What-a-woman......

The phrase, "What a woman !"  has multiple applications, as I discovered.  The message  widely varies depending the situation, the person saying it, the object of the remark, and so on.

A crematorium in a biggish city.  Mid morning winter sun streaming in through the old trees  on the river bank, where the crematorium stands. A friend had lost her only remaining parent, her father.  Relatives, and friends were gathered around, and there was much whispering. There were no male offspring of the deceased.  To some it mattered a lot.

She stood purposefully by her father's body. She would accompany him upto his last moments as a physical being, whether in life or death.  There was some discussion. Who would perform the few formalities that were considered the last rites  She spoke up and said she would.

There was some sudden dissension in the group. Some male cousins thought this was all wrong.  Some older folks, who knew the girl and her devotion to her father, saw nothing wrong . They stood by the girl. Who went ahead and performed the formalities, and then actually gave a shoulder to the stretcher that carried her father to the electric  set up.  The so called, male cousins, walked off in a huff, even before the actual cremation,  unable to bear what they thought was an insult. 

They thought they had lost face. But didn't realize that they never had one in the first place, given their atrocious attitude.  They probably went, "Shaa! What,  a woman ? Oh no ! "  as they muttered while leaving. The rest of the group, probably stood around  the girl,  in support, remembering how she cared for her father, and went, "What a woman ! ".....

Go back several decades and imagine an illiterate girl married to a senseless violent man , in her village, at the age of 14.  He would not just beat her, but tried to completely smash her mind. They would return from family trips where he wouldn't eat anything; he would return home and ask the wife to make bhakris, regardless of how late it was. She would make some chutney for him, freshly grinding it to serve with the hot bhakri of the griddle.  He would take that, smell it, the spread the chutney all over the bhakri face, and then smash the whole thing into her face.  (She told me this story).

Today she stands on her own feet  having left him  2  decades ago. She worked houses, educated her kids, now has grand kids. She encourages her daughters-n-law to take classes and work,  her sons are gainfully employed, and she bravely supports a daughter who came away from a bad marriage, after being cheated, herself. And at the end of the day, she is always out to help people, , has learnt to talk to officers in offices, bravely, and doesn't hesitate to tell off a son if she thinks he needs it. I know so many people who would simply stand, applaud, and say ,"What a woman !  What a woman !".  (Most folks would recognize her as my  household help, S, who has been with me for 25 years, and has been extensively blogged about.)

What really will make you wonder is this true story.

Out one evening  for dinner at a neighboring suburb, we were walking  on the sidewalk , as the place was some distance away, and there was a family of 4 ahead of us.  Their little fellow skipped ahead, and the older sister followed with the parents.

Newly constructed sidewalks  often have some stuff pending, in the sense, that it is not uncommon to see a thickish pipe at an very small angle to the road, sort of protruding , instead of running just below the side walk surface.

All of a sudden, we saw the woman fall down. It was dark, and she had tripped over one such protruding pipe, and was on all fours in a split second. I think she hurt her knee very badly.

Almost instantly, her husband, in a loud ringing voice , got upset and shouted ," "What a  woman ! ("Kya aurat hai ! "~What kind of a woman is this ?).  "  

I was totally aghast. The woman picked herself up, and sat on one of the stones on the side of the sidewalk, clutching her knee. She looked up at her fuming  husband,  and in a shaking voice, held out her arm as if to say "stay out",  simply shouted  and asked everyone to stay away from her. She asked them to carry on, and that  she would do whatever needed to be done  to get self  up and attended to.  And they stood around, the children, confused, and the man, probably wondering how the words, betraying his own chauvinist  convoluted thinking came out like this.  Suddenly, as an afterthought,  the husband looked around to shout at someone, spied us , and started yelling about how people left careless construction half finished , dangerous and so on. No one was fooled, I helped the woman up , and we went out separate ways.

I saw the husband looking on dazed, as if he didn't say what he did.  (Which we all heard).

But clearly , he was  or simply pretended to be,  more bothered, about her fall hurting the Earth.

It was like, "What kind of a woman trips and falls on a rusted iron protruding pipe, when out for a family dinner ?  What a woman! Shaaa ......"


Three women. Different occasions. Three different societal strata. Same disrespect,  same abuse.

And then one wonders, why,  when enlightened parents can bring up daughters  who stand shoulder to shoulder with sons in responsibilities , guts , capabilities and so on,  does no one pay any attention to sons? 

Or is it that their default development, good, bad or terrible,  is always considered the gold standard ? 

Had the guy fallen after tripping on the pipe, there would have been an almighty fuss, cribbing, limping, swearing, cancelling the outing, xrays, assorted folks rushing around with ointments, ice  etc in a your-wish-is-my-command   mode.

It really has nothing  to do with money, education, or prestige.

It's the mind-set........and its careless nurturing.