Hope amongst us

"At home, there is violence and there are tears and muffled cries. And because I bore children, where I live and eat has become family. Home never is a happy place for me. My marriage was not my choosing but a result of the Maoist insurgency. I could not return to my parents. They would not take me in. For them, living away from the family had made me impure. Once in a while, I run into my mother and she hugs me but I could never go visit my father or my brother. The doors are closed for me. So I have nowhere to run to and cry. I only have my children to call mine. Two of them. And I have told my husband I do not want more. I do my best to raise them. Not so long ago, I received training in making stools through a government office. Today, I try and spend whatever time I get with the women in the community. I train them and this fetches me some income. Many of us share similar stories. Of poverty, of alcohol and beatings, of love for our children and the burden they are to become. But there are also times of great joy and laughter when all of us abandon our worries. There is still hope amongst us. Hope that our daughters will become educated women. And our sons, when married, treat their wives with respect. But it is not easy. It is not easy when they are raised seeing men oppress women. It is not easy when fathers greet their sons after school with the stench of alcohol in their breath and harshness in their words."