{"componentChunkName":"component---src-templates-post-query-tsx","path":"/blog-post/sahelis/","result":{"pageContext":{"post":{"slug":"/blog-post/sahelis/","title":"Sahelis","date":"Jan 13, 2014","timeToRead":3,"description":"","body":"function _extends() { _extends = Object.assign || function (target) { for (var i = 1; i < arguments.length; i++) { var source = arguments[i]; for (var key in source) { if (Object.prototype.hasOwnProperty.call(source, key)) { target[key] = source[key]; } } } return target; }; return _extends.apply(this, arguments); }\n\nfunction _objectWithoutProperties(source, excluded) { if (source == null) return {}; var target = _objectWithoutPropertiesLoose(source, excluded); var key, i; if (Object.getOwnPropertySymbols) { var sourceSymbolKeys = Object.getOwnPropertySymbols(source); for (i = 0; i < sourceSymbolKeys.length; i++) { key = sourceSymbolKeys[i]; if (excluded.indexOf(key) >= 0) continue; if (!Object.prototype.propertyIsEnumerable.call(source, key)) continue; target[key] = source[key]; } } return target; }\n\nfunction _objectWithoutPropertiesLoose(source, excluded) { if (source == null) return {}; var target = {}; var sourceKeys = Object.keys(source); var key, i; for (i = 0; i < sourceKeys.length; i++) { key = sourceKeys[i]; if (excluded.indexOf(key) >= 0) continue; target[key] = source[key]; } return target; }\n\n/* @jsxRuntime classic */\n\n/* @jsx mdx */\nvar _frontmatter = {\n  \"title\": \"Sahelis\",\n  \"date\": \"2014-01-13\",\n  \"template\": \"post\",\n  \"slug\": \"sahelis\",\n  \"postedLink\": \"https://riceinstitute.org/blog/sahelis/\",\n  \"old-tags\": [\"religious-demographics\"],\n  \"description\": \"\",\n  \"tags\": \"Blog Post\",\n  \"banner\": \"\"\n};\nvar layoutProps = {\n  _frontmatter: _frontmatter\n};\nvar MDXLayout = \"wrapper\";\nreturn function MDXContent(_ref) {\n  var components = _ref.components,\n      props = _objectWithoutProperties(_ref, [\"components\"]);\n\n  return mdx(MDXLayout, _extends({}, layoutProps, props, {\n    components: components,\n    mdxType: \"MDXLayout\"\n  }), mdx(\"p\", null, \"In Hindi, \", mdx(\"em\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"saheli\"), \", means \\u201Cfemale friend,\\u201D and only girls can have \", mdx(\"em\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"sahelis\"), \". This post is about two \", mdx(\"em\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"sahelis\"), \", Farzana and Suman, who, despite spending years on either side of the same wall, have had very different experiences of motherhood.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Farzana was 20 years old when I met her, and she was pregnant for the first time. She\\u2019d been married and living with her husband, his parents and sisters-in-law for five years. Everyone was happy about the pregnancy because they had worried that Farzana could not get pregnant. Farzana once confided in me that she had not even started to have her period yet when she was married, she got it for the first time more than a year after her marriage.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"It was a difficult pregnancy: Farzana had trouble eating, she gained very little weight, and she was often sick. There was a time when she wasn\\u2019t eating much besides chewing on sugar cane. She went to the hospital to deliver, but her daughter died shortly after birth. Farzana was extremely anemic\\u2014she told me that she had had only 2 or 3 mg of hemoglobin per deciliter of blood at the time of delivery\\u2014and had nearly died. Instead of getting the blood transfusion that she needed, she was turned out of the government hospital and taken to a private hospital, where they took her money but failed to give her blood.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"It took a few months for Farzana to get better, but when she did, she got pregnant again. A little more than a year after the birth of her first baby, at home, alone, in the middle of the night, without even candle to light the mud and dung room where she lives, Farzana delivered a baby boy. He was light skinned and chubby. He died when he was a week old. It took 8 or 9 days for Farzana\\u2019s milk to dry up, and she eventually had to delete the photos of the baby she\\u2019d taken on her husband\\u2019s mobile because they made her cry too much.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Farzana is expecting her third baby in May.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Each time I visited Farzana during her first pregnancy, her neighbor and friend, Suman, would poke her head over the cement wall that separated her house from Farzana\\u2019s, and start to chat. Eventually, Suman would walk around the wall and come to sit with us in Farzana\\u2019s family\\u2019s small outdoor sitting area, called an \", mdx(\"em\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"angan\"), \".\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Suman, a high caste young woman, is a daughter of the village where Farzana is a daughter-in-law. Suman was married in July of 2012, and went to live in her husband\\u2019s house, closer to the town. Suman\\u2019s husband has a government job working on electric lines in another state, and her father-in-law had a government job as well. In contrast, Farzana is Muslim, an oppressed minority group in India, and her husband does informal manual labor work when he finds it. Unlike Farzana\\u2019s mud and dung house, Suman\\u2019s new house is cement, and unlike Farzana\\u2019s family, who often eat only flat bread and onions or chilis, Suman\\u2019s family has plenty to eat.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"Last month, I visited Suman in her husband\\u2019s house. She was holding a chubby three month old baby boy. He\\u2019d been born in the end of August, in the same hospital as Farzana\\u2019s first. Suman was exclusively breastfeeding him, and when he wasn\\u2019t eating, he was constantly passed around and played with by Suman\\u2019s four younger sisters in law. When the little boy was two months old, Suman\\u2019s husband took her to her village to introduce the baby to family and friends. Farzana called Suman over to her house, and Suman went to introduce the little boy to her friend.\"), mdx(\"p\", null, \"It\\u2019s true that life is worse, on average, in some countries than others, and in some districts than others, and even in some villages than in others. But what I learned from Suman and Farzana is that life and death can be very different for moms and babies\\u2014and two \", mdx(\"em\", {\n    parentName: \"p\"\n  }, \"sahelis\"), \"\\u2014even on two sides of the same wall.\"));\n}\n;\nMDXContent.isMDXComponent = true;","tags":[{"name":"Blog Post","slug":"blog-post"}],"banner":null}}},"staticQueryHashes":["318001574","3787687951","3787687951"]}