JUST MARRIED, PLEASE EXCUSE

by Yashodhara Lal

  It was during one of these idle explorations of the city streets that we had bought ourselves bicycles. For most people, a purchase of this nature is not what we marketeers term an ‘impulse purchase’. Those are usually things like a bag of chips or maybe a chocolate. But in our case, one minute, we were just were walking around MG Road, holding hands and gnawing on our bhuttas and the next minute, we were struggling to fit two brand-new, gleaming bicycles – his dark blue, mine a pretty purple – into the trunk of our car. We had decided on the spur of the moment that this would be a good investment as it would give us some much needed exercise and also enable us to explore the surrounding landscape, since there were some undeveloped green areas and even a forgotten lake near our new home. It had led to a total of about seven pleasant cycling excursions for us, and personally, about two near-death experiences for me.

  Shortly after this new purchase, Vijay received a cryptic text message from an unfamiliar number on his phone which, for one shocked and awed moment, we assumed to be a message from God – or maybe an eerily accurate horoscope-on-SMS service. It said ‘Yashodhara should not ride a cycle in heavy traffic areas.’ We were hugely impressed by this until further investigation revealed it in fact to be Papaji’s first ever attempt at text messaging, on the new cellphone that Vijay had imposed upon him recently. It turned out that Mummyji had heard about our cycling excursions and taken it upon herself to worry about it and had urged Papaji to intervene.

  She needn’t have worried. Shortly after this, both our bicycles were stolen by some unscrupulous visitors to our apartment complex. That night, as on every other night, we had trotted off home and left them parked outside, unlocked – with our trademark innocent trust in the world that some people, especially my mother, called carelessness. So that was the end of that.

  It was the other little things too, that made me attached to Bangalore. It was an eminently musical city – approximately every third person here appeared to be able to play a musical instrument. In fact, I thought sadly, what would become of my drum lessons?

  I had recently started these up under the tutelage of a young man with the extremely engaging name of Ryan Mario Crispin Colaco. He was the drummer for a band called Kryptos, and had what Vijay termed ‘bhayanak talent’.

  I would only later come to know the kind of fan following Ryan had amongst music lovers but at that point, he was somebody whose number I had got from someone else. When I first spoke to him on the phone to set up my first lesson, we planned to meet outside the Lifestyle mall near his house. I waited a tad nervously for him to show up. Suddenly, a really tall, dark, well-built man sporting a French beard with his long hair in a ponytail came walking up to me. He matched the mental picture that I had formed of Ryan, and I became even more nervous. Just as I was reaching out to shake his hand, he walked past me and as I looked after him in confusion, a voice behind me rang out, ‘Yashodhara?’

  I turned to see a skinny, fair young man who was nearly a head shorter than me. This was the real Ryan Mario Crispin Colaco. His languid gait, extremely long curly hair and the fact that the smell of smoke lingered about him identified him as a real Rocker. We shook hands and I grinned at him as he led me to his house nearby to start up the lessons. This dude wasn’t scary at all.

  Ryan was humorous, talented, and would turn out to be a great teacher. It was another matter that over the weeks, I didn’t practise at home at all and therefore never made any real progress, though he assured me that I ‘had the rhythm within me’. Clearly, it wasn’t going to come out anytime soon, but I had fun during the weekend lessons anyway – although I got a bigger kick out of just hearing him play new and incredibly complicated beats.

  The booming of the drums rang out all over his old-fashioned two-storied independent house. Ryan’s rather elderly parents were very nice, although I got the impression from their wan smiles that they still wished their young rocker son would get a ‘real job’. However, their resigned air implied that they had given up on this hope a long time ago.

  And now, I would have to give up on their son because I was leaving the city I loved.

  Over the next few days, as Vijay was confirmed as the preferred candidate for the rural head position, I eventually reconciled to the idea of the move; one had to support one’s spouse in the pursuit of their dream. In any case, at work, it was time for me to move on, and frankly, loyal brand manager to my wonderful tea brand though I was, there was only so much time you could spend peddling boring tea without getting completely fed up of it. While I would have preferred to stay in Bangalore, I decided that Mumbai it would be. Enjoying the unfamiliar feeling of martyrdom, I decided to go shopping for a surprise present for Vijay. I would use it to congratulate him for the new post and to communicate to him that I was okay with the move.

  I had racked my brains and thought of the perfect surprise present for him. He had told me that one of his fondest memories of his childhood in Jaipur was that of his father setting up a telescope on the terrace of their house for many happy nights of star-gazing. I figured that now that he would be visiting small villages where the night sky would be clear, a telescope would be just the thing for him.

  He was touched when I presented him with a wrapped box, and said, ‘You shouldn’t have, honey. What is it?’

  ‘Open it and see.’ I was eager to get his reaction.

  He unwrapped the box and lifted the lid to find a foot long, sleek, black, impressive looking telescope. He lifted it out and fingered it wonderingly. ‘Wow! This is absolutely cool. But why?’

  I waited a while for him to continue, until I realized that he was not referring to me by the convenient nickname he had devised for me by simply shortening my name to the first alphabet. I explained my logic and solemnly wished him many pleasant nights of reviving his old astronomical hobby by star-gazing from the villages.

  He touched my face and said, ‘This is the sweetest thing you’ve ever done for me. It’s really thoughtful.’

  As I glowed with happiness, he examined the box and saw the price tag which I had omitted to remove.

  He was quiet for a moment and then said, ‘Y. Is this correct? Fifteen thousand rupees?’

  I nodded. I had figured a high-end version made sense if you were serious about a hobby. The stars were rather far away, after all. Only the best for my Vijay.

  The next day, I sulked for most of the day on the balcony, as he went back to the mall and exchanged it for a new digital camera.

  And a short two months later, we had wrapped up our life in Bangalore and had moved to the mad city of Mumbai.

  PART II

  ROUGH

  ROAD

  1

  I Get By With a Little Help from My Help

  ‘What a view, eh, hon? Look at the waves … Look at that boat … hey, look, is that couple actually making out? Hawww … where’s our video camera? I love Bandstand!’

  We had moved from languid, pleasant Bangalore to Mumbai, the city where I immediately and penetratingly observed that people walked much too fast. With some luck, persistence and by making the lives of a couple of admin people a living hell, we had successfully wangled a company apartment on Bandstand with the most amazing sea view imaginable.

  We had already started work at our new jobs in Mumbai – Vijay in his new rural business head role, and I as brand manager for a shampoo brand. Dandruff removal seemed so much sexier than trying to convince people that tea was healthy. Except it really wasn’t, and I found that I was now merely one of approximately a hundred managers for this international brand, with many teams involved at the local, regional and global level. In fact, it was my private suspicion that there were some teams at the interplanetary level, too, but these forces remained unseen. In short, I wasn’t enjoying this job as much as the previous one.

  Our new place was a relief, though. It was really tiny, a basic two-bedroom apartment barely half the size of our Bangalore home – but big enough for the two of us, as long as we didn’t move ar
ound too much. It was on the third floor of the building, and very close to Shah Rukh Khan’s bungalow; we had already started letting it slip into casual conversation that we were now ‘Shah Rukh’s neighbours’. Our apartment had huge windows in the bedroom and living room, overlooking the sea. These windows had earlier been barred with ugly grills as part of the ‘company standard safety policy’, which said that unbarred windows were unsafe for small children. But we had got them removed using the strong argument that we had no children and didn’t plan on ever having any, small or otherwise. The removal of the grills had a spectacular effect on the place, and with the windows now opening out onto the big blue sea, the flat cleverly gave the impression of being twice as large as it really was.

  Vijay finally stopped pointing out the couples who were making out in public and we fell silent as the sun slowly started to set over the sea, making for a lovely scene in hues of orange and grey. We stood there, side by side, holding hands – a young husband and wife basking in the quiet contentment of being together, enjoying a brief respite between harried moments on the first day of unpacking.

  And then the silence was shattered by a blaring high-pitched voice ringing through the apartment.

  ‘MAIN TUMHARE LIYE CHAI BANATEEE?’

  Startled, we turned towards the door from where the voice had emanated. A short, sari-clad wizened old woman stood gazing enquiringly at us through thick spectacles.

  Vijay took charge of the situation and said, ‘Chai? Haan, haan, chai. Par … aap ho kaun?’

  The old woman suddenly seemed to remember her manners and showed all her surprisingly white teeth in what was probably meant to be an ingratiating grin. ‘MAIN ZARREENA. ISS BUILDING MEIN MAIN-ICH KAAM KARTEEE. SAB FLOOR PE MAIN-ICH. EK FLOOR, DO FLOOR, CHAAR FLOOR, SAB FLOOR.’ She added, in a revealing tone, ‘TUM TEEN FLOOR PE HO.’

  While we were still developing our response to this indisputable statement, Zarreena went ahead and rummaged around in our new kitchen and informed us loudly that we didn’t have any tea powder. Undaunted, she went over to one of the many other flats in the building in which she apparently ruled, and used the raw materials and utensils there to prepare and bring down two steaming cups of tea for us. I was immediately impressed by her resourcefulness and decided she was exactly what we needed. While sipping the tea, I quietly but firmly impressed upon Vijay that we should hire her and he shouldn’t try his negotiation tricks on her and drive her away. This tended to happen when he bargained with people, since his idea of negotiation was to bid one-twentieth of the initial price. He reluctantly agreed.

  After the brief debate on her salary which she won, she demanded of Vijay, ‘MERA CHAABEE KAHAN HAIN?’

  Vijay was taken aback, and clearly uncomfortable about trusting a complete stranger with the house key, so he said, ‘Chaabee nahin dega.’

  Zarreena looked both shocked and hurt. ‘KYOON?’

  Vijay couldn’t bring himself to say that he didn’t trust her yet, so came up with an inspired ‘Uhh … ek hi hain!’

  Zarreena guffawed at this tiny problem and said, ‘MERE KO DEYO. MAIN BANWA KE AATEE, NAA. PHATAFAT BANWA KE AATEE.’

  Defeated, Vijay mutely handed over the key. She disappeared and was soon back, with two extra copies of the key which she gave to us. And then, she proceeded to take over the house.

  Over the next few days, as we continued to settle ourselves into our new jobs, we were delighted to discover that we could leave most things regarding the house to Zarreena – she would not only cook for us, including early morning tea, breakfast and dinner, but also take care of the other household chores like cleaning, buying veggies, getting the clothes ironed and so on. It was great – like having a live-in maid without her actually living in.

  Zarreena had her little drawbacks, of course – the chief of which was her disinclination to fold clothes and put them into cupboards. She preferred to put them straight into the washing machine, regardless of whether they actually needed cleaning or not. I would buy many new clothes, try them on once and leave them around, only to find them hanging out to dry the next day. And since she would enthusiastically and indiscriminately bung everything into what was clearly her favourite invention in the world, more than one wonderfully expensive new shirt was tainted with the bright colour of a cheap undie – Vijay’s, of course.

  The other drawback was that once she got into a chatty mood, it was difficult to end the conversation. She would address me out of the blue, interrupting my reading with a conversational, ‘MADAM, MAIN SAARA HINDUSTAN KE LIYE KAAM KIYA.’

  I would be genuinely impressed by this. ‘Achha? Saara desh mein?’

  Zarreena would clarify, ‘NAHINNN! TUMHARA COMPANY KA SAARA LOG YAHAN REHTA NA. KITNA SAHIB AAYA-GAYA – SAB KE LIYE MAIN-ICH KAAM KIYA.’

  ‘Oh, achha. Hindustan Products Limited ke log ki liye.’ Zarreena was not one to bother with detail. ‘HAAN – WO-ICH TOH MAIN BHI BOLI – SAARA HINDUSTAN – TUMHARE PEHLA, KAUNSA MADRASI YAHAN THA? MOTA SAHIB?’

  I, of course, had no clue as to the real identity of the gentleman she referred to as Mota Sahib, but she insisted that I hazard a guess. And this would cue the beginning of the never-ending game of us trying to establish who lived in the apartment before Vijay and me, and who before them, and so on, ending only when it was sundown and time for her to go home.

  Vijay and I had decided that the distances and traffic situation in Mumbai warranted the hiring of a driver – it was not a luxury but a necessity, we told ourselves. However, hiring the driver proved to be easier said than done.

  For one, Vijay insisted on very exacting standards when it came to our driver and grilled the aspiring applicants quite heavily on their backgrounds, their knowledge of driving and so on before rejecting most on grounds like ‘He looked at me a bit funnily.’ For another, he wasn’t prepared to pay the going rate and his usual over-baked attempts at bargaining – including feigning a heart attack at what they quoted – drove away a good many prospects.

  Desperate to avoid the three hours of driving to and from work, Vijay decided to start taking new prospective drivers to office and back ‘on trial’. After a day or two of this, they would apparently decide that he didn’t quite cut it as a potential employer, and disappeared, melting away into the crowds of Mumbai, without even asking for any payment. Vijay claimed that this suited him just fine because it meant free rides to work, but I said that it was probably his incessant backseat driving that put them off, and told him that at this rate we would never find a reliable driver.

  And then, along came Vinod.

  Vinod was a young driver who was introduced to us by one of the security guards of our building. I liked him immediately because he was well-turned-out, bright-eyed and alert. He was slightly built and his eyes were a unique greyish-green colour. He seemed much younger than his stated age of twenty-three, and he cultivated a thin moustache possibly to try and look older.

  Vijay took him for the ‘trial period’ and was quite satisfied with his driving skills, which he had apparently perfected at the age of seven while learning to drive his father’s tractor up a few hills in his village near Allahabad in Uttar Pradesh, and without too much negotiation on the salary for once, Vinod was hired.

  Over the next few days, I discovered I liked having a driver, particularly this one. When I approached the car, he would appear out of nowhere like a shot to open the door for me, greyish-green eyes twinkling as he politely wished me good morning. He always helped with the shopping bags, and would run after me to give me my cellphone, purse or whatever item I had left behind in the car. He never missed a day of work, always arrived half an hour early and never complained about being called too early or being kept too late – in fact, often, he would even land up on his day off – Sunday – of his own accord, just to see if he could drive us somewhere. Soon, he started doing our grocery shopping for us as well.

  Vinod also politely put up with Vijay’s backseat driving and contrary instructions like ‘Koi jaldi
nahin … aaram se chalaao …’ followed by ‘Late ho rahen hain … thoda daudao.’ He didn’t needlessly chat while driving, but when he did speak, it was amusing to hear his overly polite, singsong lilt saying in response to our probing ‘Hume gaon nahin jaana, wahan bore hote hain … hamare papa-mummy kehte hain shaadi kar lo, par hume shaadi nahin karni …’

  It turned out that Vinod had previously worked for one ‘Model Memsahib’, some sort of upcoming starlet who was very fussy and difficult, and used to keep him out driving all day and all night. This was possibly one reason why he appeared to consider Vijay and me as employers of the century – the benchmark was very low.

  But thanks to having worked for Model Memsahib, Vinod knew the party places in Mumbai better than we did. If we ever asked, ‘Vinod, Hawaiian Shack maalum hain?’ he would shoot back a quick ‘Ji, sir’ with quiet confidence and take off without further ado.

  He had also been exposed to the stars and drivers of the stars due to the socializing activities of his Model Memsahib. He told us, ‘Jab Model Memsahib hume Sanjay Dutt ke ghar le gayi toh unhone hume dekh ke poocha, “ Tu baarah saal ka hain, kya?” Aur phir hume paanch hazaar rupaiye diye.’ Here he paused respectfully, a hint of nostalgia and gratitude in his eyes. He then added, ‘Bahut peete hain.’

  The arrogance of certain members of tinsel town had earned Vinod’s disapproval. ‘Shah Rukh Khan ka driver kissi se baat nahin karta … sochta hain, “Main Shah Rukh Khan ka driver hoon”.’

  Another time, he confided in me, ‘Arjun Rampal apne aap ko issuper-ishtar samajhta hain – par uss ke paas toh sirf ek Ford Endeavour hain.’ The biting scorn with which he made the last announcement made it clear what he thought of Arjun Rampal and his claim to stardom.