Wednesday, Dec. 20, 2006

A more productive day.

It starts early. 9:30am, Prashant picks me up and we head over to one widow’s house. This is the woman with leprosy. She is a widow and cares for two grandchildren. She can barely use her hands and feet. She begs for a living.

Prashant explains that I would like to sit and observe her daily routine for a while.

I crouch and shoot while she uses her nubs of fingers to scrub, rinse and hang her grandchildren’s school uniforms. Prashant has gone to a home nearby to give me space and time. If I need him, all I need to do is call.

She heads up to the roof, where she hangs up the wet clothes and picks up pieces of dried cow dung.

She is looking at me, wondering why I am so interested in her life. Why I care so much.

Prashant comes, and we tell the woman we will be back later in the afternoon, when her grandchildren are home from school. Tomorrow, we agree to follow her to Mathura, where she will beg during the day.

She begins to cry. Prashant immediately tries to comfort her. He cannot tolerate tears. She is embarrassed, he tells me later. Embarrassed that someone is so interested in her and following her all the time.

****

Potato chapattis for lunch. Spicy, but mixed with sweet pickles, they are delicious. And warm milk mixed with a chocolate powder.

Then we head off to another widow ashram. We arrive and have to wait for a while until Prashant’s contacts get there. While we are seated, we are served chai tea, dried pineapple, biscuits and other Indian snacks. There is so much hospitality in this town. Even the poorest families will offer you tea if you enter their homes.

We get permission to photograph inside of the ashram, but only for a brief time. I don’t know why the stay is being cut short, but I rush to shoot anyway. The widows here are chanting. Some are ringing bells. One woman is blowing a conch. I shoot.

We rush to get their names and scramble downstairs. I only have 10 minutes maximum to photograph the women on the first floor of the ashram. What the big rush is, I have no idea.

Later I find out that government officials are coming to inspect the ashram. The ashram’s owner got a call and wanted to get us out of there as quickly as possible.

****
We head back to the widow’s house later. Her grandchildren should be arriving home from school soon.

But she is not there, and the door is locked. She has gone to a relative’s house, a neighbor tells us. We venture over there, and are offered tea. The woman has to grip the teacup in a special way because of her fingers.

Her grandchildren mill about her, and soon all of them head back home. Dinner is being made. The woman’s granddaughter helps sift flour, and then the woman kneads dough for chapattis, the dough sticking in clumps to her finger nubs.

Suddenly, the woman’s granddaughter yells at me from the rooftop. “Sunset.” We head upstairs. The widow continues to work, silhouetted in the red and yellow of the fading sun.