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demigod-of-the-agni · 7 months

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#LongPost: A Few Hyper-Specific Things About India for India-Based Stories and Art

No this isn't a cry for more Indian-rep in Spider-Verse stories. (It is.)

Anyway. I recently went to India, and after returning to my hometown in Tamil Nadu, I reintegrated a whole slew of memories and collated new facts.. And considering I've been wanting to do one of these for quite some time (and because I need a new variety of Pavitr Prabhakar content), I thought it'd be cool if I shared some of my experiences and ideas with you.

It's best to take this with caution, though: the only places I've been to are Tiruchirappalli, Madurai, and a few towns located close to the Eastern Ghats, so my knowledge is heavily South India-based. I know for a fact that there are various similarities and differences between other geo-cultural areas of India, which is I why I've linked the other cool India Resources here as well.

In Which I Ramble About Pavitr's Character Design and the Indian Cultural Stuff Related to It by @chaos-and-sparkles (+ my addition + @neptune432's addition)

A culture post for the girlie pops (and non-girlie pops) looking to write Pavitr Prabhakar accurately by @summer-blues-stuff (+ my addition + @fandomsfeminismandme addition)

Also a timely reminder of @writingwithcolor's wonderful resources on writing about South Asian characters respectfully and sincerely

Now, for the things I've noticed in South India..

ANIMALS

There are a lot of street dogs. Like... a lot of them. And honestly it's so hard not to go up to one and give them a snack or two. The most notable dog breed is the Indian pariah and they can be found all over India. Mixed dog breeds are also common and results in a variety of features like differences in build and coat colours.

There are also other types of animals are pretty common to see alongside the roads.

Cattle are seen a lot (cows and bulls are easy to distinguish; cows (left) have udders and a small hump on their back, while bulls (right) are generally stockier and have a super-defined hump on their back). I'm pretty sure the specific cow breed is the sahiwal cow. They are either herded into paddocks for grazing or can be found wandering city streets on their own.

Goats are often herded by farmers into large masses of wool and horns and are guided to paddocks to graze. Sometimes, like cattle, they'll be found wandering city streets on their own.

Chickens are usually kept close to stalls and homes. These chickens are not plump and fluffy like most Western chickens, but are quite skinny. Mottled feather colours are usually a result of mixed chicken breeds. In Tamil Nadu, the most common chicken breed is the asil chicken.

Various birds are often seen flying around traffic if they’re not disappearing into the sky, the most common being crows, pigeons and mynahs. (The chart below on the right is not an inexhaustive list of birds; you best search them up yourself.)

TRANSPORT

There is obviously a huge amount of trucks and lorries and buses. They all have beautiful designs or crazy LEDs or large detailed fluorescent / iridescent stickers that are impossible to ignore, whether it be at high noon or midnight.

Expanding on that, the most common method of transport are motorcyclse or scooties, cars, and autos.

Also, as expected: traffic is insane. It’s horrible. It’s exhilarating. Western honking is akin to swearing, but here? Honk whenever you want. Honk if you’re happy or if you’re sad. You get a million dollars if you honk. You need to honk. It’s more important than breathing

Similarly, road rules don’t exist. Well, they do, and the Indian government does everything it can to make sure people do follow the rules, but based on the aforementioned honking, most people don't. Everyone just drives. Most bikers and motorcyclists don’t wear helmets. Only a few people wear seatbelts. Cars and motorcycles drive on the wrong side of the road and right into oncoming traffic. The chance of someone dying is 99% but it’s countered by desi stubbornness.

ENVIRONMENT & INFRASTRUCTURE

Houses and buildings are painted different colours!!! Pastel pinks and purples and deep teal hues, either plain colours or decorated with elaborate murals. This also applies to interiors. I reckon it was surprising to a lot of people when they were confronted with Mumbattan's vibrant colours, but honestly: coloured buildings slap, and it's based on the real thing. They are a sight to behold. Couple that with the architecture and oh boy- you've got such a beautiful environment.

From @jettpack's concept art for Mumbattan buildings

jettpack's concept art of the Mumbattan collider

From @chenfelicia's concept and colour keys of Mumbattan

Don't be shy to really immerse in crazy descriptors - that's how you capture the liveliness of cities like Madurai and Mumbai and ultimately, their physical manifestations like Mumbattan.

Funny enough, movie posters and political banners and flyers are EVERYWHERE. They’re huge and take up entire billboards, or congregate along walls so it becomes practically a collage. It's impossible to ignore the image of "Makkal Selvan" Vijay Sethupathi about to beat some poor loser into a pulp with a stick, or the political parties roasting each other on paper with impressive photoshopped graphics.

To tie in to the point about transport: there are hundreds of coffee stalls and snack shops and one-of-a-kind food stands. You can’t go 200 metres without running into one, either on the highway or in the city. I remember having jaggery coffee on my first night in India, and guys- it tasted so fucking good. I only wish I can transfer the taste to you. Absolutely splendid.

The climate in India is generally very humid and warm, but that doesn't mean we don't get cooler days; it is obviously cooler on winter nights. Also I've heard from many conflicting sources on India's seasonal weather (probably due to India's geograpghy), so you will have to talk to someone who is from India to really confirm. I've somewhat boiled it down to five seasons:

Summer - May-Jun; very hot (35-45ºC/95-113ºF), characterised by shrinking water bodies and droughts if there aren't any rainfalls; this time is good for plant growth/harvest if you've successfully managed water supplies

Monsoon - Jul-Aug; (34ºC/93ºF) very variable in terms of timing, characterised by torrential rains and floodings; the raining itself probably lodges somewhere in Jun-Sept but the aftereffects are felt long after the rains have stopped

Autumn - Sept-Nov; cooler but humid (25-35ºC/77-95ºF), and generally much drier since it transitions from autumn to winter

Winter - Dec-Feb; much colder, but the extent is dependent on geographic regions (20-25ºC/68-77ºF)

Spring - Mar-Apr; humid (33ºC/91ºF), sudden downpours, only occasionally do you get pleasant weather in this time

PEOPLE AND CULTURE

For some reason, there are still loud speakers blaring out music across the roads and as far as a few city blocks. I honestly thought that that had died out by the time my parents had graduated university, but it still seems like people like hearing music played at 120 decibels.

This is a complicated issue but people are not piss poor. Yes, India is a developing country, and yes there are slums and there are homeless and there are those who are stuck in a horrific sociocultural cycle, but people are rapidly getting into high-paying jobs at much higher rates than before. Overall, India is getting better; do us a favour and not have us be represented by the same poor struggle-riddled Indian stories that Hollywood and Western media is are fond of portraying.

@neptune432: One thing I think it's important to acknowledge though is how your experience in India changes depending on your caste. I feel like most of the indian voices talking online are savarna (I'm not an exception) so this doesn't get brought up as much. It's a complicated issue and one that I don't think non-indians (or savarna indians) should worry about tackling in their work, but it's worth saying because what's assumed to be everyday aspects of indian culture are actually specific to things like caste, class, and what region you're in. ex: in kerala, there are also examples of people eating on banana leaf with lots of vegan food for special occasions (namely during onam). but veganism is heavily tied to brahmanism so most of these people will be savarna. even if they eat meat otherwise, the specific interest in eating vegan for special occassions has clear implications. Though many people of different castes eat meat, it's a practice that gets discriminated against, being treated as barbaric and unclean. this is because of brahmanism and is usually only strictly followed by brahmins. dalits/bahujan usually face the worse treatment for their eating traditions. there's also the fact that hinduism is more of a recent term and a broad umbrella where many different gods and cultures have been put under (and usually done forcefully). a lot of local dieties and specific cultural practices come from outside the vedic traditions of aryans (upper caste north india), but now are treated almost as one thing. ex: kali is a south indian (dravidian) goddess who's still heavily worshipped there and who later got adapted to brahminical traditions. that's also why south indian practices of worship are different from the north and are discriminated against ex: north indians getting angry at the idea of worshipping kali by drinking alcohol and smoking even though it's an older tradition than theirs. these traditions are often connected to dalit/tribal cultures as well, which adds to why these traditions are attacked. Now, I don't feel comfortable with non-indians writing about india in general but I feel it's important to mention these things cos most people don't even realize they're only getting shown certain perspectives. How many people don't even know they're a north/south divide, for example? People are fed narrow viewpoints on India and assume that's everything to know. it's a problem cos that's what the brahminical forces in india want. This is all very general info too and I'm no expert so it's worth more research (like reading what dalits have said on their experiences). I'm not trying to criticize you btw, I just wanted to add some things cos this has been on my mind for a long time now. Couldn't have said it better myself, neptune!! (I barely mentioned it at all lmao) The caste system despite it being "abolished" still defines many traditions within India, and almost always in harmful ways. Like @summer-blues-stuff and I have mentioned in their post A culture post for the girlie pops under the Religion and caste section, it's best to leave the caste and social hierarchy alone even if you've done your research. That doesn't mean you shouldn't talk about it, it's just that people, especially those of non-South Asian decent, have to be extremely careful about it. Introductory resources on the caste system can be found on ABC, Pew Research and The Conversation.

Furthermore, the automatic assumption is that people living in shacks or remote villages have no access to greater populations and resources, which I'm happy to completely disprove. Guys: majority of the people living in my village, a rather remote village, have phones on them. Ranges from iPhones to Androids to good ol' Nokias.

(And, side note: as an Indian, I get amazingly pissed off when people's ringtones are set to maximum volume and play the same famous part of a famous song every time they get a call. Like shut the fuck up. At least quieten down? Please??)

(Also this might be a South Indian thing but Man some people are so entitled. Dudes you do not need to rub your ego into my face. Dudes you can, you know, keep all the cool things you think will get other people jealous out of the public eye. At this point I'm not jealous of what you Have, I'm pissed off at the Audacity To Think You Can Make Me Feel Bad About Myself With The Things That You Have).

Alright. Moving on.

Tiny temples and shrines are everywhere, dedicated to broad-Hinduism deities like Ganesh, Shakthi, or Vishnu; other times, they are shrines built for local deities that protect a particular village. For example, my village dedicated a little plot of water-logged land to a benevolent spirit called Subbamma, where people would leave offerings or place their sick/injured animals at the water's edge so that Subbamma could heal them. These tiny temples are almost always super colourful and amazingly detailed despite their small size

It could be a whole month before a celebration like Diwali but it’s the perfect time to set off hundreds of fireworks and firecrackers. People are just inconsiderate in many ways, it seems.

Some women wear strings of jasmine flowers in their hair. This might be completely regional-based, but most if not all women, ranging from little kids to old ladies, will wear these strings of jasmine in their hair. It's supposed to represent good fortune and beauty, and it smells wonderful.

@esrev-redips: #i usually only visit the north side of india (went to banglore and or chennai once) but im pretty sure most women in mumbai wouldnt wear #flowers in their hair unless they were of an older generation #they dont in new delhi at least and i t h i n k you can compare them but im not sure since i dont live in india either Thank you esrev!!!!! glad to see an old hunch be confirmed!!!

Normally you can wear any type of jasmine, but the common subtypes in Tamil Nadu are ஜாதிமல்லி (jathimalli; "Spanish jasmine"; left) and மல்லிப்பூ (mallipoo; right).

Eating food from a plate made from a banana leaf is more than just an aesthetic, and is often reserved for certain occasions; other times we eat from metal or ceramic plates. I can't vouch for other areas of India but I've been told the reason why banana leaves are predominantly used for large gatherings is because they can signal to diners if the food is rotten or has been poisoned; supposedly the leaf itself starts rotting and releases liquid, but I personally have never seen this happen. But of course, there are also other reasons as to why banana leaves are used (all of which are valid) ranging from being an eco-friendly disposable plate, offloading nutrients into food, or even to make the food taste better. Pick whichever reason you like.

I'm literally so hungry looking at this. (Realises this is a Pavitr thing to say.) Anyway.

FOOD RECS!!!!!!

Reblog with your favourite foods >:) The list will be routinely updated...

JAGGERY COFFEE (from me) - GOOD FUCKING STUFF. ACTUALLY. if you see it.. GET IT IMMEDIATELY

PANI PURI (from @esrev-redips) - #also you forgot to mention the PANI PURI STANDS AHHHHHH YUMYUMYUM | RRRR YOU'RE SO RIGHT. PANI PURI FOR LIFE ACTUALLY.

JASUBEN PIZZA (from @the-witch-forever-lives) - okay this is specific to Ahmedabad | okay but as specific as it may be that sounds and looks delicious??? hello??????

DABELI (from @the-witch-forever-lives) - this too???? also it LOOKS wonderful i need it right now actually

VADA PAV (from @the-witch-forever-lives) - Also Vada pav from Mumbai is so one of a kind | you are absolutely correct. vada pav is truly something magnificent

I think that's about all I can give you right now. This took me a while to type out. Feel free to ask any questions, or if you have anything you would like to add on, like anything I might have glossed over or your favourite desi foods, please do!!! I'll be sure to reblog your addition and update the original post.

The point is that this post can become one of those few other reference posts that artists and writers and other creatives can use if they ever want to make anything related to India, because it's genuinely so cool to see your culture represented so well in popular modern media.

(And in fanfic and fandom. Especially in fanfic and fandom. you have no idea how many times I've gone insane reading a Pavitr-centric fic or reading comments on Pavitr-related posts and it's just outdated ideas and harmful stereotypes and all sorts of sick bullshit, and it's always to the point where I physically have to go outside and bite into a fresh rhizome in order to ground myself. Like damn, people, you need to know things before you start creating)

So uh, I hope this was helpful if not interesting! Happy early Diwali everyone! Knowledge-over-ignorance and all that; hopefully this post does that notion justice!

#pavitr prabhakar #wrote this solely because i wanted more atsv pavitr-centric fics and i need to get that specific immersed-in-india itch scratched #and also because the india i remembered decades ago is definitely not the india i visited last week #wow time flies doesn't it #spider man india #india #writing tips #o wise writer stuff #indian culture #south asian culture #spider man across the spider verse #atsv #across the spider verse #chaipunk #goldenpunk #cultural references #atsv pavitr #agnirambles

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ansburg · 4 months

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cannot imagine getting mad about gnome racism when the main gnome cast is just like. white people who are purple

im very sorry barcus tucci but you are distracting from a serious conversation about racism in western fantasy when the slave-keeping race of dwarves overwhelmingly look like this

#it's so unserious lmao?#literally so many things to critique #from the way white gays didn't want to acknowledge that racebending karlach was fucked up #to how wyll is handled by the writers and fandom alike #or the ongoing weird shit dnd rehashes every time when it comes to nomadic peoples (the vistani & the gur)#or how primitive/tribal bleeds into more violent wrt goblins bugbears etc #but for some reason we're ..... talking abt ast*rion's gnome racism........#fandom critical #bg3 critical cw #honestly reminds me how dai made their first SEA man a rich guy who does some mild slavery apologia #and their black female character the most divisive voice on ~mage rights~#like this isn't subversive writing yall. it's just dumb as hell #*south asian man i think actually. not SEA

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daisyachain · 6 months

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The nature of time is that (culturally) Christian Euro/Anglo colonial consumers (hereafter white ‘people’) fetishize the idea of being ‘close to nature’ or ‘primitive’ or ‘savage’ and latch on to the idea that there are groups of people in the world who are somehow bestial or who have some kind of special powers from holding animist beliefs/beliefs that acknowledge the body as opposed to the Christian belief that the body is a kind of useless appendage to a person. We see this across decades from the 19thC to today in the racist fetishization of indigenous people across the globe, particularly residents of the Americas, Australasia, and southern/eastern Africa.

White consumers use a warped conception of other cultures to live out the fantasies that the Christian soul/body stuff engenders. You keep getting told that your emotions and physical sensations are the devil’s work? You want to get in touch with those physical sensations, but you don’t want it to interfere with your worldview? Simply project them on to a convenient group of people with slightly different conventions from you. Imagine how cool it would be to be 100% physical sensation (especially those pesky violent and/or sexual urges) and no mental burden, then unleash that in a way that causes millions of deaths worldwide via the dehumanization of entire nations of people just trying to live their lives. White consumers love a Proud Warrior Race Guy.

Flash forward to the 2010s, it’s generally considered impolite to spread the same propaganda that justified the genocide and dispossession of many different groups of people. However white culture hasn’t changed that much and normal human activities still need to be explained away to maintain the veneer of white intellectualism that has been used to justify white violence for years and years. You can’t just stomp around and clap your hands and dance badly, you’ve got to project it somewhere else.

But wait! There’s a community of people considered ‘tribal’ and ‘savage’, considered violent and bestial, who were never colonized! It’s…the Norse. Fetishizing early medieval North Sea raiders can’t be cultural appropriation, see, they’re white! It’s not offensive to replace an entire culture with white (male) ideas of what’s cool if that culture is totally unassociated with colonizer stereotypes and is in fact a culture of colonizers!

And that’s my theory on why there are so many Norse-inspired folk bands/video games/tv shows/memes/literally anything in the 2010s. VSaga not counted because that manga has been running since 2003 and is actually well-researched and comes out of a culture with a similar but distinct tradition of racism. The Euro storytelling tendencies of needing some kind of violent avatar have taken on ye anciente Norseman now that people care a little bit about the gallons of blood used to sketch other ethnic stereotypes. Done and dusted. Except the other side is that the fetishization of early medieval Norse culture is literally just white supremacist 101 and a lot of artists don’t step around that nearly as carefully as they should

#it’s the old saw about rammstein being constantly talked up by American nazis because they can’t speak German and having to write a song #called ‘links 2 3 4’. asscreed/the northman/vikings tv/wardruna/god of war/whatever are fairly harmless cosplay activities #but taken together it’s like. where is the line between condescending cosplay fetishization (not great but whatever) and the sort of #idealization/valorization/historical erasure that plays into white supremacist rhetoric #after all—look at where we get a lot of pop culture viking imagery from: it’s Wagner #kelsey rambles #this is a long bad post about me having Spotify as blocked on my work computer and playing some faun and then letting the radio take away #praying and wikipedia-ing that it doesn’t take me to some dogshit nazi band along the way #which YouTube recs have done repeatedly. it’s a fucking cesspool out there in the metal/neofolk world #I also keep thinking back to Faun (neofolk forerunner) saying explicitly that they use central/south asian melodies and tonalities #the whole medieval folk aesthetic thing is a cobbled-together vibe that was created by 19thC romantics and 20thC fantasy writers #i just feel like there should be more of an…acknowledgement of artifice to ward off the nazis #I like neofolk music. I love vinland saga. I enjoy mountain scenery and stories of sea raiders.#would love to be able to enjoy it without looking over my shoulder all the time

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jinjurloaf · 2 months

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مجھ سے نفرت ہے اگر اس کو تو اظہار کرے کب میں کہتا ہوں مجھے پیار ہی کرتا جائے

TRANS If he detests me so, why not confess? When have I ever asked him to go on loving me?

Iftikhar Naseem

#misra #💥#poetry #words #urdu poetry #gay writing #gay writers #gay south asian #poem #ghazal #shayari #urdu shayari #gay pakistani #gay indian

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thenixkat · 6 months

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Hey, remember that time the Tennysons and Forever Knights destroyed a whole ass Mayan temple and murdered a Mayan god in the process of trying to steal an artifact?

#nix meows #ben 10 #but its ok when our white protags desecrate and destroy the holy sites of brown people b/c the writers said so #just... thinking about this in relation to the sk*nwalker episode...#and Ben's South Asian bully that's one of the few nonwhate named characters with lines #listen... Ben 10 kinda racist

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seireiteihellbutterfly · 5 months

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My Bleach OC

So it took a lot of time to put together. But I did it! My OC for Bleach is finally ready. As always with my OC characters, I pay homage to my South Asian roots in terms of their personality and abilities.

Name: Keyuri Ramish (she/her)

Age: 30 in human years (~300 in shinigami years?)

Physical Description: 5 feet 6 inches tall, tan skin, long black hair that is often worn back in a braid. Her body is very curvy, falling under a plus size category, close to an hourglass/pear figure. Her waist is narrow, but she has very generous hips and thighs that are quite toned and a full bust. Her figure makes her self-conscious at times. Large brown eyes, thickly lashed, like a doe’s.

Position in Soul Society: She’s the third seat of Division12, captained by Mayuri Kurotsuchi. Her responsibilities mainly deal with the Research and Development team, creating new gadgets to help deal with hollows and other reiatsu anomalies. She also assists on missions remotely by observing shinigami reiatsu signatures on the R&D’s computers when they try to tackle hollows.

Personality: She’s a little reserved, but is a very warm person once she opens up. Very tactile, and expresses her affection through touch. Enjoys reading, writing, and practicing yoga. Observant, sharp, witty, and loves good banter. Gemini, coffee addict, and loves pastries.

Background: Keyuri is of South Indian origin, reborn into a community called South Asian Soul Adminstration (shortened as SASA, basically South Asia’s equivalent of Soul Society). When her parents first noticed her developing strange reiatsu, they admitted her into a temple soul school, where the priests helped her harness and develop her spiritual abilities. But Yamaduta (messengers of death, SASA’s equivalent of Shinigami) are considered as bad omens in their society, so her advisors work to have her transferred to Soul Society, believing it is a better place for her to grow her abilities and also train her zanpakuto correctly. Her zanpakuto itself is quite rare in the soul world (described in detail below)

Zanpakuto Background at SASA: Zanpakuto souls are not ingrained into a katana at SASA. Zanpakuto spirits are born, through a cycle of birth and rebirth. Once every few years, enough soul energy concentrates to allow the birth of maybe 2-5 zanpakuto. The priests at the school typically take the most talented students of that year to receive their zanpakuto. The students are taken into a separate spirit realm, where they wait in the dark, sometimes for days, until a zanpakuto spirit chooses to be born into their sword. This creates a deep bond, since the soul chooses the Yamaduta its born to. Keyuri waited 2 days before her zanpakuto’s soul came to her. Students that do not get a zanpakuto born on their first try wait years before the next birth can happen. Some SASA Yamadutas never get a soul born to them, and have to work on their other spiritual abilities to make up for not having a zanpakuto. Because of this, Yamaduta zanpakuto are rare, even within SASA.

Keyuri’s Zanpakuto: Her zanpakuto is rare, even in terms of SASA because when her zanpakuto’s soul was reborn, it was the soul of a dying sun god from somewhere in a different solar system. Zanpakuto spirits that are born under such circumstances are called Celestial zanpakuto because it can draw on the energy not only from the Yamaduta, but from all the celestial heavenly bodies, such as the sun, moon, stars, and meteors. Keyuri has admitted multiple times the frustration she faced with her Zanpakuto because there is little information on how to train a Celestial zanpakuto, let alone learn to develop and channel its abilities since they can be highly unpredictable. She admits she has said mean things to her zanpakuto in frustration, only to be hurt when she realizes how hard it was trying to befriend her.

Name: Akashvani (translation: Sky Gift)

Command: Glow, Akashvani

Appearance: Akashvani takes the form of a graceful katar, with a hilt wrapped in fine, royal blue silk embroidered with golden threads. The blade itself gleams with a silvery hue, etched with delicate patterns reminiscent of swirling constellations.

When activated, the blade elongates and emanates a soft, radiant, blue light. The hilt also elongates, giving her better control for attacking.

Shikai main abilities:

Starlight Strike

A trail of stars begins to emanate from the blade and can be controlled at will. It’s impossible to count how many stars are present at any given time, but they glow as they move, creating a beautiful sight to see. Each individual star in the trail can grow to be over 4000 degrees Celsius, effectively burning and melting anything caught in it’s way. The stars glow brighter when they come into contact with an object and start to heat up, in some cases, creating a blinding glow where no one can see what’s happening.

2. Phantom Eclipse

Mimics a lunar eclipse, creating shadows at strategic attack points. Keyuri can use the shadows to blast the enemy with the moon’s energy, dealing close range damage.

3. Radiance Shield

Constructs a protective barrier infused with the warmth and strength of solar energy. This shield absorbs incoming attacks while radiating a rejuvenating warmth that heals minor wounds of allies within its range.

#my muse #bleach oc #my oc character #my oc #plus size oc #indian oc #South Asian oc #fanfiction #bleach fanfiction #indian writers

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