I'm Going To Love This, I Say!

The aircraft wheels touched the runway at 7:15pm. At 7:14pm, half the passengers had already unfastened their seat belts. At 7:14:04pm, one half of the other half had the overhead lockers open. At 7:14:45, one half of the last half had started talking on their mobile. And the last quarter of the quarter (or whatever, pardon my weak maths) sat back and soaked in all the action, bracing for the touchdown.

I'm going to love this place, I say to myself. Just as I love all the madness back home, I'm going to love it here...

Here?

We've just landed in Lagos for a short looksie reccee, and I already kindof know what's in store.

Or, do I?

I walk out of the aerobridge and look in the direction of my co-passengers gliding down the escalator. Cool, I think, and I step onto it. An Indian in Nigeria, what cause should there be for concern? Only to realise, in that split second between my cock-sure confidence and  a frantic groping for some support, that the rails of the escalator are not moving, but the steps are. So if you haven't tried stepping onto a moving object, while holding on to a stationary object on the side, I'd say, do try it once to appreciate my cause for panic. It's like seeing your torso move forward (and downward), but your hands firmly in place, tugging at the body in motion. And the many more (smarter) passengers who did not hold on to the side rails for support add to the forward thrust from the rear, leading to a near stampede-like situation. My panic, as you can see, is not misplaced. By the time I've figured out the cause for this pandemonium, I've already stumbled on the steps a couple of times -  fallen, got up, fallen again - and made a complete fumbling-ass of myself. Not a promising start to a new place.

But I find my optimism intact; I'm going to love this place.

The airport terminal is hot, humid, and crowded. The ACs aren't working today, someone cribs. That's reassuring. It tells me simply that on most other days, the ACs DO work. That's quite okay. Just the other day, IGI plunged into total darkness. I have no reason to crib.

'You're welcome!' A jolly protocol officer welcomes us with warmth and helps us with the immigration formalities and we chat about this and that. It takes forever (an understatement) for our suitcases to arrive on the baggage carousel, but that's okay. Until a couple of years ago, most airports in India functioned on the same premise of non-urgency. I look at the other seasoned passengers who seem unperturbed. Every one looks happy and so so content. 'You're welcome!', gushes another officer on duty. I'm going to love this place, I think, and bend to pick up my suitcases. 'You're welcome!' says another official, helping me with my bags. 'Only two pieces?' he asks, with raised eyebrows. I nod. 'You sure?' I nod again. 'Wow. You're welcome!' I hear, and we move on.

By the time I've cleared the customs (and yes, they do ask for the yellow yellow-fever card, so I didn't get poked in vain) and stepped out of the terminal building, my ears are choking with 'You're welcome's. When a police officer from the siren-screeching security escort van (you'll need two, one each in front and behind your car, if you're any true blue expatriate in Nigeria) nods his head and says, 'You're welcome,' I give up. It's more of a pleasant endemic here, and I realise they probably do genuinely mean it.

Outside, the daughter cribs. 'I don't like the people here.'
Is this the moment of truth? Have I failed as a global citizen? Have I  bred brats who are racists, despite the best of my intentions?

'Why?' I ask feebly.

'I feel scared at the way everyone's talking here. Why are they fighting?'

I heave a sigh of relief. So it's something that innocuous. I squeeze her paws and reassure her. ' Don't worry darling. It's just that they have a louder voice. Don't you see them laughing?' That's true, actually. Look around you anywhere in Lagos and you'll see everyone happy. Happy and jolly and cheerful and merry. Yes, even the poor (much like in India, you see them everywhere) laugh a lot, and they mean their laughs.

I'm going to love this place, I say to myself and sit in the car. 'You're welcome, madam,' says the driver, and we drive on.

The streets are more-or-less dark (the entire nation runs on generators, so the late evenings belie the robustness and the throbbing feel of daytime). Most houses look like Osama's Abottabad compound with impossibly high boundary walls topped with barbed wires. The escort vehicles are doing their job well. In about 20 minutes, we are there at the hotel.

'You're welcome, madam,' say the guards in the escort vehicles as they leave.
'You're welcome, madam,' say the hotel guards and waiters, as we wheel in our suitcases.
'You're welcome, madam,' says the smartly turned out person  at the reception as he hands us room card.

 The hot-bod Nigerian men will put the Greek Gods to shame, any day, even with their clothes on.Oh yes yes, I'm going to love this, I secretly salivate.

The door doesn't open with the card. We try again. It doesn't. Someone (this time, an even hotter Lebanese) comes, fiddles with the door for fifteen minutes. I don't really mind the sweet delay. I'm going to so so love this place, I say, and go back to ogling.

We hear a beep which means that the card and door contraption are working.  'You're welcome,' says the chikna Leb, and ushers us into the room.

Once in, all four of us make a mad dash for the loo. The quickest, my daughter, breezes in, only to be out in a second announcing, 'The door has no lock.'

'Maybe it's the style, you idiot,' butts in my son. 'What would you know about boutique hotels?'

'It doesn't matter,' I say. 'We'll manage. Let me go in.'

'No. We'll have to get it fixed. This is not acceptable,' says the Mister, checking out the door.

'Let me go, will you?' I shout and push my way in to the swanky lock-less loo. I am reminded of all the bytes floating around the virtual world about Lagos, and I know that if there's any truth in them, try as he might, the Mister will never succeed in getting the lock fitted.

I'm going to so so love this place...I say with utmost bliss as I go about my small business.

The Mad Dash for Ash...

'You have only two options', the Dott announced. 'Either you make me Aishwarya Rai's daughter or you become Aishwarya Rai. Bas, no more, no less.'

'Neither is possible, dott dear, come drink up your milk,' I said.

'No. I'm either a born-star or I choose to die this moment. No more, no less,' she said. The Dott is just about six (days, of course). It's but obvious that kids these days have their facts of life, at least the basics like born-die-star baby-star mommy, right early.

'But you are my star, my darling girl, come drink it up.'

'I am not a star. Don't lie. I didn't hear songs being played for me on the radio, I didn't see pujas being done for me on TV, nothing moved on Twitter, not even one out of the one-billion congratulations were for me, no laddooos, I didn't find bets being placed on me, nothing nothing not one thing happened in my honour. What does that bitch of the other newborn have that I don't?'

'Oh my darling baby, come let me hug you tight. We are private people and like to keep to ourselves sweetheart. You are my star, aren't you? Now come on, drink up the milk like my precious precious gem.' 

'You can't fool me mom. I'll either have Aishwarya feed me, or I starve myself.'

'I'm not even sure if Ash will choose to breast-feed her baby, so stop fussing. Come on now, be a good girl and drink up the milk.

'No. I don't like your milk. I want Aishwarya's. No more, no less.' 

'Don't act difficult girl. Okay, let me ask the doc if they have a way of getting some yummy Bournvita pumped in here. Maybe you'd like that?'  What all must we moms do to keep our kids happy.

'You're a disaster mom. Aishwarya would never even dream of something like this. She is just so perrrrrrfect in anything and everything. Take me to her this minute. I know she's in this very hospital. Take me to her NOW or I'll start wailing.'

'Oh, no no no. Don't do that. I find it impossible to handle you when you do that. Listen to me. I've no idea which room Ash aunty is in. Now be a good girl and...'

'SHE'S NOT AUNTY,' bellowed the Dott. 'She's my man-hi-man ki Maa.'

Ma? My dott calling that dumb plastic-doll Ma? I wished the hospital bed's mid-hinge would collapse that very moment and the bed engulf me in its folds. Oh why did I live to see this day.

'Stop grimacing,' said the Dott, trying to wriggle out of my arms. 'If you can't do it, I'll find a way to get to her. No one can come between a true-super-daughter and a true-super-Ma. Maaaa...I pine for your arms and your cuddle...'

'Fine,' I said in exasperation. There was little point in showing the ungrateful brat any reason. Imagine my flesh-and-blood doing this to me! That, when she knows the entire list of terrible things that can happen as part of post-partum blues (she's seen me devour preggy and post-preggy books by the dozen). And even then, to be so so insensitive. I had half a mind of disowning her then and there, but as parents, one needs to be generous to a fault. 'Your wish. Go. But don't you come back to me if she refuses to take you as her dott. Remember, there can be only ONE star baby in this country, and that is already born and registered. You're in for a rude shock girl. Go.'

'What do you know,' she retorted. 'Ever since I heard that Ash and you were to deliver around the same time, I prayed to God every single moment of my foetal existence that I get her eyes, her hair, her skin, her beauty. See my blue eyes? That's the degree of my connect with my real-Ma. We are made for each other. One look at me and she'll run to me.' The Dott jumped off the bed and started her slow waddle towards the cabin door. Kids these days, I tell you. They learn everything right in there. 

'Ha! Run! Not with her stitches!' I smirked.

'Ha! What do you know? Ash can do anything. She can even fly in like a superwoman and rescue me from your clutches.'

'Oh well. Soon you'll know. But don't even think of coming back to me when she refuses to change your nappies. Madam Ash can't possibly be doing the menial jobs herself!'

The Dott stood there for a few seconds, and then turned around. 

'She won't? You think so?' she asked.

'You bet!' I could sense the tides turning!

'Hmmm...then who do you think will do it? Jaya-dadi? I'm petrified by her stern look. Daddu? Ooooooohhhhhh, I'd LOVE that! But then he'll be too busy caring for his bahu. Oh gosh, you think the maids will change my nappies? I so HATE the thought of that...'

'Why? You're forgetting the other Bacchhan man in the house?'

'Who?' she asked.

'Abhishek. Your adopted D-A-D!' I taunted her.

'Who's he? How come no one ever spoke about him? But it's okay, I can do without him. I just need my super-real-Maaaaaaa. I don't need anything else in this life.' The Dott turned back around towards the door and started waddling all over again.

'You can't wish away Abhi, girl. For all practical purposes, he's the one who'll bring you up. Beginning with the nappies.'

'You think so?' the Dott said, looking in my direction again. 'You mean, Ash will not have time for me?'

'Nopes. Not with all those signed contracts already waiting for her.'

'You mean I won't get to be on magazine covers with her?'

'Unlikely. The other kid will have that privilege, I guess. I told you, she's already the original registered star-entity, not you.'

'Hmmm...okay let me give it one more shot. What if that bitch and I were to get exchanged in the nursery? You know, I've seen such things happening in the movies...maybe you could help me there. Imagine, you'll end up having Ash's baby!!!' the Dott suggested, with hopeful, even pleading, eyes.

'Oh no no no. I am doing none of that. For me, it's only you or no one else. You were the one who's kicked me that long in my tummy, not Ash's child. So, you are free to go. I'll be quite fine without any baby. Badly need to catch up on sleep anyway. Been days.'

I picked up the day's newspaper and slid down to a comfortable position to rest for a while.

'Will I be able to walk the red carpet with her?'

'Again, unlikely. The world knows of only one star baby, she can't suddenly strut down the Reds with two.' 

The Dott stood there motionless, deep in thought.

'And listen. You can call me anytime, in the odd chance that you miss me.Good luck, my darling girl...muuuuaaaaahh!'

Silence in the room. Nothing stirred, not even the sterilised dust particles.

And then it happened in slow motion...the tilt of the head, the torso, the legs, the entire body, the tears trickling, the bald head bobbing, the arms open, the mouth contorting, the feet toddling, and a shrill cry piercing through the concrete walls of the hospital...Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...my Maaaaaaaa...I have started missing you already...Can't leave you and go...Maaaaaaa.' She ran towards my bed and stood at the foot. She'd managed to jump on her own, but climbing on to the bed wasn't exactly her cup of tea. They haven't yet started training kids in this department while still inside the tummy.   

'Oh, oh, what about my sleep then?' I said, a bit disappointed, having mentally prepared myself for a good restful snooze. I lifted her off the floor and placed her next to the pillow.

'Don't worry mom. I won't trouble you at all. You cuddle me and we'll both sleep tight!' the Dott said, kind of smothering me with a thousand kisses.

'Sounds like a plan! Good, come into my arms rightaway and drink up the milk first!'

'Sounds like a great plan, mom, okay!' 

And we both slept happily ever after. Until the next radio jingle blessing the OTHER blessed new-born, that is.

'Mom...?'

'Yes, my darling?'

'Why can't I be Ash's baby-girl?'

And it started all over again...

Will the insane one billion let me enjoy my little one in peace, please?

Education...

bridges gaps on the one hand and furthers divides on the other...

It includes and isolates at the same time...

It makes you feel big, and it shows how small you are...

When Enough is Not Enough...

A fraction of a second is what it took my kids on the back seat of the car to tear open the neatly wrapped return gift and compare the shades. A minute is what it took them to start a fight over which one's was better. Five minutes is what it took them to come to an amicable conclusion. Ten minutes is what they spent playing with their respective gifts in the car. Twenty minutes later, by the time the car had been parked in front of our house, the toys lay half-broken, fully-forgotten on the car floor.  

From what I could gather from the remains, each piece of what-was-junk-now looked terribly terribly expensive. A lot of thought must have, of course, gone into the careful selection of the return gift. For most of the birthday parties these days, it's the single biggest make-or-break measure of its success, so no parent wants to take a chance with it. But frankly, I don't think our children deserve to get anything more until we have succeeded in teaching them them to value what they already have.   

And so, yet another birthday party, yet another mockery of the simple act of giving for pleasure...not that I have not been party to the crime in the past. I'm reminded of this mail I had sent out to a bunch of parents at the end of my son's 8th birthday party three years ago. Reproducing it here in the hope that my sentiments find resonance somewhere... 

Hi all,

A big thankyou to all for having made Anav's 8th birthday celebrations enjoyable and memorable. Given our packed and rushed days, it's indeed an extra effort to fit in these frequent parties, so I was overwhelmed by the manner in which you all went out of your ways to send your kids over (or tried your best to make it possible); made for a beautiful lifelong memory for Anav! For him, the excitement continued well into late evening as he eagerly unwrapped his presents, squealed in delight at each one of them, and then sat with his little sister exploring/ playing with/ reading them all! Thanks again for the absolutely lovely, thoughfully picked up stuff, every single one of them.

I'm not sure why I'm sending this mail, but certain thoughts have been playing on my mind for a while, and I guess today's party gave me the necessary impetus to piece it together coherently. Having briefly interacted with you all on the phone adn in person, I feel confident that you are a bunch of parents who will appreciate my concern. Year after year, we see our kids getting loads of stuff at parties, both as birthday presents or as return gifts. While every item holds a special meaning for our kids, I feel uncomfortable by the way we are loading children, both ours and their friends, with more and more. Please dont get me wrong here, I am not the one to champion the cause of austerity, certainly not at birthdays! But what does bother me is the way we are aiding in our kids' increasingly failing to value things - far less than how we as kids used to feel about any new acquisition. We do it all the time - just look at the way our kids' rooms look these days, cupboards, cabinets, drawers, spilling over with stuff, and yet, our children never seem to feel it's enough. As parents, we perhaps will be guilty of bringing up the most matarialistic generation of kids the world has seen so far. 

Since we'll continue to interact with one another the rest of the year, most certainly in the context of birthday parties, I am taking the liberty of suggesting that we keep the exchange of gifts and presents simple. There's very little that our kids dont have these days. Can we at least aim to reach a situation (an ideal one, in my view) where our kids get equally thrilled unwrapping a small pencil box and a boardgame or a book. I have tremendous faith in the openness with which our kids' minds work. I know they like simple stuff as much as those terribly expensive and involved gadgets, but it's unfortunate that we often feel hesitant, even embarrassed, buying the not-so-expensive stuff for the birthday child.  

I have been party to this crime year after year. Often, I've gone overboard with presents and with return gifts, though I must admit that it's always been out of an actual joy of picking up more and more of those cute little stuff for kids, and never due to the compulsion of having to compete with others. But I'm not sure how many of those things kids would have cherished beyond the initial few minutes of thrill. And so I felt that a beginning has to be made somewhere. As Anav's happened to be the first birthday in class, purely as a precedent, I'd thought of keeping everything really simple this time. So I picked up those sarangis from Delhi Haat as return gifts, at Rs35 per piece (bulk rate), and felt rather happy doing so. My kids have always enjoyed playing it, and i was reasonably confident that most of his friends would like it too (though not without annoying the parents with all that noise!). But moment I put them in each of the carry bags, I felt it wasnt 'enough', sadly, undoing the one step I had earnestly hoped to take this time. So a hurried last minute trip to the mall, and the bags got a little weightier with those tennis balls, drawing books and the chocolates. At Rs 100 per child, the bags looked slightly more 'acceptable' than before, though it was still far less than what my kids returns with from most of the birthday parties. 

The party's over, the rooms have been cleared, and the birthday presents have been stacked in Anav's cupboard, some intact, some with contents already missing. But I've been feeling rather disappointed at having failed myself. Why couldnt i go ahead with my initial belief that the inexpensive, but incredibly delightful piece of instrument was all that the kids would go back with. Perhaps if the same item came for Rs200, I would not have had a moment of doubt.

As I said, I'm not sure why I'm writing to you all, but maybe, just maybe, it will help at least one parent not make the mistake I made this time. That, in itself, will be a BIG step.

Thanks again for having made Anav's party incredibly fun. The kids were great, and I look forward to seeing most of them again in the years to come!

Warm regards,

Richa

Spanking New Girlfriend

'I think I've had enough. You HAVE to get me a new girlfriend now.'

I yawned a massive yawn and continued to pore over the map. The temperatures in the city have already begun dipping at night, and with the glass screens left ajar, my house could easily have passed off as a family suite perched atop some ‘Tiger Point’ at any of the hill stations. I pulled over the duvet further up my legs and strained to locate the goddamned place on the map.

‘Do you remember where Kigali is?’ I asked him, absentmindedly, without lifting my eyes off the by-now badly creased map. The Son has left ugly circles all over it to cover all the test cricket playing nations of the world. The Dott has painted squatting aliens over places she thought they would find ‘Indian’ toilets. It’s a miracle The Hubby has left it untouched.

‘You’ll never listen, will you?’ he whined an annoying whine, some of which drifted into my ears. They had been pretty passive for a while anyway, with the eyes doing most of the dog-work with the map.


‘Hmmm? You saying something to me?’ I asked, surprised.

‘See? This is why I need a new girlfriend. You just don’t listen!’ There was that hence-proven-I’m-vindicated look in his eyes, laced with ample annoyance.

‘What do you mean a new girlfriend? When did you have an old one in the first place!’ My chortle must have sounded too dismissive because he snapped back gnarling.

‘Laugh your gut out now madam. I too will have my day, then we’ll see!’

‘Found it! It’s right here! To think that I was looking everywhere but here for the place!’ I said, looking at the map. One part of my mission accomplished, I turned to the next: locating Ouagadougou.

‘Hmmmph. Will you or will you not find me a girlfriend?’ This time he sort-of charged on, so I decided to tackle his problem before getting back to mine.

‘I don’t understand this,’ I said, folding the map any which way and tossing it aside. ‘Don’t you think I’m the wrong – I mean totally completely absolutely wrong – person to be asking for help in this matter? I may be the old wife, but your wife all the same! What interest would I possibly have in locating a girlfriend for you?!’ I said, struggling to keep my laughter from erupting at that inappropriate moment!

‘You stand to gain every which way, if you only used your mind to think and see how,’ said The Hubby, his tone softening a bit. In his typical 360 degree-analysis mode, he quickly grabbed a paper and pen from the side table and began the crash-course for me.

A few doodles, lines, scribbles, arrows (by now the page resembled an year-old’s artwork) later, he pointed to something looking like a toad and said, ‘Let’s assume this is you, the wife. The old wife.’

‘Aaahhhhhhmmm,’ I nodded.

‘And this,’ pointing to an amoebaesque (sorry, Kafka) puddle, ‘is me, the harried Hubby.’

‘Aaaaahhhhhmmm?’ I raised my brows.

‘Now you see how this one is always harried because of this, and as a result this is, in turn, hassled because the harried one gets more harried by the day?’ He added some sharp spear-like contraptions emerging from the toad and leading upto the amoeba rather ominously.

‘Okay, good drawing. But that’s it. Let’s cut this crap and let me get back to looking up the second place.’ I said and picked up the map again.

‘NO. We must decide NOW. It’s either a new girlfriend or you chuck out the cook,’ the Hubby growled again.

This looked serious indeed!

‘Excuse me?’ I said. ‘Did I hear it right? What connection could there possibly be between a girlfriend and a cook! You surely don’t expect her to rustle up cosy dinners for you every evening, eh?! And as if I would let her stay in this house!’ I could have died laughing.

‘This is no joke. You cannot have everything YOUR way. So we’ll have one of my way and one of yours. Get it?  Decide fast and decide now.’

I placed the map back on the side table and got into the act of thinking! My life without a cook was out of question. A life with some girlfriend floating around looked okay enough. Maybe she could prove to be a useful baby-sitter too, if the bacchhas decided to take a fancy to her! The decision was easy enough.

‘Okay. You may find yourself a girlfriend. Now that that is settled, may I get back to the map please? Am dying to locate that place!’ I said.

‘No. YOU need to find me a girlfriend. And that’s final,’ the Hubby said with a steely determination.

Hell! Now this new tamasha!

‘Why on earth…’ I began protesting, but he cut me short.

‘Because you’ve lived with me all these years and you will know who’s perfect for me.’

So, there.

I’ve been thinking about it, and I guess I know the right place to look for the girl.

The golfing sites and online forums! (am too lazy to drive up to the golf courses, of course)

With a bit of good luck, if I do hit the jackpot, my life will turn into an enviable one, m’friends. Look at the many benefits: my weekends will be free because they’ll be out on the greens together. I’ll have undisturbed weekday mornings without having to force out laughs at his forwarded golf jokes and golf mails. The evenings will be peaceful without having to sit through the ball-by-ball analysis (the hundredth, thousandth, millionth time) of the last terrible game (never mind if it was played a millennium ago). I assume several dinners-out for them, which means I get ample time in bed to read books.

And I get by comfortably with whatever the maid decides to cook, her mood permitting, that is.

Not a bad win-win situation, don't you think?

Interested lady golfers, please get in touch with me at the earliest. 

The Fear of Loss...

'I don't want you to die', he said last night. 'Ever, ever, ever.'

'Why?' I asked

'I'll feel so helpless without you.' 

So. He grows up. My son. At 10, he is now able to think of possibilities which can have a lasting impact on his life. His senses visualise loss, loneliness, dependence, attachments. Death.

Welcome to the world of the grown-ups and the growing-ups, Son. The fear of loss will, from now on, be a constant companion through life. It'll stick to you like a leech. The sooner you train your senses to ignore it, the happier and stronger you'll make yourself from within. There is no such thing as death - you just stop living. And fear forces your mind to believe you cannot live the way you would want to.

Let not fear make you stop living before you actually stop living, son. Learn to live it up. With, or without me. Or him, or her, or this or that.

The Bad People

It seemed like an innocuous chancing upon of two stranger kids in the passageway of the AC 1 compartment of a train, both, on their way to the ‘hills’ for a short break with their respective families. Until words floated into my ears which made me look up from the book I was engrossed in, suddenly alert and all ears.

‘Are you a Muslim?’ asked the girl in pink Barbie tank top and purple tights, not very much older than my six year old daughter.

I could not see my daughter from where I was sitting, but the awkward pause in the conversation told me she probably was fumbling for words, and even more, for getting a hold over the ‘meaning’ of what she had been asked.

‘I don’t know, I’m not sure…I’ll ask my mother when I go in…’ Something in the way she replied, the tentativeness, the volume, the diffidence, told me instantly without even looking at her that my otherwise super confident cocksure girl was not comfortable fielding this query.

‘How dumb of you not to know even this!’ said the other girl gently swinging from one of the coupe window iron bars, or some such. ‘How old are you?’

‘Six,’ said my daughter, the discomfiture still writ large in her tone.

‘GOD! So old and still don’t know whether you are a Hindu or a Muslim! But anyway, I hope you are not one M.’

‘Why?’ came another feeble word from my perplexed daughter.

‘Because they are all bad people. Very very bad people. Paapi, as my maasi calls them…’ she said giggling and grimacing as if a terrible stink had suddenly whiffed through the passageway.

‘What’s paapi?’

I wanted to get up and intervene, not because I felt my daughter’s mind was being fed with an unqualified bullshit which had no business being there, but because I felt the other girl needed to be shown the prejudice that had been forced down hers.

But I waited a while. It was a long journey, and the conversation could wait. It was more important for me to first gauge the extent of this malaise in her young impressionable mind. However, there was an abrupt break in this exchange because breakfast arrived and the girls ran into their respective cabins to eat. My daughter whispered in my ears, ‘Mom, am I a Muslim? I don’t want to be one.’

‘Why?’

‘Because Sejal says Muslims are bad people as they kill and eat cows. Tell me no please. What are Muslims?’

Distressing as it is to see the origins of the deep-rooted seeds of intolerance lying very much (also) among the so called educated elites, one shudders at the mere thought of the extent of the spread of this mindless blinding bias. Sejal is the quintessential urban educated child with a set of parents both with plum corporate jobs who spend close to a lakh a year on their daughter’s ‘good’ schooling needs. That an eight year old may have already formed such a staunch anti-Muslim opinion in her mind is also a telling sign of the all pervasive subliminal reach of this conditioning. The seemingly innocuous tidbits that work at slowly poisoning the mind are all around us, waiting to be picked up and assimilated. It’s simply in the way you and I believe and talk and discuss and listen. The specific targets might change – Muslim, Hindu, Christian, Harijan, Biharis, Madrasis, Dalits, Pakistanis, Chinkis, blacks, whites, whatever – but the insidious nature and sting of the venom remains largely the same.

When I later sat with the two girls to help them dig deeper into the purport of what they were discussing, I felt I succeeded sooner than I’d expected. Children absorb information at lighting-speed, but they also are willing to squeeze out the unwanted and reabsorb the desirable that much faster. Since Sejal had grown up hearing that Muslims are sinners for slaughtering cows and eating beef, that was the only line of argument her mind could forward.

‘What’s wrong with eating beef,’ I asked her.

‘My dadi says it’s a sin because when they kill the cow, who will give milk to the calf?’

‘Do you eat chicken and mutton at home?’ I asked. She nodded. I pointed out to her that she or her family were guilty of the same crime that she was accusing the Muslims of. Wouldn’t the goat’s little one also not be denied his mamma’s milk if we went ahead and ate her up?

The intense yet faraway look in Sejal’s eyes told me her young mind was trying hard to distill this new way of looking at the situation. She saw sense in what was being said, just as she’d seen reason in what she’d heard earlier. But something about the way the facts were put forth before her assured her that there perhaps was more sense in what she was hearing now than what she’d learnt earlier.

That point onward, it my task became easier. I sat there explaining how certain beings are sacred to one religion, and not to another. How different religions adopt different ways and means of getting to that same one goal of loving and getting closer to their respective Gods. The girls sat there, with rapt attention, oblivious of the train thundering through a long tunnel.

Thus far, I had still not addressed my daughter’s concern: was she a Muslim?

And so, after having sat with the girls for a while, I posed them a couple of questions, one to each: Would you still rather your new train friend were not a Muslim? And would you still rather you were not a Muslim?

The replies, not surprisingly, to both from both was a spontaneous No.

And then, turning to my daughter, I told her she was not a Muslim.

‘Oh, doesn’t matter mom,’ she shrugged. ‘Would I still have you and daddy if we all were Muslims?’

Yes, I said.

‘Then it really doesn’t matter mom!’ 

A shorter version of this piece appeared in Tehelka magazine, October 1, 2011.

http://www.tehelka.com/story_main50.asp?filename=hu011011PERSONAL.asp

I Am, Finally, Anna. Or, Am I?

A late, confused, unsure, and somewhat reluctant supporter to the cause, I finally stepped out of my comfort zone and joined in the peace rally today. Turned down the volume of my car stereo to let the arousing rythm of the slogans by eager volunteers float in, gave a quick crash course to my kids on what was happening before them, turned off the ignition, told my kids to pick up their water bottles, and that's it...we were out, crossing the road over from being a passive armchair commentator on all things wrong with us to actively lending my support.

Why did I step out of the car? Do I believe a Lokpal can cleanse our deep rooted corruption? I don't. Have I been following Anna and his crusade closely for the last couple of months? Not much, indeed. Do I see myself as a staunch supporter of Anna and his satyagrah? Not in the least. Does a beaming Anna being led away from Supreme Enclave stir up a patriotic fervour in me? Unlikely. Did the charm of the TV cameras' flashing lights lure me to my one minute of photo-op fame? Ha! Good one! So then, why?

Because those many many moments of frustration and irritation with the corrupt bribe-ridden state machinery flashed through my mind today in that split second when I saw the enthusiastic young college-going students doing what thousands around the country have been doing for the last couple of days: doing their bit symbolically by lending their voice of support to a selfless cause by one selfless Gandhian and spreading his word around...Bhrashtachaar hataenge / Anna teri jung hum jeetenge...in its tone and tenor, the words felt impactful, simple, even sincere, perhaps, and oh-so-different from the loud, high pitched proclamations of undying love for the motherland one is used to hearing from the rowdy supporters of various political parties. I thought of the thousand bucks I had shelled for my passport renewal, of the innumerable rounds I had had to make to the government offices to get an NOC out, of the (newly laid) pot-holed roads which steadily wreck my car, of the clogged drains and overflowing sewers in most localities each time it rains, of the several trips that my father has had to make to the RTO to obtain some basic clearances in a car-sale deal. Of every such instance when I have shrugged, sighed, seethed within, and moved on.

So I stepped out, and crossed the road over to the other end where I suddenly became a miniscule part of a pan-national movement, almost a forest-fire that looks like it won't get appeased in a hurry. I knew that if there was one moment there was to speak out, it was this.

It was a heady concoction of pride, a lump-in-the-throat kind of nationalism, anger, satisfaction at finally raising ones voice against a national malaise, and the sheer joy of belonging...somewhere. What standing there did to me is not difficult to fathom; the crowds and noise do that to me, anyway. I saw my 6-year-old daughter excitedly light up candles along with a few other kids, while my 10-year-old son clutched the water-bottle, looking a bit unsure about how our being there would bring corruption levels down in the country, and played the watchful big responsible brother to his butterfly little sister, alongside.

And then I saw the PCR vans with the cops standing there, helpless at having to be a mute witness to the protest, with pretty much nothing to do, and yet, a lot to do. I saw the abundant patience and politeness with which they were conducting themselves, every single one of them, and I wondered what would be flashing through their minds right then.

And then, just as suddenly as old frustrating memories had come flooding to me in the car of the corrupt state machinery, there was a sudden surge of those many many many other occasions when I had been pleasantly surprised, even taken aback in a nice way, at the efficiency and smoothness with which a job had been done by a government office, with negligible fuss. Of those several occasions when a government servant had gone out of his way to assist me with to the best of his ability. I knew it was time for me to head home.

Not because i had suddenly lost interest in Anna's cause or saw the state machinery with fresh tinted whitewashed eyes, but because I realised that the answers to matters of this gargutuan proportion were far far more complex than my lighting a candle. And just as I knew I had to raise my voice against corruption, I knew I had to do something else...

'Thanks for ensuring a free-flow of regular traffic here, and thanks for making it easy for us. You'll are doing a great job...!' I smiled and said to the policemen standing there as I walked back to my car, got the kids to belt up, and turned on the ignition...

'Take care madam, andhere mein theek se jaaiyega,' said one of them, coming up to my car as it inched its way forward.

On our way home, my kids asked me if I would join the car protest happening tomorrow, starting at the same place.

I didn't reply to that.

Because I still don't know whether I will or I won't.