fierce ...with heart (my interview with Rita Banerji)

When Rita Banerji asked to interview me many months ago I was surprised, overwhelmed and just a little bit intimidated. I "met" Rita last year when I interviewed her for my blog (which you can read in two parts...here and here). Ever since, we have been corresponding and have become firm friends, supporters of each other and soul sisters. I am such an admirer of this sister soldier who draws light on the subject of the genocide against India's girls. She is brave, brilliant and full of heart.

We have been working on this interview for months; she asked me these questions as part of a conversation that went back and forth. Some of my answers were initially part of private e-mails to her that I later decided to include in the interview. She asked me all sorts of candid, thoughtful and out of the box questions (art, apartheid, violence, motherhood) and I reached deep down inside of mySELF to give her my responses.  I went through a minor evolution as I did this interview and am very proud of the way it turned out...it's fierce with heart. It was quite painful to relive parts of my past but also cathartic. I  hope you will read it (right here...scroll down to July 2 2012) and tell me what you think.

"women hold up half the sky"

(Music II, Shakti series, 2007)

“Women hold up half the sky.”

                                        -Mao Zedong

This certainly isn't the first time I have written about India's gendercide on my blog...but every time I sit down to write about it... I feel equal parts furious, helpless and ...infinite sadness. Of course the war against girls is a worldwide phenomenon when you take into account economic disparities, lack of resources for females, violence etc etc. But nowhere else on the planet are they exterminating girls like in India and China!! It is happening at such an alarming rate...even I am staggered at the numbers...50 million...100 million...over 200 million... on and on. It is not a cultural phenomenon...it is sheer madness, hate and murder; genocide.  Reading about it can seem so unreal...as if it's not really happening...that it's just words and numbers. But it's not!!

(my Tara)

It's tiny sweet faces like my Tara right here. It's little fingers and toes wanting to hold and reach and grow. It's eyes that want to see, voices that want to be heard...hearts that want to beat. It's tiny helpless faces that are trusting they will be loved and taken care of. And...it just doesn't happen. The gendercide in India and China are skewing gender ratios worldwide. In India...it is considered a curse to have a baby girl and being a woman in such a misogynistic society is dangerous right from birth onwards.

(self portrait-2010)

 So...here I am...very much westernised but still...I come from these bloodlines + heart-lines + soul-linesof India and my heart breaks every single time I read about this. Now that I am a mother and  I have a precious baby girl...it has become that much more personal to me. What can we do?? Become informed, advocate, sign the petition, spread the word. Please. We must we must we must. If we don't...who will?