by Aditya
Many stories are already getting buried in my laptop. But these stories are special… not only for me but the people who are reading it right now. I hope it will compel them to reimagine the society we are living in. Personally, I don’t feel comfortable posting these stories… but posting these stories is necessary for me, you, and the world as well.
It’s time to whisper aloud whether it’s your choice or not. We need to be stayfree for a better future.
So here it is in front of you.
‘Periods and the Mosquitoes’ is from some of the incidents of my life which made me think about the world and its people again and again.
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It’s been around one year.
Just a random evening of my college days, I was going to Amba Cinema to watch a low budget Ayushman Khurana type good movie. Before leaving, I had to give a book to one of my friends at Rudra Hostel which is on the way to one of the legal exits of my St. Stephen’s college. Went there and called her to collect the book. She came and took the book. She had a smile on her face but she was looking unwell. She saw the book and the chapter which I previously advised her to read. We had a little conversation. In between, she told me that she was suffering from stomach pain. I was like… okay, it happens with everyone. The only thing I could do was to say “Take rest!”… & I did the same. In a few minutes, I was at the Green Cafe which is in front of St. Stephen’s Rudra Gate. I had Maggi-Chai at that roadside cafe. I planned for Amba but I came back to my hostel, Mukh East. I have no idea why I did so.
There was an overexcited Punjabi boy in my hostel, I went to his room and we watched something online and it wasn’t related to UPSC Exams.
In the evening, I inquired about my friend’s health. She WhatsApped me ” I’m fine, it was just period cramps.”
Cramps… it was a new word for me. Googled it. Got a little idea about the word from the internet and I just replied: “Ohhk…Take care!”
It was the first incident in my life when I was unable to say anything like “Have a speedy recovery.” or something similar to it.
SPEED IS PREFIXED.
Neither from any human, any teacher nor from my RSS wala school did I get to know about ‘Menstruation’ ; I learnt about it from the Internet… that too at the age of 21 after a WhatsApp message. But wasn’t just me… there must be thousands of people who really don’t know about it and some of them who do know, use black polythene to carry it along with their black thoughts.
After this incident, I read many related articles and watched many documentaries. Meanwhile, I realized that there was a Sanitary napkin vending machine recently installed on our campus. On the same night, I went there to see what it was all about. It was already out of stock, I couldn’t see the white beauty. For real…
At the same time, there was a collection drive by our college. I decided to buy only Sanitary Napkins as much as possible. Collected money in various ways. In some days, there were around 150 packets of Sanitary Napkins in my room (S-14) of MukhEast Hostel. From 2-3 people who visited my room that day I got very good comments which made me feel happy that I became acquainted with it from the internet, not from people with crab mentality who know about it but still criticize it. Yeah… the same people who gave those very good comments. Learning something is not enough until you have a good realization of the same.
You ask the woman to bleed for a few days in isolation and clean up their own mess.
Also, there is not a single solid reason in Manu Smriti… why the presence of a menstruating woman makes any religious ritual unsuccessful. If we believe such baseless theories… we should also skip five-six days a month of practicing rituals in Goddess’s temples. As far as I could understand ‘menstrual isolation’ is a boon for the daughters of our country.
Menstrual-Isolation is pure misogyny.
Chalo… Koi nhi… I haven’t lived in Manu’s era. Maybe… It might have been helpful for women to keep them sanitized. But is it relevant in today’s era?
On the one side of the coin India keeps a woman on the top of its civilization and on the other side of the coin, it compares the same woman to a dog when she is menstruating. We should really look deeper into it.
Adding one more story from my life’s collection…
“Please don’t kill the mosquitoes of Himachal Pradesh. We live together. Just capture them in your cupped palm and set them free outside of your room. You will definitely happy by doing this.” (These lines are from one of my friends, A Nun from Himachal Pradesh. It was August 2019, we had a medical camp in the Kee Monastery, where I was living. I too was there in the medical camp to get basic health checkups. BP and Pulse Rate were extremely high, but it was normal according to my situation. They gave me some headache, fever and high altitude sickness pills. Cough syrup was also there… and it was my permanent companion.
My hands and face were full of invisible rashes, they said it is because of the tiny mosquitoes of the Himalayas. On the other hand, one of the nuns requested me not to kill the mosquitoes.
I was like ….. “Wait…..What?”
“OMG…Ahimsa on this level.”
So now, if I say her lines changed my life… Noo, it is not enough. Her thoughts and their implementation in the real-world changed my own way of thinking. It took me many weeks and uncountable conversations with different people from the same place to have a genuine realization of her words.
Humanity shall rise again!
One day a year is not enough to celebrate the wisdom, compassion, strength, courage, and determination of women.
Happy International Women’s Day today! Let’s empower women and girls every day. ❤
Thank You!
PS: Written on 8th March 2020, on International Women’s Day!
Raw Whispers Magazine, edition 3.
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