V Nanammal :: This 93 years old woman is an incredible Yoga Instructor
Some people are the perfect example to go with the phrase that “Age is No Bar, Because its just a Number”. Not only do they inspire but also strengthen the motivational spirit of other people. Hats off to these people.
V Nanammal is a 93 years old woman who lives in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. The most unique thing about this woman is that even at this age she is as flexible as a person in his youth and in fact so much more that she is a Yoga Instructor.
She teaches yoga to around 100 students per day among which are of the ages like 70 and 60. Her youngest student is 6 years old. She calls her students as her own children.
She won a contest of “Silambattam” which a type of South Indian martial arts when she was 14 years old. She started practicing yoga since she was 10 years old.
She has not went to any doctor or taken any medicine till now which shows her love for YOGA.
“Khaas”meaning ‘special’ in Hindi, is a unique travel agency company in Delhi which only hires visually impaired women and acid attach victims.
Founded by Akash Bhardwaj, “Khaas” is providing empowering experience to it’s physically challenged employees. The agency organizes domestic and international tours for corporate organizations, schools and colleges, other than industrial tours, family trips, adventure camps, etc.
All the work is done by the visually impaired employees – right from making appointments and helping with the presentations to closing the deals and even accompanying the groups on the trips if required.
“I was in Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar area during the Diwali celebrations of 2015 when I came across a lady selling balloons. She had acid scars on her face. When I asked her what had happened, she said a boy in her neighbourhood threw acid on her face and her husband abandoned her after that. She had two kids and was working alone to look after them. She used to work as the security in-charge in a mall before the attack, but no one was willing to give her a job after the incident. ‘Everyone talks about the importance of face value,’ she told me in proper English. So I decided to help people like her by providing them better employment opportunities,” says 32-year-old Akash Bhardwaj.
He further adds “The women I work with are talented and determined. But they did not have the right platform to showcase these qualities. So I have given them that platform and am trying to make it bigger.”
Currently “Khaas” has six employees in total who are all visually impaired. They reach the office located on the fourth floor, get it clean, set up and start the work without any external aid. These girls operate their PCs with the help of the JAWS (Job Access With Speech) program that helps visually impaired people read the screen with text-to-speech output. They are also adept at using smartphones. In the last 20 days, the six employees had made 75 calls, confirmed 19 appointments, and finalized over five tours.
Akash spent almost two months training the girls, including teaching them how to get to the office. He is further planning for the company’s second round of hiring 15 girls and training them. Some will come to the office while others with mobility issues will be able to work from home. He plans to hire acid attack survivors as well.
“They are so happy with their work that many of them say they would like to work on Sundays too. They enjoy coming to the office, working together, meeting new people and talking about worldly affairs. Some of them live in hostels and don’t have their families here. One of the employees is a 32-year-old woman who lost her husband. She has a seven-year-old daughter,” says Akash.
You can help Akash take Khaas forward by contributing here.
These daredevils in their real life are a source of inspiration for millions. People say their body stops supporting for adventurous activities after the age 40, but here are these girls who are proving the proverb “Age is just a number” right.
Few of them can do mountain climbing at age of 100, and few can do ice skating at age 80. These young girls from heart are inspiring millions to follow them in their adventurous journey.
Shirley Webb is 78 years old and she can deadlift 225 pounds at this age.
Tao Porchon Lynch at age 96 has wowed the judges of America Got Talent, 2015 from her dancing talent and was on the major media. Huffington Post a media major described her as “Fireball”.
Jacqueline Murdock likes modeling at age 82 as well. She was in the news when she caught the eye of Lanvin designer Alber Elbaz, who hired her to model in his fall ad campaign.
Doris Long nicknamed “Daring Doris brook her own world record to become the oldest abseiler at the age of 101. She started at 85 and dreams to break her own record at her age 102 once again next year.
Yvonne Dowlen was a Ice Skater. She loved to skate at age 87 also and was running her Ice Skating School. Unfortunately she died at the age 90. Her school can be reached here: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?…4.117409556698
Harriette Thompson of Charlotte, North Carolina, a 92-year-old cancer survivor entered the record books by becoming the oldest woman to finish a marathon in San Diego in 7hr 24min 36sec. She astonished the youngsters across the world.
Following Mahatma Gandhi’s words “Be the change you wish to see in the world,” he did so and for all of us who travel on the roads in Bengaluru. He is an engineer named Benedict Jebakumar, a 44 years old systems engineer working at Intuit Technology Services.
He is combing the roads for nails since July 2014. He combed a record of 1654 nails off the road in a single day. Sometimes his bag gets filled and he has to return without collecting more nails. Till date, he has collected about 37 kgs of nails.
facebook.com/MyRoadMyResponsibility
He said “The main objective is to spread awareness among people. I will not stop till the authorities sit up and take notice”
It all started as he came to Bengaluru in 2012, he used to take the Outer Ring Road (ORR) to travel from his home in Banashankari to his office in Bellandur. His two-wheeler often got punctured on the ORR near Silk Board. Initially he thought of his bike’s tyre quality, but lately he realized that the same is caused due to the nails and most times they are alike and were found close to places near puncture shops.
Initially he started to collect the nails bare hands, but now he uses a foldable magnetic stick. He leaves his home early 7 in the morning, stops at the specific spots and clear up the area. And he repeats the same on his way back home.
He started a Facebook page named `My Road, My Responsibility’ in October 2014, where he documents his daily findings along with a photograph of the nails on weighing scales.
He explained that the authorities were either lethargic or that the problem was not big enough for them to pay attention.”It causes a lot of inconvenience to commuters. They might fall down from the vehicle or even get into accidents,” he pointed out.”Two arrests have been made in the past but miscreants were released within three months and the nails were back on the road.”
He noted that in the absence of CCTV cameras or official validation for puncture shops, it becomes tough to pin people down.
Jebakumar hopes that someday , authorities will find a permanent solution to this menace.”Till then, I will continue as I am helping many people,” he said.
Yes, I’m a nine-year-old girl. But I’m still a serious reporter says Hilde Kate Lysiak
This 9 Years old Pennsylvania girl, daughter of a New York Daily News reporter, Hilde Kate Lysiak is a self made reporter, editor and a publisher of Orange Street News started in 2014. She publishes her own Newspaper from her website and has published more than 100 stories at her website.
“Hilde Lysiak is persistent, confident, a little spunky and not afraid to knock on your door to get the story.” says NBC NEWS, Sept 27, 2015
Whenever she gets information about any news or crime, she reaches to the spot cycling on her bicycle, with her pen, diary and camera ready to shoot and tries to show the real facts behind the incident.
“I didn’t start publishing Pennsylvania’s Orange Street News so that people would think I’m cute. I want to get the truth to people, even if it makes grownups mad” says Hilde.
The Orange Street News devoted to the Selinsgrove area claims to be the only newspaper for the area and showcases the truth about the story before other local media. Hilde has shown that there is no age to find your passion and go for it. Her determination has made her successful and today she is featured in most of the high profile media houses.
This is what the major media houses have to say about Hilde:
“Watch out Mort Zuckerman! There’s an 8-year-old Pennsylvania girl who’s poised to become the news and media mogul of the next generation.” — New York Times, Sept 15, 2015
“The nation’s most ambitious newspaper publisher rides around her tiny Pennsylvania town in a bright pink bike and plays with Barbie in her spare time.”—New York Daily News, Sept 12, 2015
“A lesson from an eight-year-old girl who proves your never too young to find your passion…I’m in love with this girl. She’s a winner.” — NBC TODAY SHOW, Sept 27, 2015
“I don’t think people should be able to decide for me who I should be and what I should be doing. I never began my newspaper so that people would think I was cute. I started the Orange Street News to give people the information they need to know,” says Hilde.
She further adds, “if adults don’t think we can do something, then it is hard for us to believe that we can. And then how will we have great things in this world? Kids should know that if they work hard, they can do amazing things. Kids can do exceptional things and still be kids!”
In first week of April 2016 she came to popularity after reporting about a murder in the locality and when criticised, she replied to critics in the following words :
Those of you who think I need to mind my place, I’ll make you a deal. You get off your computer and do something to stop all the crime going on in my town and I’ll stop reporting on it. Until then, I’m going to keep doing my job.
The world requires such heroes with passion and dedication for their work who can bring real changes in the society’s thinking and make something challenging for the betterment of this world. These young minds have enormous capability for creativity, innovation and new thinking in their own new way.
We wish Hilde goodluck and success in her efforts.
Fairness is not the only certificate of beauty. Dark is also beautiful and the new social campaign #UnfairandLovely is proving it and changing the widely held belief across the world.
Three friends from University of Texas, Austin have recently started the campaign #UnfairandLovely to prove this world that the dark is beautiful. Pax Jones, a 21-year-old black student created a photo series featuring stunning images of her Sri Lankan classmates, sisters Mirusha and Yanusha Yogarajah.
Even in matrimonial sites in South Asian countries, women with “fair complexion” are in high demand than to the dark skinned women, which has resulted millions of men and women around the world have opted for bleaching their skin. This belief, shaped by societal attitudes and reinforced by media messages, is destroying the self-worth of countless people, young and old.
In this campaign they have appealed the Dark colored women to send selfies with the #UnfairandLovely who are undermined with the belief and disgust of being less beautiful than the fairer women.
Results of such misbelief is that skin whitening creams are becoming a big business across the world. Consumers are encouraged to believe that lightening their skin tone a shade or two will enable them to win ‘better’ jobs and spouses and generally improve the quality of their lives.
Over the years, various campaigners have tried to challenge this belief – they argue that beauty is more than skin deep and that dark is beautiful too. Bollywood actress Nandita Das is also associated with alike campaign named dark is beautiful.
Campaign “Unfair & Lovely”is becoming a hit on social media (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram) with #unfairandlovely – named after the highly popular Indian skin-lightening cream Fair and Lovely.
How it all started: Pax told when she was clicking images of Mirusha and Yanusha, they faced absurd comments. She clicked their pictures and they both commented colorism is a social evil underneath. While posting this image on social media many dark colored women started commenting and connecting. This resulted for us to start this campaign under #UnfairandLovely. Pax says it’s a platform for the dark women across the world, which aim to terminate the discrimination for dark colored people. People across the world are supporting the campaign and it’s becoming a hit on Instagram.
“In college, I was abused by a South Asian person who had lighter skin. And someone once threw a bleach balloon at me.” Such incidents are deeply humiliating says Mirusha Yogarajah to BBC.
“We wanted to start a conversation and I think we have succeeded in that” says Ms Jones.
Amazing India Amazing People is a blog started in 2014 at Tumblr showcasing the innovative stories, amazing works of people across India and world at large sharing positive news and inspiring people to do great work.
We are now starting to spread the positivity at WordPress and make a larger impact.
V Nanammal :: This 93 years old woman is an incredible Yoga Instructor
She won a contest of “Silambattam” which a type of South Indian martial arts when she was 14 years old. She started practicing yoga since she was 10 years old.
She has not went to any doctor or taken any medicine till now which shows her love for YOGA.
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