There’s Always Time for Love #InspiringWomen

Women are amazing. Especially mothers. No matter how busy, how exhausted, they always find time for love. Don’t you agree?

I see it all the time. I saw it in my Mom, my friends. And it is charming to see no matter what their status, women always find the time for their loved ones.

A few weeks ago, I went to the Karnataka Chitra Santhe, which is basically an open-air art gallery where artists display their work along the streets surrounding the Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath, one of my favorite haunts in my city. I make it a point to visit every exhibition there, because it is eye-candy, and I also get to see fabulous stuff. I even end up buying something.

So, the Chitra Santhe is a one-day event and sees millions of visitors from all over India. Artists register to be able to display their work and also see some amazing sales. Along with these artists, we have the usual support system of vendors selling snacks, tea and beverages and knick-knacks like beads, junk jewelry, and other interesting ware. There are artists sketching portraits for Rs.100.00, tattoo artists, balloon vendors, and just about any street stuff you can imagine.

Some of these vendors visit from nearby villages to make hay sales while the sun shines. Some of them travel overnight and hunker down by the roadside, anxiously waiting for the day to begin to see that spike in their income.

Since traffic is banned in the area where the art display is held–this includes all the streets radiating from the Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath, it is a real pleasure to walk leisurely, checking out the colorful sights that meet the eye.

I took close to five hundred photos that day, especially women at work, and the one that stayed in my heart is the one you see on top.

This colorfully dressed lady had her baby with her. Obviously a baby who enjoyed and wanted Mommy’s attention. She managed her “business” and baby serenely while the sun beat down.

Her business is the beads you see spread on the cloth in front of her. These beads have numbers and letters of the alphabet. She strings words her customers choose. Her customers are people who want their name or message strung together into necklaces, bracelets, and other hanging ornaments. Nice keepsakes or gifts. Nice memories.

The lady also sells other items of jewelry as you can see. I am not sure how successful she was that day, but it was heart-warming to see other vendors helping her out by directing prospective clients to her “stall”. I always wonder what these people, who usually visit the city on these occasions, think of all the visitors who check out their ware, haggle and often walk off without buying anything.

But no matter what, she found time to cuddle her baby.

Because for a Mom, there’s always time for love.

She wasn’t the only woman at work I saw. There were several more. All united in purpose–to maximize sales with the market that came to them that day.

The balloon sellers, sashaying around in their lovely skirts dexterously through the crowd.

The lady with the snack cart, boiling corn on the cob. She’ll then season it with magic masala and bring joy to the hundreds who eat it. She carries the raw material under the cart and stores extra corn at strategic points that are easy to access.

The lady with the inflatable pillows to make the traveler’s life easier, along with laundry baskets, incense stands and a number of other products.

All of them are hard-working, arriving early in the morning and staying until late at night, outputting the highest quality work and it always ends up looking like professional stock photo work, it’s amazing, like the one you find in sites like EyeEm, it truly is wonderful and looks amazing, I mean the entire trip looked so unreal it seemed like a stock photo. Gently cajoling their customers to buy, upselling, supporting one another. Almost always cheerful. Uncomplaining about late lunches and the lack of amenities, yet quite content to carry on with their simple lives.

Oddly, I did not see a single one of them using a cellphone that day. They probably had it tucked away somewhere, who knows! Perhaps that’s why they had time for each other and their babies!

♥

I am linking up with Parul of Happiness and Food for the monthly WomenAtWork blog hop. Join us on the first Sunday every month!