Labor of India

We have been in India for 1 ½ years; just a brief time, really. We have, however, become acutely aware just how tightly human labor is woven into the historic fabric of India. From the ancient ruins of Hampi, we can imagine the nameless stone carvers who labored to create ageless temples. From the beauty




of the Taj Mahal, we can imagine the many souls who anonymously toiled away to create a treasure for the centuries.

We need no imagination as we walk the streets of Bangalore to see the labor of men, women and children still who labor anonymously to create a 21st century technology capital.

Little appears to have changed over the centuries in the ready use of human endeavor to move earth or stone. The ceaseless strain of sinew and muscle gives true meaning to the term “man made.” Our dear friend Marion captured this miracle of engaged human hands transforming the landscape by commenting that India has been built over the ages “one shovelful at a time.”

The only contribution we can make to this great human endeavor is to take pictures of people as they labor, make prints and give them photos that captured a moment of their labor. We imagine these photos will be passed along from generation to generation. We can imagine someone in the future saying, “This is a picture of your grandfather when he was young.”

We have included some of those pictures on this blog and accompanying YouTube video link. Because the loading is jerky, let it run to the end with the sound off, then turn the sound up and click on Watch Again. The link is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXqzoVdjFmo