Redefining Beauty, Airport Road, Bangalore [2003]. One of those mundane, chaotic traffic days, lanes and signal... The vehicle we were in had reached far from the pedestrian crossing line when this gentle face caught my eye... She was, presumably, one of the relocated fly over construction labourers' kid, forced to beg to earn a living and/or a few extra bucks without much choice... As candid as I was trying to be, she gradually noticed the focusing camera... shy, yet self-admiral she took to pose forgetting she'd dropped her crutches, which gave away her false bandages of a fracture/mutilated foot... There was another little boy with her as well, I think it might have been her little brother or friend, who also came up running on noticing the camera, picking his crutches up in his hands... :) I quite instantly stopped photographing, as it lost it's essence through the moment... :) and we got the green light soon after... :-/ :) This portrait was displayed at Rafiki's [] play 'Sizwe Bansi' along that year, though not completely set in theme, the idea was to emphasize mellow parallels of the character 'Robert' in today's urban world... "Inspired" by Steve McCurry's portrait of the Afghan Girl and the profile "How They Found The Afghan Girl" on NGC I went back looking for her on Airport Road to give her a copy of her picture, but in all futile attempts...! Ok, humour apart, I did go looking for her... :-/ :( However, that is the last I saw of her even afterwards... :) Her impression and photo (imprint) remained with me... and a strong, bearing one of that...! 

"That is always the gypsies' way, no home anywhere, no landlord to pay rent to, wandering about as it pleases them with their children, their pigs, and a dog or two, and on them the police keep a vigilant eye. I frequently watch the doings of the family nearest me. They are dark and good-looking, with fine, strongly-built bodies, like north-west country folk. Their women are handsome, and have tall, slim, well-knit figures, and with their free and easy movements, and natural independent airs, they look to me like swarthy Englishwomen"

"These are truly children of the soil, born on it somewhere, bred by the wayside, here, there, and everywhere, dying anywhere (yet through their immortal lives and persistence I should think...). Night and day under the open sky, in the open air, on the bare ground, they lead a unique kind of life, and yet work, love, children and household duties- everything is there" -Shazadpur, February 1891.

"One girl in particular attracts my attention. She must be about eleven or twelve, but, buxom and sturdy, she might pass for fourteen or fifteen. She has winsome face- very dark and very pretty. Her hair is cut short like a boy's, which well becomes her simple, frank, and alert expression. She has a child in her arms and is staring at me with unabashed curiosity, and certainly no lack of straightforwardness or intelligence in her glance. Her half-boyish, half-girlish manner is singularly attractive -- a novel blend of masculine nonchalance and feminine charm"

"When, at length, it was time to start, they escorted my short-haired damsel, with plump shapely arms, her gold bangles and her guileless, radiant face, into a boat. I could divine that she was returning from her father's to her husband's home. They all stood there, following the boat with their gaze as it cast off, one or two wiping their eyes with the loose end of their saris. A little girl, with her hair tightly tied into a knot, clung to the neck of an older woman and silently wept on her shoulder. Perhaps she was losing a darling Didimani (elder sister often called so, meaning sister-jewel), who joined in her doll games and also slapped her when she was naughty..." - Shazadpur, July 1891.

Broken excerpts from Glimses of Bengal, Tagore.