Periods or menstruation are a fact in every girl’s and woman’s life. Pads are still categorised as a luxury item which makes them expensive, but having them is not a luxury. Especially in the poorer corners of the world where the whole subject is taboo and its thought of as dirty or unclean, which technically it is, but not in a way that would make any of us stop working unless it was particularly bad day or two in the week we have it. We are all different as well as our experiences with it. It is neither dirty, not an illness or a taboo, it’s mother nature.
I admit I only now watched this because it won an Oscar for Best Documentary (Short Subject) this year and I am now glad that I did. Directed by Rayka Zehtabchi and looking at the women in India who are too poor to buy pads at the store as well as in the sight of men and the women who help them by giving them an easy make-it-yourself pad which is cheaper as well as better quality using the technology invented by Arunachalam Muruganantham or “Padman”. We see him for a bit, but this is more about the women as it should be. The problem might be solved at first by a man, but in the end it is women who will carry this work to the cities to other women as it is much easier for other women to hear and talk openly about this subject in front of other women.
The message is to tell the story of these women, how with this they make their lives more open with the work that the pad machine gives and though the last information slides go by quite quickly in the end the lasting information is to donate to the site to help these women and the importance of this to be spread. I can see why this won the Oscar, its both informative and important and I am glad it won.
Thank you for reading!
The Little Corner 