Tanishq: Breaking the Fair Virgin Maiden Barrier

This is the latest advertisement of Tanishq, which is special in a lot of different ways. For the first time, a jewelry firm has come up with such an innovative and heart-touching thoughtful advertisement that reflects the actual celebration of a woman's identity and liberty in its own way.

The advertisement begins by showing a women getting ready to be married in sometime. In the meanwhile a little girl pops out from the background; she could be anyone, a niece, friend's daughter or a young cousin. However, the eyes of the would-be-bride has a certain spark when she see her. Their relationship of a mother and daughter becomes more evident by the way she takes care of the little girl. Afterwards, the little girl take her mother to the marriage stage where the bridegroom is waiting for the latter. The bride sits and the ceremony starts, which later reaches to the point where bother had to do the rounds of fire. The little girl also wanted to participate, but her mother signs her to remain quiet. Bridegroom witnesses that little communication of sign language between the mother-daughter that prompts him to take the little girl in his arms and complete the rounds. At the end of it all, the little girl asks if she could call the bridegroom 'Papa'.

Now let's reflect on what we just saw and what it could really mean for the millions of women as well as men. After watching it many would say that remarriage is justified for a woman who is divorced or widow with child. 

My take is, why a woman has to be married to be a mother at the very first place? An independent, strong, compassionate, kind woman can make her own choice to have a child or adopt one to be a mother without being married. The advertisement could be seen as the "Very First" marriage of a single mother who found the right man, after she chose to became a mother first.

The second most important thing that all the men and women at large could notice from this peculiar advertisement is that it has a dusky women in its center. So all those "Fair & Lovely" fans and fanatics, please understand that we Indians have something bestowed by the nature, which is exotic to the White Caucasian race. Let's cherish it and nourish it!

True that, with this particular work Tanishq has broken the mindset and the barrier, which the Indian folks had. The idea of a virgin maiden being the only suitable candidate to be a bride is shattered, a mother can be married for the first time. A divorcee or a widow can always start her life afresh. Last, but not the least; Dusky women are beautiful in every aspect if they stop worrying about their skin tone...

Didaskaleinophobia!!!

Something that bothered me a while along with my parents; Didaskaleinophobia!!

Curious on what exactly Didaskaleinophobia is?

Well, it's the accute fear in a child that instantly comes from the thought or act of going to his school. Didasko is a Greek word that means 'teach' while phobia is Greek for 'fear'. This is a peculiar phobia that is most common in young children. I suffered from Didaskaleinophobia for a very long time, which made me change more than 20 schools by the time I reached my 10th standard of school.

Let's check the causes for Didaskaleinophobia

It is a proven fact that all kinds of phobia arise due to internal predispositions as well as from certain combinations of multiple external events. Though various phobias could be easily traced back to some sort of triggering events, which are usually a very traumatic experience that the patient had in his childhood. In this case, it could be a shy character that is intimidated by the strict teacher or the bullies in the class-room.

Know the symptoms of Didaskaleinophobia

Like any other kind of phobia, its symptoms does vary person-to-person, which completely depends on the individual level of fear. These symptoms include anxiety, irregular heartbeat, rapid breathing, sweating, nausea, dry mouth, shaking and more. In extreme cases the child may run away or hide himself when it's time to leave for school or tuition.

Any medication or treatment?

The best medication in this condition is counseling by an expert. This could very well be accompanied by an array of medicines prescribed by a specialist. However, the support of the parents and siblings is the most important aspect of the treatment. Other than counseling and medications, the patient could very well have to go through psychotherapy, hypnotherapy as well as programming for his Neuro-Linguistic; if the condition is very severe.

Under no circumstances Didaskaleinophobia should be considered a phase of life, it needs to be treated like any other ailment, but with a lot of TLC.

Sending Picture Postcards to Foreign Nation...

So today I went to send the first 5 postcards of Postcrossing to my local Post-Office, there I asked the clerk on how much worth postal-stamps are to be affixed on the Picture Postcards. To my surprise the clerk didn't know anything about the picture postcards or the stamps to be fixed on them. He directed me to the Post-Master, I asked him the same.

His reply shocked me. He told me that the custom department do not allow open documents to travel outside the nation and I have to put the postcards in an envelop; after which postal-stamp worth INR 25/- is to be affixed on it for common post. 

There was no point arguing with that old man who didn't know anything about the international postal charges for picture postcards. I came back home and did some research over the internet to end up with something extremely interesting.

I reached to the official website of Postal Department of India where I went a bit further exploring into its Tools section and came across some interesting discovery on this particular Postage Calculator Page. Here one could see the real time Postal Charges for;

1. Domestic Services
2. Miscellaneous Items
3. International Services

I went to the third; International Services, which has a simple menu that plays only on Java enabled systems. So people, keep the Java updated on your computer and smartphones. Within a minute this is what I find;

1. International Picture Postcard Tariff (Land/Ship): INR 7/-
2. International Picture Postcard Tariff (Air Mail): INR 12/-

The second option is the best because it would take a maximum time of 60 days to reach the remote most corner of the globe. One of my postcards took a mere 12 days to reach Belarus through Air Mail. The first option of Land/Ship may be the cheapest, but it's not the best as the snail will beat the mail by miles.

Happy Postcrossing!!!

How to wear Kacha-Saree: The Traditional Santha Dress for Women

A friend of mine asked me long back on how to tie a traditional Santhal Saree, which we call Kachha-Saree. Here is the entire process in pictures.

Postcrossing!!!

So today I have joined this wonderful project called Postcrossing. The object of this peculiar project is to let people send and receive postcards from strangers across the world. The strangers are equally interested in sending and receiving picture postcards from other people. All this is done for "Free"! The primary idea here is to 'send a postcard and receive one from a random sender'.

Now you must be thinking, why someone would even want to send or receive Picture Postcards in the time of digital era. Well, there are many people who still like to send and receive the real snail mail. The best part of this entire process is the element of pure surprise that comes with the postcards, which one receives from various places across the globe. Some of the places you may have never known or heard of; it increases your geographical knowledge as well as political knowledge about the world in general.

How does Postcrossing work?

Once you have registered yourself on Postcrossing for free, you have to;

1. Request the address for a postcard recipient from the website with a Postcrossing ID
2. Now write the address of the recipient with the Postcrossing ID on the postcard
3. Post the postcard duly stamped
4. Now wait for your own postcard to arrive
5. Once you receive a postcard, register it on the system with its Postcrossing ID

Don't forget to upload the picture of the postcard that you send or receive.

Initially you can send a maximum of 5 postcards at a single time. Each time one of your sent postcards will be registered by it's recipient, you may request for another address promptly. The permissable number of the postcards allowed to be sent, increases when you gradually cross the certain set number of postcards.

I have sent 5 postcards today. Will update as soon as I get my own postcard from someone or the recipients of my postcards would receive their's. For your reference, here is the link to my Postcrossing Profile.