International Women’s Day

March eighth, a day when we celebrate life, we celebrate love, we celebrate kindness, as the entire world celebrates International women’s day.

We celebrate women for coming into our life and giving new definition of Celebrating Life, Celebrating International Women’s Day!

As International women’s day is approaching, in today’s post I would like to share an incident from my life.

An anecdote of a woman called ‘Jyoti’, whom I may never meet again, but I am convinced that she will continue to be present at places, where women in the truest sense will need love and support in needy times!

It was five years ago, we visited Manali, a tourist town nestled in the mountains of Himachal Pradesh.

We were a group of four friends, and we planned our trip in March, it was an unplanned trip and we wanted to spend some good time together.

On an early morning of March 08,2016, we reached Manali.

All of us decided to explore the hill station, and without a miss, we kept all our bag packs at our resort in Manali and after having a light breakfast, we went out to explore the places nearby.

International Women’s Day

We came across many beautiful and naturally scenic places.

A time came when we were too tired to move, and this was the time when we came across a mysterious woman.

A young woman with distinctive Chakk and Chiri on her head, Jhumka on her ears, Ghagri and Choli caught our eyes. We understood she was a local of that place.

The woman was sitting on a roadside pavement and stitching a choli (blouse) with her hands.

Out of curiosity I went near her and asked ‘For whom you are sewing this beautiful choli?

She looked up and smiled, ‘I am not sure, but there is someone!’

Strange!

We all friends had our lunch in the nearby dhaba. She was still sitting on the pavement and stitching the blouse.

There was a sense of mystery around this woman, as she looked extremely pure and had deep blue eyes!

We realised she was sitting alone on the pavement for quite long and maybe she had skipped her lunch. Out of goodwill my friend packed a lunch packet for her and while we had finished our meal, we moved towards her and gave her the food packet. This mysterious lady said, ‘Thank you she will need it, I will give it to her!’

Me and my friends looked at one another!

I went to the nearby medicine shop to purchase a cough syrup for me, while I turned around after the purchase, I saw this lady standing right behind.

Air of East

I was little stunned, because while I was coming towards the medicine shop, the girl was talking with my friends, how come she reached here so fast!

I smiled and asked the woman, if she would need anything.

She replied ‘Band-Aids and an Ointment.’

I asked her if she needs it for her family. The girl smiled and replied, ‘He will need it’

Strange!

While coming back along with the woman towards my friends, we thought of returning to our resort.

While walking on the pavement, we saw two very old women and a small dog were sitting on a torn bedsheet at the opposite pavement quite far from the dhaba where we had our lunch. One woman’s blouse was quite torn out, the other was sobbing for food.

We also realised some local women gossiping about the two old ladies, about how they were abandoned by their family and how they now do not own the mansion, of which they were owner some years back!

The ladies were taking interest in pointing their fingers and gossiping about the two old women, but none of them went near them to offer any help!

Ironically, the ladies were greeting each other, ‘Happy International Women’s Day!’

The mysterious woman crossed the pavement and went towards them.

She handed her stitched choli and food packet to both the old women, respectively.  She bowed down and started applying band-aid and ointment to the small dog who was sitting with them.

Closely we watched, ‘Yes the small dog had cuts and wounds over his body!’

It was almost evening, fog started to descend all around.

The mysterious woman was still standing on the other side of our pavement beside the two old women.

I shouted, ‘Never asked, May I know your name please?’

‘Jyoti’, the woman replied.

The fog started to grow and slowly the other side of the pavement started getting covered with fog.

Jyoti started disappearing slowly from our eyes.

And after some time when the fog was getting cleared Jyoti was not there!

Our tour guide came from behind us and started to take us back to our resort.

Our guide was a local person, we asked him about Jyoti. He replied that he knows almost everyone in Manali, but there is no one called Jyoti, whom he knows.

We were unable to believe his words, and as we asked a few more locals and also the dhaba owner, they replied the same!

But we know that we had met Jyoti for real!

It was on a International women’s day this mysterious woman made us realize that along with love, kindness and sacrifice a woman can bring a million of possibilities of giving back love, helping and upholding other woman in time of their needs.

And then only can we believe in celebrating life, celebrating International women’s day in reality.

International Women’s Day

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