from 'stepping out: life and sexuality in rural india'
"A woman sits quietly and looks at the floor. She seems to be in no hurry. 'What ails you?' we ask. 'I have this headache', she says demurely, all curled up wih anxieties that signal her despair. 'Sit, sit,' our workers say, 'let us have some tea. Where did you say you hurt?' Then slowly she begins to talk.
'Why did you not mention this earlier?' Dr. Rani Bang asks the woman in her clinic, while I watch. 'I speak with fear,' she says. 'Why?' 'Because you might think I am unchaste. News spreads fast in the village and brings disgrace to us and our families.'
More devastating than malaria or tuberculosis or festering carbuncles you realize is the disease of loneliness ringed with a helpless fear of losing your dignity, of losing control over your body, of having strange hands probe and cut and remove that which makes you a woman.
And loneliness is more endemic than we would like to believe.'
-Mrinal Pande
'Why did you not mention this earlier?' Dr. Rani Bang asks the woman in her clinic, while I watch. 'I speak with fear,' she says. 'Why?' 'Because you might think I am unchaste. News spreads fast in the village and brings disgrace to us and our families.'
More devastating than malaria or tuberculosis or festering carbuncles you realize is the disease of loneliness ringed with a helpless fear of losing your dignity, of losing control over your body, of having strange hands probe and cut and remove that which makes you a woman.
And loneliness is more endemic than we would like to believe.'
-Mrinal Pande