neutral.
Though muslims seem to be at the receiving end of this bias more then other religions. Why this is so I guess I will leave for another day. But it is so and its so in you’re face its difficult to ignore it. Most often people don’t realise that am muslim and its not nice to hear some of those things that are said.
Oh yeah… quite a bit is said, ranging from being called that/those muslims to saying that muslims do everything in the opposite way. Anyway recently I was travelling through coorg and chickmaglur and had to live with a lot of talk of that muslim man is so difficult and these muslims you how they are…
It filled me with so much frustration coz I have hardly heard the same kind of grouping done with any other religion. How often have you heard of this hindu fellow or that christian man or any such religion discrimination. All I’m asking for is to stop defining someone by their religion, what defines them is their beliefs (not ones imparted by religion), their values, their personality… Grow up; get over these petty childish biases.
**** This goes for all muslims too ***

————–An Article I wrote sometime in 2000————–

” They are all bloody Pakistan-living SOB’s” was how someone I knew described Muslims. Why should we Muslims be treated this way? What have we done wrong? Where have we gone wrong? And tell me why should we love Pakistan when there are other Muslim countries that are much better off? We aren’t the only minority; there are also the Christians. Why aren’t they called America-loving people or something like that?
Most of the Muslims I know are anti-Pakistan, which is completely understandable, for first of all Pakistan is not the best Muslim country in each and every way, a much better choice would be Kuwait. Second all that Pakistan is doing is disgusting (I am sure even the Pakistanis are disgusted) and thirdly even thought it is a Muslim country, it does not treat Muslims well. The few who are for Pakistan are so because they are pretty uneducated, they do not know the way Pakistan treats Muslims and to add to this the way they are treated by some people in India gives them the illusion of finding peace and acceptance in Pakistan.
Did u know that the people who decided to move to Pakistan at the time of partition are treated like outsiders there? They are called “Mujahids”, they belong in Pakistan but still are not complete Pakistanis. They have lived there for 50 years but still cannot call it their home. And the Muslims in India have lived here for years and consider it their one and only home.
A lot of soldiers in the Indian army are Muslims and they never think twice, never put religion before nationality when they lay down their lives for India. In the recent Kargil war there were so many Indian soldiers who lost their lives, no one told them that hey you shouldn’t give your life for this country. Why is it right to be Indian when there is trouble and a for-Pakistan otherwise?
So many of our film industry people are Muslims, why don’t we have a prejudice when we like them? Why do the Khans have such a great fan following? Why do we hum all the songs of Muhammed Rafi and the like, they’re Muslims afterall? And let’s not forget some of the best lyricists are Muslims? And gazals, which are a favorite of so many people, has its origins somewhere in Islam.
Some of the best instrumentalists are Muslims, and Zakir Hussain and the others are proud to be Indians.
There are so many great Muslims who are Indians and all of them put their country before their religion, and talking about people who have contributed towards the progress of India how can we forget Abdul Kalam who was the person behind India becoming a nuclear power. So it’s plain dumb and stupid to say that Indian Muslims are more for Pakistan then India. And hey next time any of u want to say Muslims are not a part of India remember, Muslims also have had a major roll to play in making India what it is today.

A thought struck me and I wondered about it. I thought of love and the human search for it. All of us have a picture of it in our minds, how it should be, what the person should be like, look like, what they should do, what they shouldn’t do, what quantities they should have…
It’s like the world is a supermarket and we are looking for that item of our choice. We know what we want and either wait until we find it or some will try out products that come close to their requirements to see if it satisfies.
Sometimes the product has its own criteria of use and in such cases either you have to let go of the product or pretend to be able to fulfill the criteria.
However most people will not settle for anything but the product they want. But then there also are those which will just live with what they have because they can’t afford the other or it’s not available or the supermarket doesn’t have an exchange policy.
Yeah, Love is a commodity too.