“The Republic of India is deemed one of the emerging superpowers of the world. With a 8.4% GDP rate and a extremely rapidly expanding market, not only it has been meritorious of BRICs membership in 2009, it has also become world’s fastest growing economy in 2018. Economic success notwithstanding, numerous are the endemic evils Indian…
Tag: India
School in India
Khelghar, at Athavle Corner. When I walked into the small, dirty and only room of Kelghar, at Athavle Corner, Pune I had one thought in my mind: “This is not a school”. I had to wait until the end of the visit to realize how wrong—or maybe right—I was. Started by the Non Governmental Organization…
Heritage walk across Pune
Cultural heritage is both easy to grasp and difficult to define: it is immediate, you know it when you see it. The definition by Unesco recites that heritage is the “legacy of physical artifacts and intangible attributes of a group or society that are inherited from past generations, maintained in the present and bestowed for the benefit…
Doing Sociology in English in India: Towards a new Tower of Babel?
Since I was a child, the Tower of Babel has been my favorite story from the Genesis. When I first arrived in India I realized how the country resembles a bewitching Babel, embodying a maze-like, per se linguistic microcosm. Its 1.3 billion inhabitants, who speak more than 19,500 different languages and dialects, would be unable…
Sacred Groves, Tamhini
I had gone to Navratri dances the night before. When I woke up on Sunday morning that very feeling of captivating energy, deep intensity and mystic spiritualism experienced during the Garba was still with me, and I have taken it along with me during the excursion at the sacred groves. The sacred groves are segments…
Mutha river
Does the river come first or human settlements, customs and traditions do? We arrive at the bank of Mutha river at 6:45 in the morning. We silently stand on the bank and we admire the river in its imperial magnificence, at sunrise. Everything is quite: no horns, no engines, nor a single bird’s chirp. The…
Blood Is Normal. Or it is not?
Menstruation and Womanhood in Contemporary India “Periods are normal. Showing them should be too.” This is the closing sentence of #bloodnormal, a British campaign from Bodyform and sister brand Libresse released in October 2017. Written by Nicholas Hulley and art directed by Nadja Lossgott, the short ad of “Blood is normal” aimed to break the…
Where am I from?
Ever since I left Italy in 2016 to travel, then study and work abroad, across the over 20 countries I have been, “Where are you from?” is one of the questions I got asked the most. Where am I from? Tricky question. I’m from Italy – that’s the easy answer. Where I feel I belong…