Wonder Women — COVID19 Lock-down Day 33
2020, When wheel stopped (or slowed down)
Note: This is part of a series of articles I’ve been writing while India is under nationwide lock-down to fight with COVID19 virus. Some are in a form of diary just recording events, some are in form of general thoughts. Today is Day 33.
Week 1 [Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, Day 6, Day 7]
Week 2 [Day 8, Day 9, Day 10, Day 11, Day 12, Day 13, Day 14]
Week 3 [Day 15, Day 16, Day 17, Day 18, Day 19, Day 20, Day 21]
Week 4 [Day 22, Day 23, Day 24, Day 25, Day 26, Day 27, Day 28]
Week 5 [Day 29, Day 30, Day 31, Day 32]
Wonder Women
No, I’m not talking about the superhero movie “Wonder Woman”. This is an attempt to pay tribute to wonder women everywhere balancing every hurdle put up by society in their path.
Today, the gender ratio in workforce is around 39%. And when we look at “unpaid” work done, there is staggering gap (with lowest gap of 1 hour per day on average and highest around 4–5 hours per day) between “unpaid” work of women vs “unpaid” work of men.
Further, even after doing same work as most of men do at workforce, on an average women receive lower wages compared to men at work.
After facing every possible hurdle, women still continue to rise up as unstoppable fire. This unstoppable force is what makes them “Wonder Women”.
The Beginning
It is almost safe to say, role of a woman in anyone’s life starts with mother. The bonding of mother with kids is a special one, for mainly because, they face biological changes, psychological traumas during pregnancy and labor. Yet their pain vanishes away in a single instant when they hear cry of the just born kid for first time. That usually will be last time they will be happy listening cry of their kids.
Many times we tend to say, kids change the world around. But the truth is, it is the mothers who change world around by shaping their kids behavior. Many kids who changed world later on are the ones that are shaped and guarded by their mothers in unthinkable ways.
I always try to draw this analogy from story of Ganesha, even for the almighty Shiva has to prove himself as father, but the mother need not. A mother doesn’t look for approval from kid, for a lot of reasons, a kid is mere reflection of mother. Remember if a kid is successful, first greet their mother and then the kid.
The Dreamer
After their interactions with mother, when kids are grown enough, kids start to face teachers, classmates and cousins. It is also the time when kids start having lot of great dreams about future. “The Dreamers” are born in schools.
Predominantly, the nursery teacher roles are occupied by women across globe. After the first “Wonder woman” of the life, the second “Wonder woman”, a teacher implants seeds of dreams.
Unfortunately the high school dropouts of girls (compared to boys) is still very large in India. This is nothing but “killing a dream”.
Yet women who fall in to ashes of their dreams are able to rise their kids to greater heights. They knew the fall, they will do anything to let their kids rise.
Social Stigma
The role played society (applicable for even developed countries) in a women’s life is more dangerous than anything. It could be gender discrimination, not giving due honor, branding woman as source of entertainment and so on.
When a women continues to pursue their dreams, first challenge they face starts with family. Some women sacrifice their dreams even after having high potential. A great example from my life is none other than my wife for spending time with kids.
Then comes the gender discrimination at workforce. There are people who simply refuse to work under a female boss. They just cannot accept a woman can have higher potential and do greater things than a male. I can write about one incident which shocked me when I heard about it, “A office boy refused to serve tea to the female engineer at work place because he believes male is superior to women”.
Then comes the entertainment branding, this is more dangerous than anything. People at higher positions exploiting their power to get advantage from team members, colleagues. There are endless reports almost from every industry. Personally I have witnessed cases of women harassment at work in sexual way by their peers, supervisors. Even after having so many laws trying to protect people, common sense just dies when it comes to matter of sexual advantages.
The Silent Catalyst
The case of many “house wives” is they are silent catalysts in success of their family members. Many times, their role goes unrecognized in attributing success to individual.
All of them do lot of “Unpaid” work at home. Being in a lock-down, it may be evident by now the amount of “Unpaid” work done at home everyday. Who can smile and continue their daily activities other than Wonder Women?
On an other thought, Bhagavadgita defines Karma Yogi as one who does their Karmas without waiting for result in return. Isn’t it strange we live among millions of Karma Yogis (wonder women who tend to be house wives) and yet they get recognized barely?
Dual Roles
Every working women goes through at least two roles every day, one at home and one at office. My mother has played this dual role successfully when we (me and my brothers) are young and this continues to amaze me when I look back.
Now with continued lock-down of more than a month (and expected to go further more), they are now playing two roles at same time. Who can handle such pressure other than Wonder Women?
Role in COVID19 Lock-down
Look around at front line warriors (Doctors and Nurses), majority of them are women. The two countries (Germany, Newzealnd) who were successful in dealing with COVID19 breakout are lead by women.
But ones who balance things at home during continued stress on entire family during this extended lock-down is none other than many wonder women.
Get amazed by their strength
Get awed by their spirit
Fall in love with wonder women of your life one more time
Respect when you encounter them, for they are true wonder of nature
By statistics, total fatalities from COVID19 crossed a mile stone of 2 Lakh globally and nearing a confirmed cases of 3 Million people. As I mentioned in one of my other articles, this means roughly 12 Million (4 direct family members) people are directly effected.
Be safe in doors and extend help whenever possible to your neighbors, citizens of your locality.
Stay safe…
Stay stronger for the COVID19 is not going anywhere in near term…
