by Braham Singh
‘Now that the end’s near, enjoy the ride. Enjoy the food, the smells, the air. Everything is now in Technicolour, like the smell of those spices. Your cancer has done half the work for you. You go, do the rest. Do things you thought impossible. No one can stop you, except yourself. Or maybe, her.’
From the corner of his eye, he sees Sindhi Camp Bhairavi hurrying past ration queues. She is headed toward the jhopadpatti slums that garland Sindhi Camp. He catches the sway to her backside as she weaves past one slapdash tenement on top of someone else’s.
‘See? You’re already becoming adventurous.’
Andhi Ma looks at the girl as if she can see her. He on the other hand can, and notices the ankles and feet are Sindhi-white in this dream.
‘Is that what you want?’
No. He just wants to be free of cancer.
‘That, my friend,’ Andhi Ma says, ‘is not going to happen.’
25
The Men’s Room
Eat at an Udipi, shit at the Taj
—The College Mantra
Turns out, Andhi Ma was an amateur when it came to Jewish anxiety. He did ponder her advice though, sitting in an Irani restaurant with cancer for company. His mole asked to be caressed and he gave in, wondering if the restaurant had those bitter almonds she’d recommended in lieu of radiation. Who knows, bitter almonds could work, just like being blitzed by the Theratron Junior at Tata Memorial could work. Doing nothing could work, or nothing could work. He would keep an open mind.
Waiters surrounded the gora backpackers on the next table and were giving them the professional treatment. One gora wiped a plate of pork vindaloo clean with a folded piece of bread, then joined his travel companions to stare at the bill because clearly, it was adding up to nothing. So why were the waiters fawning? The foreigners looked confused about what it meant being white in India, and appeared unsure of their power. Seeing Ernst, a waiter peeled off from the encirclement to bring out the fruit plate and espresso for him as usual. Sliced chikoos and bananas, a vati with a liberal dollop of honey, a frosted glass of yoghurt set last night and left in the groaning fridge. Three rupees for fruit plate, honey, yoghurt and the espresso. He wanted to tell those broke kids on the next table they could live here forever on next to nothing, as long as they used their whiteness judiciously. Don’t fuck around too much, don’t be arseholes, and step out of the way from both oncoming traffic and creeping cancer.
He sipped at his coffee. Outside, vestiges of British India peeked from behind billboards, garbage and betel nut paan stains applied in broad swipes to Colaba walls. Colaba was meant for an era without Indians cluttering the place, and with never more than fifty thousand Englishmen spread across the subcontinent. These days, there were ten times as many people clambering all over the Causeway alone. The architecture was beginning to buckle under and it was only a matter of when. Being early morning, there was still space to breathe. The crowds would be here after ten, spilling on the roads amidst cars, BEST buses and taxis. Then growing by the hour, to inch past Arabs, goras, and pickpockets with their children tugging at tourist arms, while slender men with kohl in their eyes led blonde, Scandinavian types to unknown fates like determined little tow-tractors pulling 707s through the crowd.
He took a spoonful of yoghurt to mix into the fruit and honey. The ritual being, to keep pouring until some of the yoghurt spills over, at which point he’d stop, taste a spoonful, and follow up with a sip of coffee. Once in a while the chikoo would melt in his mouth, the chilled yoghurt would be creamy perfect, the honey sweet as imported American Tupelo, and the espresso kicking back like a horse. It all came together today, in Technicolour. He chewed and poured the remaining honey into the glass, stirred it around until the yoghurt turned gold, then drank it. The sheer taste of it sent his head spinning. Three rupees later, he stepped out on the Causeway to buy a straight razor.
~
The Taj Hotel ran for four blocks parallel to Colaba Causeway. Its length obstructed the sea view, so you couldn’t see the tour boats bobbing like corks around the Gateway of India. Same as Victoria Terminus, the Taj too was Indo-Gothic, neo-Victorian or Indo-Saracen, and one hell of a structure—a Tata owned, phoren-looking, Indian design. Unlike VT however, not a single paan stain anywhere. Its exclusiveness, more than any architectural beauty, made pedestrians pause but not spit. Cars too would slow down, bumping into each other. It loomed ahead, the Taj dome, crowning the grey-and-white stone structure, but with doormen missing from the big, wooden block of a door that faced Colaba.
That’s because two Sikhs manned the door facing the harbour on the opposite side instead—the entrance to what technically, was the hotel’s arse-end but deemed the main entrance because it faced the sea. The debate on what was, or was not, the Taj Hotel’s front door trailed across a century of agonising over the architect’s motives in positioning the main entrance away from the harbour. The man allegedly committed suicide at the shame from such an obvious fuck-up. The architect was Indian, so people knew that story wasn’t true. Not about the fuck-up. The fact he would commit suicide out of shame. Rumours being what they are and therefore, true or not, the Taj became associated with suicides. So much so, they said the Tatas had a budget allocated to keep any such talk out of the newspapers.
A Tata Mercedes truck inched up from his right. It crept past the traffic sign warning in English and Marathi, TRUCKS NOT ALLOWED. If all Tata Mercedes trucks didn’t look so alike, Ernst would say this one looked familiar. So did a gorilla squeezed in the cabin along with more than a full load. The driver’s handlebar moustache cramped the confines further. The Tata Mercedes stopped as if to check out the Taj. Ernst got the feeling it was also checking him out. It struck him how since the cancer shock, he had so easily put aside the dead Arjun and his dying uncle, as well as the headless Sardar and the gorilla at the centre of it all—now staring past the Tata’s windshield with those beady, little eyes.
He walked in through the back door that was the front door, and headed for the Men’s Room. In the whole vast expanse of the hotel, he was most comfortable in the toilet. There was no place in Bombay that compelled a better shit. This was his first time inside the premises since he turned invisible twenty-six years ago, even though a ten-minute walk from his flat. The lobby had carried on without him .
‘As if I never happened,’ Ernst said out aloud to no one. Walking towards the toilets he felt dizzy, and slumped on a sofa with a suddenness that brought the Guest Relations Manager running.
‘No worries,’ he said to her. ‘Pretend I don’t exist. It’s easy.’ The Guest Relations lady didn’t know what to say, and waited while he sat out his emotions.
Cowering in the Irani restaurant that morning, trying to look cool and remain calm, he had reviewed Andhi Ma’s advice and concluded that he was right, she was wrong; this was the last straw, not some final journey in Technicolour. Buoyed by all that sugar and coffee, he had decided on the Taj. Now sitting in the foyer, the sugar buzz was gone. He was no different from all the other white patrons, scattered around the lobby like foreign exchange. The Guest Relations Manager would probably beg to differ. Her expression suggested he was different. Unlike them, he was a problem. Her hotel would only get back to normal if he would kindly leave quietly. She offered to have the doorman escort him out.
26
The Toilet Stall
Yield not to unmanliness,
Follow your Dharma wherever it goes,
Cast off fear—become more not less,
O Parantapa, Scorcher of Foes.
—The Bhagavad Gita
The toilet attendant was missing. He showed up on afternoons and evenings when tippers came in to piss and preen. No one else there either, and the wide, luxurious, teak and marble toilet stalls were empty. A jhopadpatti slum family could live in one. Given there was a functional toilet inside, they would never leave.
Ernst removed his wallet after locking the stall door. The only identification he had on him was a few visiting
cards and a driving licence. Indian drivers’ licences did not need photographs. He sat on the shut commode with his trousers on and as he tore up the licence and cards, it felt strange the way his sense of purpose was carrying him through this. He could have used it with Ingrid. He stood up to flush and it took three rounds with intervals of waiting before the itsy-bitsy pieces of a man gurgled away. Ernst then sat back and took out the straight razor he just purchased. It was Soviet, an OKA: four-inch stainless steel blade, plastic handle with a splatter of Cyrillic and no box or case.
His heart began to pound, knocking at his chest with loud thumps. Soon the whole cubicle was vibrating to the thump-thump-thumping. He felt a vein throb on the side of his forehead and marvelled at how easily all this thumping and throbbing could be stopped. Also, if he didn’t put a stop to it, there was something inside him growing with every thump that easily would. His options came down to this, or that; fucked, or screwed; now, or later; on the commode, or in bed; be like his mother and die of cancer, or go his father’s route and kill himself. I’m spoilt for choice, he thought and started to tremble.
Growing up in Berlin and around the time jackboots became fashionable, he would be unable to sleep, screaming with terror inside his head while waiting for his father to get home safe. Later in Bombay, he would scream while asleep, watching his father slit his wrists again and again until Parvatibai showed up with her poultice.
Sitting on the commode with its lid down, there wouldn’t be any screaming today. That would be ridiculous. He had no argument handy, however, against the quiet panic that took over, and he watched his hand shake trying to wield the straight razor. Even that drug-addict of a Waller exercised better control. He was going to botch it and hurt himself if he didn’t get a hold. Leave quietly without a fuss, please, and without Parvatibai having to clean up the mess. He thought of Parvatibai, and all that bulk barely left space to squeeze in Salim Ali; but he managed to do it, acknowledged his presence, and thanked him. When the only two people who cared a fuck wondered why he did it, they would place cancer first on the list, followed by, in no particular order, everything else. In reality though, it was the other way around. Everything else came first with cancer being the last straw.
The camel started to buckle under, way back when Bombay Ingrid walked up the gangplank to leave him for reasons he couldn’t fully fathom because by the time she left, they had mostly sorted things out. One day announces she’s pregnant, and next day says she’s leaving. He would still wake up on mornings surprised she would leave just like that. On other mornings he would marvel at how everything unravelled so quickly after she left or because she left. Who knew?
‘I want you to know however,’ he said, sitting on the commode, ‘that I have loved you like no other. I think of you, and think of you more and more every day, and after all these years, still you alone matter.’ He went on to say to the empty stall that she should know this, and if she didn’t, then she should just look into his eyes to know who was the thief of his heart.
He took a deep breath and though his hand still shook, he felt it was time to calm the mind.
Sai, Your presence grants me the comfort I seek.
I do as You ask,
Act as I must,
It’s not difficult this task,
My transformation to dust.
He stopped chanting because it wasn’t working. He felt like praying to Ingrid, instead. A strange and disturbing thing for a Hindu-Jew, but she was still the only thing close to Christmas in his life. If she showed up now, nothing else would matter.
Who wouldn’t show up after that? She appeared in aseptic German white, in the uniform he had never seen outside of the photograph; didn’t matter because all he cared about was her face. Bombay Ingrid’s petal-like beauty had hardened, become more muscular and attractive on Schwester Ingrid. There were crowfeet around those ocean-blue eyes. A line etched down her left side of the face alongside the nose and she had never looked more stunning. Age had worked wonders and it was like Christmas in the toilet stall. He decided if she tried to stop him, he would let her. She looked at the straight razor hovering over his wrist and her eyes widened. She reached forward, as if to stay his hand.
Slice firmly along the track to slit it properly, she advised, not across the vein—apparently, a common mistake.
~
She did look unhappy however, at his trying to slit his wrists with a cheap Soviet razor and that too on the commode.
Sordid. Any idea what a mess he would make? And to top it all, you’re doing this at the Taj? The one place that made Bombay somewhat tolerable? Had he really thought this through? She had loved passing time at the Sea Lounge on the Taj mezzanine—sipping tea, nibbling pastries. He once managed to hold her hand across the table over there for a little longer than usual. Later, they’d walked home and she’d spread herself on the bed to allow him a go. She had laughed, seeing him slobber over his Christmas present in July. Now here he was, ruining yet another memory. Why not in a nice, warm, bathtub instead? He should know—she never failed to remind him in letter after letter and now once again—his father did just that before the Nazis came a-knocking.
They had kicked open the bathroom door at the Jüdische Krankenhaus, to find Siegfried in the tub bleeding from both wrists. Schwester Ingrid wrote it was quite the sight, what with Emmy Destinn soaring from his turntable like an eagle to crap all over the soldiers. The Nazis couldn’t be bothered and froze into a rock-solid cohort sealing the doorway better than any Parvatibai; mesmerised by Siegfried’s penis sticking out through the soapy water like a fist. His father’s erection had kept them at bay allowing him to die undisturbed; avenging the embarrassing, pink homo-star they had forced him to wear. Whereas towards the end, all he wanted was the solitary, yellow, Jew one.
Why? Schwester Ingrid had asked in one of her letters, just before they stopped altogether. Why did it come to this? No one wanted ripples at the Jüdische Krankenhaus. Not the Jewish staff, not the patients living in constant terror, and definitely not the Nazis. It was their staging post for boxed and parcelled Jews shipping East. They wanted everything to look normal for those being shipped to die. To the extent of sparing the Jew staff and Jew patients for appearances sake. His father had to go fuck with that. Then slit his wrists to escape the consequences.
That reminded Ernst. Lala Prem would have deposited that cheque today. He felt a surge of adrenalin at the thought of it bouncing like Chhote Bhai’s hockey ball. There was something to be said for escaping the consequences. It shored him up into pressing down with the razor and take charge. He wanted to pray to Lord Vishnu while doing it, to Gurudeva, Maheshvara; ask them for strength. Once again, Schwester Ingrid was the one who came through. Firmly, she advised, while he prayed. Steady that hand and be firm. For once in your life, be firm.
‘Jai Gurudeva, Jai Guru Vishnu, Maheshvara. You will prevail. Jai Mahadeva. Jai, jai.’
Caught up in his chant, when Ernst first heard sounds from outside the toilet stall, they didn’t register. Marathi isn’t spoken in the Taj. When the shouting persisted, it threw him. As if a Maratha army had stormed the Indo-Saracen structure and into the Men’s Room. Impossible really, until Ernst heard a familiar voice growling instructions.
The Men’s Room door opened again with a clickity-click-click. The same male voice was now articulating in English, and a female going, ‘Yes, Sir, I understand Sir, but I simply cannot be searching among foreign guests and international VIPs. I told you, he was not feeling well and left.’ She sounded a lot like the Guest Relations lady.
‘Maybe he did, maybe not,’ the familiar voice said. ‘What’s the harm in making sure? You say he was not well and we are his friends. We are worried. You need to do as I ask, before we do something to your bleddy establishment. You know whom you are talking to?’
There was the fading clickity-click-click of stilettos on marble, as the lady scooted off to save the Taj. The male voice then reverted to Marathi and a war council came
to order. Ernst would recognise the gorilla’s rumble anywhere. Henry Gomes.
Gomes spoke and no one interrupted him. The others listened. No arguments. Ernst looked around and Schwester Ingrid was gone. Too many Indians.
Outside the toilet stall, Gomes continued with who searches where, and does what. Ernst scrambled behind the Marathi syntax to try and understand. Gomes was now laying out whom they had to find. It was a disparaging description of the shitty, old, European fuck they saw entering the hotel. Ernst grudgingly conceded the description fitted him. Then he heard the Guest Relations Manager rush back in a race against her own clickity-click-click.
‘We have searched all public areas, Sir,’ she said, breathless in the service of her hotel. ‘I can assure you, unless he has a room with us under a different name, he has left the premises. ’
There was silence around the urinals. Then Gomes muttered in Marathi, ‘That motherfucking chutiya couldn’t afford a room.’
‘Go, look around once more,’ he ordered. ‘Let me think.’ Ernst could picture the man—more gorilla really—with those shoulders and red beads for eyes.
He heard the flowing Maratha river debouche through the door. The Men’s Room was now empty except for him, and the gorilla gone silent. He probably was deep in thought, because he was an intelligent gorilla. Not intelligent enough though—Ernst was thankful—to consider checking the toilet stalls. Then, he too was gone, leaving a hollow feel to the place.
Peeking out into the vestibule to make sure the coast was clear, Ernst realised he had forgotten to kill himself.
27
The Marxist Passion Play
The permit room is a peculiarly Mumbai institution: drinks are generally served in six-ounce bottles, the lighting tends toward dingy and the clientele is almost exclusively male.
—The New York Times
The Golf Club’s permit-room was a tight fit for a working day and Japanese everywhere.