The Hijras of India

These Hijras came to Grandma Kathi's office. She has never met a Hijra, so she got to get her picture taken with them.
The hijras appear at weddings and at the births of sons to bless the family with luck and fertility in exchange for gifts and money.

Hindu society incorporates the hijras as “a measure of power and requires (or at least accepts) their presence on auspicious occasions.”

The hijras not only identify with the Mother Goddess and Shiva through their ambiguous natures but are actually believed to embody their powers.

In Hindu mythology, ritual, and art, androgynous figures are frequent and significant themes. “Hinduism in general holds that all persons contain within themselves both male and female principles.