Time to buy a hat...

“I have one surprise,” says Monu, manoeuvring across four lanes of oncoming traffic. “My Mum, she ring last night. She say, my marriage is arrange.”

I have a bit of an Emma Woodhouse Epiphany, except Monu’s Monu, not Mr Knightley, and I wasn’t thinking matrimony. It does go through me, though, with the speed of an arrow, that I was thinking repatriation... I squawk round, in the back of the car, in manner of scalded hen, the only words I can say for fifteen minutes being, “Oh!” “No!” and “Monu!” in all permutations. I’m delighted, and devastated. I quite thought he might come home with us, come December, to be our driver on the non-danger roads of Nottinghamshire, and to look after the elephants. Oh, that’s the other part of the plan. – Just a small elephant, to make it easy for Jet Airways, then she can do all her growing in our back garden. I tell Monu about the elephant project – shall I take two, so they won’t be lonely? “Yes, two, good idea.” I’m just working up to telling him about the mahout part of the deal – and indeed, telling Mr Roland, come to think of it – when he springs this wedding-thing on me, and just laughs, until I start breathing again, and can start 20 Questions, Mumbai-style.

“Do you know her?”
“No, Ma’am. Her dad, my dad friend.”
“Is she Hindu?”
“Yes.”
“Is she vegetarian?”
“Yes.”
“Does she smoke?”
“No.”
“Does she drink?”
“No, Ma’am.”
“Is she the same age as you?”
“Ma’am, I, twenty-three. This is, twenty-one.”
Perfect. Could almost have been arranged deliberately. Oh, it was.


On the down-side, she’s a teacher. “Look out, Monu,” I say, the harbinger of doom, “marrying a teacher, very danger. Ask Mr Roland...” He just laughs. “My Mum, she very happy.”
Engagement, 10 December, wedding 11 January. “Nice time. All, all green. No too hot.” My mind keeps snagging on the fact that they’re setting off for eternity together, and they’ve not even met.

“What colour are her eyes? Let me guess... Brown?”
“Yes, Ma’am, this is brown eyes.”
“Monu,” I say, tentatively, in case he’s not thought of it, “what if she looks like a buffalo?” He just laughs. No, really, what if she does look like a buffalo? She’s called Shikha. I expect she’s very beautiful.

We pass by a buffalo farm, in fact, every day, on the way in and out of town. How like Mumbai, in all its overcrowded contrariness, to have acres of farmland, in the middle of the city. Aarey Milk Colony, home to thousands of cattle and buffalo. They’re supposedly open for visitors between four and six in the evening, but Monu’s “not confident” so we call and check on the way home. He leaves me in the car – engine and aircon running – and disappears up a mud-track. He comes back within five minutes. “Is closed,” he says, sadly, and then can’t not laugh – “Fifty rupees, is open!” I hand over the Open Sesame ticket with Gandhi’s face on it, and we’re in.
We’re instantly up to our fetlocks in manure. White probably wasn’t a clever choice, for today’s ensemble.

Buffalo – stop me if you know this – are made of black leather. Monu – a country boy at heart – can distinguish strains in the shuffling melee: “This is black buffalo. This is brown.” My buffalo finesse is limited to saying, “That cow looks a bit funny!” so I have nothing to criticise. We acquire an audience – when do we not? – so here are Janesh and Ilesh, who live on the farm, and don’t go to school. The buffalo between them is over twenty years old, and has three-seater horns. At the other end of the spectrum, the calf, with Monu and the boys.

Weeks ago, when the future was all comfortable theory, I ask Monu if he’d like children of his own.
“Two. Two childrens.”
“A boy and a girl?”
“No, no. No boy. Two girl. Boy very danger.”
“You’re not wrong there, Monu...” I should know.

On the way home from the farm, I say, “This wedding, Monu. Your Mum very happy. Are you happy?”
He has to think. “Fifty percent.” It’s my turn to laugh.
“Forget about the fifty percent happy. Why fifty percent Unhappy?”
He thinks some more.
“Married life is, no freedom.” And so say all of us, dear Monu. But, it’s not as if he lives in the fast lane, our bachelor boy. He’s hardly the lynch-pin of the Mumbai jet-set, throwing his hard-earned rupees around at Indigo in Colaba, or Bombay Blue in Goregaon. He plays cricket on a Sunday, and goes to see the occasional film at the cinema. I don’t see where freedom comes into it. “Indian wife, very danger, all time, go to mall, shopping, shopping.” Does he think Mr Roland’s miserable, then, shackled to Retail Rita? “No, no, Rolandsir all time very happy.” There you are, then.

Two days later, Monu has his first conversation with Shikha (“this is very nice voice”) but won’t see her until August. But what if she looks like a buffalo/bullock/cow, won’t it be too late to say no? “I like cow,” he says, in his karmic way. He could go next week, while we’re in the UK.
“Maybe. I ask Boss.” He’s not told his boss yet – “I only say Tariq...”
“And me....”
“And you... Tariq say, all drivers - ” so Tariq’s the blabbermouth, because you won't tell anyone, will you? “All drivers make party for me, all drinking beer.”
“Did you have a beer, Monu?”
“One glass, one small, small glass!” he laughs. See, that Shikha’s not got a ring on her finger, yet, and she’s already turned my Indian boy to drink.

To Monu and Shikha.

Uninvited Guests

During a swift spot of post-prandial exercise, we stumble upon a wedding in full spate. We mill, with the milling crowds, admiring the decorated groom on his decorated horse. As well as the elaborate tufted turban, he wears a veil of fine chains over his face, which he lifts, periodically, to peep out. Personal curtains.
It’s tricky, just being another face in the throng, when yours is the only white one. Well, the only white two. We’re greeted like long lost friends, and invited to join the celebrations. A person we’ve known for less than a minute introduces us to another complete stranger, “See, my daughter, this is your Auntie and Uncle from England.” It’s easy to see how the guest list got to over three hundred, if this is how it was drawn up. Later, he says to her, “What is your name, daughter?” so either he’s a very forgetful/unusually fruitful father, or it’s a courtesy title. She’s called Shweta, which they tell us means “White.” She’s put in charge of me (!), while her not-father, Raj, spirits Roland away to do Boy Things. I watch his retreating back, wondering if I’ll ever see him again. For the first time, I’m without a mobile phone. When I try to find him, half an hour later, another guest puts two and two together (or, white stranger and white stranger together, more precisely), and points me to the car-park.
The Boy Things in question involve a bottle of whiskey, inevitably. The wedding is teetotal, so the men fortify themselves before attending. In the car-park, a black-turbaned Sikh has the back of his car open, dispensing liquid fortification. Shweta and I remind the lads that there is, in fact, a wedding going on, so we leave the Pub-In-The-Boot, and head for the bright lights.
Remember that an Indian woman will wear her own weight in sequins, just out shopping for potatoes. Imagine her, in full flig, for a special occasion. The spectacle in the wedding pavilion is breath-taking, with the ooh-aah factor of a firework display. I feel more conspicuous for drabness than for whiteness, with not the merest sequin or bead to call my own. When they’ve finished painting their faces, they paint their hands and feet. Weddings take all day to set up, using bushels of fresh flower heads, and miles of twinkly lights. I’m definitely going Hindu, next time. Hardly surprising, then, that the feast can last four days. False economy to be any shorter, if you think about it.


I ask my new Best Friend Shweta, if this is an arranged marriage - are we seeing the bride and groom, seeing each other for the first time? But Shweta says, it’s a love marriage. Rahul and Deepti – we don’t meet them, but their names are picked out in flowers, on the stage – have chosen to take one another “into my heart” for the rest of their lives. It’s also a mixed marriage, very 21st century. Not what you’d call radical, the bride and groom are merely different kinds of Hindu, but even that wouldn’t have been tolerated, a generation ago.
The more we try and wriggle away, the more they press delicacies on us, to make us to stay. If I looked less like I’d been double-digging the vegetable patch all day, I might be tempted. But we take our last photo, and tear ourselves away. “Say, ‘Bye-bye, Auntie!’” says a mother, to the child in her arms. We’re given a royal send-off, then these people can get back to the rightful focus of attention, the nuptial pair. It’s eleven o’clock at night, the wedding ceremony will take place at one-thirty in the morning. There’s some serious partying to do, before then. To Rahul and Deepti, much joy.

Here Comes the Bride

The Shoe-shine Man spreads a cloth on the pavement, and sits on it। In a neat row, in front of him, he arranges the tools of his trade: brushes, rags, pots of polish and wax. Then, cross-legged, he waits for business. You can’t help but notice, all the feet passing by are bare, or in flip-flops - this isn’t what you’d call a well-heeled area. It’s going to be a long day for the Shoe-shine Man. If he had clippers, and a nail-file... The busy road’s flanked by now familiar lock-ups, selling everything from bags of cement to glasses of milky tea. I still can’t tell whether the flapping linen’s for sale, or just drying. “Goat,” says Monu, emphatically, pointing. He’s worked out that I harbour a small penchant for local fauna. I see a goat, then another with a kid, then more. “Is Muslim area. Muslim like goat.” So that explains it. Not a single woman to be seen, and the streets are awash with goats. Some bone-rattling along the way (the roads, not the suspension), Monu breaks off crooning to the Indian pop-song on his tape, an octave above his comfort range, pointing again. “Is wedding. Hindu wedding. I stop?” So we pull over, and go for an unashamed gawp.

The bride’s on her mobile phone, bored. By her side, her future husband fidgets uneasily. He looks about twelve. The horses, with their golden bridles, toss their heads, waiting, and the carriage shifts. Everyone’s too busy having a good time, to pay any attention to the nuptial pair. Behind their coach, the women chatter and laugh, their wedding finery blinding in the midday sun. In front of the horses, the male guests dance and clap, wearing wedding turbans in cream silk, with crested cockades and Davy Crockett tails at the back. They circle, chanting and stamping, while a waiter in a bow-tie distributes glasses of water from a tray held above his shoulder. The bride closes her mobile phone with a snap, and stashes it in the sequinned bag on her lap. She lifts her face, to smile at the groom.
“Rich people?” I ask Monu, dazzled by glittering nosebands and festooned silk. “No, no rich. No rich people,” he says. Well, someone’s Dad’s definitely going to be “no rich” when they’ve paid for this lot.
I wonder how much arranging culminates in today – not just the mother-of-the-bride’s shoes, and what to serve the guests in the swagged pavilion, when the official ceremony is over, but the selection of this bride for this groom, and the negotiations over the dowry. Our society rails against arranged marriage, but are we the unenlightened ones? Here, it’s a business venture, rooted in common sense, rather than a sentimental undertaking. It suddenly seems naive, to base the most important decision of your life on what could be an adolescent impulse, or just chemistry. An arranged marriage is also an act of love, I’m told - the family’s love for their son or daughter. After all, you wouldn’t let a schoolboy buy a house, would you? And there is love, they say, in an arranged marriage, it just comes after. We leave the Hindu bride getting to know her husband, and climb back into the car.
On the way home, I fall asleep. Monu kindly wakes me up, to admire a passing buffalo, and there’s the Shoeshine Man, buffing black leather to a fine gloss, while the unshod owner wiggles his toes in the evening air. I wonder if he does a discount, for sandals?