The tiniest Bhaloo

is what I used to call her as I rocked her in the winter.

Shona with her faithful-and permanently puzzled- Jhumroo

Now that is no longer accurate- I am pretty sure there are a lot of smaller bears around. The basket of  which she once occupied only a quarter has now been flattened into a pancake by her trying to fit into it. She has chewed off the edges now, and sleeps on it- overflowing from all sides.

What I love best about her is that she has so much of Mian and I in her. Mian and Shona tend to be at their snuggliest in the mornings, they have the same expression when they do something they shouldn't be doing. When I was visiting mum this time, I missed one particularly endearing trait they both have.

When I stand and cook, these two tend to potter about in the same room. And every time one of them passes by me, I get a peck. There is nothing in the world as lovely as standing in ones home, cooking for the ones you love, and having them show that this love is reciprocated by little kisses at two different heights depending on the kisser- so that I get some on my face, and some on my knees.

What she gets from me I think is her utter love for our home. Now that we are living with Mian and his students, our visits home tend to take on a festive air. She and I don't quite know what to do, and so we do it all. In Sho's case, it means sitting on her patch of the porch, digging up her bones, chasing the birds, and splashing in the stream. I am embedding a very inadequate video of her reaction when we visited it last. It is sheer joy to see her splash about in the stream..I do hope this video gives some idea of the utter delight that is Shona-Bhaloo.

Living in a city

I did it before, for over a decade. But the last four years have spoiled me.

I am in Delhi now, attending a week-long training program. And this means that I am living nearly the regular city life- wake up, commute, work, commute, get whatever I need to get done after work, try to get back safely, sleep. I don't have a house to look after, but I am still left wondering where my day went. And I quite enjoyed it once. My life has changed me.

And in more ways than one. My not being a city-wallah seems to be written all over my face. What is  it, I wonder. Is it the shopping lust in my eyes that manifests itself as a 500gm bag of coffee, and a 400gm jar of Cuticura*? The DIY fringe? The flyaway hair? Or is it the salwar-kameez worn with hiking boots?

Twice in the last two days I have been confided in by men who knew I would understand their longing for the rural life. One was a auto-driver- father of two, pays Rs.4,000 as rent, saves half that much each month, gets ghee and dals from his village, wants to return there soon.
'You know how it is', he said, 'life is cheaper and easier in the village. But we must think of the children'. Talking of where I was going, he asked,' Have you started service there?'.
No, I told him. It is a training programme.
 'It is good you took an auto the first day. But from tomorrow, you take one of these white mini-vans. You won't be able to afford the auto everyday. Don't worry about me. I will get some passenger or the other.'

And then there was the young man- no family, he said, just a father and mother and brother- who spoke to me of his fields back in Rajasthan. And then refused to let me walk. 'You stand here. It is getting dark now. I will call an auto for you'.

*Cuticura talcum powder that I grew up using! It was discontinued a few years ago, but  it is back! It still smells the same, or nearly so. Sad about the new and hideous bottle. I did so love the old one (shown below)

Home sick

I need home, I have realised. Being with family is the most important thing, of course. But it is not enough for me. I need the actual physical being home. It is hard not to judge myself, not to scold myself and say that I am being greedy.
I came home with a sprained ankle, and with one thing and  another, have only been there a couple of times in the last week and a half. Most of the time, I am at Sonapani. And I don't like it. And I don't know why.
I should be supremely happy here. I am among family and friends, in a  place where I am loved and that I consider another home. The area is stunning with D's carefully planned garden. Even as far as amenities go, the internet works well enough here for me to stream Star Trek episodes, there is running hot water, and I am served the most delicious food.
On the other hand, home is leaking, internet and phone only work sporadically, and food is limited to grains and preserved things.
And I still want to be there. Soon, soon.

Welcomed home

I was away for a month- a bit of work, a bit of visiting family. I got back on a foggy damp day. In the evening, the Himalayas welcomed me home with a spectacular show.Viewing the mountains is extremely rare in the monsoon. And to have it accompanied by unearthly golden light and brooding clouds is truly a gift. I am a lucky woman, I thought.

But this was not the best welcome.

I came in to Sonapani, instead of our home in Chatola. Mian's students are here, and so my wee household had moved here lock, stock and barrel when I was away. When I arrived, they were both busy with important things- Mian was meeting with his students, Shona B was showing her best friend who's boss.

I'll go and rest, I told them, come down when you are free. I turned and started to go down the steps. A noise made me turn around. There they were, my family. Students and play ignored, walking down the steps single-file behind me.

I am an incredibly lucky woman.

No longer in safe custody

I wonder if anyone remembers the note titled 'Every woman should have' that was circulating the internet a couple of years ago. It listed a number of things some of which made sense- like a set of tools, and a reliable recipe for 'company'. I would like to add one thing to that list: a landline.

Shortly, very shortly after I moved to Dehradun I went and got me a phone. I did it myself and acquired a good dose of self-confidence along with the phone connection. I met interesting people along the way, and they helped me feel at home. The broadband connection allowed me to skype with Mian and enabled me to sail through times that would otherwise have been lonely. That phone bill increased my legitimacy and allowed me to open a separate bank account, renew my passport, replace my lost PAN card. In case of a glitch in cellphone connections, I had the landline as a backup. Above all, it was mine. It was a phone connection I had untangled red tape for. It was my claim to responsible citizenship.

And so when I left Dun I was loth to abandon the phone. Despite not knowing where we would be going, and despite the fact that I could always get another, I did not want to let this go. Instead, I ran through bureaucratic  loops once more, and put it  in safe custody- a lovely term for BSNL's holding on to the connection for me.

But it is not working out well. There are no phones where I stay. Getting them to lay a line will take more energy than I have. And today, I started the process of terminating my phone connection by applying that it be taken out of safe custody.

It has been nine months since I left Dun. The hard, nearly homeless, cold days are over. Now we have a home, furniture, a garden, a dog even. I have two cell connections and a data card that allows  me to be connected no matter where I am. I am glad to stop paying every month for a phone that I do not use, and do not see any way to begin using.

Why then, do I feel bereft?

One of those who watch

Shona-Bhaloo with best friend Rambo in the background. He trotted over that day for a self-planned play date.
Sho, of course, was extremely happy.

What Shona and I gaze at most evenings.

The Wedge-tailed Green Pigeon. Stunningly beautiful. These are distinguishable from the Pompadour because only the male has the red blush on his wings. What I find most enthralling is the orange glow at the throat.They come every evening to a tree with berries on it and fill the air with their cooing. Yesterday, a pair flew to the lemon tree and posed for us. How could I not obey?

And for those of you who  remember my camera-less state, the Mian changed all that. I now have a gorgeous machine whose standards I need to educate myself to!

What is wrong with these men?

Imagine this. A well-lit and fully occupied bus traveling down the highway. The driver's love for music has created all the passengers to realize that they will not be able to sleep this night. A woman is traveling. She is galloping towards her forties,and her grey hairs attest to this. She sports a mangalsutra, and the rest of her outfit is frumpy enough to cause her concern at times. She is confident and assured. Sitting next to her is a man in his fifties. He is traveling for work, and has spoken on the phone of wanting to get back to his family. He has ingested nothing but water throughout the journey. A safe enough scene. No victims,no perpetrators that leap out.

In the middle of the night, the man tries the old surreptitiously-stroking-with-extended-fingers.

Seriously? Did he think I would not notice? Did he think that I would be too intimidated to protest? Or, I shudder to think, did he think I would welcome it? Perhaps he thought that I would not have seen the trick before. Perhaps he thought he was the first man  ever to think of it, and did not know that every woman in the subcontinent has experienced it a dozen times.

These men should know that we have perfected our 'strategically-poised-thumbnail' trick.

Go ahead and lust after every woman you see. Go ahead and think you are God's gift to the world. But do yourself a favour and don't underestimate our intelligence.

Burning mountains

I am sitting here on the porch anxiously waiting for Mian to return. It has been two hours since he went off to fight a forest fire. I know there are other people around, I know that two hours is nothing when it comes to fire, I know Mian is a careful and responsible man, but still I worry.

The fire as it was last night. See how it is restricted to the top of the ridge

But back to the fires. The hills around us have been burning for the last several days. Some set accidentally, some 'controlled fires' that weren't, and some lit by embers from other fires.

And still we are lucky. In most areas, forest fires are a sort of Somebody Else's Problem. The villagers believe that it is the forest department's job (which, one may argue, it is) while the forest department has no personnel, equipment, or funds  for anything other than painting 'prevent fire' hoardings (which is also true). The area we live in is different. Right now, there are about 20-30 people trying to control the fire I see in front of me.

Methods for fire prevention are primitive, to put it kindly. A bunch of people go to where the forest is, and stand there in the heat and smoke. Using branches, they beat out embers and the advancing flames. Other people use rakes, sticks, and their bare hands to clear away enough litter to create a sizeable fire line. Their hands and faces are blackened, they inhale smoke, and are cut by thorns. It is hot, thankless work. And so not surprising, perhaps that people don't go to put fires out.


Except here.

The forest fire as it is now, at 5:30 pm. It is daylight, but smoke covers the valley, and I can hear the crackle as it burns

If here, people tend to run towards a fire rather than away from it, it is thanks to the wonderful people at Sonapani. These people have taken it  upon themselves to protect the forest they love. Since the area started burning, they have been out there with rakes and determination. And they do not restrict themselves to the fires that threaten them. The last marathon 18-hour fight was for a forest across the valley. Today, they are here with the Chatola villagers. Bless them.

Of furniture

I wonder if anyone remembers Champak magazine. If you have never heard the name before, you haven't missed much. It was a children's periodical (perhaps monthly?) and extremely shoddy. The language was bad, the illustrations badly-drawn, and the humour crude. The type of magazine, in fact, of which we would smirk 'humph, North Indian' as if that explained it all.

Hungry for reading matter, my sis and I would still occasionally  buy it. And one of those stories stuck in my mind. It was a tale of a chronically messy boy who was unable to clean his room. He just did not know where to start. One day, his mother gave him a vase of sunflowers. He couldn't bear to keep them on a messy table, and so cleared the top. This necessitated clearing the drawers, which required him to tidy the closet, and so on till finally, the boy stared wonderingly at a gleaming room.

Something of the sort happened to me  yesterday. The carpenters finished their work, and left me looking at three tables, two chairs and two shelves. The shelves called out for a vase of flowers, which called out for tidily arranged spice jars, which needed a clean space for the other vessels, and so on.

At the end of it, I stared wonderingly at a gleaming room. The kitchen appliances shone. In the center of the room stood a table with two chairs drawn up to it. A cloth had been spread on it and a teapot squatted in the centre. The light streamed in from the window next to the stove and created a bright orange square where Shona sat. The rose on the shelf glowed like a jewel.

I looked at it and burst into tears.

A table is so little to ask for. And it has taken us since November to get it. All winter, we have been squatting on the floor, or on camp stools. We have been cooking and prepping food on a stack of suitcases, or on the stone wall near the patio.

It seems like we are making a big deal of furniture. But think of all that it means. It means cooking side by side in comfort. It means a workspace where we can put books and papers without things sliding off our laps. It means goodbye to that incessant pain in my lower back. Above all, it means meals with grace. It means no more balancing plates on our laps and guarding food from the dog. It means a table laid for dinner. It means candles, and flowers, and conversation, and laughter.

It might have taken us since November. But it is worth it.

To-do lists, love and a wee bit of jealousy

Mian returns in a fortnight, and this means that I get into a little flurry of getting things done before he comes.

 He protests mightily at this of course.   'We should do it together' he says. 'I don't want you to think that you need to make things ready before I come' he insists. I shrug and go on with my happy plans of surprising him when he gets here. Some of these plans are laudable, designed to make his life a little easier- like making tables. Some plans lean more towards hiding evidence of misdeeds- like cleaning up oven splatters. Whatever they are, they are done for love of the man.

Which is why I was touched to realize that G had such a list too. He has been excited about getting the external wall plastered and coated with a lime wash. I am in the middle of my all-too-frequent cash flow hiccups.

'We can do it later', I told him.

'No' he asserted, 'before Saheb comes.'

I recognised that urgency all too well. 'My Saheb' I snarled- almost.

Plastering walls is fine. But if  G's to-do list includes a pedicure, my wifely antennae are going to start tingling.

Absolutely Cuckoo*

One morning, Mian received a text message from me, 'I think I am going out of my mind..a bird just miaowed at me.'

It happened like this. Shona and I were pottering around the garden when we heard a plaintive miaowing. Shona and I both hunted for the cat, but couldn't find it. We both stood under a tree that had seemed to be where the sound was coming from, and looked at each other. And then we heard it again, directly above us.

We looked up and an a jay looked back at us. It opened its beak and miaowed. It was at this point that I yelped, Shona whimpered and we scampered back home. I checked the bird book, and there was no mention of miaows..the bird is supposed to screech. It is at this point that I messaged Mian.

I am glad Shona B was there, because else I would have seriously thought the mountains were addling my brain. As it is, when G came around, Shona and I  nonchalantly brought the conversation around to ornithology.

'Lots of birds now' I said.
'hmm' said he
' Some that I haven't seen before.'
'perhaps'
'The bird calls are different here too'
'Duh'
Taking my courage in my hands, 'In fact, today I heard one that sounded like a cat'
This time he looked up, relief flooding his face 'So you heard it too! yes, there is one that miaows.'

I am sane. Or atleast, no crazier than before I moved here.

* The title? How could I resist? Magnetic fields, and well worth a listen.

A most decadent day

By Pahari standards, at least. Shona and I spent a grand total of 50 rs between us, and felt like two pampered princesses at the end of it.

It all began when I made dinner for the little one and realized that I was out of rice, and out of cash to replenish supplies with.  

So the next morning, I fed the pup her breakfast and went off to Mukteshwar which is where the nearest ATM is. I had only done this walk once before, and that was with my Mian. In my minds eye, I saw it as being long and ardous, and so had decided to make a day of it.

It wasn't bad at all, we reached in only 1.5 hours. And we had started early, so the walk was when the birds were still active.Its spring, and the walk was wonderfully fragrant. It surprises me how close the plant life here is  to the Pacific Northwest. A lot of the flowers I passed, I had first seen in the Olympic National Park. Buttercups, ox-eye daisies, wild roses..The last especially were wonderfully fragrant. This monsoon, I plan on getting cuttings and planting them where they will ramble over the walls of our house.

But to go on, we walked up to Mukteshwar through the forest with me looking at the butterflies and Shona hunting them. Once I was done with the ATM and the bank, a most wondrous thing happened as far as the little one was concerned. We shared an omlette between us, and I had some chai. Spicy, salted meals come very rarely in the pup's life, and she went into transports of delight. After she was done and as I sat sipping my chai, she turned her bowl over to lick the underside-in case some egg reached there by osmosis. 'The pup's never been fed' I could feel the passersby thinking.

On our way back home, I stopped where a rock juts out over a cliff. We sat down, and I pulled out a second surprise for the pup- grapes! Grapes are possibly the only thing the pup loves over a  bone..she was so excited to see what was in the bag that she actually fell over. That was the highlight of my day..sitting there on a cliff and sharing grapes with scrupulous fairness.

And then when we got home, we napped..and the little one woke to a belly rub. Spoilt pup? maybe a wee bit.

I miss Dehradun

In many ways, I am living a childhood fantasy. Its quite incredible in a 'connecticut yankee..' sort of way. After all, how many children do grow up to be astronauts or royalty-trapped-in-a-tower?

But I miss Dehradun

And this was driven home to me during a visit this week. Some aspects of it I still don't like- the 'might rules' attitude, the xenophobia..but, but..

You see, I shared my dehra with the people I came to love.

The fruit-seller who was so happy to see me, he insisted i sit down with him and eat some grapes. The old man who is now senile, but still recognized me and managed to convey it. The colleagues who made rice and brought my favourite foods in their tiffins. The little girl who spent all  the previous day making a drawing and mounting it on cardboard for me and Mian. The little boy who thought I am moving back and was overjoyed till he learnt the truth. The only slightly older boy who couldn't stop talking and remembering the last time he had been home. The friend who drove out of her way to meet me for fifteen minutes. The families who took me into their homes and fed me and entertained me. The woman who nearly burst into tears when she saw me.  The colleague who bumped into me 'accidentally on purpose' and proceeded to tell me of a land dispute- he knew I couldn't help, but 'I can't tell anyone else', he said.

And this is the gist of it. Somehow, I touched lives there..I realised this week that just as they were part of my life, I was part of theirs too. And I miss that. And I hate that this seems to be one more instance of my unreliability. I will be back, I promised them as I left. More than for them, the promise was for myself.

 

Close, too close

Finally able to share, and thrilled about it.

What would Lemos Teacher say?

Mian and I both dread the days when a button comes off his shirt. That is when something primordial rises up in me and despite the fact that he is better with a needle and thread than I am, drives me to say, 'I'll do that! No, really. I can do it,  honest. It's easy as pie!' Being the gentleman that he is, Mian refrains from pointing out that I can't bake a pie either and hands over the shirt. If the shirt is lucky, I forget about it. An unlucky shirt gets mangled beyond rescue and handed back to its owner with the promise, 'I'll buy you another one. Honest.'

And this is despite Lemos teacher. In the fourth standard, we were taught the basics of sewing. In that entire school, she was perhaps the only teacher who saw being left-handed not as a sign of moral depravity, but as a reason for extra effort on her part. And so she picked up the needle in her left hand, and slowly, painstakingly, pricking herself all the while, taught me to hem and sew on buttons. Her return on investment was dismal.

All this  is to justify my unrestrained pride in this:

 Made all by my own self with half a pair of old jeans and bits of an older kurta!
Which brings us to the question I asked earlier. Would she grimace at the unfinished edges, or be pleased with the frugality of the project?

Eye candy

In lieu of words, images  of the little one working it  for the camera.

She's grown, hasn't she?

Upper class travel

Not sure if this post will be anything close to coherent. The story begins with my first 'phoren' trip- which was also maybe my 2nd or 3rd flight ever. As things go, my connecting flight was delayed by 24 hours, which meant that I needed to spend a day and a night at the Frankfurt airport. Incredibly crowded it was, and I was desperate to sleep. I wandered about till I came to a room that was miraculously vacant. There were loungers, remarkably clean and empty toilets, and a sense of peace. I sponge-bathed and lay down to sleep congratulating myself on finding a decent spot no one else had found yet.

It was much much later that I realised that I had probably gate-crashed into the business lounge. The Indian Railways have a similar and even more complex hierarchy. there are separate waiting rooms for 'sleeper general', 'sleeper women', 'general', 'AC', 'AC women', and in atleast one station a separate one for 2AC and higher.

The delhi metro might be alternately lauded and criticised. One thing is pukka, though. It is totally, unabashedly democratic. A couple of days ago, I watched as what seemed like an entire village helped a gramdma use the escalator. She was triumphant as she stepped off it. 'That was the first time', she informed everyone. 'A couple of more times, and it will be nothing'.

What do I want to say with this post? I am not entirely sure. Maybe I just want to convey the pleasure I felt when she triumphantly stepped off the escalator. Maybe my sense of empathy with her as she found herself out of her element, but coping all the same. I don't know

Just drag her along

The day before yesterday, the little pup-let went off her food- an event sufficiently unusual to provoke a flurry of texts between me and my mian. She also threw up a pellet of animal hair- proof of a 'meal' she illicitly had when she had run away the day before.

When I called the vet however, he didnt want to take any chances and asked me to bring her up to the roadhead. 18 hours without food is a long time for a 5-kg pup, and she was too weak to manage the 45 minute trek uphill. And so I hoisted her up on my shoulders.

This caused a great deal of comment, and I needed to explain to all I passed,"This is usually her favourite walk. But she is ill, and can't do it. I'm taking her to the vet." In most cases, the response was a cluck, and wishes that she would get well soon.

 Until I met a man who said, "so what? drag her along." I looked at the trusting eyes of the little patient as she lay on my shoulders, and felt horrible about that remark.

My sadness was defused pretty soon though, when I realised that she has more friends here than I do. Little children darted away from their mothers to say hello to Shona- who they knew by name. Later that day, G came runnning down because he had been told that I had taken Shona to the vet. And in the evening, Mian told me that the villagers of Sitla were asking how she was.

 Clearly, Mr.Drag-her-along was a stranger around these parts.

The ghosts in our house

The house that is now ours is full of stories of the people who lived there before us.
There's Kaki, to whom the house belonged and who I always suspect has a soft corner for my Mian-who she calls her Panditji. There are their relatives, visitors, and the several people who worked on this land.

But the stories I hear most often are of the couple who rented before us. I hear of their ambitous garden, of how they imported the compost all the way from Pant Nagar, of how they were scared of the rural setting, of how they lit up the orchard every night to scare the darkness everyday.
And I don't just hear the stories, they crop up in our lives. They planted sunflowers, and gladioli, and lilies- all of which are now naturalised here. They erected a creaky bird feeder which scared the birds and that I now -in a most prosaic fashion- dry laundry on. They read Mills and Boons, and I now dip into the two books they left behind. They began to painstakingly stencil the walls of their house before giving up and laughingly painting a huge flower on a part of the last wall they worked on.

And this makes me wonder about the stories we are creating. Our black thumbs, the solar cooker, the way we take our trash all the way to Haldwani, these things will perhaps be talked about. But I hope that somewhere in those stories is also mention of our coffee mornings, of how Mian and I stand on the porch wrapped around each other and look at the sky. I hope their are stories of how he brings the water and does all the heavy work. I hope there are stories of the meals we make, of our little Bhaloo. I do hope that some of this joy lingers in the house.

Splash!

It was a freezing cold day on the Ganga. Despite the sun having risen nearly 4 hours ago, the clouds did not allow it to warm the earth. The two oarsmen were relatively warm, the remaining four of us sat rolled up in our sleeping bags thinking dark thoughts of the day we had volunteered for this jaunt.

Because of the clamminess of the day, the river was deserted. No boats, farmers, fishermen or even dolphins. We hunkered down in our woolens to prevent our noses from freezing.

That's when I heard laughter. We looked incredulously at two young girls as they stood in the water. They were fully dressed, but the floral salwar-kameezes were thoroughly soaked. One of them was washing her hair, the other was not up to anything that lady-like.

As we watched, she ran down the slope to the river and without a pause jumped in. Watching her swim strongly out away from the bank I was taken back to my childhood. My sis and I, we were not the sporting types ever. But the one thing we did, did often, and loved to do was swim. She taught me all I know of swimming.

As I watched the girl swim in the Ganga as her sister bathed, I was envious for a moment. That envy was overtaken by pity, though. Not one of my childhood memories has either me or my sis standing on the banks while the other swam. With us it was always a double splash!

I don't do justice to a swimsuit, I don't have technique, and I can't dive to the bottom of a water body. But thanks to my sis, I can swim, and delight in it.

Going to school

'Shonaaaaa' they shout from the top of the hill. And Shona immediately runs up the hill to greet the students on their way to school. They run down together, I gather up the furry scamp near our house, and wave good bye to the others.

Till one day when the littlest girl of the lot nudged her brother. 'Well' she said, 'aren't you going to ask her?'
'Ask me what?'
'Will you tutor us? in English and Maths?'

Uh oh. Here we go again.

Only this time, it is even more challenging. Instead of just one little girl, I also have her two brothers to teach. Instead of just struggling to teach english to a hindi-speaker, I now have to teach maths- in Hindi. I opened one of their maths textbooks, and realised that there is no way I can do it. I cannot understand half the terms, and certainly cannot teach them.

They won't take no for an answer, though. 'In March', I promised. I am very nervous.

I am also humbled by the efforts these children take to get an education. I complained in the last post about the walk I need to take to the top of the hill facing ours for a strong internet connection, about the walk I need to do once or twice a week. These children go to that ridge, and then down to the other side every single day. And for what, I wonder.

What is this walk of 4 steep kilometers going to actually give them? Really, truly give them? A 10th standard certificate. And what is that? A stepping stone to a 'better life', where the better life means going away from the land they love, toiling throughout their lives and coming back as strangers. At the same time, I am the last person to say that literacy is not vital. Homeschooling is not an option where these children are first-generation learners. They clearly need to read, write, and calculate if they are not to be hoodwinked by everyone. But that is not all they need. They need to learn science, ethics, natural history. They need to learn how to use what they have learnt, to take science beyond the textbooks. And this the school does not teach them. Is it futile then, this walking to school? Is it necessary? Is there a better way?

I don't know. And next week onwards, these three come to me to fill some of the gaps in their learning. I am extremely nervous

A wee bit cold (again)

The day before yesterday was a day of hailstorms.A day when going out was not something to look forward to. So cold and hailstorm-y infact, that I had to cancel a skype meeting I had. The connection between the two? Well, the thing is that to access the reliable internet that one needs for online phone conversations, I need to go to Sonapani. A 2-km trek which would not be so bad if 3/4ths of it was not vertical. And not something I wanted to do with hail, a pup, and a leopard who snacks on pups on the route. I wish my colleagues would understand that, though. It seems that everytime I set up an online meeting, the weather gods grease up their cannons. I realise my colleagues' frustration, I feel it too. But this is a choice I have made.

And very often, that choice is amply rewarded.

I woke up to this yesterday. I photographed our dishwashing sink because the frost was most clear on the coffee cup, but every leaf had its rim of ice, every stone had a starry pattern on it. I had filled the kadhai with water to soak, it was solid. The first time that has happened. I am used to a thick crust of ice, but frozen solid? the first time. Shona and I had fun licking a kadhai-shaped ice-candy. Mian declared the two of us nuts.

And by the way, not a bad view for a sink, eh?

The miraculous Ganga water

What surprised me was not how dirty it was, but the reverse. Yes, at Allahabad where we got into the boat the water was atrociously, heart breakingly filthy. The first day that we were floating down, we passed what I took to be decomposing marigolds. It is only when we came close to them that I realised that they were decomposing feces. Thankfully, that stomach-turning moment was the lowest I got. After that, things rapidly got better. From the second day, the water was turbid, true, but naturally so. It was no longer 'fragrant' and for that we were glad.
On the second day, the Tamsa joined the Ganga vastly increasing its volume and its cleanliness. After that, things were pleasant indeed. DM and I took it in turns to occupy the coveted position in the extreme rear of the boat. Here we sat, exposed to the elements, one hand occasionally trailing in the water with a sharp eye out for wildlife.
We saw the Ganga in many moods, with the weather changing nearly every day. The one that is most vividly in my mind, is the day the Tamsa joined us. The sun was out, and the colours incredibly vivid. The broad ink-blue of the Ganga was bordered by a deep rust earthen wall. Beyond were mustard fields in blossom.
Beautiful day, lucky us.

Not Enough

This has been my continual refrain over the last month. And I hate it, because this continuous complaining is not me, or so I tell myself. But so it has been.
It started with the cold wave. This drastically limited my internet access to 15 shivering minutes a day, if that. How, you ask? well..we only have access to the internet on the north-east corner of our porch- the one that directly faces the Himalaya. This is also the corner most exposed to a piercing wind that seemed to blow down all the way from Nepal, carrying hail and snow with it. I could not sit there for any length of time, and so it is not till Mian and I finally ran away to the south that I learnt that there was talk of declaring the cold wave as a national disaster.
But not enough heat. Not enough electricity (the storms blew out power). Not enough space. And when we went to the south, to warm sun and warmer family, not enough time. Not enough time to visit, to talk of all that we wanted to share, to cook. Not enough time to see all that we wanted to. Not enough time to work. And in trying to do it all, I ended up making noone happy.
But now we are back. It is still winter, but the miserable cold has gone. Things are slightly easier. And this little bundle that we left behind when we went to the south is back with us-Shona Bhaloo, the centre of our world.

Soon, it will be spring.

I have never stolen anything that was actually being worshipped at the time

No, this is not my defense for stealing a boat. My comrades- DV and DM- lawfully rented the boat that took us from Allahabad to Varanasi.
The sentence is perhaps the most interesting thing I heard during the Ganga trip. We were visiting a very nice and hospitable gentleman when he said that.
But he was not the only interesting person we met. There was a young girl at Dumdumma, where we spent the first night. Educated in a NTPC colony, she moved back to her village when her father retired to discover that she did not belong to it anymore. She spoke English with us, watched as we packed our tents to leave- something she so badly wanted to do too- and did not let go of DM's hand as he stepped into the boat to leave.
There was Mr.R, who managed a toll bridge at Mahewa, and had been managing one since 1969. We told him of what an important job it was, but all he could repeat was that 'he had never been capable of getting a government job.'
The boatmen, who warrant a post of their very own.
The Os, with their gracious hospitality and their colonial lifestyle.
And of course, the three of us. Three very different people, very different backgrounds, very different reasons for doing this trip, and on one little boat for 7 days. Miraculously, we not only came out of it without tossing anyone overboard, but we actually ended up being friends.
And now we are each back, in our homes.

Vintage travel

I was travelling last week, and am off tomorrow for ten days. I will be taking baby steps along the same paths where some of my heroes strode. First visiting some mountains (THE mountains, the Himalayas) and then a river (THE river, the Ganga) . A bit of work, a lot of play.

The Ganga visit is utterly fascinating. Three strangers, of whom I am one, plan to buy/hire/steal a rowboat and paddle from Allahabad to Varanasi (150 kms, 2 hours by road, 5 days by boat). Only one of these three knows his/her way around a boat. We plan to take it slow, with the journey being far more important than the destination.

We will camp on the river islands, watch the sunset turn the river to gold. We will wake in time to see the sun's rays chase away the wraith-like tendrils of fog that rise from the water. At times, the river will be blanketed by flocks of migratory birds. We will pass different time zones. Some places, the banks will lined with forts that were once impenetrable but now are crumbling into the river. The next minute, we might pass groups of children exulting in the water they live by. While I expect to learn a lot more about myself and about my companions in these six days than about the people along the river, we will be treated to an ever-changing but eternal landscape.

And I will be doing all this without a camera. A grain of sand, nothing more, that my camera happened to swallow and this will challenge me more than the bed of the Ganga herself. I was pretty upset, as you can imagine.

But not any more. Think about it. The great travellers I grew up reading- the heroes I mentioned earlier- have not only  painted impressive images of the places they visited, but also of the flavour of their experiences. Their words and descriptions are with me wherever I go, adding to the pleasure of what I see. I greet some landscapes with the joy one reserves for meeting old friends, because that is what they are- I know these areas intimately through these books. The necessity of photographs? It's all maya.

I will see you around Christmas, then. With stories and sketches.

Of kitchens and cake baking

Today a friend and I baked a cake in the Sonapani kitchen. 'Because the students are coming', I explained. S and the staff grinned- they knew as well as I did that it was Mian's return that spurred my baking, not that of his brood.

It's an easy cake recipe and one that is complicated in the memories it brings up. My mum, my sis and I have been baking this cake always. It's a Thangam Phillip recipe, out of the book that we always turned to. The book carried evidence of the love we had showered on it..it was besmeared with masala and batter, dog eared, falling apart, and stuffed with handwritten recipes. That finally fell apart, and now I have the second generation copy. It too, is fragrant with all I have cooked from it. It too, has Amma's notes, written in her voluptous kannada-inspired handwriting.

I no longer need the book to make this cake with. What I do need is something to stop me from crying with missing my childhood and the many other times we have made this cake. My mum, my sis and I have made it in our old sawantwadi house, in the circular Bajaj oven that did not have a thermostat. We have made it happily for birthdays, and sadly for Acca to take to her college with her. We made it in Pune, in our spanking new OTG, again a Bajaj. I have made it super-sweet for a little baby who did not appreciate bitter chocolate yet. I've made it for a crush who called it 'captivating chicu's chocolatey chocolate cake'. I made it for Mian when he was not my Mian yet. I made it today to welcome him back after a week away. And I always miss my mum  and my sis when I make it.

But here is the recipe.
Ingredients:
1 cup maida
1 cup cocoa
1 cup butter
1 cup (or a little less) powdered sugar
1 pinch salt
4 eggs (3 if large)
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla (or rum, or coffee)

Method:
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.
Sift the flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt together. Three times, and with the sieve 10 cm above the plate, my mum would insist.
Cream the butter and sugar together till very, very light and fluffy. The more, the better, Amma says.
Then add the eggs one by one, whisking after each addition. If it curdles, add a tbs of the dry mixture, she said while she rescued the cake. 
Then gently fold in the dry mix, moving in one direction only.
Add a little milk if it seems dry. It should look like dosa batter.
Pour into a buttered and floured cake pan. Bake for 30 mins or till done. Don't check for done-ness too often, it lets the cold air in.
Never in the last 30 years have the three of us been able to let a cake cool unmolested for long enough to ice it. If you are more disciplined than we are, good for you!

Come, eat

I was reminded of this phrase 'basaa jewayala (come, eat)' when I travelled back home yesterday.

If you come across a person eating in rural India, expect to hear this phrase. The person might be a stranger, it does not matter, you will be invited anyway. The meal might be barely enough for one person, but it will still be offered to you. In most cases, this is an instinctive invitation and the expected response is a polite, 'please continue.' But if you are hungry and accept, the food will be shared gladly and with real pleasure.

This is something I love about India. There is always enough to share. 

This point was driven home to me a few times over the last couple of weeks. I was travelling back home with some students, and we were four to a seat. 'Will we fit in?' they asked me worriedly. 'Oh yes', I said. 'There are more coming' the driver said. And yes, we all fit in. And we picked up some more on the way. We sat on each other's laps, scrunched up tight, and there was plenty of room.

The bus I took home yesterday. I was holding on to the overhead bar, but knew that I didn't need to. Propped up by the many people around me, it is very unlikely that I could have fallen..I could barely breathe. And we still stopped every time someone hailed the bus. No one complained. On the contrary, people encouraged the driver to stop and take in more people. 'Squeeze in, there are children ahead'. 'Poor things, they are office-wallahs and this is the last bus home.' There was always room. 

So the next time I see a dangerously overloaded bus, I will not think of poverty, but of richness. We might not have a seat in the bus, but we can spare some stranger a long walk. We might have a roti for lunch, but we can still take the edge off someone else's hunger. There's always enough to share.

Winter and new beginnings

I have been rushing about various villages in the area recently. The thing that strikes me most is how wrong appearances can be. Over and over again, I am reminded of my one rule: Never underestimate anyone.

The old, traditionally dressed, illiterate grandmother turns out to be the manager of a micro-finance account worth Rs.80,000/-. The mouse-like assistant at the community health centre is the only one I met who is utterly confident of the vigour of panchayati raj institutions.

And the gardener in me notices with astonishment that what she had first considered to be the season of endings is burgeoning with new life. It is winter, and we are headed into the coldest bit.

But. Every village is teeming with new life. Winter wheat eagerly shakes off the shelter of the warm soil.Baby goats and calves are taking their first wobbly steps- or soaking in some sun.

While less momentous in the grand scheme of things, I have a new beginning too.
I will be writing of our homesteading efforts in a new blog. The blog, as does our home, requires a lot of tweaking. But I am excited to share it with you, and perfection is overrated. Isn't it?



The buffalo calf? photo taken by the Mian

The Mansion

When I got off at the Pul Bangash metro station (which thanks to Kavita and Unmana I know got its name from the when the Bangash tribe settled near a bridge) that I glanced out of the station and saw this tower.

I thought it was a church and walked out to see it. Its not.

It is the Roshanara mansion, and that is all I could find out about it. I would love to know when it was built and by whom. But while I don't have any factual information about it, I know this: its residents are warm and friendly folk.

I walked in the approximate direction of the tower, and found myself in a narrow road with high walls on either side. I stood there, craning my neck to catch a glimpse of that lovely iron dome when a young policeman came along and raised an eyebrow at me.

I saw a lovely tower, I told him, and I came looking for it. Is it a church? Would he know where it is?
That was no church, he told me, and instructed me to follow him. He turned into a narrow opening in the wall and up a steep flight of stairs.

And there I was, inside Roshanara Mansion. looking at a beautiful weather vane over a set of roofs. The building is now divided up into several small apartments, of maybe one or two small rooms each. I was ooh-ing over the weather vane when a woman came out of one of these apartments. We got to chatting, and it ended with her inviting me over for tea.

I am not sure if I would do that if I found a stranger gawking at my house- I hope I would.

Walking in Roshanara Bagh ,Old Delhi

It was when I was idly looking at my Delhi map (available free at tourism offices and the airport) that I saw a green patch labelled Roshanara Bagh.

Roshanara Bagh!

Built by Shah Jahans beautiful, talented and ruthless younger daughter, this eponymous garden is where she both relaxed and carried out her schemes. It is here that she came with a procession of richly decorated elephants to while away the hot summer months. Set in the dry and dusty plains of the Yamuna, the garden must have had all the cool sparkle of an emerald.

Despite reading about it in the 'City of Djinns', I was astounded that it still existed. On a  map. With a metro stop close by.

And so it is that I and a camera hopped on the Red line to the Pul Bangash metro station. I wish I knew how the area got its name, because it sounds like there is a story behind it. All I could find is that Bangash is the name of a Pashtun tribe, but nothing about a Mr.Pul.

I got there and tugged the sleeve of the first cycle rickshaw-wallah I could find. 'Can you take me there?' and for 20Rs, he did.

The garden might be a little dusty today, but since both the garden and its surroundings have degenerated with time, it still offers respite.

Its located off a busy circle on Roshanara road, and once you get in, the traffic seems far away. There are some horrible new additions (the 'sports maidan' gate, for instance), but if you squint, the old garden is still visible.

The structure of the garden, with its symmetrical partitions reminds you of its mughal origins. The cycas trees have not grown much since Roshanara last conversed with her spies. The mulberry tree might then have been a seed dropped by a bird.

The visitors have changed. There are cricket playing boys now. Families with stainless steel tiffins relax under the trees.

The residents have not changed much. Squirrels and mynahs and mongooses and hawks. They interrupted picnics then, and do so now.

A meeting in Delhi

from which I came away confused and a little sad. It wasn't so much the results of the meeting that made me react this way. It was the composition of the attendees. You see, back in 1999- when I attended my first work meeting, I was the only woman present. And my primary role there was to take minutes and hand my boss the appropriate files. But that was the construction industry, and that was the last century.

When I joined the NGO sector, I reasoned that things could only become better. And on the face of it, they were. There were more women present, but the great majority (myself included) were there to assist their bosses. They- and I- were the ones who did the implementation, but when it came to strategy, our male bosses handled it. Still, atleast 30% of the attendees were women, and I looked forward to all of us growing up and taking a greater part in strategy and planning.

Last week, I was the only woman at the meeting. Or so I thought till I looked behind me and saw a cluster of women sitting behind- away from the table despite there being plenty of vacant seats. They were research students, and had done the work that was being presented- by someone else. And it is ok, they were students, they were learning.

But why was I the only woman at the table? Where are my colleagues? I heartily support women's decision to work from home, to opt out of the rat race altogether. Mian and I too, have made a similar decision. And that is good..I strongly believe in shaping our lives to yield the highest amount of happiness possible- atleast till someone gives me concrete proof of reincarnation.

But I wonder about the role models these women- future scientists- have. The male students were at the table..why were the women not? Is this decision- the one most women of my generation made- responsible? But is it worthwhile to sacrifice my quality of life for some nebulous role-setting?

 I don't know. I wish I did.

On a different, but maybe related note, here is a picture I clicked of a toilet in Mussoorie. Stereotyping at its finest.

The house at Chatola

This is a long story that begins with a couple of other stories.

 One of my favourite school memories is that of my mum going into the garden at dawn to pick roses so I could take them to a teacher I had a crush on. These were no ordinary roses either; the Prince Edward is my favourite rose. Its short flowering season and leggy appearance mean that it is largely used these days as a stock rose, if it is planted at all. However, for sheer rose-ish-ness, it is difficult to beat. A voluptuous shape, deep pink colour, and a concentrated ittar aroma mean it has all that defines ‘rose’. I love this, and my mum and I have tried with varying success to grow this wherever we have lived.

And persimmons. The first time I ate one was in Seattle. After I learned the hard way that they are supposed to be eaten when squishy, I fell in love with the silky honeyed flesh. A year after I moved to Dun, I found and ate them again. Then I missed the next season. So yes, I have eaten them twice. I was excited to move to the hills because we have friends here who have a persimmon tree, and I might maybe, perhaps, hopefully, be able to beg a couple off them.

And now the main story.


A couple of days back, Mian and I arranged to meet at a house that we could possibly rent. We were sold on the fact that it is a traditional-style house(!) in an apple orchard (!), but there were a lot of things to be considered before we could allow our hopes to rise. I went there then, and not knowing where the entrance was, left the path and climbed up the hill once I saw the house. 30 seconds of scrambling, and as I came on to flat land, I found myself eye to eye with a stunning Edward Rose. ‘Home’ I thought, but did not dare to voice it.

Mian came along, and with increasing excitement we checked out the internet connectivity (it works!), the bathroom (the most modern thing in the valley), and the kitchen( adequate with a wee bit of work). Then we noted the more important things: a patio which gets the sun (soon to have raised herb beds , pots of lavender, a solar cooker, and comfy seating), a fireplace in every room (calling out for a rug and scrabble and glasses of amber liquid), wooden flooring, a singing stream, a wee view of the high Himalaya, a room for the goats and mushrooms we hope to have.

And then we discovered the four heavily-laden persimmon trees.

Home.

Almost there

I hate to start a post with an apology, but sometimes that's how it is.

I haven't posted for a while, and that's because I haven't been settled enough to do it. We have been travelling, and  my internet connection has been set up anew each day( usually by my patient Mian) and held in place with thread and willpower.

But today I am sitting at my own computer, with a working (touch wood) modem. Today, I am living what I had dreamt about when I first mentioned moving- sitting in a garden, writing, looking at the mountains, and waiting for my Mian to walk home to me. Life is good.

We are not home yet..we are still looking for a place to make our own. But for the next 10 weeks, we are living in paradise with friends. And it is good.

In which Mian and Chicu move house

We are off..
Finally, it seems like.
Too soon, I think the next moment.
But most of the packing is done. We are planning meals on what needs to be eaten up. We finished the open bottle of vodka last night. The phone is 'put in safe custody' as the BSNL chaps call it.
Stories are there, and will come soon. But not when I see unpacked stuff patiently waiting for me.
Soon, soon.

Jageshwar

I am short of words today, so this will be a picture-heavy post. But it doesn't really matter. Because Jageshwar tends to rob one of words. When my colleagues and I visited, we quietly walked among the trees and the temples. So in a way, you are getting the authentic experience.

I, ?

When I was in the 11th standard, my sis had just moved to Pune as a new bride and mother. She would send me clothes from the Big City, and once mentioned feeling out of place in a store. At that age, I could not picture the child on her hip, her being tired after a full day, and with the day's stains on her clothes any more than I could imagine the effect of these on her. I knew she was still my spunky & chic sister, how could she be out of place in a department store?

And then, like other things, I learnt this too. These days, I guess that I look like..well, like what I am. A conservatively and unimaginatively dressed , sometimes frumpy, sometimes frazzled woman. I generally wear a salwar-kameez, always crumpled and generally faded. My hair is gathered in a ponytail, and the escaped bits stick straight out. I wear glasses, flat sandals and no makeup. This means that if I ever enter anything other than a grocery store, I am looked down upon. Trendy salespersons correcting my pronunciation and assuming I can't afford what I am looking at happens pretty often, and I don't mind it. I was a salesperson once, and had made the same mistake. 'Paying for my sins,' I think and move on.

The other day, I entered an 'adventure goods' store in Dun to look at camping stoves. The other (male and six feet tall) customers had clearly just come off a cliff, clad as they were in mountain gear-from the shoes to the hat. When an overweight salwar-kameez clad woman with vegetables sticking out of her bag entered and asked to look at 'um..camping stoves..something that runs on butane, perhaps?', he came to a very understandable conclusion. 'Gas stoves are down the road' he said, pointing to the household goods section of the market.

Ouch. Considering that this is my favourite photo of myself:

Not a nice place to be

Pantnagar, Uttarakhand.

It was once a dense forest. Loved by the animals that had adapted themselves to their home, dreaded by the invaders who sought to conquer it.

Pant nagar is today dominated by an industrial estate- sterile at first glance, its toxicity is apparent when you look deeper. The people we spoke with told us of moving here during the Bangladesh war when they were given permission to move into deserted army barracks. Outside the small cleared circle that was theirs, was terror in the form of a dark forest with wild animals. Now not a tree remains. The economy runs on doing 'labour work' for the industries. The rivers are polluted beyond imagination; the water from the wells tastes of antibiotics.

Despite this, rural life still attempts to hang on by its teeth.

Take the river below. Even from the bridge we could smell it- like a belch after taking a B-complex capsule. The water was grey and sluggish. Despite that, life goes on. Tame ducks swim in those water. There is a fisherman patiently throwing his net over and over again into the opaque waters. Not in the snap for reasons of respect are a family performing a puja for their ancestors.

Further on, I came across a buffalo-shoeing. Never having seen this before, I stopped to see and take pictures. My colleague was embarrassed; the shoers were delighted. And it is not as brutal as it looks. The man holding the buffalo's head was the owner, and the animal trusted him and lay there calmly as he stroked its head. The only time I saw the buffalo jerk its foot was when the man tapped the nails into place. Here is a photo.

the Kausani-Garur trek

I think (and please correct me if I am wrong) that it was Eric Newby who said of his wife Wanda, that she firmly believed that a hill should run downhill both ways. And I agree with her.

While trekking, every step is bittersweet. If plodding uphill, its ok- your reward lies a bit further ahead. Sadly, if you are gaily waltzing downhill ,you know you will pay for it soon.

Unless you are walking from Kausani to Garur. This is that magical thing- a mountain walk that's downhill all the way. It's 9 km, or so we were told by the chap who came with my colleague and me. We were walking through the valley to inspect the springs,but there are also lots of things for the holiday-maker to enjoy.

The walk starts at the Kausani market, or if you choose, you can motor down to the tea gardens like we did. Right opposite the gate, there is a earth path that goes downhill into the valley. Follow it as it meanders through a Tolkienish Shire.

There are no grand vistas here, no awe-inspiring panoramas. Here instead is the charm of well kept fields, of neat woods, and bubbling little streams that refresh these. The walk leads through satisfying varying terrain. Initially you walk through pine forests, which lower down are replaced by a mixed broad-leaf forest. This is lush and crossed by numerous rivulets that either have a bridge, or need to be crossed over. There are farms to walk through, and rivers to walk along.  The path goes by a school and some houses, each one of which has sunflowers growing in the yard. The best part? It's all downhill!

For us spring-surveyors, the valley and the walk was the destination. However, Garur is an interesting marketplace. We had a very satisfying meal of rajma-chawal (though everything tastes good after a 9km walk). And it is also the home of the Baijnath temple, which also has a tank full of fish which you can feed.

I tried to look for a map to share with you, but couldn't get one. Its best then, if you can get someone to show you the way. And since I have a reader who is making the trip with his 8-yr old daughter, this is also a good trip for young ones, provided you have a plan B. Either be prepared to carry the child yourself, or negotiate with someone at the market to show you the road, and also pick her up once in a  while. Its a safe path, with no cliffs or scrambles involved and will give her the thrill of completing a 'real' hike. And for added incentive, there are plenty of these fruit trees.
Nashpatis. And apparently so common that even the schoolboys were ignoring them. A couple plopped down in front of us, and we did not ignore them. And I am glad we didn't.  They were the sweetest, juiciest, crispest, freshest pears I have ever eaten.

Bonding

When I first moved to Dun and found myself friendless, I had begun looking among the office-wallahs for someone to hang out with. One of these had caught my eye, but to initiate friendship would have meant negotiating office hierarchy and gender politics. Consequently, I never invited S over for coffee. Three years later, I realised that I might have missed something.

I was regaling my colleagues at lunch with tales of my last trip in the mountains. When I was describing the drive, I said, ‘The worst thing about a pine forest is..’

‘A lack of undergrowth!’ interjected a gruff voice behind me, completing my sentence perfectly.

I turned around in disbelief to see S, the twinkle in his eye mirroring the one in mine. As the office looked on, we simultaneously burst into the uproarious, thigh-slapping laughter that is born of a shared embarrassing secret.

For those who don’t know why it is a bad thing, think about the long drives, the tiny hamlets, the utter lack of toilets. Think about the poor researcher forced to go on a long-ish trek till she is over the ridge just so she can be out of her colleagues’ view. Think about her discomfiture as she squats in relief and then notices a cowherd on the slope facing her.

Undergrowth is a good thing. Shared laughter is even better.

the rasgulla that wasn't

We were driving down from Danya all the way to Dehradun. A two-day journey, and all throughout our driver only spoke of one thing. ‘We should stop for rasgullas at Nagina’, he said ‘I know a place where they are incredible. All officers beg to stop there.'

During the drive, my colleague and I swapped tales of the rasgullas we had eaten in Calcutta and vied with each other for the most mouth-watering descriptions of those luscious paneer balls. The first thing that something might be amiss came when I looked at the menu on the wall and asked, ‘What is the difference between a rasgulla (Rs. 5) and a chenna rasgulla( Rs. 6)? Aren’t all rasgullas made of chenna?’ We shrugged and ordered what our driver recommended- two samosas and two rasgullas each.

The samosas were everything they are supposed to be. Crisp, flaky, rich pastry enclosed warm, spicy-sweet soft potatoes and made us close our eyes in bliss. The rasgullas were not anything rasgullas are supposed to be. Simply because they were gulab jamuns. I have no idea why the names are mixed up. Other than the shape, rasgullas and gulabjamuns are as different as two things can be. A rasgulla is a ball of paneer dipped in sugar syrup and served cold. A gulab jamun is a ball of flour deep fried, dipped in sugar syrup and served hot.
That said, gulab jamuns are among my favourite sweets, and these were the best I’ve ever eaten. Not too sweet and without that annoying hard centre badly made ones have. These were served piping hot and were so soft they seemed to gently quiver on my plate. I polished mine off, and seriously contemplated walking around for a half hour just so I could have two more.

The place is well worth a stop if you ever find yourself driving down to Hardiwar from the east. The name of the shop is Tularam’s, and it is just opposite the railway station.

I, weasel

There are things I do not like in myself. Perhaps the most despicable thing about me is my utter unreliability towards those I love. I had grown up thinking that I would always stay with my mum and take care of her. A few years ago, I felt shuttered in and eventually ran away, metaphorically and literally speaking.

My sis and my niece are two people I utterly love, who I want to spend more time with, but don’t. This time, I was in Pune for one precious evening during which my niece smothered me with kisses and painted my nails ‘because you have a meeting’. I was almost in tears as she painstakingly, inexpertly applied sparkly pink to my fingernails. But early the next morning, while she slept, I went away.

And now the little child I teach. We might not have made much progress in English, but we have become great friends. As I plan for the winter, I feel regret at leaving her, but that is overshadowed by excitement. And yesterday, because my travels for the last few weeks have not let us meet, she sent me this through her dad.

In a month, while she sleeps, I will go away.

of a Naula

Naulas are the little depression springs that communities in Uttarakhand use to collect drinking water.
As Naulas go, the one on the left is a pretty typical one. Its located in Bageshwar district. As you see, the spring has been enclosed using attractive stone masonry. Two little lampholders guide passing travelers. The water is cool and clear. The cleanliness is not by accident. There are various signs painted on that request the users not to use soap within the spring or otherwise pollute it in any way.

Sadly, this desire to not pollute it is used to further oppression. There is a hamlet nearby where people of the scheduled caste live. They are not allowed to use this spring, though it is close to their hamlet. Instead, they must use one a kilometre away. In the summer, their spring dries up. Then they are 'generously' given water from this spring. Provided of course, that they do not defile it by entering the premises. And so, they are not allowed to help themselves to the water. Instead a brahman must pour out the water into their pots from a height. What if there is no brahman present, you ask? well then, they are expected to wait till one such person comes along.

And that is the image that has been haunting me since I returned. People patiently waiting beside a full pool of clean water, but unable to use it. 

Conversations on the road

If you haven't guessed already, I've been away. 5 districts in two states, and I haven't processed it all. The landscapes, of rural UP and the Himalayas were stunning enough to make me gasp for pleasure. This was a work tour, and my colleague and I were hosted by extremely passionate and committed people. We saw wonderful work being done, and magnificent restored forests. At the same time, there was much to distress me- xenophobia, untouchability, smugness. Great joy, great sadness, and I still need to sort through my photos, notes and memories. Till then a conversation:

Me (hunting for um, feminine products at a junction town): Hello Bhaisaab. Do you have Kotex?
He: (Blank stare)
Me (getting a little desperate because my colleagues might turn up) : Um. Kotex? Stayfree? Whisper?
He: What are those?
Me: Sanitary napkins. Do you have any?
He: What are those? Something to do with a camera?

There were many responses possible to that statement. A short sex-ed class might have been called for. I could have said,'It could be, but that's way too kinky for me'. I chose the coward's way out.

 'No. Thank you anyway.'