Our Daughters
She is not your daughter.
Her name is Rajani, and she is just five years old. In the moonlight that dusts over a small Rajastan village she is walking around barefoot, clutching a pair of pink sunglasses, giggling with her sisters, and every now and then bringing a pair of fingers up to her mouth to suck on them. She doesn’t realize what’s about to come.
From the corner of the hut in which two of her sisters are being bathed and clothed for a ceremony called a gauna, her uncle watches her with proud eyes. But his eyes aren’t watching as to say, “What a sweet little niece I have”. His eyes are instead saying, “What a fine bride she will make.”
In a nearby town another girl, who is not your daughter, is bathing for the same ceremony. But this ceremony is among her own family- a ceremony intended to be secret, much like Rajani’s. Her name is Zahara. Zahara is ten-years-old and has a better understanding of what is to come. With tears in her eyes she fastens the back of her shawl and winces as she takes the hand of her father. He, too, smiles proudly. The dowry on Zahara will be wonderful, for Zahara is beautiful.
Just before dawn, both Zahara and Rajani- who is now asleep, still clutching her pink sunglasses and cooing within obscure dreams upon her uncle’s shoulder- make the descent to their separate ceremonies. There, in the dusty light of coming ...
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