Vijay, or Lambu as he was nicknamed at IIT, was a position holder – he was a house secretary, and therefore one of the haves in the college hierarchy; he was over six feet tall and had longish hair swept along his forehead in the style of the day’s Hindi film heroes. So you could say he was amongst the more desirable specimens at IIT, although perhaps that still wasn’t saying very much.
Vidya seemed to like him, and after some foot-shuffling on his part and some eyelash-batting on hers, they got to talking, and even had a couple of dances together.
Over the next few months, their relationship blossomed in the form of frequent cards and letters sent to each other. Without Shyama didi hovering over his shoulder, Vijay was able to express himself freely and romantically, and they looked forward to their meeting at the next Social.
The evening of the party, Vijay stood around with his bunch of friends, waiting for the bus with the girls from JMC to arrive. When the bus finally pulled up and the girls piled out, there was a moment of shy uncertainty as both groups eyed each other expectantly. Then the girls giggled and started to enter the hall in bunches of two and three.
Vijay’s friend Vishal, or Mota as he was fondly called, leaned over to him and said, ‘So, Lambu? Which one is your girl?’
He got no answer, and looked up to see Lambu’s face all scrunched up in confusion. Vijay finally let out a chagrined ‘I don’t know! They all look the same to me.’
‘What? You can’t recognize your own girlfriend?’
‘I met her only once!’
Mota nodded slowly with sympathy and said, ‘Lambu. Ek baat bolu? Tu bahut bada ch**iya hain.’
At this point, one of the giggling girls passing by paused to give Vijay a meaningful smile, and then continued on her way. ‘That was her!’ said Vijay.
Mota was relieved but asked, ‘Are you sure?’
‘No. But she smiled at me, so I’ll try her first.’
It turned out that the smiling girl was indeed Vidya. However, the realization that she hadn’t left enough of an impression for him to even remember her face, made Vijay feel that she was not destined to be the love of his life. He soon found himself getting bored and listless with her chatter and longed to join his gang of buddies, who were now huddled together in a drunk circle, poking fun at all the people on the dance floor.
In desperation, he broke away from her for a few minutes and went rummaging behind the speakers. Sure enough, he found what he was looking for – a half-full bottle of vodka. Throwing caution to the wind, he consumed the entire contents of the bottle, and emerged, as often happens under the influence of alcohol, a changed person.
He weaved his way back to Vidya in a debonair manner, only tripping once at the end of the journey and almost knocking her over. She was suddenly overwhelmed by the smell of alcohol and said pettishly, ‘You know, Vijay? I think there is someone who may be drinking here!’
He leaned in close, towering over her. ‘Really? How do you know?’
She leaned back warily. ‘I can smell it …’
‘Oh, is that so?’ he said, leaning in even closer. Without warning, he suddenly exhaled in a loud huff, all over her face. ‘Quick – can you smell it on my breath?’
Her face all screwed up and holding her own breath, she said a scared and automatic ‘No’.
‘Well then, in that case, no one is drinking here. So let usss enjoyyy!’ He leered at her and started contorting his long limbs in drunk, hypnotic dance movements. She backed away from him in alarm.
That was the end of Vijay’s relationship with Vidya. She backed straight into the arms of another young man from IIT named Vikram. They spent the evening together discussing the many character flaws of Vijay Sharma. She sobbed, ‘I don’t know what happened, he was such a gentleman before.’ Vikram growled protectively something along the lines of ‘ That b*****d Lambu is a total ch**. Er, what I mean is, a lovely girl like you is too good for someone like him.’ A few years later, they were married and Vijay proudly took full credit for their happiness – even though neither ever spoke to him again.
In his final year, Vijay met a gentle young aspiring doctor from Maulana Azad Medical College – Sania. They spent a lovely Delhi summer together, and the fact that he didn’t once forget what her face looked like was proof of the fact that she meant something special to him.
However, while the Hindu-Muslim thing meant damn-all to the young lovers, Sania’s father had a different point of view on it. One day, he found out about the two of them through an ill-concealed photograph in one of his daughter’s books, and within a short time, the entire family was gone without a trace.
Vijay’s heart was truly broken this time, and he moped about in Jaipur for many weeks after his graduation. It was to offer him some much-needed counsel that his good friend Dhruv – the selfsame Dhruv of the earlier ‘Mummy-Mummy’ fame – wrote him a heartfelt letter.
In Vijay’s family, the concept of privacy had apparently not yet been invented. If a letter arrived for any one of them, whoever first saw it would typically tear it open and read it. It so happened that the day Dhruv’s letter arrived, Vijay was out, and it was received by Papaji. He and Mummyji were the ones to consume its inflammatory and unpalatable contents. For Dhruv, who apparently liked to take, or at least recommend the more decisive and dramatic courses of possible action, had exhorted Vijay in the letter to ‘not let religious divides between Hindus and Muslims stand in the way of his happiness’ and to ‘find her and then elope at the earliest possible with his true love.’
When Vijay came home, his parents had a thing or two to say to him and they said it well into the night. By the time morning came around, he had reconciled to the fact that perhaps he and Sania were not meant to be in this particular lifetime, although he would always continue to hold her in the highest esteem.
Dhruv’s esteem with Mummyji, however, dropped to rock bottom levels. As always, she was welcoming and polite, but she began referring to him in conversation with Vijay as ‘Woh tera bawla dost.’
As much as I was amused by the stories of Vijay’s past loves, I found myself also feeling resentful of the wistfulness with which he mentioned them – perhaps it was the fact that he described all of them as very sweet and gentle girls, which was, I suspected in moments of honest introspection, probably not how most people would choose to describe me. If they did, they had always kept it a very well-guarded secret from me.
Our temperaments really were so different. Once again, I found myself feeling apprehensive that these differences would lead to serious problems in the future.
Only time would tell.
13
Of Chai in Jaipur
We hadn’t been to Jaipur since the wedding, so we decided to go there for a couple of days to spend time with Mummyji and Papaji. Part of me looked forward to the trip wherein I would get to be the bahu, but most of me was filled with trepidation, since it was obvious that I would really have to work hard in order to fit in.
I was still thinking about this as we pulled up in the taxi at their house. During our previous visit here, I had watched Garima at our common in-laws’ place. She would wake up at 6 a.m., deftly don a sari, go into the kitchen and help Mummyji with all the cooking, and generally behave like a good daughter-in-law. She had the advantage of more years in the family and of course, a similar upbringing in a family from a similar background, in nearby Ajmer. Clearly, she had set the precedent for the younger bahu, namely moi. ‘Traitor,’ I thought malevolently as the door opened.
Mummyji and Papaji were delighted to see us. I murmured something as I touched their feet – I was still embarrassed and shy around them. Mummyji looked at me keenly and declared that I was looking very tired and it was understandable, considering how hard I worked and that the flight from Bangalore was probably not very comfortable and that it was a very hectic schedule that I had and so on, and how I should probably go and have a little rest right away. I let myself be ushered into our room, gladly escaping the
action for a while to compose myself. It was only 9 p.m., so I thought I would lie down for a few minutes while Vijay spoke to his parents. The next thing I knew, it was morning already.
I hissed at Vijay, who was lying next to me, ‘Vijay! Why didn’t you wake me up last night?’
He mumbled, ‘What? Oh … we thought you were really tired and …’ Before completing his explanation, he was asleep again, his mouth and one eye half-open.
I looked around the room and noticed with a start that it was already 8.30 a.m. And here I had been planning to wake up early and help in the kitchen. I wondered what to do next. By this time, Mummyji had probably been up for the last three hours, having had her bath, done her puja, prepared the tea, cooked a delicious breakfast and accomplished other sundry chores.
Feeling somewhat guilty, I thought I would at least make some cosmetic changes, so I went in for a bath, glad that the common bathroom was free. When I was done, I sneaked out and darted back to our room and started to attempt to put on a sari. After about thirty minutes of this – with only a few minutes of pretending it was my Superwoman cape – it was still hanging loose and inadequate about my person.
I prodded Vijay awake again in order to get him to help me. He was the self-proclaimed sari expert and had promised to help me with it. I barked at him that it was time to make good. He stretched goodnaturedly and sat up in bed, looking at my attempt so far. A smile came over his face and he proceeded to explain, correct and help. To my surprise, he actually knew what he was talking about. It escaped me as to what context he would have needed to learn to tie a sari in. Still, thanks to him, I finally emerged from our room looking the radiant but demure young bride.
Mummyji greeted me enthusiastically, and exhorted me to have my tea and drink some milk. I didn’t quite know how to manage both. Now that the ordeal of tying the sari was over, I started feeling unoccupied and useless. I walked into the kitchen, remembering just in the nick of time to remove my slippers outside the door. I stood next to Mummyji, who was humming to herself blissfully as she stirred some sabzis. Breakfast having been already prepared, she had immediately started the lunch and dinner preparations.
I noted how she made everything lovingly and painstakingly from scratch – absolutely no short cuts. I already knew from Vijay’s descriptions, how every single dish that emerged from her kitchen was a treat – whether it was alu ka parathas, dal-baati, meethe chawal, namkeen chawal, atte ka halwa, chakli or Vijay’s favourite alu gobi. Despite a little competition from her little flower garden, it was her kitchen that was her true pride and joy.
I vaguely thought that by hanging around while she cooked, I would somehow be helping her and also learning how to cook, perhaps by osmosis – but neither seemed to be happening. While we chatted, mostly about what their many relatives in Jaipur were doing, I kept losing interest in the actual cooking and idly wondering how amazing it was that she could stand for hours at the stove without a break when my own knees already felt like they would give way any minute.
At lunchtime, I insisted upon making the rotis. I was eager to demonstrate my new-found skill that I had learnt thanks to Vijay. I finally served my attractively misshapen creations, including one nearly perfect rhombus, with pride. I received many wah-wahs for the effort, and stood beaming at the family while they all forced my rotis down. But later at dinner, when I announced that I would make rotis again, there was an almost unanimous and emphatic chorus of ‘no’s. Mummyji quickly added that I must be so tired after so many days of work and on this little break, I should just rest.
I was determined to help, though. I decided that the least I could do was lay the table for dinner and so I happily pottered around back and forth between the kitchen and the table, with all the plates, forks, spoons, katoris and glasses I could manage to find and laid them all out in a pretty and thoughtful pattern. I surveyed my work with satisfaction and then went off to my room for a while. When I came back, the glasses had been replaced by steel tumblers, the plain steel plates had been replaced by ones with patterns, the forks had apparently been deemed redundant, the spoons I had selected were apparently too small and had been replaced by bigger ones. I looked around dismally, and was only slightly cheered to find that the katoris I had selected were still in place. Just then, Mummyji pottered in with a set of four small katoris and as I watched, she replaced my katoris, explaining that they were too big for the dal, and why didn’t I just go have a little rest.
After much thought on the subject, I hit upon a role that I could play faultlessly on a regular basis – as the official tea-maker. This would be my thing, my niche. One of the first things Vijay had taught me to make was tea, and besides, I had now been working in marketing for a tea brand for months. Consequently, I fancied myself something of a tea expert. From the next day onwards, I started lurking around in the darker corridors of the house, pouncing on whoever passed by and offering to make tea for them – nay, insisting on it.
This usually turned out to be the hapless Papaji, who (till now) had not been a heavy drinker of tea. But I plied him with cup after cup on the slightest excuse, convincing him each time on a different ground – it was good for digestion, it contained theanine that helped in focused relaxation, it contained anti-oxidants and only about half the amount of caffeine as coffee – which he never touched, anyway. This kept me reasonably busy over the next three days, and I achieved a considerable degree of success with this initiative, despite the little handicap that for some reason, while pouring it out, I tended to spill about as much tea as I made. I countered this problem with a logical and intelligent solution – I simply started to make twice the required quantity. I had an MBA, after all.
On the fourth afternoon, I was doing my thing with the tea, making some for everybody, while Mummyji sat in the drawing room with Vijay and Papaji. The tea took me about twenty minutes to prepare. I heated the water, adding copious amounts of ginger, cardamom and even a little cinnamon. I then added just the right amount of sugar, and brought it to a boil. I lowered the flame on the gas, and added four loving pinches of my very own brand of tea powder, which I had insisted replace the erstwhile household favourite. After a couple of minutes of letting it simmer, I added the milk and let it boil over again. I carefully poured out four cups, wiped up the copious spillage and brought the tea out, steaming on a tray. The others took their cups and I sat down with them. I took a sip of my own cup with a sigh of satisfaction. It tasted perfect – and there was really nothing like tea prepared from scratch for these precious moments with the family. ‘Very nice chai,’ said Papaji encouragingly and Vijay and Mummyji murmured in agreement. Mummyji, clearly unable to sit still as usual, got up soon to potter about in the kitchen.
It suddenly struck me that I’d better check whether I had switched off the gas, since this was a tiny detail that sometimes escaped me. I went into the kitchen and found I had indeed switched it off this time. I also found Mummyji standing there, with her back to me, pouring more milk into the cup of tea I had made for her. As I watched, she also added one heaped teaspoon of sugar and started stirring. She was unaware of my presence and was humming to herself happily what sounded like a particularly peppy bhajan for Krishna bhagwan. I left her to it, and wordlessly exited the kitchen, feeling a little despondent.
While Vijay’s parents appeared to be convinced that I was Loser No. One when it came to household matters, they were very proud of the fact that I had a career. I did my best to convince them that I was just a lowly brand manager – mere flotsam in the corporate food chain – but they didn’t seem to get it.
I was thus introduced as ‘Itni badi company ki bahut badi officer’ to a duly impressed Chauhan uncle, who visited the day before we were due to return to Bangalore. Chauhan uncle was an old friend of the family, who came by with his ‘Missus’ for a cup of tea, one evening. In keeping with the charming practice that still prevailed in the older circles in Jaipur, they dropped in unannounced.
We all sat around in the
drawing room, chatting and exchanging pleasantries. I was blissfully absorbed in the conversation, although I didn’t participate much and was in actuality, fascinated by and secretly keeping track of the number of times the phrase ‘Aur, aap kaise hain?’ was being used. Mummyji got up shortly after, presumably to prepare the tea, which I generously and distractedly left to her this time round. After a while, Papaji made an exit as well. This left me and Vijay to hold the fort; Chauhan uncle and he chatted about this and that, and the Missus and I kept smiling at each other, unable to find any common ground until I had a brainwave and asked her in a friendly manner, ‘Aur, aap kaise hain?’ Thankfully we were rejoined soon by Mummyji and the conversation moved on to other things.
After a few minutes, I noticed Papaji discreetly calling me out of the room. I followed him into the other room curiously and saw that he had carefully put together a large tray with assorted namkeen, biscuits and steaming cups of Mummyji’s tea. He asked me to take it out to the drawing room and I said ‘Of course’ and started to carry it out.
Before I could lift the tray, he suggested that I should perhaps wait a few more minutes before doing so. I agreed to this too, vaguely wondering why this was necessary. Then the realization hit me that waiting a while before entering the room would make it look like I had put everything together myself, as a good bahu would probably have done in these parts. I grinned at Papaji conspiratorially and had it been anyone else, would probably also have winked and given the thumbs-up sign. He smiled back a little wistfully and then went off into the drawing room. I timed myself for exactly four and a half minutes by the clock and entered the living room demurely with the tray, to the clear satisfaction of all the observers in the room.
JUST MARRIED, PLEASE EXCUSE Page 8