>this is how I see you<

Chennai

Nap


Yep. There must be more two-wheelers than beds in India.


Flower ladies


In Saidapet.


Entering the imaginary world


in a place crowded with people (Chennai Central).


Night falls over Kortedala

Surprise! I walk around in Saidapet trying to find a bus to Adyar and I stumble across Swedish pop singer Jens Lekman, his silent and content smile while having his hair cut on a poster in a corner. The wonders of this world! Night falls over Kortedala – an excellent album!

Another excellent Swedish pop song to share with the world (The Wannadies):

Always when we fight
I try to make you laugh
Til everything’s forgotten
I know you hate that

Always when we fight
I kiss you once or twice
And everything’s forgotten
I know you hate that

//

You tell me I’m a real man
and try to look impressed
Not very
convincing
You know I love it

Now we watch TV
Til we fall asleep
Not very exciting
But it’s you and…

… me will – always – be together
You and me – always – and forever
ba ba ba ba
ba ba
It was always
You and me – always – and forever
You and me – always – and forever
ba ba ba ba
ba
It was always
You and me – always – and forever
You and me – always – and forever
ba ba ba ba
babaroah


Night falls over Chennai


I just love the suburban Chennai train. Look, it is like a speedy snake overtaking all the traffic and the whole world at the same time, making you hair unruly with wind.


The sweet life as a researcher

One day of all those days as life passes by:


Taking the bus trying to get on before the traffic jam starts at 8.45. Always fail and get stuck eitherways. Luckily Chennai has lots of nice mural paintings; this one I see everytime I head for Egmore.


Hanging out at the Tamil Nadu Archives. Literally wading in books! And today I got to read documentation from 1834 – wooow! Books are so old they are almost falling apart, it is magical to turn the pages and the handwriting is extremely beautiful!


Conducting interviews with people having different views and experiences on my essay topic. Today I met Mr. Veeramani, President of the Dravidar Kazhagam, pro-reservationist.


Waiting at the train platform to get into the ladies’ compartment.


Doing some serious idli researching. I didn’t know that you could buy ready-made idli mix! Ha!


Is this what winner cooking looks like?

I am starting to feel that my time in India is about to wrap up for this time. Because as every time you are about to leave a place, things suddenly go in ultra-speed. I am meeting so many interesting people, I am invited to so many homes and so many positive things are happening. I feel it is very beautiful and good for me to be here with a mission, a mission to understand Indian society and reservations in depth. I am happy to feel that I have a mission to try to understand something very complex and bring knowledge back to my home country. And as happens with the course of time, I am finally moving about in Chennai as it is my own town, enjoying contacts and friends already made. And at the same time as I am learning more about Indian society, caste and politics than I could imagine!


Mom…. I got tattooed


(Thanks V for letting me portray your hand!)


Buying train ticket

St Thomas Mount station 09:25


Essay writing


Interiors of the hostel to give you strength.


Digging into the archives at the TATA Institute of Social Sciences in Mumbai.


Making my way through the jungle of documents and animals at the gem of library in the Periyar Thidal, Chennai.

I guess most of you have been wondering if that Swedish girl was not supposed to do some research for her master thesis and not just go around taking photos using up Swedish government scholarship. Well I can tell you that I am multi-tasked! Since day 2 (first day was for getting out of the airport and find a place to sleep) I have been engaging in reading, talking and writing about quotas for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes in higher education in India and Tamil Nadu. I have dug into the principle of equality before the law and ways to reach real equality through special provisions for the historically discriminated segments of society. And:

The magic of deadlines!

If I was working on hard since I came here, that’s nothing from the last two weeks when I had a deadline to hold on to and an hour to send my so-far-finished work to my supervisor in Sweden. So much work has been done, so many things have been cleared out, so many places have been visited, so many new bus lines have been conquered and so much interesting people have been met!

Having to go out of the library to search for documents and persons, I have started to explore Chennai. I have been going by bus to places I didn’t know how to reach before. I have stumbled across archives just out of pure luck. I have met fighters for social justice and the anti-religious and anti-caste Periyar movement. I have met Mr. K.M. Vijayan who has filed petitions against the Tamil Nadu Reservation Act in the Supreme Court, and I have had the opportunity to meet the Chairman of the Tamil Nadu Backward Classes Commission Thiru M.S. Janarthanam and hear his highly interesting views on the judiciary and caste in Indian society from his experience as a practicioner of more than half a century in the Indian legal system.

When I came here I was firmly determined to keep all the politics and different opinions on reservations out of my essay as it was supposed to be purely legal. But I am starting to realize that it is more complicated than that, that there is no universal view of the existence and nature of the caste system and its operations in India today. Different groups argue differently on its importance in Indian society, and there are big battles fought from these different starting points on all levels in society, political, legal, occupational, in every-day life. I am starting to see that the battle between different interest groups and their relative power in Indian society also affects the legal issues, and that it is impossible to separate one from the other.


Walking the streets of Chennai


Amazing shadows!


If you want to get pregnant


you can come to the Velankanni church close to my house and tie a little baby figure in a cage onto the flagpole.


For the daily hair-do


Isn’t it just amazing that you can just step out of your house to get buy a fresh lovely fragrant flowers and put in your hair every day?? Who needs bottled scent when you can have the freshest of jasmin or rose! This is really one of the things I completely love with Chennai.


My second cricket game


Look at the bat!


Precision.


The cheering crowd.


Hands.


Reach.


My first cricket game


Score?


Mass media was there.


And paparazzi, of course.


Not in the winning team, but still!


Into the waves


As the Ganesh Charturthi festival was going to an end we brought the statue from the altar in our house to the beach and the local kids at the beach were eager to leave it to the sea.


So they took it and all the other things that had been on the altar, far out in the waves, to let it be carried away…


Where sky earth and water meet


Shortcut


After having been an all too frequent visitor at the computer doctor’s, finally my lappie is back and the blog is also back! Yeah!

I thought there was only one way to get to the beach…


… and suddenly I get to know that there’s a shortcut, just follow the street straight and then the path under the tree and with the sand dancing around your feet and all the moving green beauty…


… and before you know it you have the Bay of Bengal and the whole Indian Ocean capturing all your senses!


A taste of democracy


India against corruption demonstration in Pondicherry.


Butter against corruption in Times of India.


It is easy to make new friends…


… when you’re having a camera!


Civil Society Stands Strong – Goverment Has Initiated Negotiations With Anna Movement to Pass Lokpal Bill


I got messages on that Mr. Nturvelu that I visited last week in the India Against Corruption movement in was still fasting, so I went back to see him and how activities were still going on on LB Street in Adyar, southern Chennai.


Mr. Nturvelu was, despite of his age of 81 years, feeling well, he told me. However, if I understood it right he would break fast today Friday morning as the Indian Government was now stepping down, starting to negotiate as demands from civil society are too pressing not to be met.


This is a peaceful movement, in a country where many times protests seem to have the tendency to get violent.


Trapped


Suddenly it is there and you are stuck. The rain pours down and you should not move unless you want to get soaking wet within two seconds. Stuck under tree at Chembur station, Munmbai.


This time on my street in Chennai, only fifty metres from my house – can’t get my camera wet, just had to wait!


My terrace


From my terrace you can see the ocean…. (look cloooosley in between the two buildings!)


…. and the shadows.


Activism!


In India, corruption is a big problem. I have not noted it myself so far (as I did only after a few days in Mexico), but people tell me that it is really bad and that (in contrast to Mexico where people voluntarily bribe to get away with smaller offences) police here force you to bribe, or else you will be beaten up or in other very serious trouble. That is why it makes me so happy to see sooooo many Indians all over the country to go out on the streets and demand accountability of their politicians and public officials.

And as a law student it is very interesting to see the intersection of civil society activism and its impact on the legislative. Will this movement all over India, gathering thousands of people (including many that never before have gone out on the street to take part in action like this), make a parliamentary bill pass? Will a civil citizen like Anna Hazare gather so much public support, attention and pressure that his fast will be able to affect the passing of a bill in parliament?

The Chennai Anna Hazare anti-corruption movement has gathered in an empty construction building not very far from my home, and people I speak to are very sure of that the bill will be passed with this public pressure within a short period of time. The one who impresses me the most is without doubt this man:


Mr. Appai Nturvelu is 81 years old and when I talk to him he has been fasting for three days in support of Anna Hazare’s fast and India’s anti-corruption movement to have the stricter anti-corruption Lokpal bill passed, which will put harder constraints on politicians and public officials. When I ask how it is to fast, if it does not make him feel weak, if he think it really will help, he just clenches his fist and raises it extremely determinedly into the air. His fist glows of resistance. It glows of willpower and it glows of defiance. I get it translated that he is determined to be part of this movement to make a change. I feel my whole within fill up with admiration and the spirit of the place moves me.

People who believe they can make a change, are the people who will make a change.


Independence day


Independence day celebrations at campus!

My tribute.

Independent India is as young as only 64 years old!(Look at the little boy in Red Cross Youth panoply!)