One of the one percent in 13 million.

[Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi]

Many of us jot down in our diaries some favourite lines or phrases we run across in novels and poetry. You never know when they might become relevant.

Devapreeta Jena also has that kind of diary. But, it’s on her body.

Under her neck: “There is no love of life without despair of life.”

“That’s a quote from (French writer) Albert Camus,” she says, referring to the tattoo, while sitting with a book in a Paharganj café.

As a Masters in sociology, Ms Jena also sports another distinctive tattoo, again from Camus: “In the depth of winter I finally learned that within me there was an invincible summer.”

The 24-year-old has tattooed her own thoughts, as well. “Hell over oblivion” runs towards her shoulder. The lady has quite a few more tattoos, some consisting of attractive designs. Such as the little shapes on her finger tips that looks like an eye.

“Live. Revolt” is another of her own thoughts found on her wrist. “That tattoo is a daily reminder to live and be loyal to my principles,” she says, smiling enigmatically.

After explaining that she started getting tattoos some years ago while passing through a particular phase in her life, Ms Jena shifts her attention to the book on her table—Sigmund Freud’s Civilization and Its Discontents.

[This is the 258th portrait of Mission Delhi project]

The girl with the Camus tattoo

1.

2.

3.

4.