She was the daughter of a prominent scholar, and so well-educated that she was pretty much deemed unmarriable. This didn’t bother her, because she had such a mind of her own that she didn’t even want to get married. She did marry though, albeit later in life, and she had quite a career in court serving with the Empress. Despite the prestige, she found the lifestyle superficial and stifling, and once her daughter was old enough to be well-settled in court, Murasaki chose to live a spiritual life near a monastery.

I found this account so touching that I felt as though I were there. The details of daily life were portrayed with the utmost attention; the colors of fabrics and flowers played a prominent role in the book. I suppose I have come to view melancholy as a purely modern affliction, but it’s obvious through her poems that, even in the 11th century, Murasaki experienced profound sadness. That time period must have also been the height of Buddhism’s spread in Japan, and turning to spiritual life was common, if not the norm. Yet it is no coincidence that Buddhism is seeing a resurgence now. People are becoming ever increasingly disillusioned with the world, and seeking answers to the pesky questions that our culture cannot seem to answer with to any satisfaction.

I was live tweeting (seems to be one of my favorite pastimes nowadays!) and below is the Storified version.

I also enjoyed seeing Elie Wiesel and hearing his philosophies. He lamented that nowadays, people don’t know how to wait; for him, so much pleasure in life has come through the waiting and anticipation.

There were lots of other stars around yesterday; pictured below is Randi Zuckerberg, Derrick Ashong & Mandy Moore.

Check out 92Y’s Social Good Summit: Recap of Day Two with video clips!

(My 2nd Youtube video!!)

Yesterday was Gangaur, a holiday celebrating marital bliss, and for once I went out to see what the festivities were all about! And of course, some more bliss is always welcome.

Actually, the holiday is mainly for women–those who are unwed wish to be blessed with a husband, and those who are wed wish for their husband’s wellbeing. So it got me thinking about women and several things I’ve read recently about women & technology.

Janet Fouts asks, “Why aren’t there more women in open source?“ Rachel Happe of The Social Organization discusses the cultural barriers of women entering tech leadership in her recent post. She mentions a piece from TechCrunch, “Why Women Rule the Internet,” which I also had read and made me cringe (it’s actually more about online shopping being dominated by women, and marketing to them!).

I also came across a couple posts by Allison Fine where she explores women’s role in leadership and in Social Media. Juxtaposed against Mashable’s survey on How Women Really Feel About Their Facebook Friends, the picture isn’t so rosy and describes women in particularly catty terms who see their contacts as mostly irritating.

Yet, a key theme running throughout these discussions is that something dramatic is shifting due to the opportunities presented to women by technologies. Certainly for me personally, the sense of empowerment I get through the use of ICTs on a daily basis is pretty much unparalleled.

Yes, getting educated was also empowering; but just refer back to those sorry statistics that are mentioned in the above posts which point to the lack of women’s leadership despite their levels of education. They speak for themselves.

This post is dedicated in gratitude to all of the wonderful women in my life. I feel so lucky to have known so many strong, intelligent, talented and truly beautiful women. Happy women’s day to you all!

I know it’s not Mother’s Day, but I feel the urge to thank my mom who sent me the info on the above film. She has an insatiable thirst for knowledge and I must owe my own to her…

Thanks to my grandmothers, whose hard work and dedication to family were remarkable.  They both went to law school well before it was a common thing for women to do.

Sometimes the contrast between women’s roles and lives in India and the US seems so stark, but then when I really think about it they both pretty much boil down to the same thing: well-being for the family and community. It’s just that in the US, we’ve gotten accustomed to the luxury of being able to think about ourselves, our desires and our independence.

But wherever we are, being a woman is a complicated affair. And being able to go through it gracefully with head held high, and make a contribution to people’s lives, is a commendable deed.

As I see my relatives and peers becoming mothers, I can’t help but wonder at the tremendous amount of patience and courage they have. What a gift they are giving of themselves.

Being a woman is the opposite of delicate; it demands fierceness and fortitude. A steadfast commitment to compassion. Just like the Devi, Linga Bhairavi…

Yesterday I met Kavita Srivastava, a well-known activist in Jaipur. She was meeting a street artist, who was presenting all of his clay sculptures to us and explaining very animatedly the stories behind each piece. She is planning to help him set up an exhibition, and I offered to help with any publicity, even starting a blog. She knows so many people with phenomenal stories of human courage that it would be a pleasure to help her document them and raise awareness of her work!

She had spoken at a session I attended on Women’s Empowerment at the Jaipur Lit Fest, where she had recounted a heartbreaking story about a woman called Bhawari Devi:

Bhanwari Devi, a local woman who was working with Srivastava, was gang-raped by upper-caste men after she tried to stop a Brahman child wedding. Though the rape was witnessed by Bhanwari’s husband, the police refused to investigate, and Bhanwari was ostracized. Bhanwari eventually managed to file a police report, but the high court acquitted the alleged rapists.

One judge said simply that he did not believe upper-caste men could commit a crime so heinous. Srivastava was so shaken that she helped Bhanwari file an appeal in the Supreme Court–it is still pending–and later quit her job. “I realized I couldn’t spend my life writing reports that would simply gather dust,” she says.

Yesterday, I had the great fortune to attend my first book launch–of The F-Word by Mita Kapur. I had met her a few months ago through her work with the literary organization Siyahi, and was thrilled to hear of her book about food being launched.

Considering my own misgivings about cooking & doing housework, I did find the event pretty inspiring. Enough so that I went home and made Atta ka halwa (a sweet made from flour & sugar), for the first time!!

The hosts of Highway On My Plate were along for the ride (see middle photo). They were mostly funny but pretty crude, making a lot of references to gender stereotypes and sexual innuendos.

All of Jaipur’s upper crust were at the event, and I was pleasantly surprised to bump into a couple people I know since I was pretty lost in that crowd. When it was over, I was introduced to the couple who was sitting in the row in front of me. We went through the usual formalities, when somehow we struck upon a quaint coincidence–I had studied in the same program as their daughter, who was in the year above me at Wesleyan!

The meeting was held at the Pink City Cultural Center, and organized by Dr Mahaveer Singh Nathawat and @swagatsen, whose friend @sanjukta basu, TED fellow and renowned feminist, had just conducted the SMBaithak in Delhi. I don’t think she would’ve been too pleased to see that I was the only woman participating! (A couple ladies showed up towards the end, but they were pretty much only talking to each other in the back).

when it was over we had a chance to talk about organizing an event for climate change on 10/10/10.

Nonetheless, I was eager to share my experience as Isha Foundation‘s community manager and social communications coordinator. After the participants had trickled out, I watched  a film the PCCC had created about the deterioration of the nearby lake’s ecosystem (where Jal Mahal is). I suggested they can hold an event on 10/10/10 and they jumped at the opportunity. Too bad I’m already organizing another event and can’t be in two places at once

Not only was untidiness both cause and effect of inner chaos, but it was also a surefire argument catalyst. At times of utter despair, I was ready to call in the reserves of more senior domestic goddesses (aka my mother & mother-in-law!). Anything but take on the task by myself.

(image from plokta.com)

That’s not to say that my husband wasn’t willing to help. But sometimes his habits would so exasperate me that I would rather just do the job alone. Apparently this is common amongst couples: women take cleaning so seriously that, if the husband helps, he has a hard time living up to their high standards. Yes, I’ve read this before online at the height of my troubles, but I don’t feel like digging up the links myself right now. If you’re interested, google it! I did find this from my previous post:

A recent article on Alternet by Vanessa Richmond perfectly illustrates the trend, at least among American women, to shun cooking as an “unliberated” act.

My grandmother would tell me how impressed she was that, when I was younger, I was so well-organized and I would try to help her tidy her kitchen when I visited. That was probably my parent’s influence, which has obviously since loosened its grip–or has it? I really wonder if my disdain for orderliness has its roots in adolescent defiance, which then became compounded by feminist theories. Or perhaps I just didn’t feel like devoting my attention and energy in that direction.

Sadhguru’s Huffington Post piece from last week, If the Feminine Ruled This Planet, Life Would Be About Living, really struck a chord with me. Firstly, a caveat:

When I say feminine, I am not talking about it in terms of male-female; I am talking about it in terms of masculine-feminine.

Yes, but women certainly are implicated. The feminine is under threat, not just by patriarchy and social norms, but from women ourselves. We are not choosing to speak out against the systems which suppress the feminine.

So today, there is a danger that the female is giving up the feminine because survival has once again become the dominant factor. Survival has been pushed up to a demanding scale like never before. In earlier times, survival meant just gathering the day’s food. But today, survival means a BMW, the latest technological gadgets for your children, a summer home, etc. That is very challenging. So as this happens, as the demand for this type of life increases, there will ultimately be no room for the feminine to find any place in society.

There is so much pressure on women to compete like men in the workplace, and then still maintain the household. When I was growing up, my mom worked, but I had friends whose moms were housewives and I envied them. However, nowadays it is a rare luxury if families can afford to have a stay-at-home mom.

So something needs to happen for the feminine to flower within each human being. The feminine should be nurtured right from the start. As many children go into science and technology, the same number should also go into music, art, philosophy and literature. This must happen. If this does not happen, there will be no room for the feminine in the world. So celebrating the feminine is very essential. It is not about “woman,” but rather the “feminine.”

I struggled with the division of disciplines as I was younger. I enjoyed most of the subjects, but found math really challenging. I longed to pursue music, dance, and theater, but it was difficult to accommodate everything. When it came to college and professional choices, it was obvious that intuitive, artistic pursuits could only serve as hobbies, whereas my career would have to be based in the logical aspects of life. A lot of feminist research has been about quantifying the “care economy,” and calls for better remuneration of the jobs that women typically fill.

The very nature of this continual quest for survival is masculine. The masculine is always about conquering something. The feminine is not about conquest. The feminine is about flowering, about relaxing, about living – not about getting. So what’s needed is a shift. If that shift does not happen, we will exhaust the planet too fast. If the feminine ruled this planet, there would be no ecological problems because it would not be one mindless, endless conquest – it would be about living.

What do you prefer: conquering or relaxing?