Everywhere we go, we are surrounded by beautiful Indian women in their saris wearing an incredible amount of jewelry and decoration. We had heard various rumors that the red dots on their foreheads and the position of their nose rings may be linked to their marital status. Yesterday as we attempted to add a bit of color to our "Barbie" white skin, we got a lesson on the Hindu culture from some of our friends, or rather the local women wandering the beach in a mad attempt to make a few rupees off of the few items they clenched in their fists, trying to be relatively discreet in their selling from the glares of police whom patrol the beach every few hours. During our three hour beach time, the police were observed twice. When the police would arrive, the women would quickly get up from their sitting perch before us and make for the bushes where they would hide out until it was cleared that officials had left. We observed that one of the girls acted as a watchman, patrolling the beach and keeping watch for the police arrival/ departure. We imagine the girls selling gave her a cut of their profits at the end of the day.
In speaking with the women as they allowed us a reprieve from their selling antics, we learned that in the Hindu faith, there are a few different symbols of marriage which are much different from the western norm of married persons sporting a wedding band on their left hand. As we came to learn, in india, a woman symbolizes her marital status in several ways; in Hinduism, when a girl gets married, she adorns certain jewelry and observes certain customs to make obvious her marital status. Married Hindu girls mangalsutra or a gold necklace that her husband places around her neck at the time of marriage. Bangals, toe rings, and a red bindi on a woman's forehead also symbolize not only her rite of passage from a girl to a married woman, but also her heightened position in society as an adult who is respected and capable of running a household.
No comments:
Post a Comment