Rani-didi helps out at Akanksha, because her daughter’s a pupil. Her English isn’t as confident as Bhavika’s, and she often lapses into Hindi, taking the unavailable-to-me short-cut to understanding. She sounds cross, but don’t be fooled. You only have to see her, lavishly pencilling in whole constellations of Well Done stars, on the kids’ books, to know that she’s a soft touch.
When they’ve finished an exercise, the children come clamouring for it to be marked. Mehur flops his book onto my lap, only to have Swapnil flop his on top. One-potato, two-potato.... The trend picks up steam, (Rani's not the only soft touch...),but before I suffocate under a pile of maths books, I beg for mercy, disinterring Mehur’s and Swapnil’s books from the bottom of the heap, as prior claimants. When I investigate, they’ve both already been marked by Varun-bhaiya, a student-volunteer. This seems to be of little interest to the boys, who thrust their pencils into my hand, wanting me to sign their work, “Didi, name!” and add any further embellishments I think they may have earned, “One star, Didi? Three star?” I feel Rani-didi’s somewhat cornered the stellar market, so instead, I draw a little heart on one, and a cup of tea on the other. This is where it all begins to unravel, like the mats we’re sitting on. We lose the drift of our Odd or Even? number-work, in the Harrods’ sale quest for artistic approval. (I say, artistic, we’re not talking M F Husain, here, we’re talking clip-art, but this lot are definitely know-what-they-like merchants, so I’m home-free.) “One more heart,” says Khaja. “This small heart,” he points, “Make big heart, here.” Since I lost my heart to Khaja weeks ago, I see no problem with this. Sultana, on the other hand, is resistant to market change, and remains faithful to the star system. I have to rub out a primitive house on her book, and draw a sprinkling of stars. Naina gives me her book, and three centimetres of pencil. She’s not happy with the “Very Neat Work!” already inscribed, she wants, “Excellent!” “No!” says Khaja, “no excellent this!” It’s a cut-throat world, approbation. I’m also unsure that Bhavika-didi’s going to be thrilled, to see the kids’ careful columns of figures doodled into extinction, as the teacups blossom in the margins...
Next, we tackle Grammar. We learn to start sentences with a capital letter, to leave a space between words, and to put a full-stop at the end. Sentences in Hindi end with a line, like the end of a bar, in music script: the full stop’s a whole new concept. Sonal’s much inclined to put her football full-stop on the line above, rather than the line where her writing is, but other than this, we’ve largely got the idea. We’re all issued a wooden lolly-stick, to mark the divide between words, our “Spaceman Stick.” I decorate mine with little flowers, as well as my name, then so do all the little girls around me – it’s not tricky to work out, why I like coming here. Khaja, on the other hand, colours his a jolly black. You can’t win them all.
Each child’s “folder” is a green cloth bag, with Velcro tabs, in which all books and stationery are kept. A quick eyeball along the row, reveals that some children have magpie tendencies (check Sultana’s bag for an Aladdin’s Cave, if you can prise it out of her hands...). Number One hot-hot-hot property is the rubber, much prized and fought-over. I see Nikita using a rubber the size of a pea, but then she has tiny fingers, I suppose. Next favourite, in the worldly goods line, is the pencil-sharpener, or the cutter, as the kids call it. This is why Naina’s pencil is so short, they love sharpening. They have a few crayons each, but the interesting colours are whittled down to shards.
I can solve this, I think, in my Lady Bountiful way. I go to Something Special, on Hill Road - my favourite shop in Mumbai, but the grimiest outlet in the whole of retail, every last box of paperclips filmed in dust. (If I have mentioned it before, you’re allowed to go to sleep for two lines, but... are there more than four pairs of scissors in your house? Can you lay a ready hand on at least three kinds of sticky-tape? Do you own any glitter-glue AT ALL? If the answer to any or all of these is “Yes,” you need to get yourself down to Something Special. No, really.) I buy packs of crayons, rubbers, and pencil-sharpeners, twenty-five of each. It costs me £4. And some smiley face stickers. Well, who could resist?
“Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes” – my signature piece – is by way of being an Old Favourite, by now. It’s chaos, but everyone’s having fun, until Anand gets an elbow in the eye, and we have to curtail proceedings. I wonder about the wisdom of putting our left leg in, and then out, and then in, and then out, and shaking it all about, next time, but I haven’t seen a First Aid Kit in Didi’s cupboard. Still, bring on the Hokey-Cokey, I say.
When I hand over the booty-bag to Bhavika-didi, she says thanks, but then stashes it on a high shelf, out of reach. I’m allowed to give out just three rubbers, to share. At the end of the morning, only one comes back. I’m about to launch a thorough-going investigation, upending everyone’s folder, starting with Sultana’s, Chief Squirrel, when it occurs to me, that these small people probably don’t have much, in the way of possessions, at home. If they want an orange rubber, they’re welcome.
We give Bhavika a lift home, and in the car, she says, that if they have rubbers and sharpeners, they will spend all their time, rubbing out perfect work and sharpening already sharp pencils, just for the pleasure of using the facilities. I’m awash with sympathy, remembering Miss Miller’s desktop sharpener, with the crank-handle, at Beaumont Juniors. We used to stab our pencils, under the desk, to snap the point, so we could queue up to use it.
Tomorrow, says Bhavika, she will explain, that any pupil writing a whole page, with no rubbing out, will get a smiley-face sticker, to cheer up the so-far empty Star Chart on the wall. If the scheme works, I think, the rubber stash in Didi’s cupboard will still be healthy, when Khaja’s grandchildren are on the mat in Room 112, thanking God for the birds that sing.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Sunday, June 29, 2008
The Dal Queen
Dal wasn’t a big feature on the menu, when I was growing up. We had mushy peas, though, and that’s more or less the same, isn’t it, just without the eastern promise? What’s a few cumin seeds, between friends? Old habits die hard, and my first few attempts at proper dal turn into either pease pudding or lentil soup. Today, I watch an expert at her craft: the Dal Queen, whose masala tin I am unworthy to take a spoon to.
Since I’m sous-chef to her Delia, I prepare for her arrival by doing skill-free labour, such as chopping onions and tomatoes. I leave them trailing round the hob, in a flotilla of satellite dishes, just like on Delia. I’m very pleased with myself, until she says kindly, “We would usually chop the onion finer than this for the dal.... but it’s ok.” So now I can’t even chop onions. Dammit.
First into the hot oil, go the mustard seeds. When they start to go snap, crackle and pop, add the cumin seeds, and as much ground chilli as you’re up for. Let this sizzle around for a bit, but don’t abandon it. That way charcoal lies. We add the onion (magnanimously overlooking coarseness of inexpert chopping) and powdered coriander, turmeric, and asafoetida powder. (Helps digestion, that’s all I know. I can spell it, though, that surely counts for something? I look it up, for some retroactive wisdom, now I own a little pot of it. It’s from the parsley family, and it stinks so much, that, across the world, its common names mean Devil’s Dung - “Merde du Diable.” Given that, in its freshest state, it smells like garlic going off, whoever thought it’d be ok to pop it in the balti, in the first place? Very handy for Jains, though, who aren’t allowed so much as an onion to pique a tired palate...)
Back to the pan in hand. Add garlic, and root ginger, peeled, chopped, sliced, crushed, however you prefer to subjugate it. Then it all fizzes away to itself, until the onion’s transparent. I quite like crispy little brown edges, to the onion, though this is probably a taste born of necessity – onions, in my kitchen, always sneak past the required, softened stage, into something crunchy, when my back’s turned, usually when I'm rootling in the fridge for half a lemon to go in my gin and tonic. Cook’s perks.
When everything’s nicely got to know each other, add chopped tomatoes. Not as many as today’s hopeless sous-chef has chopped. Just some. Indian tomatoes, I have learnt, keep their shape when cooked, unlike home ones, which collapse if you show them a frying-pan. Put the lid on your onion-mix, and wait until you can see the oil reappearing, round the edges of the tomatoes. Now you can add your lentils, which you've already washed until the water runs clear. Add water, bring to the boil, and simmer, for fifteen minutes. Less water for a thick dal, more for a runny one – it’s not rocket science, lads.
While that’s all going hubble-bubble, you’ve got time to make chapatti. Tip a mound of wheat-flour into a two-tone metal bowl, dribble in a little oil, to soften the dough, and enough water. Less is easier than more, to correct, it’s always good to remember. Corral all the loose flour, squish everything into a ball, and give it five minutes’ gentle knuckling. Pull it into egg-sized balls (small eggs), flatten them slightly, and dip in more flour. If you have a marble chapatti-rolling-out block, and a wooden chapatti-rolling-out pin, now’s a great time to get them out. If not, improvise. Chopping-board, milk-bottle, whatever. Each egg-ball of dough should roll out thinly to a circle about eight inches across, but don’t get the tape-measure out, it's not that kind of a chapatti.
Now. Have you got a tawa? We have. Admittedly, it still has the sticky label on it, because we only bought it yesterday, in HyperCity. There’s no HyperCity, near your house, you can live dangerously, and use a frying-pan. No oil. When the pan’s hot, flap the first chapatti in, and watch. When the edges turn white, turn it over. You have to pat it, with a cloth, lovingly, and turn it again, and again. If it’s behaving itself, it will start to puff up. When it gets little brown freckles, it’s cooked. Take it out, with your asbestos fingers, and put it on that handy plate you’ve already got out. The chapattis stay soft, if you wrap them in a cloth. (You need a lot of cloths, for this recipe. Clean ones.) Then start again. The first one’s often tricky, while the pan gets used to the idea – just like pancakes, I say, supportively. This afternoon, though, the first one’s perfect, like the next eight, so we have nothing to offer hovering boys or dustbin dogs. Just as well, since both are in short supply.
The dal’s done. All it needs, is as much of the pile of sous-chef-chopped coriander leaves, as you can fit in your bunched fingers. This is comfort eating, big time. The Dal Queen says that, in India, they cook rice and lentils, onions and spices together, to make khichdi, a dish traditionally fed to invalids. We turn it into kedgeree - why do we have to add flaked fish and boiled eggs? I blame the Raj.
Nothing's weighed or measured, here, you will notice. Learning to cook Indian food, hanging on the loose end of your Mum's sari, everything's down to fingertips and intuition. The scales can stay in the cupboard.
So, anyway, pasta’s edging off the last-meal-before-you-die radar. Dal’s my new soul food. Next, I'm wanting to tackle aloo gobhi, but there's the small matter of onion-chopping, to sort out, first.
Since I’m sous-chef to her Delia, I prepare for her arrival by doing skill-free labour, such as chopping onions and tomatoes. I leave them trailing round the hob, in a flotilla of satellite dishes, just like on Delia. I’m very pleased with myself, until she says kindly, “We would usually chop the onion finer than this for the dal.... but it’s ok.” So now I can’t even chop onions. Dammit.
First into the hot oil, go the mustard seeds. When they start to go snap, crackle and pop, add the cumin seeds, and as much ground chilli as you’re up for. Let this sizzle around for a bit, but don’t abandon it. That way charcoal lies. We add the onion (magnanimously overlooking coarseness of inexpert chopping) and powdered coriander, turmeric, and asafoetida powder. (Helps digestion, that’s all I know. I can spell it, though, that surely counts for something? I look it up, for some retroactive wisdom, now I own a little pot of it. It’s from the parsley family, and it stinks so much, that, across the world, its common names mean Devil’s Dung - “Merde du Diable.” Given that, in its freshest state, it smells like garlic going off, whoever thought it’d be ok to pop it in the balti, in the first place? Very handy for Jains, though, who aren’t allowed so much as an onion to pique a tired palate...)
Back to the pan in hand. Add garlic, and root ginger, peeled, chopped, sliced, crushed, however you prefer to subjugate it. Then it all fizzes away to itself, until the onion’s transparent. I quite like crispy little brown edges, to the onion, though this is probably a taste born of necessity – onions, in my kitchen, always sneak past the required, softened stage, into something crunchy, when my back’s turned, usually when I'm rootling in the fridge for half a lemon to go in my gin and tonic. Cook’s perks.
When everything’s nicely got to know each other, add chopped tomatoes. Not as many as today’s hopeless sous-chef has chopped. Just some. Indian tomatoes, I have learnt, keep their shape when cooked, unlike home ones, which collapse if you show them a frying-pan. Put the lid on your onion-mix, and wait until you can see the oil reappearing, round the edges of the tomatoes. Now you can add your lentils, which you've already washed until the water runs clear. Add water, bring to the boil, and simmer, for fifteen minutes. Less water for a thick dal, more for a runny one – it’s not rocket science, lads.
While that’s all going hubble-bubble, you’ve got time to make chapatti. Tip a mound of wheat-flour into a two-tone metal bowl, dribble in a little oil, to soften the dough, and enough water. Less is easier than more, to correct, it’s always good to remember. Corral all the loose flour, squish everything into a ball, and give it five minutes’ gentle knuckling. Pull it into egg-sized balls (small eggs), flatten them slightly, and dip in more flour. If you have a marble chapatti-rolling-out block, and a wooden chapatti-rolling-out pin, now’s a great time to get them out. If not, improvise. Chopping-board, milk-bottle, whatever. Each egg-ball of dough should roll out thinly to a circle about eight inches across, but don’t get the tape-measure out, it's not that kind of a chapatti.
Now. Have you got a tawa? We have. Admittedly, it still has the sticky label on it, because we only bought it yesterday, in HyperCity. There’s no HyperCity, near your house, you can live dangerously, and use a frying-pan. No oil. When the pan’s hot, flap the first chapatti in, and watch. When the edges turn white, turn it over. You have to pat it, with a cloth, lovingly, and turn it again, and again. If it’s behaving itself, it will start to puff up. When it gets little brown freckles, it’s cooked. Take it out, with your asbestos fingers, and put it on that handy plate you’ve already got out. The chapattis stay soft, if you wrap them in a cloth. (You need a lot of cloths, for this recipe. Clean ones.) Then start again. The first one’s often tricky, while the pan gets used to the idea – just like pancakes, I say, supportively. This afternoon, though, the first one’s perfect, like the next eight, so we have nothing to offer hovering boys or dustbin dogs. Just as well, since both are in short supply.
The dal’s done. All it needs, is as much of the pile of sous-chef-chopped coriander leaves, as you can fit in your bunched fingers. This is comfort eating, big time. The Dal Queen says that, in India, they cook rice and lentils, onions and spices together, to make khichdi, a dish traditionally fed to invalids. We turn it into kedgeree - why do we have to add flaked fish and boiled eggs? I blame the Raj.
Nothing's weighed or measured, here, you will notice. Learning to cook Indian food, hanging on the loose end of your Mum's sari, everything's down to fingertips and intuition. The scales can stay in the cupboard.
So, anyway, pasta’s edging off the last-meal-before-you-die radar. Dal’s my new soul food. Next, I'm wanting to tackle aloo gobhi, but there's the small matter of onion-chopping, to sort out, first.
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Matheran
We turn our backs on the rags and rubble of Mumbai, heading across the estuary, in search of some green and pleasant land. Monu suggests Matheran, a hill-station about sixty miles east. We’ve never heard of it, but we give it a go. It turns out, when we get there, that he’s never been, either, so it’s a bit of a pig in a poke. (Not very pc, I know, given our current co-ordinates, but you think of a veg alternative – ‘an aubergine in a hessian sack’ doesn’t quite do it, does it?) Happily for Lucknow’s favourite son, Matheran exceeds all our green hopes, even the monsoon hides in the wings, until we’re back in the car, on our way home.
As soon as we leave the expressway, nature takes over. Against all expectations, it’s like Scotland, hill after craggy hill, head in the clouds and feet in the mist. We wind the windows down, and the hot air rushes in. So, not quite like Scotland, after all.
We see a washerwoman, by the well, slapping her linen on the rocks, wringing it out, then piling it into her basket to carry home, on her head. I think we should have basket-balancing on the National Curriculum, it does wonders for deportment and posture.
Women bend, ankle-deep in the flooded rice-fields, weeding. Only a quarter of each field is green with new shoots, the remainder to be seeded as the season unfolds. I feel sorry for the bullocks, straining to pull their ploughs through the mud, but Mr Roland, the country-wise, reckons they’re up for it. I don’t recall seeing many bullock-carts in Buckinghamshire, so I’m unsure how he knows, but I suppose he’s right.
The local school’s painted egg-yolk yellow - farm egg, not supermarket egg, obviously, I don’t think they do colour-chart chemical interference, here. The small girls wear navy-blue pinafores over white blouses, with red ribbons in their looped plaits, just to be cute. Their school bags are bigger than they are. Their older sisters wear long white kurtas over navy salwars, with navy dupattas. Simple, but stunning. For the first time, I see that the words “elegant” and “school-uniform” can be in the same sentence, without starting a fight. The boys are in white shirts and beige shorts, or beige longs, depending on the size of boy.
The further up the mountain we go, the more crumbly the road, which makes interesting driving on hairpin bends. Monu’s slightly inclined to survey the scenery, so I offer to drive. He laughs. I don’t doubt him for an instant, which is more than I can say of Mr Roland, swerving up and down the Gorges du Tarn...
Near the top of the hill, we run into a dead-end. Cars aren’t allowed any further, in the interests of pure air and tourism. As soon as we slow down, we’re surrounded, and Monu replaces his chauffeur’s cap with his guide-and-protector hat. If we want to reach Matheran, we have three choices. We can walk, we can take the mini-train, or we can go on horseback. Guess?
We choose c)... I know....
We invite Monu to come with us. “This very long price...” he says, doubtfully reporting negotiations so far, but then he capitulates. “OK, I come.” So the horsemen bring our noble steeds. Monu gets a pony (“Very nice horse, very small, very fast. I like my horse.”) Roland gets Meghraj, King of the Clouds, speckled brown and white. And mine is beautiful, a glossy chestnut called Raja, just a foot taller than everyone else’s. Now is this because a) I look instantly like a competent horsewoman, exuding equestrian savoir-faire; b) Raj has the nicest nature, and I visibly need all the help I can get; or (depressingly) c) I have such an enormous backside, a smaller mount won’t do? Don’t tell me what you think...
Despite having read every word from J Cooper’s pen, I still think horse-riding’s not really a sport. I mean, the horse does all the work, doesn’t it? You just have to sit there, enjoying the view... Head Horseman Krishna accompanies Raja and me (thus supporting possibility b) above – also Raja’s his top horse, so it’s in his interest to hold onto the bridle every inch of the way...). “Straight back, straight back,” he reproves, “no soft back.” I sit up, and immediately forget how to hold the reins. “This brake, this left, this right. This finger, this finger, like this. Hold tight.” My spine sags. If you think it’s easy, go and give yourself a scrub-down with a curry-comb right now. It’s harder than it looks. So this is me, eating humble pony-cubes.
I ask Krishna, if Raja’s a boy or a girl horse, because I’m too busy, getting my handbag trapped on the pommel, as I hurl myself into the saddle from a standing start, to check out Raja’s credentials. I think he says, “she,” so I ask, interestedly, if she’s had a foal...Puzzlement. A baby horse? Blank. A horse baby, then? Light dawns. “This boy horse, all boys,” he says. No baby, then. It seems he didn’t say, “she,” he said, “this sneeze,” when Raja was spluttering. It’s going to be a long trek.
About a million miles up the stony path, we sidle to a halt, and I winch myself off Raja, glad to be on terra firma, even with wobbly legs. 
As soon as we leave the expressway, nature takes over. Against all expectations, it’s like Scotland, hill after craggy hill, head in the clouds and feet in the mist. We wind the windows down, and the hot air rushes in. So, not quite like Scotland, after all.
We see a washerwoman, by the well, slapping her linen on the rocks, wringing it out, then piling it into her basket to carry home, on her head. I think we should have basket-balancing on the National Curriculum, it does wonders for deportment and posture.
Women bend, ankle-deep in the flooded rice-fields, weeding. Only a quarter of each field is green with new shoots, the remainder to be seeded as the season unfolds. I feel sorry for the bullocks, straining to pull their ploughs through the mud, but Mr Roland, the country-wise, reckons they’re up for it. I don’t recall seeing many bullock-carts in Buckinghamshire, so I’m unsure how he knows, but I suppose he’s right.
The local school’s painted egg-yolk yellow - farm egg, not supermarket egg, obviously, I don’t think they do colour-chart chemical interference, here. The small girls wear navy-blue pinafores over white blouses, with red ribbons in their looped plaits, just to be cute. Their school bags are bigger than they are. Their older sisters wear long white kurtas over navy salwars, with navy dupattas. Simple, but stunning. For the first time, I see that the words “elegant” and “school-uniform” can be in the same sentence, without starting a fight. The boys are in white shirts and beige shorts, or beige longs, depending on the size of boy.
The further up the mountain we go, the more crumbly the road, which makes interesting driving on hairpin bends. Monu’s slightly inclined to survey the scenery, so I offer to drive. He laughs. I don’t doubt him for an instant, which is more than I can say of Mr Roland, swerving up and down the Gorges du Tarn...
Near the top of the hill, we run into a dead-end. Cars aren’t allowed any further, in the interests of pure air and tourism. As soon as we slow down, we’re surrounded, and Monu replaces his chauffeur’s cap with his guide-and-protector hat. If we want to reach Matheran, we have three choices. We can walk, we can take the mini-train, or we can go on horseback. Guess?
We choose c)... I know....
We invite Monu to come with us. “This very long price...” he says, doubtfully reporting negotiations so far, but then he capitulates. “OK, I come.” So the horsemen bring our noble steeds. Monu gets a pony (“Very nice horse, very small, very fast. I like my horse.”) Roland gets Meghraj, King of the Clouds, speckled brown and white. And mine is beautiful, a glossy chestnut called Raja, just a foot taller than everyone else’s. Now is this because a) I look instantly like a competent horsewoman, exuding equestrian savoir-faire; b) Raj has the nicest nature, and I visibly need all the help I can get; or (depressingly) c) I have such an enormous backside, a smaller mount won’t do? Don’t tell me what you think...
Despite having read every word from J Cooper’s pen, I still think horse-riding’s not really a sport. I mean, the horse does all the work, doesn’t it? You just have to sit there, enjoying the view... Head Horseman Krishna accompanies Raja and me (thus supporting possibility b) above – also Raja’s his top horse, so it’s in his interest to hold onto the bridle every inch of the way...). “Straight back, straight back,” he reproves, “no soft back.” I sit up, and immediately forget how to hold the reins. “This brake, this left, this right. This finger, this finger, like this. Hold tight.” My spine sags. If you think it’s easy, go and give yourself a scrub-down with a curry-comb right now. It’s harder than it looks. So this is me, eating humble pony-cubes.
I ask Krishna, if Raja’s a boy or a girl horse, because I’m too busy, getting my handbag trapped on the pommel, as I hurl myself into the saddle from a standing start, to check out Raja’s credentials. I think he says, “she,” so I ask, interestedly, if she’s had a foal...Puzzlement. A baby horse? Blank. A horse baby, then? Light dawns. “This boy horse, all boys,” he says. No baby, then. It seems he didn’t say, “she,” he said, “this sneeze,” when Raja was spluttering. It’s going to be a long trek.
About a million miles up the stony path, we sidle to a halt, and I winch myself off Raja, glad to be on terra firma, even with wobbly legs.
In the rapid exchange Monu has with the drivers, I hear the magic words “restaurant” and “market” – shopping and lunch, what could be nicer? Apparently, though, we’re here for the view. Well, once we scramble down a steep track, through a copse, we are. En route, Monu stops, and points to a craggy mound of red earth. Mr Roland and I crane forward. “This snake house.” We take a step back, to admire it more fully. “He sleeping,” says Monu, confidently. He’s turning into a bit of a Patrol Leader, our Monu. We tiptoe away. No-one likes being woken up from a nice nap, do they?
The thing about getting off the horse, is that you have to get back on again. When you go by plane, it’s not the actual flying that’s dangerous, it’s the takeoff and landing. Same with horses. I can cope with the clip-clop, clip-clop in between, just about. Fortunately, there’s a handy wall, so it’s more of a walk-on, this time.
“You like, go fast?” asks Krishna, “you stand, you sit, stand, sit, one-two, one-two.” Before I can answer, he says something in horse, with his tongue and his teeth, and we take off. I think I may be doing sit-stand, instead of stand-sit, because I get a thorough saddle-spanking, and it occurs to me Raja and I aren’t ready for the Way the Farmer Rides, just yet.
The mud’s a darker shade of Heinz Tomato Soup, witness Mr Roland’s fawn trouser-bottoms. I ask if the horses have to be washed every day, like our car, but Krishna says, only once a fortnight, more often’s not good for them. “But every night, massage.” I think he means the horses.
We stop for another view, down another track, but ignore the verdant panorama in favour of a monkey-dog fight. Four snarling dogs, one very persistent monkey. Youths lounging nearby encourage him, in English, for our benefit, shooing away the dogs. “You no hear what I speak?" They punctuate their request with stones. "Go away, no-good bastard dogs!” The dogs yelp
“You like, go fast?” asks Krishna, “you stand, you sit, stand, sit, one-two, one-two.” Before I can answer, he says something in horse, with his tongue and his teeth, and we take off. I think I may be doing sit-stand, instead of stand-sit, because I get a thorough saddle-spanking, and it occurs to me Raja and I aren’t ready for the Way the Farmer Rides, just yet.
The mud’s a darker shade of Heinz Tomato Soup, witness Mr Roland’s fawn trouser-bottoms. I ask if the horses have to be washed every day, like our car, but Krishna says, only once a fortnight, more often’s not good for them. “But every night, massage.” I think he means the horses.
We stop for another view, down another track, but ignore the verdant panorama in favour of a monkey-dog fight. Four snarling dogs, one very persistent monkey. Youths lounging nearby encourage him, in English, for our benefit, shooing away the dogs. “You no hear what I speak?" They punctuate their request with stones. "Go away, no-good bastard dogs!” The dogs yelp
back up the path to the street. After a little while, the monkey follows. He’s clearly not had enough.
There’s another conference about lunch, but it’s destined not to be, so we sling our legs over our horses’ backs, again, for the homeward trek. We meet men, pulling and pushing cartloads of stones and grit, up to the village. “Indian men, very small, very strong,” says Krishna, steering out of their way. We stop, where the railway track crosses the path, waving to the train as it squeaks to a halt. Like the local Mumbai train, this one has doors which are never closed, and the passengers loll out, on all sides.
“This horse jump,” Krishna informs me. He clicks twice, and Raja does a spirited wiggle and a kick, at the end of which, I’m lying across his neck, sliding sideways, stirrups flying. Monu, ever supportive, is behind me, laughing. It’s alright for him, on My Little Pony, back there...
There’s another conference about lunch, but it’s destined not to be, so we sling our legs over our horses’ backs, again, for the homeward trek. We meet men, pulling and pushing cartloads of stones and grit, up to the village. “Indian men, very small, very strong,” says Krishna, steering out of their way. We stop, where the railway track crosses the path, waving to the train as it squeaks to a halt. Like the local Mumbai train, this one has doors which are never closed, and the passengers loll out, on all sides.
“This horse jump,” Krishna informs me. He clicks twice, and Raja does a spirited wiggle and a kick, at the end of which, I’m lying across his neck, sliding sideways, stirrups flying. Monu, ever supportive, is behind me, laughing. It’s alright for him, on My Little Pony, back there...
We ride to within three feet of the car, which is as well, because I can’t walk, once Raja and I go our separate ways. “You want see this horse jump?” Krishna asks, as we’re leaving. We do. He manoeuvres about a bit, then does a standing leap, Heigh Ho Silver, without banging his nose on Raja’s neck. We clap and wave.
I roll the window up, as we gather a little speed, but the damage is done. Out of conditioner this morning, open-window drive, horseback exposure to elements, natural tendency to madness – factor in the monsoon, and you have a coiffure like a mousy pan-scourer. I will not get a comb through this until next Tuesday.
In the car, I ask Monu why we don’t have lunch, and he says, “No nice. Village women very dirty.” He pulls in, at a road-side stall. We drive home, munching Magic Masala Balaji Wafers, aka crinkle-cut crisps, washed down with mango juice. Or coke, if you’re Monu.
A perfect day.
I roll the window up, as we gather a little speed, but the damage is done. Out of conditioner this morning, open-window drive, horseback exposure to elements, natural tendency to madness – factor in the monsoon, and you have a coiffure like a mousy pan-scourer. I will not get a comb through this until next Tuesday.
In the car, I ask Monu why we don’t have lunch, and he says, “No nice. Village women very dirty.” He pulls in, at a road-side stall. We drive home, munching Magic Masala Balaji Wafers, aka crinkle-cut crisps, washed down with mango juice. Or coke, if you’re Monu.
A perfect day.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Ticket to Ride
“Buy ticket from ticket office,” Monu says, “no from person outside station.” He means it – inside the station, on the wall, a notice declares, “Ticket from a tout is a ticket to jail.” So we queue up, duly chastened.
Victoria Station – V.T. to its friends – is about two hours’ drive from our flat. We climb out of the car, and do a quick double-take – V.T.’s the twin of London St Pancras, contriving to be impressive and pretty at the same time. Inside, you couldn't be anywhere but India. We're confronted by dozens of ticket windows, with explicit, but, to us, incomprehensible directions, about which stations are served from each. A kind man, in a pale blue shirt and cream trousers (unofficial official uniform here, as for Michael Palin), sees our white-faced bewilderment, and tells us we need the first floor, desk 53 for foreigners. Monu’s words ringing in my ears, I’m inclined to doubt him, but he wants neither payment nor thanks, so we do what he suggests. Halfway up the sweeping marble stairs, where the first floor’s cut away to accommodate the staircase, there’s a plinth lagged in cushioned plastic, for the protection of unwary heads, who presumably choose to bound up four stairs at a time. I look around me, and the only head, I can see, in need of protecting, is Jacob’s.
Buying a ticket’s the most cumbersome, time-consuming exercise I’ve ever seen. You have to fill in a form for every journey you want to make, with train time, name, number, and date, as well as everything about the passenger you’d need, to register with Dateline. Now, and only now, we discover that they only accept pounds or rupees. Everyone puts his credit card back in his wallet. Happily, there’s a magic wall on the ground floor, in its own little kiosk, so Jacob and I go to collect a million rupees, then slope back upstairs, trying to look inconspicuous. By now, three people have been served, but one has pushed in, so it’s still not our go. The ticket lady, with a lab coat on over her sari, slides a wooden sign in front of her window - “Please wait” – and disappears. “She go lunch,” says the pusher-in, fatalistically. Painted on her window - underneath the depressing news about credit cards - “11.50 – 12.10 lunch.” The ticket clerks obviously dine alone, at Indian railways, a twenty-minute lunch-break doesn’t include time to chat. We chat, though, to some nice Americans in the queue, behind us, swapping travel tales and life stories and Soft Mints. Some would-be travellers try to start an ancillary queue, to my left, so I put a proprietary arm out, casually, to the marble counter, blocking the pass. It also fences in the pusher-in, but it serves him right for pushing in, in the first place. If anyone else tries to queue-jump, I will cheerfully punch them. Happily for international peace, no-one does, and, when Mrs Patil finally comes back from her chapatti-wrap, new-minted tickets are handed over. She needs to see the ATM receipt, though, in case I might have been counterfeiting rupees in our spare room, with hand-rolled paper and a box of crayons, of an evening. You’d be brilliant at drawing Gandhi, if you did, his face is on every banknote.
The foreign tickets allocation only covers journeys within two days, so we have to join the scrum on the ground floor, to buy tickets for the rest of the boys’ Indian adventure. It’s like at Sainsbury’s deli counter, you have to get a token first, and wait for your number to be allocated. Sadly the ticket-for-a-ticket queue snakes round the whole of the ground floor. We join it, disgruntled but resigned – isn’t queuing our specialist subject, in the UK? Before we’ve properly exhaled our first sigh, another charming man in a blue and cream ensemble, tells us we don’t have to queue, if we have credit cards, so we skip off to windows 11 & 12, and are served almost instantly. The bloke behind us openly reads our forms over our shoulders, inching forward bit by bit, until he’s one of us, then at the counter between us, and I even have to ask him to move, so I can sign the receipt pushed under the screen. They don’t do personal space, in Mumbai. Well, logically, there’s not room for it.
So, we succeed, but Monu doesn’t. He needs a ticket home. An Indian person, at an Indian railway station, wanting an Indian ticket, from Mumbai – in India - to Lucknow – also in India – and he needs ID. Not a single word of ill-will against British Rail will ever pass my lips again.
The boys’ train’s early evening, so we spend the day touring Elephanta Island, to get our money’s worth out of the repeat two-hour trek to south Mumbai. Back in the car, all sporting bizarre monsoon-tan, we have lots of time, until we drift to a standstill. We were always going to hit traffic, because that’s Mumbai, but this is carpark-traffic, and our hour and a half leeway’s beginning to melt. “Sit. Sit. Sit,” says Monu, so we know it’s bad. “Today, V.V.I.P. visit Mumbai, all all road stop.” In a bold move, we leave the car, and cross the road, to Marineline Station, where we catch an urban train into Central Station. Only three stops. Sounds so easy, doesn’t it?
Put aside all the articles you read about Mumbai railways having the highest passenger fatalities, not to mention over-crowding and pick-pocketing. None of the signs, blossoming on every post, is in English. It’s definitely our lack, for not understanding Hindi, but knowing that, doesn’t make it any easier to find a ticket, or a platform, or a train. We hop up stairs, across walkways, down stairs, no ticket office, ask again, increasingly desperate. The boys manfully tote all their worldly goods, without a murmur. I’m finding three cartons of juice and a bag of caramels for the train, almost more than I can bear, though in fairness, I’m also weighed down by an invisible rucksackful of panic. Our tickets are seven rupees each. Platform 1.
A million Indians are on Platform 1. We excuse-me, sorry our way through the throng, turning heads with our white-and-Elephanta-Island-pink faces. I ask four different people if the next train’s to Mumbai Central. Apparently so. We move forward, as the next train comes in, and everyone round us laughs, wagging fingers, holding us back. Ladies only. A whole train, just for ladies. It’s a very short train, with daylight visible between fluttering saris. It looks like a very nice train, but – I check out all the y-chromosomes around me – it’s not for us.
Less than two minutes later, a train we can board. Well, with some polite elbowing then hefty shoving, we can. Sardines have room for potted plants and scatter cushions, in their tin, compared with this. My second foot’s barely landed, when the train starts to move, and I turn back, to count the boys, in a panic. One, two, three. Mr Roland, bonus. It’s all a bit real, clamouring for attention from every sense, but olfactory has it, by a nose...
An Indian friend tells us about four businessmen he sees, travelling on such a commuter-train into the city, who balance a briefcase on top of their four pot-bellies, to play a hand of cards. I don’t think it’d work, with a back-pack.
Think sausages. When you puncture a sausage skin, the unconfined sausage, inside, just pops out. So, the urban network, here. “Indian train, doors all-time open, very danger,” says Monu. People hang out, catching the view or the evening air, or pushed by the sausage behind, I’m not sure.
We pull in to Central Station. People behind us are already tunnelling through us, to get off. We burst out together, onto the platform. I count heads. Roughly quorate. Chelo.
Local’s divided from national by a slender footbridge, and it’s another world. We’re still the only westerners visible, but there’s slightly more organisation in the air. After all the adrenalin, there’s an hour in hand. On the platform, no train, but a passenger list, including Gower, Pomeroy and Hardy, our own trio of musketeers.
Whole families are camped, in the main waiting-area, picnicking or sleeping. The boys buy chips and coke from the unlikely MacDonald’s, but Jacob – eager to embrace the whole Indian experience, his insides still unruffled – prefers idli, and watermelon-juice.
Freedom’s just a boarding-step away, so the boys allow a photo-opportunity, before they escape.
Victoria Station – V.T. to its friends – is about two hours’ drive from our flat. We climb out of the car, and do a quick double-take – V.T.’s the twin of London St Pancras, contriving to be impressive and pretty at the same time. Inside, you couldn't be anywhere but India. We're confronted by dozens of ticket windows, with explicit, but, to us, incomprehensible directions, about which stations are served from each. A kind man, in a pale blue shirt and cream trousers (unofficial official uniform here, as for Michael Palin), sees our white-faced bewilderment, and tells us we need the first floor, desk 53 for foreigners. Monu’s words ringing in my ears, I’m inclined to doubt him, but he wants neither payment nor thanks, so we do what he suggests. Halfway up the sweeping marble stairs, where the first floor’s cut away to accommodate the staircase, there’s a plinth lagged in cushioned plastic, for the protection of unwary heads, who presumably choose to bound up four stairs at a time. I look around me, and the only head, I can see, in need of protecting, is Jacob’s.
Buying a ticket’s the most cumbersome, time-consuming exercise I’ve ever seen. You have to fill in a form for every journey you want to make, with train time, name, number, and date, as well as everything about the passenger you’d need, to register with Dateline. Now, and only now, we discover that they only accept pounds or rupees. Everyone puts his credit card back in his wallet. Happily, there’s a magic wall on the ground floor, in its own little kiosk, so Jacob and I go to collect a million rupees, then slope back upstairs, trying to look inconspicuous. By now, three people have been served, but one has pushed in, so it’s still not our go. The ticket lady, with a lab coat on over her sari, slides a wooden sign in front of her window - “Please wait” – and disappears. “She go lunch,” says the pusher-in, fatalistically. Painted on her window - underneath the depressing news about credit cards - “11.50 – 12.10 lunch.” The ticket clerks obviously dine alone, at Indian railways, a twenty-minute lunch-break doesn’t include time to chat. We chat, though, to some nice Americans in the queue, behind us, swapping travel tales and life stories and Soft Mints. Some would-be travellers try to start an ancillary queue, to my left, so I put a proprietary arm out, casually, to the marble counter, blocking the pass. It also fences in the pusher-in, but it serves him right for pushing in, in the first place. If anyone else tries to queue-jump, I will cheerfully punch them. Happily for international peace, no-one does, and, when Mrs Patil finally comes back from her chapatti-wrap, new-minted tickets are handed over. She needs to see the ATM receipt, though, in case I might have been counterfeiting rupees in our spare room, with hand-rolled paper and a box of crayons, of an evening. You’d be brilliant at drawing Gandhi, if you did, his face is on every banknote.
The foreign tickets allocation only covers journeys within two days, so we have to join the scrum on the ground floor, to buy tickets for the rest of the boys’ Indian adventure. It’s like at Sainsbury’s deli counter, you have to get a token first, and wait for your number to be allocated. Sadly the ticket-for-a-ticket queue snakes round the whole of the ground floor. We join it, disgruntled but resigned – isn’t queuing our specialist subject, in the UK? Before we’ve properly exhaled our first sigh, another charming man in a blue and cream ensemble, tells us we don’t have to queue, if we have credit cards, so we skip off to windows 11 & 12, and are served almost instantly. The bloke behind us openly reads our forms over our shoulders, inching forward bit by bit, until he’s one of us, then at the counter between us, and I even have to ask him to move, so I can sign the receipt pushed under the screen. They don’t do personal space, in Mumbai. Well, logically, there’s not room for it.
So, we succeed, but Monu doesn’t. He needs a ticket home. An Indian person, at an Indian railway station, wanting an Indian ticket, from Mumbai – in India - to Lucknow – also in India – and he needs ID. Not a single word of ill-will against British Rail will ever pass my lips again.
The boys’ train’s early evening, so we spend the day touring Elephanta Island, to get our money’s worth out of the repeat two-hour trek to south Mumbai. Back in the car, all sporting bizarre monsoon-tan, we have lots of time, until we drift to a standstill. We were always going to hit traffic, because that’s Mumbai, but this is carpark-traffic, and our hour and a half leeway’s beginning to melt. “Sit. Sit. Sit,” says Monu, so we know it’s bad. “Today, V.V.I.P. visit Mumbai, all all road stop.” In a bold move, we leave the car, and cross the road, to Marineline Station, where we catch an urban train into Central Station. Only three stops. Sounds so easy, doesn’t it?
Put aside all the articles you read about Mumbai railways having the highest passenger fatalities, not to mention over-crowding and pick-pocketing. None of the signs, blossoming on every post, is in English. It’s definitely our lack, for not understanding Hindi, but knowing that, doesn’t make it any easier to find a ticket, or a platform, or a train. We hop up stairs, across walkways, down stairs, no ticket office, ask again, increasingly desperate. The boys manfully tote all their worldly goods, without a murmur. I’m finding three cartons of juice and a bag of caramels for the train, almost more than I can bear, though in fairness, I’m also weighed down by an invisible rucksackful of panic. Our tickets are seven rupees each. Platform 1.
A million Indians are on Platform 1. We excuse-me, sorry our way through the throng, turning heads with our white-and-Elephanta-Island-pink faces. I ask four different people if the next train’s to Mumbai Central. Apparently so. We move forward, as the next train comes in, and everyone round us laughs, wagging fingers, holding us back. Ladies only. A whole train, just for ladies. It’s a very short train, with daylight visible between fluttering saris. It looks like a very nice train, but – I check out all the y-chromosomes around me – it’s not for us.
Less than two minutes later, a train we can board. Well, with some polite elbowing then hefty shoving, we can. Sardines have room for potted plants and scatter cushions, in their tin, compared with this. My second foot’s barely landed, when the train starts to move, and I turn back, to count the boys, in a panic. One, two, three. Mr Roland, bonus. It’s all a bit real, clamouring for attention from every sense, but olfactory has it, by a nose...
An Indian friend tells us about four businessmen he sees, travelling on such a commuter-train into the city, who balance a briefcase on top of their four pot-bellies, to play a hand of cards. I don’t think it’d work, with a back-pack.
Think sausages. When you puncture a sausage skin, the unconfined sausage, inside, just pops out. So, the urban network, here. “Indian train, doors all-time open, very danger,” says Monu. People hang out, catching the view or the evening air, or pushed by the sausage behind, I’m not sure.
We pull in to Central Station. People behind us are already tunnelling through us, to get off. We burst out together, onto the platform. I count heads. Roughly quorate. Chelo.
Local’s divided from national by a slender footbridge, and it’s another world. We’re still the only westerners visible, but there’s slightly more organisation in the air. After all the adrenalin, there’s an hour in hand. On the platform, no train, but a passenger list, including Gower, Pomeroy and Hardy, our own trio of musketeers.
Whole families are camped, in the main waiting-area, picnicking or sleeping. The boys buy chips and coke from the unlikely MacDonald’s, but Jacob – eager to embrace the whole Indian experience, his insides still unruffled – prefers idli, and watermelon-juice.
Freedom’s just a boarding-step away, so the boys allow a photo-opportunity, before they escape.
Monu – like Radar – appears at our side. We would have made the train, if we’d stayed in the car. It takes us more than two hours, to drive home. As we pass a tv shop, Monu leans out of the car to catch the cricket results. India’s winning. By the time we get home, the boys are halfway to Jaipur.
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Welcome to India
Well, they’re here.
Driving to the airport at four in the morning, even Monu’s looking pale. We’re all glad of the covering darkness; at least two of us close our eyes for a bit. On the other hand, the roads are a piece of chum chum, and we whisk along in under fifteen minutes, instead of the usual fifty. I suggest rescheduling office hours, to maximise the benefit of this early morning facility, but it falls on stony ground. I pass round the Soft Mints, and we chew our breakfast in silence.
At Arrivals, we feel less like the only people left on the planet, because they’re queuing six-deep, by the exit doors. This isn’t just to catch the first possible glimpse of a newly de-planed Grandma, or long-lost Cousin Rahul, it’s because the air, escaping from the airport lounge, has been conditioned, and is therefore cool, rather than the ambient warm felt.
I’m not sure, if Indian people understand about queuing, or is it just the ones in our immediate vicinity, who get it wrong? First off, if we sense someone, elbowing into our personal space, we step back, and usher them past. Then, it occurs to me, they’re not muscling through, to reclaim their abandoned child, who’s wriggled to the front, at the barrier, they’re just muscling through, full stop. So I wind in my crowd-etiquette antennae, ignore the signals, and stand my ground. Futile. The man on my right hand – literally – insinuates himself in the not-space between me and the woman in front, like cramming a too-fat newspaper through a letter-box. He ends up standing on the other side of Mr Roland, where he could have walked, round the back of us, with no worming at all. Maybe he likes a challenge. I think of Hugh Grant, going to the arrivals lounge at Heathrow, in Love Actually, to have his faith in humanity restored, and I can only assume he doesn’t go at four thirty in the morning, when everyone’s crabby and unlovely.
The security officers nurse their rifles, nonchalantly. The one sitting down, overwhelmed by the responsibility of superior rank, nods off for ten minutes. Mayhem’s too tired to break loose. He wakes up, and compensates for taking his eye off the ball, momentarily, by snapping orders at small sari’d ladies, with impossibly loaded trolleys.
It’s a long time since yesterday’s four-word conversation with itinerant son, from Gatwick. Between then and now, he has the possibility of missing not one, but two flights, including the hurdle of not letting his stop-over, in Qatar, turn into a sleep-over. It’s not without anxiety, that I scrutinise every emerging face. In all truth, I can tell pretty quickly if it’s Jacob or not, without even having to play the telltale genetics card. Baggage-trolleys emerge round the corner in front of their owners, and I know Jacob’s not likely to be bringing a microwave oven, or a home entertainment centre with him. If the first thing I see is a box of mangoes, or a washing-airer, all swathed in bubble-wrap, I don’t even look at the person pushing. Ditto, matching designer luggage – it’s the raggle-taggle gypsies I’m waiting for, so tatty ruck-sacks will be the order of the day. I even think, no trolley.
And there they are, blinking in the fluorescent light, hefting seasoned back-packs, trolleyless, after all. They look pale, but they’ve been in transit for twenty hours, the pre-dawn light leaches the roses from their cheeks, and everyone else is brown - how could they not look pale? I have no leis, nor bindi, with which to welcome them, so I give them a Soft Mint, instead.
We motor through untypically deserted streets, but they won’t know, until tomorrow, how much of a miracle this is. It’s still dark, so it’s like looking round a house, shrouded in dust-sheets. Once across the threshold, they have showers, eat a loaf-ful of toast, and fall into bed, asleep before they’re horizontal. After six hours, we winkle them back into consciousness with more tea.
The promised rain doesn’t arrive until we’re stranded in the middle of Powai, but, since we’re sitting on the canopied terrace of Mocha Coffee Shop, upstairs at the Galleria, we’re happy to spectate. We brave the scrum at D-Mart, in search of what Monu calls “rain-dress,” but Mr & Mrs Kumar of Powai, et al., are out and about, panic-buying moths-balls and brown jaggery cones, so the aisles are too thronged, to be able to turn round, let alone try cagoules on. Going for a browse round D-Mart seems to be the local pastime of choice, on a damp Sunday afternoon, much as people, in the UK, idle away the slack hours til tea, mooching around yellowing trays of impatiens, at the garden centre. We buy a bag of khari biscuits, to eat on the way home, and some grandpa vests for the boys, to test out the Indian theory, that it’s cooler, with the extra insulation.
The boys make bold plans to quarter the sub-continent – so much India, and so little time. The Rough Guide may well fit it all on one page, but they're not going to fit it all into one month. We walk to Utsav for dinner – ordering in the hot evening air, outside, eating in the saving cool, inside.
When we get home, Jacob has his third shower of the day. They say, no-one can come to India, and remain unchanged. QED.
Driving to the airport at four in the morning, even Monu’s looking pale. We’re all glad of the covering darkness; at least two of us close our eyes for a bit. On the other hand, the roads are a piece of chum chum, and we whisk along in under fifteen minutes, instead of the usual fifty. I suggest rescheduling office hours, to maximise the benefit of this early morning facility, but it falls on stony ground. I pass round the Soft Mints, and we chew our breakfast in silence.
At Arrivals, we feel less like the only people left on the planet, because they’re queuing six-deep, by the exit doors. This isn’t just to catch the first possible glimpse of a newly de-planed Grandma, or long-lost Cousin Rahul, it’s because the air, escaping from the airport lounge, has been conditioned, and is therefore cool, rather than the ambient warm felt.
I’m not sure, if Indian people understand about queuing, or is it just the ones in our immediate vicinity, who get it wrong? First off, if we sense someone, elbowing into our personal space, we step back, and usher them past. Then, it occurs to me, they’re not muscling through, to reclaim their abandoned child, who’s wriggled to the front, at the barrier, they’re just muscling through, full stop. So I wind in my crowd-etiquette antennae, ignore the signals, and stand my ground. Futile. The man on my right hand – literally – insinuates himself in the not-space between me and the woman in front, like cramming a too-fat newspaper through a letter-box. He ends up standing on the other side of Mr Roland, where he could have walked, round the back of us, with no worming at all. Maybe he likes a challenge. I think of Hugh Grant, going to the arrivals lounge at Heathrow, in Love Actually, to have his faith in humanity restored, and I can only assume he doesn’t go at four thirty in the morning, when everyone’s crabby and unlovely.
The security officers nurse their rifles, nonchalantly. The one sitting down, overwhelmed by the responsibility of superior rank, nods off for ten minutes. Mayhem’s too tired to break loose. He wakes up, and compensates for taking his eye off the ball, momentarily, by snapping orders at small sari’d ladies, with impossibly loaded trolleys.
It’s a long time since yesterday’s four-word conversation with itinerant son, from Gatwick. Between then and now, he has the possibility of missing not one, but two flights, including the hurdle of not letting his stop-over, in Qatar, turn into a sleep-over. It’s not without anxiety, that I scrutinise every emerging face. In all truth, I can tell pretty quickly if it’s Jacob or not, without even having to play the telltale genetics card. Baggage-trolleys emerge round the corner in front of their owners, and I know Jacob’s not likely to be bringing a microwave oven, or a home entertainment centre with him. If the first thing I see is a box of mangoes, or a washing-airer, all swathed in bubble-wrap, I don’t even look at the person pushing. Ditto, matching designer luggage – it’s the raggle-taggle gypsies I’m waiting for, so tatty ruck-sacks will be the order of the day. I even think, no trolley.
And there they are, blinking in the fluorescent light, hefting seasoned back-packs, trolleyless, after all. They look pale, but they’ve been in transit for twenty hours, the pre-dawn light leaches the roses from their cheeks, and everyone else is brown - how could they not look pale? I have no leis, nor bindi, with which to welcome them, so I give them a Soft Mint, instead.
We motor through untypically deserted streets, but they won’t know, until tomorrow, how much of a miracle this is. It’s still dark, so it’s like looking round a house, shrouded in dust-sheets. Once across the threshold, they have showers, eat a loaf-ful of toast, and fall into bed, asleep before they’re horizontal. After six hours, we winkle them back into consciousness with more tea.
The promised rain doesn’t arrive until we’re stranded in the middle of Powai, but, since we’re sitting on the canopied terrace of Mocha Coffee Shop, upstairs at the Galleria, we’re happy to spectate. We brave the scrum at D-Mart, in search of what Monu calls “rain-dress,” but Mr & Mrs Kumar of Powai, et al., are out and about, panic-buying moths-balls and brown jaggery cones, so the aisles are too thronged, to be able to turn round, let alone try cagoules on. Going for a browse round D-Mart seems to be the local pastime of choice, on a damp Sunday afternoon, much as people, in the UK, idle away the slack hours til tea, mooching around yellowing trays of impatiens, at the garden centre. We buy a bag of khari biscuits, to eat on the way home, and some grandpa vests for the boys, to test out the Indian theory, that it’s cooler, with the extra insulation.
The boys make bold plans to quarter the sub-continent – so much India, and so little time. The Rough Guide may well fit it all on one page, but they're not going to fit it all into one month. We walk to Utsav for dinner – ordering in the hot evening air, outside, eating in the saving cool, inside.
When we get home, Jacob has his third shower of the day. They say, no-one can come to India, and remain unchanged. QED.
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Ars gratia artis
So, where’s that monsoon gone, then? We haven’t had wet toes since last Saturday, seven days of drought. I’ve got two umbrellas which haven’t even been unfurled yet, except in the shop. The corporation water tankers are out, today. I see a little bloke up a ladder, with a big green curly hose, force-feeding a civic tree gallons of water. We had about a foot of rain last week, I can hardly believe the local flora’s spitting feathers, just yet. Maybe he gets paid per bole.
I think it rained, in the night, but our windows are indented, thus immune to splashing, and there’s only so much you can say for definite, at midnight, as far as damp tarmac’s concerned, a hundred yards below. In traffic-light retail, back at day-time street-level, umbrellas have ceded the field to colouring-books and car-polishing cloths, again, so we’re lulled into thinking the monsoon may be remarkably short, this year. Four months, down to eight days - global warming, I’m thinking.
Today, we spring-clean, in anticipation of house-guests. Scrubbing three toilets and ferreting the dust-bunnies out from underneath the sofas, I’m not unaware of a certain irony. The third scion of the House of Gower is the least tidy person the world’s known, since Man first stood on his back legs, and said, “This cave could do with a spruce up, Maureen, where’s the Ewbank?” Jacob’s more than happy, to slouch in front of his computer, curled up in a blissful mélange of lecture notes, toast crusts, beer-bottles and unwashed boxers. He lives, what you might call, in medias res – the detritus of living laps chummily about him, and, if you ask him to do something, he’s always just in the middle of doing something else. More sensitive to words than bacteria, he’s offended if you say “mess,” or “pig-heap,” or “e-coli,” in his presence. “I don’t know what you mean,” he protests, stung, “I tidied up for you...” The ironic thing about this piece of irony, though, is that it doesn’t make any difference: even as I tell myself, that Jacob and his mates won’t a) notice or b) care, I’m still hurtling round the flat, like a whirling dervish, with a mop. I make the beds, with the seven-piece embroidered coverlet set, matching the curtains. I have yet to meet a man who can see the point of cushions, but I tweak and fluff, nonetheless. Mr Roland, meanwhile, prepares for the invasion by laying in a crate of beer, and even I can see that this is the targeted kind of forward thinking, which knocks embroidered pillowslips into a cocked hat, as far as noticing and caring are concerned. We are what we are, I reflect, peevishly polishing the bathroom taps, and unwrapping peaches and fruits moisturizing soap with aloe vera.
Out there, on the streets of Mumbai, last week’s initial skirmishing, with torrential rain, has given the lorries a much-needed wash and brush-up. In India, the lorry’s an art-form unto itself – a vehicle in more than one sense, then. I feel, increasingly, that we’re repressed, lorrily, in the UK. We have acres of vanside devoted to “Eddie Stobart” or “Alfred McAlpine” – how interesting isn’t that? Here, the only limit’s your imagination, and why not? We see not only butterflies, and shells, and flowers – the lotus is very popular, for obvious reasons – but also whole scenes unravelling, on the flanks of passing trucks. There are pastoral tales, with calves suckling, or balmy beaches, or birds in flight. There are religious tableaux, with Ganesh and his missus, or Krishna, cavorting with his flute and his glee-chorus of cowherdesses. Often, the petrol tank’s painted with a tiger, its mouth snarling round the inlet. And propaganda, “India is great!” just above the "HORN - OK - PLEASE." I wonder, if you have to be handy with a paintbrush, to drive a lorry, here, or if there’s a fleet of peripatetic truck-artists you can employ, to embellish your rig, in a lay-by somewhere. I wave and smile at a lot of lorry-drivers, to while away the long hours of traffic-jam prison, and they smile and wave back, but I don’t yet know any of them, on first name terms. When I do, I’ll ask. Even the cement-mixers, down on the building-sites in Powai, are painted with flowers. We’re missing a whole aesthetic opportunity, here. Why not lorries?
Chain-fringeing’s also a favourite, here, along lorry bumpers, but it passes my understanding – does it have a function (lightning conducting, for example), or is it just heavy metal lace? Long tassels of tinsel dangle from the wing-mirrors, and swags of orange flowers festoon the cab. A hundred years ago, in January, it seemed tawdry, but now, it’s normal, so a lorry, without garlands, looks positively lustreless and bah-humbug.
Wasp-waisted 1950s showgirls, in swimsuits (or not), languish on the windscreens of lorries back home, next to a loving inscription - “Christine” or “Waynetta” – wife? girlfriend? 1950s showgirl, maybe? Here, there’s not a cab you couldn’t show your Mum – the decals depict praying hands, entwined with a blooming rose, or a jolly god, having a think and setting the world to rights, or just a spangly “Om.”
Monu’s picking us up at four o’clock in the morning, to meet Jacobsir’s plane. Guess when the monsoon’s scheduled to make a reappearance? Timing is all, I always think. Hope the boys have packed their sou’westers, wrapped round their Lonely Planet Guide to India. I've parked my broom, because we're ready, more or less. As well as Mr Roland’s stash of Kingfisher, we’ve got an industrial sack of Bombay Mix in the cupboard, and enough pappads to tile the whole apartment. Just need to pop to the Culture Shop, to see if they’ve got any guest-towels with Ganesh on.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes
Bhavika-didi’s a better man than I am. We’re doing opposites, today, and she says, “Is Didi fat, or is Didi thin?” Catch me putting my own head on that particular chopping-block. She prompts the children with mime, blowing out her cheeks and stomping among the rows, like an elephant. The kids shout, “Fat!” Fat!” and squeal with delight. Bhavika-didi obviously has a healthier self-image than mine.
Self-esteem’s on the curriculum, here at Akanksha, though, and Didi’s getting tough. Just as, with our happy triggers, there came a point when mangoes weren’t allowed to make us happy, and we had to find something a little more cherché (like coming to Akanksha, or reading a book), so, now, the same upgrade, with compliments. Although Didi at first accepts, “Raja has a nice t-shirt,” or “Ashish has nice hair,” she now says we’re done with nice this and nice that, “I want something more about Ashish inside.” “Ashish is a good friend,” says Kajal, with a little prompting. And we’re off. Within ten minutes, we’re all good friends, but I like to think that that doesn’t stop our having nice hair, as well.
We also do what makes us unhappy (not-smiley face on board) – which turns up fascinating results. “I don’t like it when Didi shouts.” “I don’t like it if my friend cries.” “I don’t like it when my mother beats me.” The Child Protection Agency’d have a field day here. It’s a lot more direct and honest, somehow, a small clip round the ear. If a child’s fidgeting, Bhavika gets hold of his arm, swivels him back into position, taps him on the head, and restores order, all without breaking the flow of her odd and even numbers explanation. In the UK, a pupil can whip a knife out of his pocket, and the only sanction we have for protection, is to threaten to keep him in at playtime. Show me the youth, brandishing a broken bottle in your face, who will be cowed into submission at the prospect of doing lines after school... If Bhavika were unkind, the kids would simply stop coming. As it is, sending them away is her most powerful weapon: they’ll do anything, to keep their place on the frayed mats in Room 112. I think again, of the UK education system, where consistent truancy is punished by exclusion – how did we get that crazy?
Education’s not free, in India, but, as with all retail, there’s a whole spectrum on offer, depending on your purse. You can buy a sari for less than £2, down at D-Mart, or you can spend hundreds of pounds on a designer number, at Sakhi, in Santa Cruz. So with education. For those of more slender means, there’s education to be had at Rs50 a month (60p). Or, for something a little more up-market, you can pay Rs1,500 a month (nearly £20). Before you think, that’s less than you spend on cigarettes/wine/Indian takeway in a week, do a Mr Micawber balance-sheet, and consider that the average income, here in Mumbai, is between three and five thousand rupees a month (£50-£60).
For your child to be eligible for the Akanksha scheme, he or she has to attend state school, your monthly family income has to be Rs5,000, and you have to have a ration card. To get a ration card, you have to be resident in Mumbai for five years. (Our own Monu thus has a ration card, entitling him to buy basic commodities at a special price, “All cheap – flour, sugar, rice – all, all cheap.” Since making a cup of tea stretches the outside edges of his culinary capabilities, though, he’s not best placed for this to be much of a financial advantage.) The point of the salary and the ration card, by way of guarantee, is all about stability. Every day, another thousand people come to live in Mumbai, to discover, like the thousand from yesterday, that the streets are paved with rubble and excrement, not gold. Akanksha needs to make best use of its resources, by supporting children who will come week after week. It’s not a holiday club. In the state school, there’s no limit to class size, the average being around sixty pupils. There’s little in the way of interaction – child-centred learning hasn’t reached the sub-continent yet - so Akanksha, with classes of no more than twenty-five, hopes to furnish the missing personal touch. They can’t cover the whole curriculum, in two and a half hours a day - which is why attendance at state school is also necessary - but they undertake the TLC side of things.
In Mumbai, there are more children, needing educating, than there are centres of education, so the school premises work a double shift, starting early morning (as early as 6 a.m.!) and finishing in the evening. Some areas have a primary shift, then secondary, others, vice versa. My Mankhurd class loses Akash, because he’s changed state school – he was doing Akanksha in the morning, and ordinary school in the afternoon, but his new school runs in the morning, so he’s been reallocated an afternoon Akanksha session elsewhere. I’m very sad, he was extremely cute, but who am I to stand in the way of a boy’s education?
At the end of every session, there are parents waiting at the door, to complain to Bhavika about their wayward offspring, not wanting to go to state school in the afternoon. Bhavika keeps them behind, after the rest have thanked God for the world so sweet, etc., and been dismissed. She gives the recalcitrant scholars a right old drubbing, first in English, then in machine-gun Hindi, for good measure. Didi doesn’t believe in sitting on the fence.
Today, I'm in charge of “Head, shoulders, knees and toes,” which we do with more enthusiasm than melody, it has to be said. (I’m glad to note, that I can still touch my toes, without involving the knee-joint, although my padmaasana’s still lop-sided.) In a bold move, I try to get the children to miss out the word “head,” just doing the action instead, but it creates primordial chaos in about fourteen seconds. It does wonders for my playground cred, though – when Bhavika asks everyone to sit in a circle, Khaja and Sultana pat the floor next to them, invitingly, tugging at my dupatta, “Didididididididididi...” I don’t need asking twice.
When we do our thinking and stretching, at pack-up time, Bhavika says, “How does a mountain stand? That way we’ll always stand. Like a mountain.” We go back out into the world, with straight spines.
Self-esteem’s on the curriculum, here at Akanksha, though, and Didi’s getting tough. Just as, with our happy triggers, there came a point when mangoes weren’t allowed to make us happy, and we had to find something a little more cherché (like coming to Akanksha, or reading a book), so, now, the same upgrade, with compliments. Although Didi at first accepts, “Raja has a nice t-shirt,” or “Ashish has nice hair,” she now says we’re done with nice this and nice that, “I want something more about Ashish inside.” “Ashish is a good friend,” says Kajal, with a little prompting. And we’re off. Within ten minutes, we’re all good friends, but I like to think that that doesn’t stop our having nice hair, as well.
We also do what makes us unhappy (not-smiley face on board) – which turns up fascinating results. “I don’t like it when Didi shouts.” “I don’t like it if my friend cries.” “I don’t like it when my mother beats me.” The Child Protection Agency’d have a field day here. It’s a lot more direct and honest, somehow, a small clip round the ear. If a child’s fidgeting, Bhavika gets hold of his arm, swivels him back into position, taps him on the head, and restores order, all without breaking the flow of her odd and even numbers explanation. In the UK, a pupil can whip a knife out of his pocket, and the only sanction we have for protection, is to threaten to keep him in at playtime. Show me the youth, brandishing a broken bottle in your face, who will be cowed into submission at the prospect of doing lines after school... If Bhavika were unkind, the kids would simply stop coming. As it is, sending them away is her most powerful weapon: they’ll do anything, to keep their place on the frayed mats in Room 112. I think again, of the UK education system, where consistent truancy is punished by exclusion – how did we get that crazy?
Education’s not free, in India, but, as with all retail, there’s a whole spectrum on offer, depending on your purse. You can buy a sari for less than £2, down at D-Mart, or you can spend hundreds of pounds on a designer number, at Sakhi, in Santa Cruz. So with education. For those of more slender means, there’s education to be had at Rs50 a month (60p). Or, for something a little more up-market, you can pay Rs1,500 a month (nearly £20). Before you think, that’s less than you spend on cigarettes/wine/Indian takeway in a week, do a Mr Micawber balance-sheet, and consider that the average income, here in Mumbai, is between three and five thousand rupees a month (£50-£60).
For your child to be eligible for the Akanksha scheme, he or she has to attend state school, your monthly family income has to be Rs5,000, and you have to have a ration card. To get a ration card, you have to be resident in Mumbai for five years. (Our own Monu thus has a ration card, entitling him to buy basic commodities at a special price, “All cheap – flour, sugar, rice – all, all cheap.” Since making a cup of tea stretches the outside edges of his culinary capabilities, though, he’s not best placed for this to be much of a financial advantage.) The point of the salary and the ration card, by way of guarantee, is all about stability. Every day, another thousand people come to live in Mumbai, to discover, like the thousand from yesterday, that the streets are paved with rubble and excrement, not gold. Akanksha needs to make best use of its resources, by supporting children who will come week after week. It’s not a holiday club. In the state school, there’s no limit to class size, the average being around sixty pupils. There’s little in the way of interaction – child-centred learning hasn’t reached the sub-continent yet - so Akanksha, with classes of no more than twenty-five, hopes to furnish the missing personal touch. They can’t cover the whole curriculum, in two and a half hours a day - which is why attendance at state school is also necessary - but they undertake the TLC side of things.
In Mumbai, there are more children, needing educating, than there are centres of education, so the school premises work a double shift, starting early morning (as early as 6 a.m.!) and finishing in the evening. Some areas have a primary shift, then secondary, others, vice versa. My Mankhurd class loses Akash, because he’s changed state school – he was doing Akanksha in the morning, and ordinary school in the afternoon, but his new school runs in the morning, so he’s been reallocated an afternoon Akanksha session elsewhere. I’m very sad, he was extremely cute, but who am I to stand in the way of a boy’s education?
At the end of every session, there are parents waiting at the door, to complain to Bhavika about their wayward offspring, not wanting to go to state school in the afternoon. Bhavika keeps them behind, after the rest have thanked God for the world so sweet, etc., and been dismissed. She gives the recalcitrant scholars a right old drubbing, first in English, then in machine-gun Hindi, for good measure. Didi doesn’t believe in sitting on the fence.
Today, I'm in charge of “Head, shoulders, knees and toes,” which we do with more enthusiasm than melody, it has to be said. (I’m glad to note, that I can still touch my toes, without involving the knee-joint, although my padmaasana’s still lop-sided.) In a bold move, I try to get the children to miss out the word “head,” just doing the action instead, but it creates primordial chaos in about fourteen seconds. It does wonders for my playground cred, though – when Bhavika asks everyone to sit in a circle, Khaja and Sultana pat the floor next to them, invitingly, tugging at my dupatta, “Didididididididididi...” I don’t need asking twice.
When we do our thinking and stretching, at pack-up time, Bhavika says, “How does a mountain stand? That way we’ll always stand. Like a mountain.” We go back out into the world, with straight spines.
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