The society I grew up in, it has a rather aversive attitude towards the eunuchs (and transgenders).

To an extent that they are considered lesser of humans who does not get the social status of a regular man or woman; to an extent when the eunuchs live separately from their families- in ‘eunuch colonies’, don’t get proper education as they are very often abandoned by their families and what they mostly do for a living is prostitution.

The word ‘hijra’ (the Hindi/ Bengali/ Urdu word for eunuch) is derogatory in South Asian languages- something you do not use in ‘sophisticated’ company, more a slang than anything else. Sadly it is not much different in the English-speaking world either. I don’t know about the social statuses of that this less than fortunate group in the context of the more civilized Western society, but if ‘the word’ is used as a derogatory term- there is little chance of anything being different to a vast degree- after all.

While our biologist friends can give us a perfectly reasonable scientific reason of what causes a person to be a man, woman or a member of ‘the third sex’- I am more concerned with the way society treats this group. I find it funny in having to spell it out- but there is more to an individual than what ‘gender’ you can categorize him (or her or whatever) as- it’s time we became aware of it.

Just as sad it is that anyone will find it funny when a group of Indians with a disgusting sense of humour passing through a photograph of Serena and Venus Williams wearing a sari- saying the following-

‘You will die laughing at how ‘hijra’ Venus and Serena looks’.

Here is the picture:

No, I’m not laughing.

I see two American ladies wearing YOUR traditional clothing, I see two ladies belonging to a different racial group than you wearing YOUR traditional clothing- I see these two ladies are trying to embrace your culture. I see nothing funny in that, I think it is nice.

It’s time you stopped laughing too.

Allow us to also suggest

• Lines, Borders and Human Rights
• Tale of sacrificial goats

6:15am wake-up alarm goes off…

I force myself out of bed, brush my teeth and get my things ready for a dreadful drive to work….its not toooooo far but the insanely drivers around me make it a never ending journey, And a difficult one.

I don’t have a clue why our side of the world hasn’t learnt how to drive yet…oh no they know how to start a car, put it into gear and race off but do they know there are other people doing the same on the same route? All morality and ethic lessons are locked in the car boot, refusing to come out as I see the most educated(looking) people doing as bad on the roads as any other wagon driver, khota gaari wala and our very great motorcyslists…whoa I bow to them! If you have ever driven on these roads, you’d know the feeling AND its not a good one.

I struggle everyday amongst the never ending trail of insanely traffic honking the horns for no valid reason and my 5 years old asks everyday, why do they blow the horns too much!?!

We talk about changing the system but who is going to change it…these effing drivers who don’t even want to drive in one lane!!!!

pardon me, if Ive stopped making sense…these are just the after effects!

Some random suggestions

• The moral police of God
• PS: It’s all for God…
• And I ask, WHY!?!

Racism. I’d have thought we’ve come a long way, and this world is a better place now than it was about a decade back when it comes to human rights (unless, of course, you are a woman living in Mogadishu , or something similar to that somewhere else), that racism is predominantly a thing of the past- and whatever of it exists today is mostly limited to a disillusioned, uneducated, closed-minded minority.

In a way, it’s right. We humans have come a long way. We are now more aware and, I’d say, more sensitive- too; or so I thought- that was yesterday.

Today I’m asking the question- are we really much different now? A news has surfaced recently and I cannot help but wonder if I was giving these modern-day humans too much credit.

You see- when in this ‘modern’ times a Louisiana justice of peace in Tangipahoa Parish, Keith Bardwell, denies to marry interracial couples on the grounds of… well… race- all I could successfully do is ‘gulp’.

To quote a few lines from the article:

Bardwell said he asks everyone who calls about marriage if they are a mixed race couple. If they are, he does not marry them, he said.

“There is a problem with both groups accepting a child from such a marriage,” Bardwell said. “I think those children suffer and I won’t help put them through it.”

“I try to treat everyone equally,” he said.

Shocking!

Those children suffer, eh? Are you sure you did not mean that they become US Presidents when they grow up, Mr. Bardwell? You do seem like one of those who will not like a ‘mixed race’ president running your country!

Also… does he even ‘hear’ himself say those things?! Dude- first it was ‘inter-religion marriage, now you go ‘inter-race’?! Helloooo… Brotherhood! Where have YOU gone now?

To elaborate a little further- as if that wasn’t enough, he then goes:

“I’m not a racist. I just don’t believe in mixing the races that way,” Bardwell told the Associated Press on Thursday. “I have piles and piles of black friends. They come to my home, I marry them, they use my bathroom. I treat them just like everyone else.”

That sounds ‘racist’ to me, Mr. Bardwell… ‘very racist’, actually.

Apparently, Mr Bardwell, you seem very smug about the things you ‘let them do’! Seems like you are keeping a list, too. Eh?

Well… all I can say on a positive note is that at least, what he was doing is considered ‘illegal’ in these modern times.

Allow us to also suggest

• Did you hear the news? Religion has killed humanity in broad daylight…
• Lines, Borders and Human Rights
• The Bra Boys of Islamic Extremism

In a zoo in Gaza, two donkeys were given a dye job… ummm… to make them look like zebras. Well, look here for details, if you’d need some kind of proof.

Believe me now? You just can’t make this stuff up, can you?

What may be the reason for all this… err… fuss, you ask?

They wanted to show their children how a zebra looks like. You cannot get the animal in Asia, which is found mostly, if not only, in Africa. On top of that, they are expensive and Gaza’s Palestinians are impoverished. A genuine zebra would have been too expensive to bring into the Israel-blockaded Gaza via smuggling tunnels under the border with Egypt.

Rather sad, if you look at it this way, but- if you ask me- it STILL does not make it right.

Poverty is cruel and sad…. but I would still prefer you to not take the path of deceit. I understand that for the children, it was fun of sort sorts, but playing with their trust, saying that it was a zebra they were looking at while it was actually a donkey, is something I just could not justify…. maybe it’s just me.

And also did you think what those zebras went through being taped all over in masking tapes and dyed with a paint brush using women’s hair colour?

I think that there are some things that should be left to only the willing humans. Please spare the animals, will you?

What do you think?

Allow us to also suggest

• Lines, Borders and Human Rights

Facebook; a modern day tool for keeping in touch with everyone who may or may not be interested in every minute detail of our lives. It’s good… really, except perhaps for the second by second status updates.

I’m not a fan of that. Not at all, no.

But then tolerance and a little extra knowledge cannot hurt. After all, it does not hurt to know that Sammy went to Vegas on a vacation, or that Timmy there is having coffee, or that Stevie is drunk.

Useless information that you’d give a rat’s ass for, true, but still okay. I decide to chill out, take a deep breath and tell myself that it’s all good, worse things have happened after all.

That’s when Liz goes personal… say… she brings the bedroom to her status update. Ummm… okay. Liz, did you just write… umm… THAT..!!

I laugh… and life goes on. I laugh a bit more. I decide Facebook has good entertainment value sometimes and is a ‘keep’!

That’s until Nelly poses a question in form of yet another status update: Do I have stop being a daughter when I am a wife?

Since you asked- no Nelly- you do not. No, and no, not even when you are the sicko who is the daughter and wife for the same man! Eww… lets draw the line at incest, shall we?

But of course, I don’t say that. Mommy taught me to be civil, after all. I fail miserably at times. This post is a burning example of that fail- as you see. Instead, I check Nelly’s number of friends.

250.

TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY!!!!

It does seem too many to be receiving this question. Hell, even 5 seem too many! But, is it just me?

It does not stop there unfortunately. Sometimes Nelly, sometimes Stevie, sometimes Nikilesh- a page full of personal stuffs look at me in form of status updates, and I keep feeling like the proverbial fish-out-of-water:

“I have hernia”
“Am I the sacrificial goat in this relationship?”
“I pine for Sally. I love you so much, Sally-kins. Ummmmmmah…”

Hmm… these seem personal, more personal than what Liz shared- to be honest. And I wonder what am I missing?!!

I guess these are shouts for attention…. ‘LOUD’ shouts! And, it seems like I am not alone in this thought, others are having similar thoughts too. Some experts say that Facebook statuses say a lot about who you are as a person. I think I agree. I think Nelly is obsessed with herself and a miserable whiney attention freak, so is Liz- less whiney and just as miserable …. and Stevie, Timmy and Sammy are just plain boring….

I guess that makes me a judgement passing stalker.

May be it’s time the FB-world should look up the word ‘Personal’ in the dictionary? And while that happens- I can give a good ‘once over’ to my list of friends.

And you? You, meanwhile, can have a look at this. I thought it was a good read.

Allow us to also suggest

• Tale of sacrificial goats
• Do tremors happen when God slaps the earth on her butt-cheeks?