The bus door flies open and my thoughts are abruptly halted.
The conductor sings out in a roll of Kannada. I briefly make out “Kanakapura”. I must be going the right way, but this is definitely the wrong bus. A horde of South-Indians clammer onto the bus, popping out of the tight door before the bus takes off again, although it had hardly stopped. Two women choose to sit up tight and close to me. I breathe a sigh of relief. They smile softly at me and open their tiffins for breakfast. I check my head scarf is holding on and in that moment my mind throws back to the village the
day before.
For a month now I’ve been sitting on village house floors talking to the women about their rural existence. Awkwardly ramming rice into my mouth over lunch with Teja, I realise it’s in caring for each other that this movement gains momentum.
This is not a movement.
The yearning for equilibrium here is nothing like the fight for equality in the west. Genders can’t be equal; We’re not the same. But, we are just as necessary as the other. The women in the villages care for each other. There’s a shift; a way of thinking that acknowledges the need to care for one another.
Not 20years ago a woman with marital trouble was told by the other women of the village to “go home, your place is with your husband”. Often the result was a beating, or far worse, their death.
Now, there are no secrets as they gossip over their work and exchange the best ways to manage their men. It’s a gentle change, and not one that will be remembered when the tipping point arrives.
“Do you think things will change Teja?” I ask in all my naiveté.
“Mmm yes”, she says as her eyes scan the ceiling searching her economy of English, “It will be a long time. A long time”.
The word long, had never sounded so long. One morning the men here will wake up and wonder who will make their roti, samosa, their Dosa. I think this evolution will happen without them and then they’ll catch up.
The bus bumps and jumps and throws us about the road, snapping me out of my day-dream. I look up to see a young girl also day-dreaming out the window. I silently raise my camera and steal her image. She barks her eyes at me.
We’re kindred spirits dreaming about the future. I wonder how wide her imagination goes?
What does she think is possible for her?
Someone is playing hindi music from his phone. Collared shirts and thongs, Saree’s and roti’s.
The morning bus from Bangalore.
