How can pads be differently special?

My dear students, family, friends, colleagues and well-wishers,

Here is an un-usual piece about a common essential of personal daily life, which is at the same time intimate and public.

Mayuri Joshi-Dhavale is from my Class of 1999, SIMC; with her fellow-students Madhura Majumdar-Mandal, Daisy Borah and Anu Chitnis.

Mayuri says: “I’ve thought deep and hard, before posting this intimate account of a personal topic that is considered a taboo to talk about today. I write because it’s important to talk about it. If it reaches your heart, please support the #padssquad initiative to ensure that we reach sanitary pads to the women who can’t afford it.

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By Mayuri Joshi-Dhavale

The day I started menstruating was a day of celebration for me.

“It” arrived in my life so fashionably late that I had started questioning myself if I was in fact actually a girl! Every girl in my class had started their periods between the 6th and 8th standards. I was in the 10^th. And yet no sight of the damn thing for me.

I felt it was ages ago that I had attended a seminar in school on menstrual health and hygiene and I had come back home with my very own packet of pads; so excited to become a lady and to start using something that is just for us. It made me feel “special” to have & use these pads. Most women in India were still on cloth. Just how special, I realised much later …

My turn was just not coming. Being skinny in frame, I hardly looked like a girl. Added to that, being a total tomboy didn’t help. Often, I was the butt of jokes. I waited for “its arrival” patiently, despite being told “it” is painful, “it” is discomforting; “it” changes your life for good. But when “it arrived” in the last quarter of my 10th standard, I celebrated. And that was also the last time, I ever gave “it” a thought.

The next time I thought about “it” was when I missed my period and found out I was pregnant. Once again the feeling associated with “it” was only joy. This time though for “not” having “it” …

Because in return I was getting a baby. Nothing could be better.

For me, menstruation was never a challenge. Never did I suffer any pain; always had the money to buy what I needed. Pads were a joke in our family of one man and four women: That all of my Dad’s salary went into buying sanitary napkins for one woman every week. My home was safe and the atmosphere was liberal: we spoke freely about women’s issues.

The first time I realized the seriousness of “it” was when we visited a family friend. I stained the bed and my Mom and Dad were much embarrassed and spent the next few hours cleaning it. I would always wonder: What’s the big deal? Would they be as embarrassed, I wondered, if I bled from my knee?  Strangely, my heart was always a rebel and I only felt proud to be a part of the circle of women I was such a late entrant to. Now everyone knew; and that was strangely comforting.

The second and the last time I stained my clothes was when I was in the 12th standard. It was the annual sports day, so I was wearing an all-white uniform and I didn't realize I had stained my uniform. My classmate, a boy, came up to me and told me about it, as he walked me home. He covered me like a shield. He was shocked that I was not embarrassed by it. To my dismay, I remained the talk of the school for the next few weeks. All in all, I had totally, completely embraced “it” and I was fortunate to have been born in an environment where the treatment towards me did not change, because I was having my periods.

And then Covid-19 happened …

Years passed and I did not give “it” much thought until … Covid-19 happened. By fate, I was pulled into relief work. Starting with giving out rations, I went on to helping migrants to get back home. During this pandemic, I became a part of  Padsquad, a movement of 40 pad-squadders working relentlessly in 21 cities to ensure that sanitary pads reach the poor & needy. A few drives and multiple discussions later, I have now been exposed to the reality of women’s health and hygiene in India, as it stands today.

Women remain the last priority: sanitary napkins are a luxury, menstrual cups a faraway dream.

Village women are treated as outcasts during those days and are not allowed to touch anything, lest it get contaminated. Many women in India use straw, grass or cow-dung in place of cloth or pads. With no water to drink, where is the water to wash cloth-pads? Since food is a priority, sanitary napkins are a luxury. On that front, the women think like the government, which treats sanitary pads as a luxury item and not an essential commodity.

Women suffer silently with UTI, due to poor sanitary conditions and lack of good clean cloth or sanitary pads. Malnutrition leads to excess bleeding and painful periods. PCOD goes undetected. Young un-married girls conceive, because no one told them about the connection between menstruation and pregnancy. Girls get married as soon as their periods start. They bear many children, because the husbands refuse to fix themselves and the women have no money for contraceptives or pills.

Now I realize that mere distribution of sanitary napkins is not enough. For now, reaching sanitary pads is the urgent need. How can it be that the same pads, which made me feel so special, are differently special for other women, who have no access to pads?

What is a privilege needs to be treated as a basic right and need.

Is this an issue about gender, class, culture, education? Or is the whole health-care system broken? Religion? The absence of a progressive mind? Or just a biological issue that was taken for granted as a way of life and thus ignored?

So I ask: If the men bled like women do every month, would pads still be seen as a luxury or a need?  

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If Mayuri's piece reaches your heart, please support the #padssquad initiative to ensure that we reach sanitary pads to the women who can’t afford it.

Her email address: <mayuridhavale@hotmail.com> 

Your support is my strength. 

Peace and love,

~ Joe Pinto, Saturday, 10 October 2020, Pune.

Poles apart, but under the same sky …

My dear students, family, friends, colleagues & well-wishers,

I announced this blog in 2015. But did not upload any pieces by my students. Here is the first of pieces in the pipe-line.

Niketa Mulay is from my Class of 2007, Dept of Communication & Journalism, aka Ranade Institute, Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU). She writes poems under the pen-name "Glassbeads".

Niketa ditched a cozy bank job to pursue a Masters in Journalism and Communication in 2005: "The career change was not a smooth ride, but the satisfaction of doing something I was passionate about, outweighed the odd balls that I faced. After my son Vikrant was born, I took a break. And in 2010, I returned to free-lance writing and editing.

"I have kept my inner poet alive in this labyrinth of commercial writing. I love to read, write and scuba-dive. I root for human rights, conscious living, whole-some parenting and music." 

Words: 841. The original in Marathi appeared in Maharashtra Times on 27 July 2019. Translated into the English by her batch-mate Karuna Gosavi.

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By Niketa Mulay

POLES apart, but under the same sky, is the story of my long-distance relationship with my husband Ranjit. Our entire lives have revolved around communicating across miles, right from meeting ‘on-line’ for the first time – till now.

Our long-distance relationship survives on three strong pillars – trust, empathy and communication.

Trust, both giving and retaining, is of prime importance in my relationship with Ranjit who is a marine engineer and works on a ship. Months away from each other, we have now gotten used to this life, because both of us knew this fact – before we got married. Maybe, that is vital factor for a marriage to work – knowing before-hand and well, what you are getting into.

Trust is crucial. If he trusts me to look after his family, then we’re headed in the right direction. I have to uphold his belief that, in his absence, I will be competently responsible in handling issues that prop up at home. In the same way, I trust him to be loyal to me physically and mentally, despite temptations.

Forget these bigger things, even small stuff like doing the banking work and paying bills requires some level of trust. U have to prove that U can handle day-to-day affairs. And, in the partner’s absence, handling big issues like medical and personal emergencies builds immense faith in each other.

I can’t be a representative for shippie wives or others who make such relationships work, because every couple has its own logic and magic formula. From my personal experience and the recounting of experiences by friends and relatives, however, I am summing up my inferences on whether long- distance relationships work.

It’s hard work, I admit. But the minute you sink into self-pity, the delicate fabric of empathy is torn. When I think of Ranjit and empathise with his situation of missing the comfort of home and his dear ones, I realise my self-pity is so inadequate. When I am having fun with my colleagues at an office party, I remind myself that Hubby is some-where in the middle of the ocean working 12-hour shifts. That helps me to appreciate my position and value my comforts.

He understands the same when he is back home on a vacation: that I have been handling things at home and he has to help to make things easier when he is around. He figures I need a break and packs me off to a solo holiday at times! Such understanding doesn’t happen overnight, it takes years to build and a lot of positive communication. In our case, it has taken 16 years!

Communication is vital in such a situation. In the era of WhatsApp and video-calling, keeping in touch becomes easy. But sometimes a little becomes too much, too quickly. In our case, e-mail is the most favoured medium of communication. E-mails allow both of us the time to think about our thoughts and write about them, and also give the other person the time to ponder over what has been written.

We know that most problems happen when we react to what is said. In e-mails, the time for instant reaction is very less and there is more scope for understanding. Also, patience levels go up, because I know my husband can’t respond immediately.

With WhatsApp chat, the reply and response is expected to be instantaneous, but sometimes it is difficult to do so. Hubby may not know my state of mind at a particular time and yet expects me to instantly respond to his messages. Such communication becomes stressful at times; in our case although we can stay in touch better, it also causes misunderstanding and fights at times. So, over-communication is also a problem: he doesn’t have to know what I have cooked; I don’t need to ask him what pyjamas he is wearing!

There are days when I need to speak to him desperately, but I can’t because there is no network on the ship. At such times, it gets frustrating. But one gets by, staying distracted with other tasks. We miss each other's birthdays and anniversaries and festivals and important days.

Ranjit was sailing when his father expired. At such times to comfort a person is difficult and important. He was present, however, when our son Vikrant was born and loves being a hands-on dad. He strives hard to match his schedule so that we can enjoy a vacation together. “Being there” during our boy’s formative years is so vital and Hubby does that.

Such events bring us closer to each other. We have our arguments and fights too – it’s not all pink and rosy. But both of us want to see the bigger picture, how it is helping us come closer and develop as individuals and as a couple. The gains far out-weigh the minus points in my opinion.

Often friends ask me how we manage to keep our long-distance relationship strong. I tell them: “The distance has taught us to value each other’s presence more than we imagined. So the love grows stronger.”

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Please send your pieces to my email address:

<editjoepinto@gmail.com>

Your support is my strength,

Peace and love,

~ Joe Pinto, Saturday, 10 October 2020, Pune.

To my sincere & honest students: Be good

My dear sincere & honest (s&h) students,

I would like to dedicate this blog to:
1. Gauri Gharpure, the first of my s&h students to remove my fear of the Internet and suggest that I may want to start a blog of my own for the sake of my students. I started "Against the Tide" on 2 October 2008.
2. Smriti Mudgal, Kajal Iyer and Smita Aggarwal -- the earliest among my s&h students, who encouraged me with comments and suggestions.
3. Abhilasha Padhy, Aditi Kumar, Aparna Das-Sadukhan, Arpita Dey, Chinmaye Bhave, Deepthy Menon, Harmanpreet Kaur, Shrinkhla Narula, Sindoora Iyer, Shilpy Balakrishna (in alphabetical order by name); who were the earliest of my s&h students to start blogs of their own.
4. All my s&h students, who have commented on my blog-posts and especially those of U who encouraged me to write the five-part memoir on my mother.
5. All those who keep me alive with their questions. For, what is journalism in one word, if not "Question"?

The purpose of this blog is to:
1. Carry the writings & work of my s&h students
2. Introduce them & the work they do
3. Build & sustain a network of my s&h students, a part of the larger "community of the good".
4. Pay tribute to those of my s&h students, from whom I have learned.

Please send in your suggestions and comments.

Your support is my strength.

Peace and love,
- Joe.

Pune, India; Tuesday, 27 January 2015.