Mission Unsuccessful? Abort.

I remember this thought provoking ad that was making rounds in facebook few days back – It was a set of images tearing off each body part of a child inside a womb using forceps. Finally the head is brutally crushed before taking it out. The caption reads in the lines of “This is what you do every time you abort. Stop the killing”.
And then there was a TOI article, titled “Number of Abortions dropping in India”, which started with:
First the good news: the number of medical termination of pregnancies (induced abortions) has started to dip in India.

So, is it “good news” if abortion is not a preferred route when:
• One of the parents has AIDS?
• The mother is a raped 12-year old, who doesn’t want a reminder of the reproduction process?
• The parents don’t think they can afford a(or another) baby?
• The baby is unwanted?

The.baby.is.unwanted.
That is where our mindset hits a snag, especially considering there are 76 Million Unwanted babies being aborted every year globally – 76 Million murderers. How can a baby be unwanted, when there are so many who can’t have any? How can it be unwanted when very few are blessed with one? How can a married couple not want to have one(or indeed, another) baby? How can it be unwanted when it is a boy? Why be pro-choice and anti-life, when you can attain a higher state of being pro-life?

First things first. Pro-choice is not “anti”-life. The “life” is currently a few set of cells, which is not even living. Either spare the baby some pain before it is alive, or let it live and make it suffer throughout its life for its parent(s)’s mistake.
Secondly, pro-choice is not only for girl babies. I understand that is why it is vehemently opposed to in India. According to the National Consensus for Medical Abortion in India, 11 Million abortions take place in the country. Since sex determination is a criminal offense here, and even if we take out 50% of that total (assuming that the family found out illegally), that still leaves out a healthy 5.5 Million Undetermined sex abortions. We should be proud of such people who have the guts to admit they are not ready and are trying to correct their mistakes, instead of ignoring it and saying, “Arre chodo yaar, jo hoga dekha jaayega”.
Thirdly, abortion should not be tagged as “empowering women” – it is as much a male right as a female’s. Tagging it such is only demeaning a woman's position further. A child is unwanted, even if one parent doesn’t want it. If there is a hope of their coming around, then let’s go ahead. If not, either separate or let the cells die out peacefully before they know they are hated.

There are kids who grow up well with divorced parents, and there are kids who are admitted to hospitals with human bites all over them. There are kids who grow up in slums and open up hotels, and there are kids who are born with AIDS. There are kids who are adopted and are happy, and there are those whose faces are thrust against a wet grinder stone by their stepmothers. There are unwanted pregnancies happening all over the world. Let us not rejoice the dip in abortion levels. Let us rather look at the amount of condoms and contraceptives being sold and heave a sigh of relief, so that no babies are born as a punishment to what the parents did in a heat of passion.

A Calendar Too Crowded - Sagarika Chakraborty

Synopsis:
A Collection of short stories and poems around the theme of womanhood categorised month-wise.

Category:
Simple, Serious

Genre:
Fiction

Language:
No profanity

Favorite Quote:
None

Review:
Let me start off by saying that I am not a feminist. I have been treated as an equal (if not better) to all my male counterparts at every stage of life and hence haven’t had a reason strong enough to become one. I enjoy taking up the “traditional womanly” roles that the society designates, and am proud to do it well.
But that was not the only cause for my disconnect with this book. While the inequality harping got on my nerves, my primary issue was with the style of writing. Though I look forward to discovering an author’s voice in every book, I wish Sagarika had toned down the annoying one she has shown here – primarily in first person and a tendency to repeat a line or a phrase at the end of every para . She had a great concept – that of categorising the stories by months. I wish she had exploited that and experimented with the style of writing too.
I was ready to give up after three stories. It promised to be a dull, half-baked and poorly researched collection. Grammatical errors only made it worse. The prime example is the very first story, “The gift called ‘Life’”, where the author has written a first-person account of a girl soul narrating her life. Unfortunately, the story is a confused mix of past, present and future tenses. Even if one can get past that, the story focusses on how a blame game is played with a girl child (because of her gender) and some of her gripes are just bizarre. As an example, consider the following line from the story:
“At the age of twenty-six, it was all my fault that many a worthy suitor refused to marry me because of my bohemian lifestyle and because I occasionally smoked.”
Gender has nothing to do with it, but if it is not “all her fault” for smoking, whose fault is it?

The second story was even more incredulous – this time taking stock of a traditional mother of a toddler through the eyes of a pregnant woman. The latter finds fault with the former carrying his bag, holding an umbrella over his head, fanning him, eating late, giving him the ‘good grapes’, letting the son litter the house or waste water, spoon-feeding him, dancing to Bollywood songs, and what not. I have a one year old whose idea of waking me up is to hit me squarely in the eye. Does this mean that he doesn’t “care” for me? It is surprising that she decided to whine about a ten-year old’s behaviour towards his mother (and vice versa), whose understanding of respect or responsibility is sketchy at best. If, however, she had increased the son’s age by fifteen more years, it would have been hard hitting. I wish Sagarika had researched more this subject, or refrained from writing on one she had no experience in. It is easier being a theoretical mother than a practical one.

It is a shame that the first two stories of the book were so poorly constructed, for the rest of the stories are not half bad. The author’s disconnected style of writing did not leave room to form any . However, the topics, the categorisation and in very few cases, the stories make for an interesting reading.
“A life in my Mind”, for example, is the story of a single mother who, through the course of her thought process, starts wondering if she and her daughter are missing a male figure in their lives. The approach was believable and honest instead of preachy, and that was a welcome change.
The poem, “Behind the Whispers”, is very well written. Though rhyming, minimal creative liberties have been taken and the message is well-conveyed. The prose-cum-poem “Of Jatakarmas and Stana Pradhidhanas” is written in a clean and crisp style comparing the lives of a rich and a poor working women and showing the lack of a maternity and child support in both the cases. I was dreading that the author would end up showing how a poorer woman could be a better mother than a richer one, but am glad that she didn’t take the usual route to drive home a very strong point.
“Selling a Body to Gain a Mind” is a unique take on prostitute’s children (though I wish Sagarika had made the child of the prostitute a boy instead of a girl), and could be termed as the most touching story in this collection. “Knowledge beyond the printed letters”, though inspiring, bordered on describing the ideal and non-existent woman. The last story “The gift called nationality”, though interesting in terms of the topic and the approach, falls flat because of the way it is written.

Verdict:
Any feminist would lap it up. It shows how amazing women are and how poorly they are treated by society, parents, in-laws, husbands and random people walking on the road. For a non-feminist (like me) and for men, the negatives are many. However, despite poor research, bad editing and grammatical mistakes, some do make one think – if not about women, then definitely about adoption, single motherhood, respecting prostitutes and saving for old age. Just for that, this book should be given a chance.

Note:
This review is a part of the Book Reviews Program at BlogAdda.com. Participate now to get free books!

Small packages can bring big changes

Innumerable things change after having a baby - big and small. It is so gradual that we notice them only after it has become a routine. I started noticing 11 months after having mine, and the consultant-devil woke up inside me to make a list of them*:

• No amount of wanna-be-cool mother resolutions work, and falling into obsessive-compulsive pattern seems inevitable.


• The disaster-intuitive radars start developing.


• The timid voice gives way to an assertive one.


• The catching reflex becomes stronger with each passing day.


• Organizational and multi-tasking skills sky-rocket.


• Judging and advicing married couples becomes difficult to control.


• Keeping a clean house while the baby is awake is an abandoned dream.


• Bath is a luxury, and even at its slowest, does not last longer than 10 minutes.


• The head is perpetually inclined at a 45 degree angle with ears pointing to the room where the baby is sleeping.


• the neighbourhood teenage boy playing loud music, the uncle meticulously reversing his car and the auto honking its horn are all equally and creatively bad-mouthed.


• Peeing and pooping are replaced by pee-pee and poo-poo, and their smells fail to stimulate or repulse us.


• Hosting a simple dinner takes a full day, if not more, taking the baby-delays into account.


• All the purchases are based on their being unbreakable and child-proof.


• A walk down the block, a trip to the garden or mall are all equally barfed at.


• Planning a trip back home becomes more nerve-racking than exciting.


• The mall shopping gets over in a haze - organized and rushed with a shopping list clutched in the hand like a lifesaver.
  
• Chunky jewellery and heels are discarded for an all-bare and flat look.


• No shopping trip is complete without checking out the baby store.


• There is always a shortage of cloth nappies.


• The shop-keepers and market owners suddenly become friendlier and more understanding.


• Steamed vegetables, runny dal rice and mashed apples start tasting delicious.


• Phone and spectacle replacement ideas are abandoned seeing the conditions of the current ones in the tiny hands.


• The days and weeks are passed by mentally noting all the relevant growth milestones.


• The mobile-using, hippie-clothed school children wandering hand-in-hand with the opposite sex are looked at with absolute terror, and worried looks are exhanged with the partner.


• All ways of raising the child, other than your own, seem faulty.


• Despite expecting it, the first 'amma' or 'appa' can send your heart plummeting.


• Watching a sleeping child suddenly becomes the new stress-buster, replacing book-reading and movie-watching.


• Unknowingly, the second childhood begins, where rhymes are sung and dances are danced entertaining self more than the child.


• You start respecting your parents more.


• With the added responsibilities, the bond with the partner becomes stronger and more dependable.

* I read a similar post-baby changes list by another blogger, but I hope against hope that this doesn't look like a rip-off!

The bee-ginning of a love story

There were myriad emotions running through her as she decided to take a long walk down the valley. Anger dominated them all, leaving her drained and resentful. On an impulse, she entered the Bee-yard, hoping that the beekeeper would let her channel this destructive streak.
He knew she was coming before he spotted her. A primal instinct drove his eyes towards her. She seemed agitated, but all he could notice was her blinding aura.He must have looked stupid in his standstill position with bees swarming all around him.

She approached him, and stared. He saw her lips forming four musical words.
“You have beautiful eyes!”
He felt the clouds parting, washing him in sun rays. He smiled as he answered,
“I know. After all, beauty lies in the eyes of the bee-holder.”

She took up a stick and started beating the hives, all the while looking into his mesmerising eyes.

An Artist of the Floating World - Kazuo Ishiguro

Synopsis:
A documentation of the life of a patriotic artist during pre- and post- World War II Japan through the eyes of an unreliable narrator.

Category:
Simple, Serious

Genre:
Drama

Language:
No profanity

Favorite Quote:
“One supposes all groups of pupils tend to have a leader figure – someone whose abilities the teacher singles out as an example for the others to follow. And it is this pupil by virtue of his having strongest grasp of his teachers ideas, who will tend to function as the main interpreter of those ideas to the less experienced or the less gifted pupils. But by the same token, it is this same leading pupil who is most likely to see the shortcomings in the teachers work, or else develop views of his own divergent from those of the teacher. In theory, of course, a good teacher should accept this tendency- indeed welcome it as a sign that he has brought his pupil to a point of maturity. In practice, however, the emotions involved can be qute complicated. Sometimes when someone has nurtured a pupil long and hard, it is difficult to see any such maturing of talent other than treachery and some regrettable situations are apt to arise”

“The finest, most fragile beauty an artist can hope to capture drifts within those pleasure houses in the dark”.

Review:
From a writer’s point of view, writing in first person can have serious drawbacks. While it helps bring the reader closer to the book, it also risks monotony, since the writer cannot delve deeper into other characters. So, a typical first-person narration has enough twists and turns to keep the reader riveted to the central character themselves.
Ishiguro on the other hand, tries nothing of that sort in this book. On the contrary, except for a couple of memories, the story of Masuji Ono is fairly straightforward, at least in the beginning. However, on reading it through, the reader realises that he is dealing with an unreliable narrator, which suddenly makes the straightforward story develop many more layers, most of them unknown and assumed.
The floating world, for an artist in the early twenties, meant a nigh-time world of pleasure, entertainment and drink, which formed the backdrop of all their paintings. After reading the book though, one cannot help but wonder if the title was also used to show an artists’ life in the 6 years of war, which marked a transient stage in Japan in terms of ideologies, beliefs and leadership.

In October 1948, Japan is still trying to come to terms with the massive damage, physical and mental, the war had created. That made it difficult for Ono to find a suitable groom for his second daughter Noriko. She had become caustic after one of the marriage talks fell through in 1947. Ono believed that she and his elder daughter Setsuko thought him to be the cause of it, which was confirmed when the latter asks him to take “precautionary steps” to ensure that the talks went smoothly.
While Ono initially believed it could be because of the difference in status, he slowly began revisiting his former colleagues to ensure that they would maintain a high opinion of him in case of any investigations. The story thus develops, through the negotiations and the daughters’ insinuations in the present, and through his memories of the past.

Ono’s father was against his becoming an artist, and believed that, as predicted by a wandering priest, he had a weak streak and a tendency towards deceit and slothfulness. Though he does not stand up to his father then, he was very passionate about his interest and decided to leave home to pursue it. After seven years of working in a firm where quantity and speed were more important than quality work, he joined the patronage of a famous painter and printmaker Seiji Moriyama (Mori-San).
Seven years into the patronage, he meets Matsuda, who influences him to use his art for a greater cause, and for inspiring the country to move forward. By constant provocation, Matsuda showed Ono how the country was being run by greedy politicians and businessmen, and the voice of Imperial Majesty of Japan was getting drowned. So, from painting the images from the pleasure world, Ono started working on political artworks to convey stronger messages, much to the disliking of his master, Mori-san, and he was made to leave.
The late twenties and early thirties of Ono’s life have not been documented, but we can make out that he had become very successful and rose to influence. With the commencement of war, Ono joined the State government as an artist and the member of the cultural committee, and also, as the official advisor to the office of unpatriotic activities.
By the end of the war, the remaining younger generation was bitter towards the older one for supporting the Imperial Majesty, and for “leading them astray”. Some of the remaining men started committing suicide or Hara-Kiri as an apology for their actions. When he realised that his second daughter Noriko’s current proposal could also be in danger because of his past, he admitted his mistake to the groom’s family, saying that he had believed he was acting in good faith. The proposal then goes off smoothly.
However, the simple transition from the present to the past through reminiscence had been marked with various lapses in Ono’s memory. When Setsuko mentioned that she had never asked him to take precautionary measures, and that Ono was never a man of influence, we start questioning Ono’s narrative. He is never completely sure of his conversation with others, leading us to question his lucidity. His faith in his high stature and position keeps increasing exponentially with his memories, until Setsuko mentions (or is it remind?) that he was just an artist and nothing more.

The flow is simple and effortless. To an extent, the erratic jump between the present and the various pasts serves to keep the story interesting. However, “if” there is a puzzle to be solved here, I am yet to solve it. Taken at face value, the book shows how tremulous the post-war Japan society had been, and how the patriotic population were suddenly termed traitors. According to Ono:

“There is surely no shame in mistakes made in the best of faith. It is surely a thing far more shameful to be unable or unwilling to accept them.”

The book may, on a parallel track, be showing how the new Japan is developing – americanized, democratic and with real American idols like Indiana Jones and Popeye. The reader can sense the disgruntled tone of the author here, and can hazard a guess that the author was trying to vindicate the older generation for what they had done.

Verdict:
In a typical Ishuguro style, this book is simple and clean. However, it is not memorable in terms of plot, writing style or the characterisations. While it provides an interesting light on the society of Japan in the late 40s and early 50s, it is neither a light read nor an enlightening one.