She worked hard and it wasn't always easy yet she found time to be innovative and artistic, down to earth and fun and was the best cook bringing in recipes from northern Greece where she hailed from, to the island of Cyprus where she settled when she married my father. Last year all three daughters visited her home town of Kozani and held a memorial service with the remaining members of her family to honour her life and her achievements.
So this day is inextricably linked with emotion but always hope. Being in India for the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day is particularly poignant as inspite of what is said and promised I do feel that a woman's lot here is a hard one to bear.
There is hope and it comes from accepting women babies as an equal blessing to male babies- a lot more needs to be done here. It comes from the spread of education - a woman is able to earn her living and become an active citizen in the country in addition to her role as a mother and a homemaker.It is significant that in the Kindergarten that UNIA run and support out of the 100 children who attend barely a handful are girls.
It comes from all the various initiatives of the government, where women are prominent but now will be even more so as they pass the Women's Reservation Bill into law which will reserve 33% of seats in parliament to women.
There is promise and there is hope but there is also still a lot of prejudice and sexism - rape numbers are still frighteningly high, women who are single cannot travel safely at night, cannot find accomodation easily and have no place in society after divorce.
Often these days are significant to those who know them but how much does the life of a woman bearing bricks to feed her family change because of it ? Sadly little but we shall see the changes and report on them as India powers ahead.
Happy Women's Day MM.
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