Saris, kurtas and ready-made Indian clothes
The newly-found eastern part in me wants to control my shopping impulses in this country. "Dress in white plain cotton and eat rice puffs with salt and turmenic" my zen side says. "You came here to work with the rural poor". However, the old consuMERIst dark side of me still dominates many of my actions, specially when I visit a place where you can actually buy pretty nice stuff.
Clothing is one of the things that is lovely over here. Silks, pure cotton...even the least girly of the girls would fall for these fabrics. The other day I tried to wear a sari for the first time in my life and it felt surprisingly comfortable and easy. Indeed, it is like walking with a thin towel all over you and very light on underwear or something that holds your under-sari body.
The ladies working as representative officers for my job here are going to wear saris when they visit clients in rural remote areas. It is a must. Apparently, the other typical outfit worn by Indian women, kurta salwar, is considered as too modern in rural areas. Hence, if you wear a sari, your mind is where it has to be...if you wear a kurta...your mind is polluted with sex and provocation. I am slightly exaggerating, you know that. But, and here comes the important question, do remote rural ultra-conservachiks realize that women actually show a lot more of flesh wearing a sari than loose kurtas?
Saris might be the traditional costume, dating as far as Indus Valley times, but they are clearly pieces of clothe wrapping women: you get a complete XXX picture of women's backs and bellies. The little t-shirt under the sari (choli) is exactly that, little. To me it looks more like a XXL bra.
Kurtas, instead, cover your belly, back and everything else a man could dream of. Last but not least, people like these guys
http://www.anokhi.com/photos/photo_archive/index.html
renew the closets of the (rich) girls from the capitals of this country and are the obscure textile temptation of my dark side.
In Rome do as Romans do. I am behaving. There is a swimming pool in one of the private schools of this village and I have been going few times to freshen up. When my colleagues told me about the swimming pool I immediately thought I could finally get there that Indian tan that is getting so hard to catch. I was a little bit surprised when the local manager told me that I should wear shorts and something loose to cover the upper part of my body (breasts!). Interestingly, local boys were swimming with t-shirts. I obeyed. No problem, Meri is ready: I bought a cute surfing outfit in Santa Cruz, California which I never ever thought I would use in India. Gosh, now I sounded snobby.
However, my visits to that school are getting more and more interesting: when rules push too hard, boys might try harder to find out what saris or loose swimming clothes mysteriously hide. They were pretty creative in finding the way of spying on a pale, almost 30-year old Spaniard changing her clothes in a local swimming pool in Thanjavur. I am behaving, I swear.
Clothing is one of the things that is lovely over here. Silks, pure cotton...even the least girly of the girls would fall for these fabrics. The other day I tried to wear a sari for the first time in my life and it felt surprisingly comfortable and easy. Indeed, it is like walking with a thin towel all over you and very light on underwear or something that holds your under-sari body.The ladies working as representative officers for my job here are going to wear saris when they visit clients in rural remote areas. It is a must. Apparently, the other typical outfit worn by Indian women, kurta salwar, is considered as too modern in rural areas. Hence, if you wear a sari, your mind is where it has to be...if you wear a kurta...your mind is polluted with sex and provocation. I am slightly exaggerating, you know that. But, and here comes the important question, do remote rural ultra-conservachiks realize that women actually show a lot more of flesh wearing a sari than loose kurtas?
Saris might be the traditional costume, dating as far as Indus Valley times, but they are clearly pieces of clothe wrapping women: you get a complete XXX picture of women's backs and bellies. The little t-shirt under the sari (choli) is exactly that, little. To me it looks more like a XXL bra.
Kurtas, instead, cover your belly, back and everything else a man could dream of. Last but not least, people like these guys
http://www.anokhi.com/photos/photo_archive/index.html
renew the closets of the (rich) girls from the capitals of this country and are the obscure textile temptation of my dark side.
In Rome do as Romans do. I am behaving. There is a swimming pool in one of the private schools of this village and I have been going few times to freshen up. When my colleagues told me about the swimming pool I immediately thought I could finally get there that Indian tan that is getting so hard to catch. I was a little bit surprised when the local manager told me that I should wear shorts and something loose to cover the upper part of my body (breasts!). Interestingly, local boys were swimming with t-shirts. I obeyed. No problem, Meri is ready: I bought a cute surfing outfit in Santa Cruz, California which I never ever thought I would use in India. Gosh, now I sounded snobby.
However, my visits to that school are getting more and more interesting: when rules push too hard, boys might try harder to find out what saris or loose swimming clothes mysteriously hide. They were pretty creative in finding the way of spying on a pale, almost 30-year old Spaniard changing her clothes in a local swimming pool in Thanjavur. I am behaving, I swear.
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