In an exclusive video for Lifebuoy, Bollywood actress and mother, Kajol shares her opinion about a video featuring Gondappa which has gone viral. She explains how as a mother, she constantly worries about the health of her children and how a minor things like a cold or a cut can make her extremely worried about her child.
Gondappa's story is a heart breaking one. He walks the entire way from his house to the village temple on his hands on a hot summer noon, never putting his feet down before he reaches the deity's shrine. He does all of this to thank the gods for his child has turned five. His actions might seem bizarre at first but when we realize that Gondappa is one of those few unfortunate parents who has lost his children to diarrhea, his actions don't seem misplaced. This is his first child to have survived.
As a parent, one's child's health is the prime priority and as Kajol mentions even a sneeze and bruise can get mothers worrying about their child's health. And to imagine having to lose one's infant is unimaginable.
You might like to watch the original video about Gondappa where he tells his story. See it HERE.
"Every year two million (2000000) children under the age of five die of infections like diarrhea and pneumonia."
The most surprising aspect is the fact that these diseases which take such a huge toll of lives every year are diseases which can be very easily prevented. The only basic requirements of personal hygiene can keep these fatal diseases at bay. Washing one's hands before and after eating, after using the toilet, before cooking and handling food, and keeping the house clean are the basic few requirements which can help in prevention of the disease. Unfortunately, a large majority of parents are completely oblivious of these.
Lifebuoy as one of India's leading brands has come forward with the Help a Child Reach Five campaign to spread the importance of personal hygiene to the remote rural areas of India. They have set to focus on Thesgora, a village in India with one of the highest rates of diarrhea and have started to spread the awareness regarding the need for basic personal hygiene and bringing in real change to help prevent a large number of infectious diseases leading to child deaths. For every share of the video, Lifebuoy has promised to pay Re.1 towards the campaign.
Join Lifebuoy's campaign on their Facebook page, theirYoutube stream and on their website to help reduce the number of child deaths in India due to diarrhea. Share Gondappa's story and if possible, donate to the campaign if you can and spread the word so that no parent has to go through the horror of losing their beloved child.
This post is sponsored by Lifebuoy but all opinions are my own.
What is the first thing that you think of when you read the title of this post?
For me, it immediately reminds me of Phoebe's epic song, Smelly Cat from my favourite TV show, F.R.I.E.N.D.S
For those of you who have never heard of it, here it is for your hearing pleasure-
Smelly Cat
Smelly cat, smelly cat, what are they feeding you?
Smelly cat, smelly cat, it's not your fault.
They won't take you to the vet.
You're obviously not their favorite pet.
It may not be a bed of roses.
And you're no friend to those with noses.
Now coming to what this post is actually about - Smell and memories associated with them.
Smell I believe is the most powerful way to rouse your memory. Just a waft of fragrance reminds one of an obscure and random incident from the past which you could never have remembered consciously. It is like this floodgate of memories which breaks with flashes from your past running one after another in a slideshow mode, beautiful ( and sometimes not so beautiful) memories fleeting like a film right in front of you as you stand still, eyes closed, inhaling the scent through your nostrils, taking it inside of you, into your lungs.
I, particularly have a very strong sense of smell. The smell of certain things evoke a very strong reaction. It gets so enveloping that sometimes I can feel the scent running through me, down my spine, giving me goose-flesh. There are so many memories that I can associate with an array of smells.
It was only last evening that I was coming back home when the bus stopped at a traffic signal close to the footpath which had a row of florists one after another selling all kinds of beautiful flowers and amongst all the mishmash of perfumes from those flowers, my nose caught one in particular- the smell of a rose. I despise anything artifically rose scented but I absolutely love the smell of a fresh rose bud. I have had this love for a very long time, as long as I can remember. My mom tells me how I used to be completely wonder struck at the sight and smell of roses, red ones in particular whenever I saw them. There used to be this particular florist's that was close to a shopping area where we used to live in Vizag. I (as mum tells) used to instantly get glued to the nearest light post to the shop, holding to it and stood there standing and smelling the rose for as long as I could before my parents would come and pull me from there. I faintly remember how the amused shopkeeper had many a times offered the four year old me a red rose.
just replace the cat with a mini me :P
The smell of books is something I am completely addicted to. Every new academic year when my dad returned home with bags with my news books, I would hurriedly open the packet and smell each and every book and carry them everywhere with me. I love scampering around old bookstores, finding the oldest books and flipping through the yellow pages smelling the amazing romantic smell (yes, I can smell romance as well), older the book, yellower its pages and stronger the scent. My maternal uncle has a personal library with books that are more than 50 years old and some even older, from his own childhood. Every time I visit them, I spend my entire time sitting in that old room with shelves containing books every where, reading some and smelling some. I love flipping through pages, caressing them and smelling them when I read books. Books are after all supposed to be absorbed in entirety, tasting them with all your senses (except maybe tasting them literally) and not just read with your eyes alone.
Yes, I am a book sniffer.
Another very favourite smell of mine (yeah I am that weird, I have favourites in odours as well) is the smell of baked food - cakes, pastries, cookies etc etc. Every time the smell of a freshly baked cookie enters my nostrils, it instantly takes me back to my childhood when my mom used to bake us cakes and "nan khatais" (it is a kind of eggless crispy cookie/biscuit) .Well my super sensitive nose was of course bad news for my mum for she had to always think of new hiding places for all these goodies she prepared or the little mouse that I was, I would sniff around everywhere in the house in search of them and gobble them as fast as I could.
Freshly baked goodies ^_^
As a Bengali the Durga Pujo and the time associated with it is of special significance to us. Also during this time, the air has a magic about it. it smells of a hundred different things all somehow associated with the pujo. The faint scent of the fragrant shiuli flowers from the backyard early in the morning, the smell of chandan and incense from the pujo, the fragrance of the jasmine, mogra, marigolds and all other flowers from the garlands around the pujo mandap, the intoxicating smell of the dhuno from the dhunuchi dance in the evening, the aroma of the delicacies cooked during those four-five days all combine together for a sniffers' delight.
That is a dhunuchi
So what are your favourite smells, the ones that revive any special memory from your past?
This Post is written for the "Smelly Air to Smiley Air" contest at Indiblogger sponsored by Ambipur. Check out the Ambi Pur Facebook page for the amazing array of room fresheners available in different scents and different varieties to keep your rooms smelling like cherry blossoms whenever your want. Just a few sprays and you can easily get rid of any unwanted odour, be it the the musty stench during the monsoon or the despicable smell of discarded socks in an instant.
Till Next,
P.S.- All pictures (except my signature of course) are google finds.
The word Mia in Italian means "My" and in Danish means "beloved". In my words it would mean an extension of me, of my identity, of who I am.
What does Mia Woman mean to you?
To me she is that epitome of womanhood - beautiful, efficient, smart and loving ; someone who is in perfect control of her life, be it her household or her workplace. She is the woman who thinks of her work to be her religion and her motivating force, a medium of her self expression and also a place through which she can bring in change, in her life and in the world, however small it might be.
My Mia woman is somebody I have always admired and emulated since the time I gained consciousness- my aunt, my mom's twin sister, Ganga mashi ("mashi" is the Bengali for your mom's sister) . Apart from the fact that I love her because she is my aunt, it is the person she is which commands respect, admiration and love from everybody around her. There hasn't been a single time she has ceased to amaze me with her beauty, her work and her dedication to every single thing she does. Mashi is differently-abled, one of her hands don't function properly; but that hasn't stopped her from doing everything she had wanted to do, overcoming all the physical obstacles on the way. She has been the perfect daughter, taking care of my dida (i.e. my granny) when she was extremely ill, which my uncles as sons failed to do. She single-handedly took care of my ailing granma for fifteen years till she passed away, sacrificing a lot from her personal life. What makes it all the more admirable is the fact that she never spoke a word of complaint against all the hardships she had to endure in the process.
That's her :)
What I admire the most about her is not just how she handled her personal crises but how she managed her work and gained the love and respect from everyone she knows. My aunt is an LIC agent. She started working for the Insurance company some twenty years ago when the whole concept of saving your money against future accidents wasn't very well known. Mashi's job requirements demand her to interact with a lot of people (her clients) on a daily basis, to be almost at their beck and call to collect and submit the money to the company in time. What makes her extra special is how she has actually transformed a lot of lives in the process. She went around to not very well educated people around the area she lives and helped them grasp the importance of having an insurance covered for their life so that their loved ones are not left helpless after them. And all of this wasn't done for of the commission she would get for each case she submitted, because I know a lot of under privileged people who have their lives insured and haven't paid a penny, my aunt paid the entire amount, all the installments from her own earnings for them. What started as a job requirement has now transformed into a personal relationship for my aunt. The people who are her clients have now turned her into a member of their own family for she has embraced each of them as her very own. The job leaves her with no time of her own and no holiday. She efficiently managed (and still does) all the household chores along side taking care of my granny and going to work everyday and running to help people whenever she was called for even if it is in the middle of the night. Every time I walk the streets with her, I see some old man, a tiny five year old and some lady wave at her with a smile, asking , "Bhalo acho?" (meaning "How have you been?") and she waves back replying and handing over a candy to the kid.
Ganga Mashi is everything beautiful means - simple, independent, loving and demure. She has not only made her own life beautiful with her work but has also spread her beauty to other lives around her. She is as beautiful as her work.
Check out this beautiful TVC by Tanishq which represents everything their Mia collection is - light and beautiful yet unflashy.
I believe that your clothes and your jewelery is representative of you, an external manifestation of the beautiful woman you are, inside and outside. If you liked those pretty danglers on Megha in the clip, check out Tanishq's website for them and more here.
How would the world be if the greatest of inventors kept their discoveries and inventions just for themselves instead of giving it to the world? Sharing your happiness does not decrease it but increases it multi-fold.
"One idea can change the world."
What is the best childhood memory you have? Mine is reading out passages from Enid Blyton's Rag, Tag and Bobtail and Other Stories to my kid sister during our bed time. We would cuddle up together on our bed and I would read her out a couple of passages as we took a flight together into the magical world inhabited by goblins, fairies and elves. I remember and delight at how I taught my baby sister to read and spell words from our Dr.Seuss and Blyton books before my sis was formally taught the alphabets. I used to make her sing along with me as I read aloud poems like The Midnight Tea Party and many other rhymes I had learnt.
Can't thank my parents enough for not subscribing to the
cable connection for our TV till I was grown up.
I was introduced to the wonderful world of story books when I had by chance happened to find an old hand-me-down copy of Blyton's Tell Me A Story which belonged to an older cousin of mine. The five year old me was so fascinated by the colorful illustrations in the books which helped me imagine and make pictures inside my head how creatures like elves, brownies and pixies looked like as I read along the stories. It has been more than sixteen years since and I still have the book with me. That was the beginning and I haven't stopped gorging on books ever since. My mom often caught me hiding and reading my beloved Famous Five books behind my textbooks. Every year with the money I got on my birthday, I would go to our local book store and come back with my hands full with bags filled with story books. Our school library card permitted just one book a week and I borrowed the books my friends has issued from the library and read as many and as fast as I could.
A few pictures from my very first story book
A few months back, a friend of mine happened to send me a surprise gift package. I literally cried out of joy when I opened the package to discover my very favourite books from childhood, the entire set of The Naughtiest Girl inside it.
I happened to see this video which was a part of the TEDxGateway Mumbai in December 2012 partnered by Franklin Templeton Investments.
Rohini Nilekani, Founder Chairperson of Pratham Books put forward a few insightful facts that provide a statistical view of the child readership status in our country-
Our country has a child readership of around 300 million.
The book output which caters to this 300 million readers is just 25000.
In comparison to the United Kingdom where every child has around 6 books to read, one book in India is shared by 20 children.
50% of these books published in our country are in two basic languages- English and Hindi. A very small number of all these books are published in vernacular languages. In a country with more than 150 languages and with 200 million children who cannot read English, it is important to publish more books in the regional languages which can be read and understood by these children.
These statistics were something I wasn't at all prepared for. I could not imagine how life would have turned out for me had I never found the joy of reading story books. They helped me think out of the box, imagine a world that I had never seen and they made me who I am today. And to think there are children who have access to not a single book is heartbreaking. It is extremely important to tell a child how the world looks beyond the text books. There is a world full of surprises and wonderful stuff that only textbooks can never teach you. It is only with the help of these story books that you can discover them and take your flight.
Pratham Books with association with some philanthropic patrons have started with a mission to reach out to these little kids in every corner of the country and have set out with the motto of "A book in every child's hand". The dream is a huge one to accomplish but since their very foundation Pratham Books have changed the scenario for the better. Pratham Books have engaged a huge number of writers, illustrators and enthusiastic volunteers who have helped create original stories which children can easily associate with and have published story books in more than 11 languages so far.
The video clip reminded me of the time when I was in primary section and the school library was accessible only to the secondary and senior secondary students. I used to pray to God to make me grow up super-fast so that I could read all those beautiful story books I saw neatly stacked up in the library shelves. During the lunch break, I would stand outside the library door and peep inside and stare at my lucky seniors who could read those books. Little did I know then that the school librarian had been keeping a watch on me. And one fine day, to my utter delight, I found her approaching me and taking me by my hand. She made me sit on her chair and asked me why I religiously stood outside the door everyday and I told her the reason. Miss Grace (that was her name) went over to the magazine rack and brought me a few copies of Champak and Tinkle to read and told me I could come to the library and read whenever I want. That was the kindest and the best thing anybody could have possibly done to me.
A few years back, I had to move to Kolkata from Kochi and my parents were trying their best to reduce the luggage to the minimum. Naturally, my old stories books were set aside in the "leave behind" box of things. I, who was extremely attached to all my books was adamant not to leave them back. But then, better sense took over and I decided to give away my old story books to my friends from the colony. I gave a bundle of books to each and every friend I had and made them promise to read them after I left Kochi and I like to believe they kept their part of the promise and I was able to initiate a change, however small that was.
The aim of reaching out to these children and hand them each a book is a very difficult task to achieve. Pratham Books have taken huge leaps in the direction by publishing story books at extremely low prices of around Rs.25 each book. Even at this rate, the dream was a distant one. So they came out with an even better plan, the concept of a story card. An excerpt from the Pratham Books website explaining the concept of a storycard-
"The story of the Storycards is an interesting one! They are a living example of making an effort to reach the last child... Pratham Books has always been committed to increase penetration so that ALL children have access to good reading material. As Pratham's programmes began to touch the lives of more and more children through the READ India Campaign, there was a need for low cost material that could be distributed to the children. This was how the idea of creating story cards out of Pratham Books' titles germinated. In economically disadvantaged states, even the cost of a Pratham Books title would make it a discretionary buy whereas a story card can strengthen and encourage reading at a fraction of the cost and can be an attractive and motivational takeaway for a child. "
Just look at the interest and delight with which she is reading
The concept of these reading story cards is amazing as it reduces the production cost of books. The cost of producing these are fractional to the production cost of a complete story book. These are mini story books which are available each at Rs. 2 which can easily fulfill the dream of giving one story book to a child and ensure a change.
These storycards take me back to the time when I was in the primary section. Our school had allocated specific library periods for us when reading books apart from those in the syllabus were made compulsory. For us little ones who were not eligible to access the main library, our Head Mistress came over to our classes with a big bundle of these card like mini books which had fascinating tales and small wondrous articles about strange organisms like the Piranha fishes and sometimes about gardening and other amazing stuff. We used to compete to finish as many cards and find answers to the exercises that were at the back of these cards in the one hour duration of our library period.
There is a saying that goes "Charity begins at home". I believe that change is possible, it begins at the individual level. Every small step counts and it is only with baby steps that this mission can be accomplished. The best part of this wonderful initiative is the fact that it is open ended. People like you and I can join and encourage others around us to come together and work for the cause as volunteers, by pledging ourselves to the cause, helping in providing the books, donating and helping in establishing libraries in the remote corners of the country where these books are not easily available.
"Imagination is what sets us apart from all other organisms. Help children find their wings so that they can stretch them and fly."
As to how I plan to bring in the change from my side, I have promised myself to donate my first salary to the cause when I get a job. I had already started out with the change long before I had actually realised and I hope to take it a step further by doing my part of the change. I cannot explain the joy it gives me to see my little niece coming running towards me with her picture books and her Geronimo Stilton story books for me to read and translate the stories to her. It takes me back to my very own childhood.
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