Friday, April 29, 2011

Take a Bow...

or well, just simply applaud. If nothing else, it wouldn't kill you to check if I have it in on my Flickr photostream.

For about a very short while, I have been enticed with the idea of pursuing photography as a serious hobby. 'Serious' denotes that I would heavily invest my time and resources into it but at the end of the day, it'd remain a hobby, not a professional priority.

Needless to say, its an expensive hobby. I'm sure I'm going to be investing a lot of my money (that should ideally go into this 'savings plan' for the BIG MOVE) on buying further requirements like lenses.

But from my trip to Leh/Ladakh, what I also realized was how much work it is in a day for an 'average' photographer. Especially, if you're using a DSLR and that too, Canon. So many changes and shifts in settings and modes to customize to the lighting, framing, angle, shooting etc. etc. I remember my hands were aching at the end of the day and my right eye being a li'l blurry in vision.

Moreover, the frustration that can come with it when your hands ache, your eyes are sore and you have like a 1000 odd pictures (and not even enough memory space for it!), and you just HATE all your pictures. Maybe one odd two could be a little consoling.

Nevertheless, the whole experience has been very fulfilling and one of growth as a person and as an artistic skill. I always tend to come up with these high flying plans for myself (just because I don't have a life otherwise!). Shooting street fashion was my less than humble, ambitious plan. It still is. I really don't think I can just as yet define what's 'my thing' as a photographer. Right now, I'm willing to shoot anything and everything from a cat licking its paws to stills of really random objects like 3 pin multi plugs. But I look forward to knowing what my thing is and its going to be such an exciting journey.

I'm not sure of how much potential and therefore, use will I be but I'd like to do pro bono photography. There really hasn't been anything so far that I was good at and willing to do for free (I'm not good at too many things so I like to hoard them for maximum gain!). Always went by the wise words, "If you'r good at something, never do it for free". But the purity of and the joy in giving and the warm glow you feel inside is worth much more than a few extra bucks.

So I take a bow to this amazing art, that is my new lease for life.


Friday, April 8, 2011

Setting The Record "Straight"

A message I received on Facebook today.


Nk Kishord April 8 at 1:23pm Report
Read abt u in one of the mag- The Week if i remember correctly. Yr perception that people from north east are not welcome in other part of India - specially western part may not b entirely correct. i live in Mumbai and hv been seeing many from NE states working here happily. I hope u will change yr perception in times to come. by the way what is your NGO engaged in?? Best wishes -KISHOR
Makepeace Sitlhou April 8 at 2:33pm
Hi!

Thank you for writing in. 

The situation in Mumbai and South India is different from North. And I and my family have mostly only stayed in Northern parts of the country, in particular Delhi where we have been located for the past 10 years now. Because the north is closer home, it is also more accessible to North easterners hence there's a greater migration rate towards places like Delhi and Chandigarh then Bangalore or Mumbai (although there have been increasingly shifts). North India has a very ghetto attitude towards North Easterners in a way of not only discrimination in treatment but they also perceive us as soft targets. This in turn perpetuates a ghetto like collectivity amongst the north easterners who find it safer and familiar to stick with each other. Hence the bridge only becomes greater!

People in the south, being a whole lot more civilized, are more accommodating and even friendly. Yet, I've seen mainlanders from there also rife with many stereotypes (which are limiting and unintentionally, even offensive) about us. 

Nevertheless, it is really good to know that the perception is becoming a lot more friendly and familiar about us. I personally don't endorse north easterners to be lauded as 'victims' and the 'marginalized' continuously. It really doesn't help our cause and I think what would more automatically shun any over assuming mainlander, is by proving our worth doubly! It is no discrete fact that many communities from the north east are still very socio-economically backward and listed under ST/SC under the constituition. Having said this, I still don't think its just or fair for us to receive the treatment and the narrow description we have been dis-positioned with!

Wow! You just brought out all my thoughts! :P

regards,

Makepeace.

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Me lose weight? How about you lose some steam?!




I really meant to get down tonight to writing a book review. But instead I'm just gonna be doing a review of our times and culture today. An article on women and their weight obsession, so appropriately titled 'The Big Issue' by Shane Watson, got my attention and concentration in a focussed manner from the flying rages of frustration and resentment it has been infesting in my head for so long now.

Since about 6 years now, I've been constantly nagged by my parents and relatives to, "GO LOSE SOME WEIGHT!". The way they put it, you would think it was a pound of apples that I could just drop down somewhere. Relatives have an infamous reputation for poking their noses in place where its really none of their business. They've always had one bone or the other to pick with me and luckily enough for them, this bone became their livelihood.

No, I'm not such a repressed person to only find the space in a blog to vent and diss my relatives but especially after reading the linked article, a lot of dots started connecting.


"There is a lot of confusion about this weight fascism. We blame fashion. We blame models. We blame ageism and advertising and celebrity. But who stands to gain from ostracising women because they are too curvaceous or too thin? Other women, that’s who: women who mistrust their own sex and who lack confidence in themselves".
The women in my family - lovely as they are, charming as they can be - are not really the most progressive of their times. Mind you, they are made of steel but only so rigidly moulded in a socio-economically backward society's stereotypical roles and expectations. I, the darkest sheep in this herd, turned out different - in some advantaged ways that are glorified and many other ill fitting ways that are collectively abhorred. You guessed the latter! 


It sounds condescending but I realized that for all the times I felt judged and so cruelly evaluated, they were balancing off the remarks I get of being 'smart' and 'ambitious'. For everytime that I'm a hard working girl focussed with her goals, I'm a fat 'no looker' who's going to have a tough time pleasing (or even getting) a husband 'coz I wouldn't cook for him. Because they're dolled up as Barbie now but will not be after two kids and hence, must find their Ken (or someone who comes even an inch closer) 'coz they couldn't rely on their own worn out potential for enough of life's luxuries. This is exactly how women are pitted against each other. While they think I have excess meat oozing out of my buttons, I think all their meat went to their heads!

Nigella is right! Men don't pull these on you (save the "Your Momma So Fat" jokes), although I know a few who do exceptionally care a little bit more. But I also know a lot of smart, intelligent (and as beautiful) women for whom its not the defining identity. My rant also connects well with Nigella when she says,

"Perhaps this is all about how we define ourselves as women. Should we be at home, baking cakes? Should we be binding our pregnancy bumps in the boardroom? If we can turn all our anxieties about how we should be living our lives into a fight about our size, then maybe that is our way of coping".


I believe I've come from a place of inherent feminism but don't swarm a world where it is a natural disposition. So I pride myself over having fought against a lot of odds yet this is still something I need to overcome as a woman. To synthesize my feelings with what I believe i.e. to not beat up myself over not being a certain size I'm told I should be. 


"In the fat camp are those who represent the forces of goodness and womanliness, or indulgence and ill discipline, depending on where you stand on the scales; in the skinny camp are the savvy, fit, modern girls, or the life-deniers – if you’re not so thin yourself. The size you are is a statement of your entire life philosophy, and the gulf between the two camps is filled with fear and misunderstanding. It is war, ladies, and it is our war. We are making enemies of each other on the basis of body shape".


Ladies, lets grow up from these 'girly' battles of skinny bitches vs. fat cow!




What's beautiful is beautiful, whether or not perfect.