BLOG ACTION DAY….A PERSPECTIVE ON POVERTY
It’s Blog Action Day today & the focus is on POVERTY.
What is BLOG ACTION DAY all about?
“Blog Action Day is an annual nonprofit event that aims to unite the world’s bloggers, podcasters and videocasters, to post about the same issue on the same day. Our aim is to raise awareness and trigger a global discussion. Global issues like poverty are extremely complex. There is no simple, clear answer. By asking thousands of different people to give their viewpoints and opinions, Blog Action Day creates an extraordinary lens through which to view these issues. 
Each blogger brings their own perspective and ideas. Each blogger posts relating to their own blog topic. And each blogger engages their audience differently. In 2008 we aim to again focus the blogging community’s energies and passions, this time on the mammoth issue of global poverty.”
Poverty (also called penury) is deprivation of common necessities that determine the quality of life, including food, clothing, shelter and safe drinking water, and may also include the deprivation of opportunities to learn, to obtain better employment to escape poverty, and/or to enjoy the respect of fellow citizens. 
Food Poverty
Food poverty can be defined as the inability to access a nutritionally adequate diet and the related impacts on health, culture and social participation. Food poverty is not just about the consumption of too little food to meet basic nutritional requirements. It includes social and cultural contexts where people cannot eat, shop for, provide or exchange food in the manner that is the acceptable norm in society.
This is just a small attempt to share my photo journey on a platform afforded by the BLOG ACTION DAY organisers. All these pictures were clicked on a single trip into the heart of New Delhi, the capital of India, & I didn’t have to go out of my way. I went armed with the camera & I found disparity in every frame.
Most of the pictures were taken in a span of 2 hours, 12-2 in the afternoon, some out of the moving car, & are a window to our world on ‘poverty & the man on the street’. Poverty & disparity exist, sometimes, in the most heart-wrenching forms, & don’t differentiate between the old & the young, women or men etc. The snapshots that follow are of people struggling to earn a living, each in their own manner. It isn’t easy to click poverty, or another fellow beings disparity. I was ashamed at times, almost fearful too; but my thought was that this could contribute towards evoking a larger collective conscience & compassion.
‘POVERTY & THE MAN ON THE STREET’…a journey
The journey was soul stirring & haunting in some ways. There seems to be so much to do & so little time. The gap seems to be growing larger & larger in some ways, & with the current economic situation, the goal has become more complex. Let’s get together in our own little ways, at the micro level, in our neighbourhoods, wherever; we can make a difference. It’s our collective responsibility to give back to the world.
Each time I see the snapshots, which is very often, especially the old woman’s eyes, the lyrics of the song ‘These Eyes’ come to my mind…”you gave a promise to me, you broke it, you broke it”. The Canadian rock band The Guess Who‘s 1969 ballad “These Eyes” was the group’s first Top 10 US hit single in 1969, & is a very moving number.
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Deeba @ PAB
About me: I am a freelance food writer, recipe developer and photographer. Food is my passion - baking, cooking, developing recipes, making recipes healthier, using fresh seasonal produce and local products, keeping a check on my carbon footprint and being a responsible foodie! I enjoy food styling, food photography, recipe development and product reviews. I express this through my food photographs which I style and the recipes I blog. My strength lies in 'Doing Food From Scratch'; it must taste as good as it looks, and be healthy too. Baking in India, often my biggest challenge is the non-availability of baking ingredients, and this has now become a platform to get creative on. I enjoy cooking immensely as well.
24 Comments
michelle of bleeding espresso
These photos are speaking many more than 1,000 words. Thank you for sharing them and your also your words with us, reminding us that we must fight poverty together.
michelle of bleeding espresso
(Oops, an extra “your” up there, but I hope you still understand what I meant) 😉
Cherrye at My Bella Vita
These images are so disturbing. It is almost unfathomable…
Absolute Vanilla (and Atyllah)
Powerful photos and an excellent way of tackling Blog Action Day’s Poverty drive. I was going to use photos for my post as well, but then I figured I’d stick with words since I’d used photos on my previous post, which also dealt with poverty.
Ning
Sadly, these pictures can be found here in the Philippines, too. 🙁 Thank you for the reminder to do our share in this.
Psychgrad
Thank you for sharing these pictures. We don’t see this kind of poverty in Canada.
Cham
This pictu are very touching. We don’t need to go far to see the poverty in our country, just step down the road and we see all those people. I just feel I visited India after seeing this post!
Great awareness!
Manggy
As Ning said, we too have similar images of poverty here… Whether it is comparable to Gurgaon I’m not sure. But there is still hope to be found, and beauty in these people– some even have the strength of people to smile, like the vendor you clicked!
arundati
touching…..the one of the old lady gave me goose flesh…and brings back to my mind “a real durwan” one of the stories in the interpreter of maladies by jhumpa lahiri…she describes this old lady who has all her worldly possessions in a bag and sleeps under the open skies….hauntingly brought to life by your pictures…we have so much to be grateful for…
Ivy
It’s a pity that there are so many people starving to death and so many others spending without consideration. In Greece there is not such poverty, although you will find beggars everywhere (mostly gypsies) but who are probably richer than the rest of us.
Arfi Binsted
I watched a news last night that we can catch from our satellite dish, either in Indonesia or out there in Zimbabwe, my God, these people are hungry. I was crying when I saw those pictures, and I also am thankful for what I’ve had. It is sad really, although we give hands to help them, still… I suppose it is what a government should really do, to take care of its people rather than busying themselves putting money into their pockets. Politicians are usually only sweets in their campaigns but always failed to help the poors. It happens anywhere.
Good pictures. I don’t know if I can find any like those in NZ.
Bharti
Moving pictures Deeba.
I keep hearing stories about the new malls coming up in India. I wish someone would tell me these people were being supported and things were being done to get them out of this poverty cycle. I am a fan of micro finance..I like supporting organizations that lend to the poorest of poor and help them get on their way to financial independence.
noble pig
This is a very touching and needed post. Thank you for doing it Deeba.
familiabencomo
Beautiful post. I’m left without anything to add…. just sad that in this day in age we still see so many people suffer. The children break my heart – they should have worries about passing the spelling test, not how to make a few coins for dinner.
Tanti baci, bella. Thank you for bringing this issue to light in such a dignified way. You have such a heart.
xoxox Amy
Reeni
Thank-you for the insightful photos and your moving words. I think I will be seeing these in my dreams tonight, especially the older woman at the end,
Ari (Baking and Books)
This is such a powerful post, thank you – I really don’t have the words to express the feelings those photos evoked.
muralimanohar
What an incredible post. Thank you for sharing.
Proud Italian Cook
Deeba, You’ve touched the hearts of us all with this very powerful post! Thank you!
Gloria
Deeba Really I love these post is sad but is so good know this reality. Here in some places we have this too, poverty always touch my heart and for this I think is so important sharing all we have with some people that need so.
We live in the same world but why some have a lot and others not??? Really I dont know, sometimes, these shoking me!!Thanks dear Deeba is always good dont forget this reality,xxGloria
Helene
My husband came back from Africa with pictures of poverty. This is so heartbreaking.
nicisme
You really don’t need words with photos like these.
awoz
Sad and beautifull picture in the same time…
Jeanne
Wow Deeba, those are really hard-hitting pictures. I think when you come from a country with such a huge rich/poor divide (as both India and South Africa have), you sometimes stop “seeing” the poverty. When I visit home now, my eyes are far more open to the poverty, precisely because there is so little of it in Europe. Not to say that there isn’t poverty, but it’s nowhere near as pervasive or desperate.
Thanks for peeling back the wrapper to show us even just a little corner of this global problem.
Naomi
Wonderful post … thank you for sharing it with me.
It is true that so many of us don't ever have the opportunity to SEE this with our own eyes, so I am thankful that you shared it.
May we never turn an eye to what truly IS a global issue … but one that so many of us in countries "with more" fail to realize is really on every corner.