The word ‘geri’ actually refers to the ’rounds’ farmers in Punjabi villages used to take around their fields. But in Chandigarh, the ‘Geri Route’ has been for decades become the site of cars and bikes moving in rounds, with the drivers openly harassing women who walk the path.

This ‘route’ spans roads surrounding Sector 8,9,10, and 11 of the city and goes around the area where the colleges are. When I got to know about this route and the ‘culture’ it had spawned, I was horrified. I was disturbed by how sanctioned this kind of harassment and misogyny had become in the name of ‘fun’.

After moving to the city, I participated in the ‘Bekhauf Aazaadi March’ organised in the wake of the Varnika Kundu stalking case. We had marched at night across the Geri Route to let it be known that women have the right to walk on the roads at any time. There was an outpouring of raging emotions at the event.

Following the march, I posted a request using the Google Maps review option for the renaming of the route. ‘Geri Route’ is, in fact, not the official name of the street, it is just local parlance. I also started a petition on Change.org about this request and posted about it on Facebook to add more weight to the campaign. I believe changing the language using which the route is referred to is a big deal. It is a small but significant step in stopping the legitimising of the harassment that has become common and accepted there.

A few months after the review was posted, Google Maps renamed the stretch the ‘Azaadi Route’.

“Azaadi (Freedom) Route – the route where the free spirit of Chandigarh – defined best by the women who fear none and nothing in their assertion of equality – flows. No, not the freedom to do as you please, not the freedom to violate the other or to go unchecked, but the freedom to walk without fear. Bekhauf.”

(https://www.change.org/p/google-maps-change-the-name-of-geri-route-to-azaadi-route)

Idol worship and ideal worship are somewhat analogous. Both involve an irrational desire for something that doesn’t exist and something that is a figment of imagination turned into a deep-rooted socio-cultural belief and construction.

Idol worship is still not as pernicious because it is only a metaphor, a symbol after all. But the ‘ideal’, a dangerous myth has inexorably hegemonized the human societies, creating a false consciousness of perfection, camouflaging the underlying dirt . The longing for the ideal is violent, oppressive and stifling, and in the context of gender, the imposition of idealism has created a toxic womanhood under which women grapple to meet the benchmark of excellence that is predicated upon sustaining the subservient position of the “second sex” ascribed to them.

It is indispensable to attack the idealism of the ideal, to demolish the  utopia and embrace the ‘imperfections.’ While the pan-Indian, traditional “sanskari” image of an ideal woman is visibly sexist, misogynistic and patriarchal, the modern, westernized and ‘cosmopolitan’ femininity too is not spared from the patriarchal dominance. There is a culture of shame associated with body hair and fat in the mainstream cinema and fashion industries. The stigma around the expression of sexuality and nonchalant swearing by a woman (Mallika Dua) and the levels of cyber abuse and hatred in the form of masculinism that it instigates, are indicative of the insecurities of fragile masculinity over a woman trespassing the ‘masculine’ space and shaking the gender binary.

I strongly feel that we need more people who destabilize the gender binary and norms, trouble gender and bring an anarchy to the oppressive ‘ideal’ system.

This piece is about the walls women are sometimes met with when we express anything that is unexpected or not the norm. It explores the silences that trying to communicate difficult things brings about.

I’m seventeen.

He’s twenty five.

I say let’s not.

He does it anyway.

I’m twenty three.

He’s twenty three.

I say I can’t breathe.

He continues.

I’m twenty nine.

He’s in his fifties.

I say please don’t.

He doesn’t stop.

I’m thirty.

He’s in his fifties, maybe sixties.

I say I’m just doing my job.

He doesn’t stop, either.

No means nothing.

Language is a lie.

I’m seventeen.

He’s twenty five.

I say let’s not.

He says OK.

He does it anyway.

I’m twenty three.

He’s twenty three.

I say I can’t breathe.

He says then die.

He continues.

I’m twenty nine.

He’s in his fifties.

I say please don’t.

He says I’m harmless.

He doesn’t stop.

I’m thirty.

He’s in his fifties or sixties.

I say I’m just doing my job.

He says you can tell me your problems. Alone in my room.

He doesn’t stop, either.

I guess no means nothing. All language is a lie.

A sanskari woman would never go out on dates with boys who are strangers they said. But I always did what I wanted to and never stopped because I am a ‘girl’. Given my love for meeting new people, I went out on a few Tinder dates and almost dated one of them. Because, why not! Who knew, I would find love in a hopeless place!

Also, an ‘ideal woman’ of marriage-able age is expected to be thin and feminine, but I bear no shame in being overweight, (though, I am not denying my concern of my health!) But, a guy (or his family) who rejects me because of my weight is not worth living my whole life with. Hence, I chose to be the way I am, and only try to be healthy, and not live up to the expectations of the society.

At so many points in my life, I have broken the tradition of going to temple when I have periods. I see no logic in staying away from idols and temples when I am menstruating!

From the time I understood that I am the one who will be responsible for my decisions, I started making my own choices. Starting from taking PCM (Physics, Chemistry, Maths) after the 10th grade.

In the middle of the night, sitting in the dark, I had removed the option of ‘Commerce’ (that I had tick-marked first because I had been strongly suggested by my family and asked by my father to opt for it), using a whitener and selected PCM with a thought in my mind that I don’t want to blame anyone else in the future for the choices I make today.

I decided not to go for a 9-5 regular job, choosing to continue to experiment for better learning. Then one day,  I chopped off my long curly hair to feel freer than ever! I took off to the Himalayas. I got my hair colored for the first time ever and got my first tattoo, at the same time. “Why did you do this to yourself?”, my father asked. “I wanted to get this done now, there is no point if I do it at the age of 30, when you think I have become older and wiser,” I answered. He smiled back in acceptance.

Adorning myself every year with the tattoos that I have chosen, believing in their depiction, make me not an ‘ideal woman’ at all, especially as I work with children. I also have taken a very well-thought out decision in cohesion with my husband to not have a baby. We don’t have answers if and when s/he asks us what were you doing when this world was becoming a sad place to live for us!

My grandmom often used to say, “Never trust a man who cries openly and a woman who laughs openly!”

She wanted her grand-daughters to be well-behaved princesses. My father was an IAS officer, and she expected us to step it up. The rules she abided by were – be quiet, or speak less; serve everyone; and don’t laugh too loud. Break these rules and risk not being taken seriously!

But over the years, she changed. I grew up boisterous, learning to be so in an all-girls’ school. Everything we did there was quite loud! Seeing me as I had become, her ideas shifted. She started to tell people, “You should see my grand-daughter. She laughs aloud, even when among a 100 men!” There was pride in her voice, because being able to laugh loudly was, in her eyes, a sign of power.

Her reactions also helped me understand the social background of women of her generation. She became a study subject for me, about women of a different period. Being able to laugh aloud was one of many small victories that these women celebrated, like being able to buy one’s son a wrist-watch, or managing to finance his education by working extra hours. For these working class women, who came from the soil, the ‘ideal woman’ meant something else than it does to us today.