關於 beauty rituals around the world ，我們在網路上蒐集到這些相關的討論、資訊與評價

Believe, have hope and faith.

True love prevails.

A poor guy meets a rich girl. They fall in love. Girl goes back to her country. Boy promises to make it big and visit her. Time passes but he struggles to make both ends meet. He decides to fulfill his promise - picks up a cycle and sets on a journey across 8 countries to meet the love of his life!

No, this isn't the story of an upcoming Bollywood movie. Although it pretty much qualifies to be one! This is the story of Dr. Pradyumna Kumar Mahanandia from India and Charlotte Von Schedvin from Sweden and it has all the elements of a Bollywood blockbuster - emotion, drama and lots of love.

An epic saga of romance, PK proves that when love is determined, it pushes all boundaries.

Born in 1949 into a poor weaver family of Odisha, Dhenkanal who were considered untouchables, PK was a gifted artist. However, the family didn't have enough money to finance his education. He would often find himself at the receiving end of insult due to the dreaded caste system. Later In 1971, he joined College of Art in New Delhi and gained popularity for making portraits.

In 1975, 19-year-old Charlotte Von Sledvin, a student in London, heard about him and traveled all the way to India to get her portrait made. As the stars had conspired, during the course of making the portrait, he was possessed by her beauty and she, with his sheer simplicity. Love had set in.

Charlotte took the Indian name Charulata and they both married following traditional rituals.

When it was time for Charlotte to leave, she asked her husband to come along, however, PK was still a student and wanted to finish his studies. When she offered to send air tickets later, he refused saying he would come to meet her on his own. After she left, the two kept in touch through letters.

PK's love-filled heart had made the promise, but the reality of having no money to fulfill it stared PK in the eyes. But he was not one to give up. He sold all his belongings and bought a second-hand bicycle. Carrying all his paints and brushes along, he did the unthinkable.

He set out on a voyage to the Far West with a hope to reunite with his love. This was back in 1978.

He reached Amritsar from New Delhi before entering Afghanistan, Iran, Turkey, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Germany, Austria and Denmark. His cycle broke down many times on the way and he even had to go on without food for days. But nothing could break his will.

After 4 months and 3 weeks of back-breaking journey, he finally reached Gothenburg, Sweden.

Those were the days when not many countries required visa for travelling.
Upon reaching, he was questioned by Swedish immigration officers who were amazed to see a man who had come from India riding a bicycle. PK told them the reason behind his visit and produced photographs of his marriage with Charlotte.
Authorities were surprised and did not believe that someone of royal blood from Europe would marry a poor Indian.

The sudden revelation made even PK skeptical whether his lady love would accept him or not.

When Charlotte learned about the man from India who cycled all the way for around 5 months, she drove to Gothenburg and received her husband with unbridled happiness. Her parents accepted Pradyumna as a part of their family by breaking a royal tradition that prohibited non-white people from residing with the nobles.

After 40 years of marriage, Dr PK Mahanandia serves as the Odiya Cultural Ambassador of India to Sweden and lives with his wife Charlotte and 2 children in Sweden. His village, that once shunned him as an untouchable, now gives a thundering welcome every time he makes a visit.

Pradyumna is well known in Sweden as an artist and is working as an Adviser, Art and Culture, under the Swedish Government. Swedish Government in honour of their love has made films to document this immortal love of the century. His paintings have been exhibited in major cities of the world and have found places in the prestigious UNICEF greeting cards. On 4 January 2012, he was awarded an honorary doctorate degree (Degree of Honoris Causa) from Utkal University of Culture (UUC) in Bhubaneshwar, Odisha state, India. He was also designated as the Oriya Cultural ambassador to Sweden by the Government of Odisha.[5] Renowned Bollywood film maker Sanjay Leela Bhansali is planning to make a film on the love story of PK Mahanandia and Charlotte.[

Beauty is everywhere. Spread the Love gorgeous ♥ ∞

Dear Ones -

Can we talk about something?

For the last few months, I've been growing uneasy about a phenomenon I've seen playing out in the media over women's bodies and women's appearance.

And no, this is not about the USUAL thing that makes me uneasy in the media (the exploitation and hyper-sexualization of women's bodies, etc. etc...) That hasn't changed, and I'm not tackling that today.

This is about something new.

This is about prominent women publicly criticizing other prominent women about body image questions, and about each other's private beauty decisions.

I don't want to see this anymore.

The history of women's bodies and women's beauty is a battlefield of epic (and sometimes violent) proportions. The last thing any of us need to be doing is judging each other and turning on each other.

What really frustrates me is the patronizing tone that is sometimes adopted, when a woman who has made a certain set of decisions about her own face and her own body criticizes another woman who has made an entirely different set of decisions about HER own face and HER own body.

You know the tone. It goes like this: "I just think it's so sad that she felt she needed to do that..."

This is a tone of voice that fills me with ire, because: REALLY? Does it make you feel "sad"? Are sure you're using the word "sad" correctly? Does your neighbor's boob job really make you feel "sad"? Does that movie star's plastic surgery genuinely make you feel "sad"? Are you honestly crying into your pillow at night about somebody's Brazilian butt lift — the way you would cry about a death in the family? Honestly?

Or are you just judging a sister, and hiding your judgment behind a screen of moral appropriation?

Check yourself.

No decision that any of us make about our appearance makes us morally better or morally worse than any other woman.

The scale of beauty in our world is vast and complicated and often politically, socially, and culturally confounding. At one extreme, you have the "all-natural" obsessives, who judge anybody who artificially alters her appearance in any manner whatsoever as vain and shallow. At the other of the scale are the extreme beauty junkies, who will do anything for an enhanced sense of beauty, and who judge everyone else as slovenly and drab.

We all have to figure out where we land on that scale. Lipstick, but no hair dye? Legs shaved, but not arms? Hair processing, but no Brazilian wax? Short skirts but no bikini tops? Two-inch heels, but not five-inch heels?

It all sends a message, and it all comes with complications. None of it is easy to figure out. And this is not even taking into account larger questions about religion, history, and cultural ethics. What looks like modesty on a woman in Rio de Janeiro looks like flagrancy in Salt Lake City. What looks like modesty in Salt Lake City is flagrancy in Cairo. What looks like modesty in Cairo is flagrancy in Riyadh. What looks like flagrancy to your grandmother looks like frumpiness to your teenager. What looks beautiful to me might look grotesque or even offensive to you.

IT'S COMPLICATED.

My experience is this: once we have decided where we land on that scale of beauty, we tend to judge all the other women who have made different decisions in either direction around us: This woman is too vain; that one is too plain...it never ends.

It also bothers me that women who define themselves as liberal, left-wing feminists (like myself) will stand on a picket line to defend the right of another woman to do whatever she wants with her reproductive system — but then attack that woman for what she decided to do to her face.

Let me break it down for you: It's none of your business.

Every single molecule of woman's body belongs to HER.

Yes, even her lips.

Yes, even her butt.

To judge a fellow woman for her choices about her own appearance is not only cruel, it also speaks to a fundamental insecurity that says, "I am so uncomfortable with myself that I have now become deeply uncomfortable with YOU, lady — and I don't even know you."

So have some compassion for the fact that it is difficult for any woman to figure out where to place herself on that vast and emotionally-loaded scale of female aesthetic. And check your own vanity before you criticize someone else's vanity. (And do not kid yourself that you are not vain because you do not partake in certain beauty rituals that other women partake in — because you are also making decisions about your body, your face, and your clothing every single day. With every one of those decisions you are also telegraphing to the world your own politics, your own opinions, your own needs and fears, and yes, often your own arrogance.)

No matter what you're wearing, you are dressing up, too.

As the great drag queen RuPaul has said: "We are all born naked. Everything else is just drag."

So be sympathetic. Everyone is facing her own battlefield in her own manner. And the only way you can express empathy about another woman's vanity IS TO BE HONEST ABOUT YOUR OWN.

Once you have reached that place of authentic honesty about your own struggle, you will only ever show kindness toward your sisters.

So here's what I do.

When I see a woman who has lost weight, I say, "You look terrific."

When I see a woman who has quit dieting and embraced her curves, I say, "You look terrific."

When I see a woman who has obviously just had plastic surgery, I say, "You look terrific."

When I see a woman who has let her hair go grey and is hanging out at grocery store in her husband's sweatpants, I say, "You look terrific."

Because you know what? If you are woman and you managed to get up today and go outside, then you look terrific.

If you are still here, then you look terrific.

If you are able to go face down a world that has been arguing about your body and your face for centuries, then you look terrific.

If you have figured out what you need to wear, or do, or not do, in order to feel safe in your own skin, then you look terrific.

If you are standing on your own two feet and the stress of being a woman hasn't killed you yet, then YOU LOOK TERRIFIC.

To say anything less than that to (or about) your fellow woman is to add ammunition to a war that is bad enough already.

So back off, everyone. Be kind.

You're all stunning.

ONWARD,
LG