Among a Murder of Crows

Black…white. Nothing can be in black and white as it is here. But the blackness is as profane as the white is sacred—it’s the myth of colors. Today they are just stating facts. The crows flock around as the Bluebird watches. They gather the facts to assess the Bluebird’s flight patterns of life. What the Bluebird would have thought could never be assessed because it is such a huge tome of memories full of incidents, accidents and consequences of both. The crows know better and they cower over details and reduce it to a docket number. That’s all it was—thirteen years reduced to a label: 378 of 2007.

The wings of satin and cotton whish around and dispense the odor of sweat, hard work, manipulation, money, arrogance, sarcasm, spirit and hope…the crows gather in closer, in anticipation of their share of the castaway bread. Numbers roll out—488 of 2007, 571 of 2007, and a crow swoops on a thick file and flies off as if everything will now be settled in haste.

Nothing is in haste here, except the waiting. Only the waiting is hurried by the tension and anticipation. The Bluebird perches and looks around. Just a number now—all the years of flying and nesting and flying again. As the crows throw their piercing stares and questioning glances, the Bluebird isn’t afraid but thinks—how is it that the crows preside over the courts of justice? You would think that justice prevails in temples of silence but the din is unending.

And then suddenly silence. The whirr of the fans, the whimper of the death of expectations—and then the final scratch of a pen.

Winter always thaws into spring. Despite the crows cawing, a bluebird will sing.

Materials Maids Are Made Of

In India, we have the luxury of domestic help. While we do not designate them as domestic consultants, some of us shy away from calling them servants. For the lack of adequate nomenclature they are simply called maids—this is not indicative of their maidenly status or age but the one qualification would demand that the domestic help hails from the fairer sex (you would not call a maid a maid to refer to a man now would you?). Some brash employers are not shy at all and in fact use the rashly incorrect term servant-maids as if to reinforce their own dominant status and reassure themselves of the fact that they at least are neither servants nor maids…who are they kidding?

These maids range from the extremely loyal Lakshmis to the elusive Mayas. And of course there is the variety of in-betweens. After being with a loyal Lakshmi, even though I knew she was overpaid and underworked, it was a learning experience for me when I moved house. First of all no one wanted to come…because I wasn’t trained enough in the local language and I was not assertive enough. “Don’t be so polite”, I was advised by a pro, “By doing that you are giving them the power and control to negotiate with you. You should show them who is in charge.” Well, too short timed to learn the language of the maiden’s choice so I change the prerequisites and I assertively wave goodbye to the maids who aren’t familiar with the national language…then I realize I have said goodbye to all of them! I panic and employ the last maid standing who spoke in a smattering of illegible sounds and phrases, which I thought I could overcome with sign language. It was a very short-lived relationship because she did the exact opposite of whatever I asked her to do and what was worse, I ended up doing all her work because she very regularly never turned up.

So there I was on the lookout again for the maid from heaven and the advice I got this time was, “Can’t find anyone local, look global then.” Global? I am pointed to the watchman from Nepal. I walk up nonchalantly to show I am in control and then I desperately beg him to find me someone who speaks in Hindi, can do the housework and please come early as 6.30am. The begging pays off and I am assured domestic help. The next day, sharp at 6.21am the doorbell jerks me out of bed with a warning. I see a ‘Made in Nepal’ at the door, very presentable and neat—she could have been an extra straight out of Dev Anand’s movie Hare Krishna Hare Ram. As she begins to work, I wonder if she is real. Absolutely with robotic precision she scoops out the dust from the floors and rids the grease from the dishes. I was impressed, until I saw that if she could not locate the other pair of a lonesome shoe, she would simply get rid of it by chucking it in the dustbin. Once I programmed her into the advanced search mode to look a little more, and alerted the family that they should never leave related things separated, life was like clockwork. So much that we needed no alarm as the bell rang everyday, even Sundays at 6.21 am and if she was ever off the mark, she would be a minute or two early rather than late. We cruised with Irona and our life seemed ironed out—at least on the level of domestic management.

Very happy with life, I turned to friends to check out how they were. “I have quite the material maid…she is up with the sun, in for work that she does a shoddy job of and wants everything I am not using,” said a friend. She continued, “Why the other day when I told her to sweep the floors better, she complained that the dust was because of the fact that my family and I walk too much around the house and would be better of sitting in one place. And she had the audacity to eye the burgundy wine dispenser and slyly tell me, “I know what that is…my man and I have a peg every evening” She also wanted a bed I don’t use and when I realized that she had no house and asked her where she would put it, she said that she would sleep under it!” It did not end just there, the maid was disgusted with the 18-year-old apology for a TV that had to be smacked to adjust volume levels and picture qualities. After all, there are standards to keep! Only a Plasma screen would do and my friend is still paying off the installments for it as the maid approvingly nods and dusts the new wall adornment.

Anyway, the key is to be confident and get them to do work. If there is no work, then find something for them to do—these ladies shouldn’t be left to sit around and with this statement, we both turned to the friend who to these material maids was an employer from heaven. She had two maids, so that they have each other for company, because the last time she had hired a single maid, the lass, alas got lonely enough to get involved with the chauffeur. And that was quite a to do! So the two have each other for company, cooked meals, a time slot for TV viewing, adequate rest as our friend gets a lot of the cooking done, so much so that if you dropped in for a cup of tea, she would send a beseeching look in the direction of the maids and very sweetly ask for a cup of tea. We actually thought that the maids would refuse and ask her to go make it herself. “They are so sweet,” she said as the two of them trotted off to make one cup of tea together and we were left wondering whether to strangle her into being assertive or just hand in our resumes and have her employ us as maids—I mean think of it, we would get more time to spend with each other, bully our employer, eat great food, have a TV time which we never get in our own households and we would be politely begged to get work done—it was the ideal situation.

I am in fact still debating that option because my cruise with Irona ended the day her father-in-law chose to pass away in far away Nepal and I was left with her relative who like her comes on time alright but that’s where the similarity ends. I have accepted that she is far from perfect but if I don’t look closely enough, the floors will look clean. If I don’t hear as acutely as I do, the glass bowls that break will already be a thing of the past. If I keep my fingers balled into a fist, I will never get to run them on the tables and shelves to check for the dust…and life will go on.

And I do want to raise a toast to this incomparable set of people usually ladies who help us in our quest to be efficient mothers, impeccable housekeepers, and career-focused women. The way they go about doing the work, we do not want to do. How in a Machiavellian silent way, they throw a noose around us to reduce us to be helplessly dependant on them so that they are assured employment for life. Ultimate material girls in a material world working for material ends—cheers to them!

The Housefly's Song

Once upon a time but not very long ago, in a land very near around lived a playful little Capetilla. She lived happily in a house with the smart Optapus and the plain Housefly who both loved her very very much. You would have thought that the togetherness would have been enough, even though it was not extraordinarily marked by exotic excitement. On the contrary, what they had was the comfortable ordinary…and that made the Capetilla happy enough.

The Capetilla just never wanted to grow up. She bounced around playing all the games she could with the Optapus. In a game of hide and seek, she would hide in a corner and over up her face…she thought if I can’t see myself, then no one can see me! Of course the Optapus would get her out and hug her with his warm tentacles and together they would laugh…he always made the Capetilla and the Housefly feel safe and protected. They made up more games like the Bridge game and the Running around the table game and the Just dancing wild game. But the Optapus who was very smart also taught her the brainy games like chess, which the ordinary Housefly could never figure out, so to make them laugh because they looked so serious when they played this game, she would snatch the Capetilla’s white queen with a scream, rush it into the Optapus’s black army and run them all down as both the Capetilla and the Optapus laughed with glee! The Capetilla would demand the family hug and all three would come together at her call.

But the silly games would still be played and sometimes when she would not want to go to school, the Capetilla would run and hide under the big Optapus’s blanket so that the Housefly would not find her. But she did, and she would get the Capetilla ready just in time. You see, the Housefly might have been plain but she was hardworking and she had learned well from the Optapus about being responsible. She learned that you have to know what is important in life and work hard for it…so work she did, the plain Housefly who did not seem to have any colors.

As time flew, the Capetilla understood that she must work towards becoming the lovely butterfly she is destined to be, no matter the pain she felt about giving up the play. She knew that she could touch all the people around her with all the wisdom and beauty she had. So she stretched out the many hands she had and held it out to the people she loved with her big heart, so that she might show them the way to make their life better.

As she saw the Capetilla stretch out her hands, the plain Housefly reached out to hold on and she began to learn that apart from the shades of grays, she did have colors deep inside of her and slowly she began to let all the colors bloom in her ordinary world

But for the smart Optapus, his dreams were made of stuff more than the ordinary. His horizons stretched into places unknown. He did not realize that the world tickled his body just enough to make it feel good for a while. He never cared to think that that the world out there did not care for his soul and so the Optapus went deep into the world’s cold ocean of life far, far away. For him, the search was long and lonely but he was strong and smart. As he left, the wise little Capetilla wondered if the Optapus could hear the words of the Housefly as she sang:

“Oh won't you stay, stay awhile
With your own ones.
Don't ever stray,
Stray so far from your own ones.
For the world is so cold.
Don't care nothin' for your soul
You share with your own ones.

Don't rush away, rush away
From your own ones.
Just one more day, one more day
With your own ones.”*


*Irish Heartbeat by Van Morrison

The Festival of Lights

“How come if it’s all about lights, that’s it so noisy?” Good question, wise niece, but it’s not just noisy it is NOISY all in uppercase and it is nosily noisy because the noise noses into our sleep which is already not all that noiseless what with the hundred and one noisy thoughts that are knocking and bursting around in our heads. But it’s just once a year and everyone decides to go about celebrating Diwali their own way. With rangolis, with diyas, with biryani, with sparklers, and firecrakers that end with a boom or without a whimper.

Gone are the days when you went with one uncle to shop for crackers, hide the loot and then beg another uncle to buy you more. The more the uncles and aunts, the merrier because we in India still had one set of parents…not yet graduated into the step and the half of parenthood. However, you had two sets of grandparents, so you tapped one set and then the other. Then your parents were duty bound to buy you firecrackers as well and boy were you going to hang around them to remind them of their duties. So at the end of all the procurement exercises, you had a satisfying heist and you began sunning it daily with concentrated responsibility that your parents wished you showed when you studied Math.

And then came Diwali…oh the much awaited day when you began with seven diyas near the tulsi and went on to light up the entire house with diyas and candles. You had all the conniving cousins over with their collection, which was probably the result of a heist conducted in a similar manner as your own. Those were the days…of the endless sparklers, earthen flowerpots as well as the conical paper ones, the Chinese crackers, the gory black snake tablets that oozed out black ash that crumbled with a prod, the chakris that spun on the floor as you danced dodging the sparks. For the more adventurous among us, it was the tal-patra patakas made from the palmyra trees while the less brave were content lighting the colored matchsticks and the plain phuljharis. Everything was a matter of togetherness from the clothes to the dinners and we thought of nothing about taxing our mothers and aunts who ended up doing all the work and were tired at the end of it all.

That was then. Now Diwali is a whirl of statements. A statement on one’s wealth—the earth shaking 1000 laddi, the 3000 rupees each firework that creates patterns in the sky and the Diwali parties to die for. A statement against child labour—a day of thought for the underage workers in the firework industry…you don’t burst any crackers today because you want to spare them a thought that will be gone tomorrow. A statement against pollution—you settle for the quiet among the crackers for yourself and listen to the entire neighborhood’s frenzy of explosions. In this world of statements, we forget to really savour the moment of fun, or understand the symbolism of the lights, make it meaningful by splashing in the togetherness, and miss the chance to have another memorable Diwali. It just came and it went, like any other festival does.

Then there are those light up the neighbour’s coconut tree. “It was a genuine accident—the rocket swerved from its orbit and made a bonfire of the coconut tree. We did in no way want to make an issue of it, after all it could have been planted by a great grandfather or his ancestors, so we just sauntered inside innocently and rushed out again to alert them to call for a fire engine”, said the inadvertent arsonist. “It was a terribly damp Diwali for them considering that their bedrooms were flooded”, she continued, “But our children were delighted to see the fire engine and all the firemen at work. So there was some learning in it after all”.

Hope you all had a memorably happy and safe Diwali?

The 'S'ides of September

There is something about September that always makes me say “Don’t come, September, please don’t come”. As August ends, apprehension sets in and it’s always those lines from an U2 song that come to mind:

September... streets capsizing...
spilling over down the drain
...shards of glass splinters like rain
But you could only feel your own pain...

It’s a flyover in the heart of Hyderabad meant to ease the traffic and make your life free of the snarls. Tell that to the ones trapped under it one Sunday September evening as the colossal beams and pillars crushed life out of them. You prayed that people you loved were not around it, but the unknown lifeless faces you saw under the rubble are ones you have got to know now and can’t forget. You survived.

Pain of losing whatever you valued. No, it was not perfect what you had. Yes, it was already on fragile foundations…but you held it up, and you held on tight and one September it was swept away. You survived.

Lord Ganesh is setting off to his watery end and your flowering plant has finally bloomed on a sunny September day. You delightedly examine the white little star like flowers that are stretching out to say hello to the morning sun and then suddenly you get a call about a car crash. A loss of a cherished guardian…you weep, you grieve, and years pass. You survived.

Another bright September morning in Santa Clara, the TV beamed pictures of the Twin Towers collapsing. Death, anguish, destruction and those who watched also began breaking into pieces becoming one with the bricks, mortar, and melted steel. You survived.

For those who survive, what survives along with them is the pain. However much you tell yourself and others that what counts are the happy memories, along with the happy memories come the sad, bad and mean ones too. Forgetting is what you can add as the 13th labor for Hercules—cleaning out the Augean Stables was probably easier.

You survived so that you may see many more Septembers—all sides of it—the birthdays, the world cup, the end of term fun after one finally gets over the report card, and the fact that it heralds the arrival of October—the Devi's time to be celebrated. Here's to life! Here's to how it must go on...for those of us who are its survivors!

And the Rakhi goes to...

He’s given his sister an iPod and as he gets out of the car, loads his humungous suitcases (full of pieces of America that he will share with everybody he knows) on an airport trolley, he tells her, “This is not a time for understanding—there will be a lot of noise. So fill your life with music instead.” His sister drives off after a quick wave and a lump in her throat. She turns on the iPod to drown the tears that threaten her eyes and this is what she hears…
“Sail on Silver girl,
Sail on by.
Your time has come to shine.
All your dreams are on their way.
See how they shine.
And If you need a friend
I’m sailing right behind.
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will ease your mind.
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will ease your mind.”*

*Bridge over Troubled Water, Paul Simon

The World in Pink

You can see the world in a grain of sand or through rose tinted glasses. You can view it with your jaundiced best yellow, but have you ever seen the world in pink? Not that Pink is a favorite with me—a bete noire rather. Probably because of the stereotyping associated with it to format little girls from birth into sugar and spice and all things nice…yada, yada, yada.

Then you open your eyes on a rare cheerful Monday morning (because you met your deadlines on Friday…yeah!) and you find that your kid can’t open hers. They are stuck. You splash water, use a hot compress to pry them open and what finally look back at you are slits of pink that are anything but your child’s clear, bright, ‘why-why’ eyes! It can’t be—yes it is—she’s got the Pink Eye! The first few moments you try and retrace the steps of how it happened…a best pal got it; best pal’s mother got it before that. She’s a school teacher and must have had the little tykes around her sneezing and coughing on her face. “What can I do? They even feel that the sole purpose of my dupatta is for them to blow their noses on…I suddenly hear weird noises and turn to see my little ones trumpeting into it.” The cause has been established and now it’s time for damage control. Call to the doctor, drive to four medicine shops who don’t have the necessary eye drops. There is an epidemic on, I guess. The fifth—a dark dingy germ infested one does—beggars can’t be choosers so you buy it, along with a mild ‘preventive’ eye drop for yourself and bottle of sanitizer. You stand kid in a corner, hand her a pair of dark glasses and explain that you will have to play a game of dodge with her as you cannot possibly contract this color at all—you simply do not like pink. She looks on like a forlorn, nine-year old James Bond in dark glasses as you delineate the required rules of segregation—family later accuses you of apartheid but you don’t want to see in pink and would rather risk them seeing red.

Your colleagues definitely wouldn’t want you at work with traces of the pink hanging over you and thank god for a boss who is woman enough to understand the working mom. So you log on from home, only to have your kid walk up to your desk and ask, “What do I do?” Go and read a book which has a big enough print. 45 minutes later, “What do I do now?” Play something—go and pretend that you are Pinky the Pirate, off on a mission with Capt. Jack Sparrow or something like that. You asked for it. Out comes a Yankee Doodle with dark glasses and a wide brimmed straw hat, galloping on a badminton racquet singing, yes, you guessed it—‘Yankee Doodle’! It is sung in various permutations and combinations and at varied tempos. So inspired is she that she even thinks of setting up Yankee Doodle communities. After an hour, she comes up and suggests that you have worked enough and that now you should play with her. You remind her that its the way you earn to pay rent and buy the antibiotic eye drops that are due in her eyes now. She runs and hides the bottle. You find it and drag kid from under bed and do the necessary evil of dropping the medicine in her eyes to her shouts of “It stings!” Well, that’s what the pink eye brings.

Once back at your desk you get a half an hour of peace that the drops buy you and then she’s back. This time the suggestion is, “Just sit at the desk and work like you are doing right now and play ‘Koffee with Karan’ with me—you can pretend to be any film star you want to be and I’ll interview you”. Can I be a Count Dracula, I think with a very cold, chilling stare. “Or from the icy cold look in your eyes, Mimi, we could call the program ‘Sorbet with Sujata’, she says with a chuckle (she knows she is safe because I am maintaining a distance with the pink). At least she has a way with words. Finally, I give in to a game of ‘I Spy’. The only difference being that she begins with, “I spy with my little pink eye…” We spy as much as we can, sitting in the balcony and move on to reading the clouds. We actually spot a smile in the sky. What you are smiling at, I wonder—I have to be homed in, and live in fear of this little pink eye. Or may be it’s a sign I won’t get it, I hope.

Three days and I’m still safe. The domestic help walks in with pink puffed eyes—I unceremoniously walk her out and use generous amounts of sanitizer on the door knob and broomsticks. I’ve played dodge very well so far. I have been using the ‘preventive’ eye drops, kept all the pink-eyed ones at a distance and even slept with sunglasses on. Once her eyes are wide open and clear, kid goes back to school, relieved that she can now be in the more entertaining company of her peers. As I wake up, I am relieved that I haven’t got the pink slip yet considering I’ve been working from home and then…I can’t open my eyes! “Time to play dodge with you, Mimi?” grins the wide, why-why eyed kid. “You are the reason”, I sms in retaliation to the friend who started it all and she calls back on her way to work saying, “Think of it as an Annual Maintenance Program for your eyes.” Sister of friend calls with an I-told-you-she-is-the-reason subject line and informs me that all and sundry are seeing pink, even those who talked to her over the phone and live in other states—may be even other countries. I’m beginning to actually get a feeling that if you don't pass it on, it doesn't get cured…kind of like a chain email you hem and haw about deleting because of the bad luck it may bring if you did not pass it on. I got a cheery sms from The Reason asking me how the Annual Eye Maintenance Program was going. I replied “In swollen proportions”. Should have added pink to it.

Moral of the Story: Pink se panga nahi lene ka.

In an Inuksuk...

…there is warmth. It’s the Inuit way of saying “There’s someone there for you—you are not alone in your journey”. And so an Inuksuk made its journey all the way from Canada with Meenakshi and Aparna to tell us that we will always have company no matter where we go. Interestingly made from rocks from the Canadian shield, its outstretched greeting every morning is a great beginning.

But sometimes the great beginnings might have the not-so-great middles. Especially when you have a Rakhi making competition at school and are not endowed with the traditional creative instincts. All this made worse because you do not have a traditionally oriented mom who instead of gathering the mandatory tinsel, bindis, stick on peacocks and other feathered friends, hands you a pencil shaving in a perfectly turned out helix. “At least your mom did not give you different types of dal to make a Rakhi with”, said a friend encouragingly—her mother was another anti-traditionalist obviously more tuned in to gastronomic fantasies that gets extended into all spheres of life including art and craft.

So you take that pencil shaving and work it in with the other recycled materials and decide on a ‘Recycle—Save nature” theme. You love it, your friends love it and are in awe that you actually could create something out of what one would just chuck away in the dustbin. Encouraged by the adulation, you begin to hope for a prize. Just that the judges are watching out for the peacocks, roses, the shine and the shimmer and all that jazz. So they announce the first prize, and the second and the third…and there are no more prizes after that. You get off the bus with your Rakhi of the Recycled and no prize, till your mother hands you a pretty little draw string purse full of beautiful pebbles from a lake you will dream of visiting someday. “Look at the color—this one’s almost purple! Look at the lines! How old could this be? It looks so rough but feels so smooth! Thank you!” It’s a gift from a young colleague of your mom’s but for you it’s a prize you won.

So perfect are they that you know exactly what you must do with these pebbles. You sit together and build an Inuksuk. You put them together to remind you that you have what is more important—people who make you smile when you are sad and fill the icy moments of life with warmth.
We gave the Inuksuk a name. We call it Shiv, short for Shivranjini, who journeyed through the Himalayas to the Pangong Tso Lake and drew out from there the smooth, amazingly hued pebbles that became pebbles no more but a prize for an competition that wasn’t won. It will now stand as an Inuksuk from the Himalayas to remind us that there will always be someone—to bring in a smile, some cheer and a prize of pebbles from a lake on top of the world.

Hard Work for an Air Full of Nothing

Naga walked in holding on to her arm. It was swathed in Crepe bandage.

What happened, Naga, I asked?

“It’s my son, madam’, she grimaced. “He jumped on to me and swung on my arm like a monkey!”

“I thought my arm would come off, madam”, she said very seriously.

I tried a little harder not to laugh but it’s hard to keep a straight face when there’s an image of a monkey-kid swinging on a limb!

“What madam…so much we have to do to raise children! I need my arm to work no at the computer? Do they have any idea of how hard we work so that they can waste to buy things here and there?”

But Naga, that’s what we earn for isn’t it?

“Oh yes, Madam, we have to earn so that they can have all the good things we did not have. My mother did not sometimes have milk to give me and I have to buy Bournvita to put in the milk so that they will at least drink the milk without complaints.”

“And my son, he will not only drink but also eat the Bournvita. My daughter madam, is very adjusting but this son…so much waste he does without thinking how hard I work”, she grumbled on.

Come on, Naga, can we really expect them to understand how hard we work? It’s like the saying that our fathers had to take the stairs so that we could use elevators…

“Yes but Madam, it does not mean that we have to buy all the junk these silly advertising fellows put on TV. Other children will buy so mine will want and there I am buying packets of chips which are only air full of nothing and few chips.”

Hmm…that’s a thought I did not think of.

“Yes Madam, full of air those packets of Lays, Fritos, Cheetos and what not and we pay Rs 10 for each pack when we could have got the air for free…we only need to go out and take a deep breath, no madam? Why pay Rs 10 for it?”

Well…the air is supposed to keep the chips fresh and there are some chips in it, Naga.

“What Madam, may be two rupees worth of it. That Saif fellow cannot eat just one that is ok, no—he is anyway getting to eat the chips free to hold the packet on TV—but then when our children decide that they too cannot eat just one…all our money is going down the pockets of these chips company for the air they pack with the few thin potato bits.”

Kids need some junk food too once in a while, Naga. If you deprive them of it, they would want it more.

She grumbled on “But, no understanding they are having about the value of money, Madam. For them Rs 10 is like a piece of paper. I have been working since class 10 to earn and children today—all they want is leisure.

All I want is leisure too, Naga, I said to myself. All we all want is leisure. And isn't it ironic that we have to work our tails off for those moments of leisure and those packets of chips with air full of nothing?

In a Manner of Speaking

In a manner of speaking, everyone can be what he or she wants to be but you…you…you are the proverbial Caesar’s wife…you must be above suspicion. You must speak so that your words hurt none. You must behave so that your actions hurt none. You must at least make sure that you do not react to anything anyone says or does (or even thinks). Even if it hurts you a bit, or a little more than just a bit, or insults you big time and perhaps wants to make you shout so loud and so desperately that you want to scale the tallest tower in the vicinity or at least the tallest tree and let out a scream to provide the much needed release to your lungs (and soul!) and let everybody know how you feel…oh no, that option is not for you. You must be, in a manner of speaking, perfectly, politically correct in the most polished possible way.

And here you are, so plainly you, so blatantly blunt, not aspiring for the lofty heights of the painfully prosaic and mythical political correctness. So what are you going do you do? “Sharpen, up”, says a little thing. Sharpen eh? But sharp would hurt more wouldn’t it in a literal manner of speaking? Now that’s a thought—blunt as opposed to sharp—what’s the choice? Blunt wouldn’t kill you would think. Sharp is what would sting you think. The choice is your’s, everybody else around gets to punish you anyway they like anyway, for your verbal transgressions, your irate expressions—anything will be meted out to you from the icy cold shoulder or the ridiculously raucous smses. In a manner of speaking, why is it that everyone expects you to be the epitome of perfection while you see no proactive efforts on their part to attempt the same? Ah! Did you overlook the fine print…they have a right to just be themselves—so sensitive that they must express their emotional reactions to your actions. They believe however, that you lost your’s when you decided to lose your way and cross their paths.

But what do you believe in? You have the right to be you…do you? Then be so, you can’t make everyone happy…in a manner of speaking. You still need to do the decent thing bit, is it? Then, be yourself and do the decent bit and from your point of view, in a manner of speaking, that makes the others an ‘indecent’ lot…

“…So in a manner of speaking
I just want to say
That like you I should find a way
To tell you everything
By saying nothing…”*

*In a Manner of Speaking, Depeche Mode

Sleepover It

There comes a time when every mom has to give into it—a sleepover party. A code name is given to the party—so those not invited would not feel bad. How polished! Rooms are cleaned and loud but faithless vows are made that the room will be kept clean. Menus are drawn up by the host child and tailored to fit some if not all friends. Passwords are made to be whispered into each friend’s ear to ensure entry to the room. While board games are pulled out, they will give room to the ones born from their imagination. The mood is at an all time high and parents are given compliments that they are the best. The best is to bask in these compliments till the time you clash over discussions of the mundane clean-your-room, do-your-homework, be-responsible…etc.

So all the young ones make their elegant entrances with their overnight cases and favorite pillows or pokemons or bunnies or dollies—you would think the teddy bears have fierce competition in their work space these days. The first few minutes are always a little icy—sometimes uncharitable comparison of whose house, room, bed, PJs, etc are better. Then they thaw a bit, get off their high horses and get down to the business of having fun. Many tears are shed over the board games—everybody wants to win you see and they don’t. Paintings are drawn to wipe out the tears and then a movie accompanies the dinner. Everyone has to sleep in the same bed, so you let them lay as they want to on the bed or around it with barricade of pillows. Then you listen to the stories…of how there was a girl with a ribbon around her neck and how a chap kept asking her why she wore it. But she wouldn’t tell. He married her nevertheless and kept asking her as the years passed by till finally she undid the ribbon and guess what happened? Her head fell off!

As a parent, your role in the sleepover is to be at your ward’s beck and call, supervise that all the games are safe enough, be a fair mediator in case of confrontation which anyway don’t last long so it’s better left unaddressed, make sure that they are well fed, and of course once in a while try and get a bit of rest.

For me, during a sleepover that had begun the day before, the floor looked enticing enough to sleep on so I did. Besides, I was just too tired to haul myself to the bedroom. I just lay down on the floor, while the girls played a game. All that I heard came in surreal snatches but nevertheless were eye-openers. I believe the game was “Vet and Pet”, where one was the vet, the other thankfully was not a pet but a zookeeper (a welcome change from a game of yesterday where she was the pet and the other a dog trainer), and the third was giving all the animals and a mermaid a nice wash. From the corner of a tired eye I saw the miniature plastic animals, being examined and washed with a lot of care. The vet had come to assess the animals and came out with the following diagnosis:
The Lion was having dental problems that need to be dealt with. The zookeeper retorted, “You go and stick your hand in its mouth then!”
The second was that the Giraffe was lonely and should be moved to live with the Rhinoceros for company. The zookeeper replied, “But…but the Rhinoceros has suddenly turned carnivorous…”
The third was that the stones were getting into the paws of some other ambi-vorous animal but the big shock came when the zoo keeper was given a bill that went into a few thousands of…dollars!

Being fully aware of the exchange rates (they have been learning about currency) the zookeeper protested and launched a verbal attack on the vet, who solidly held her ground. Meanwhile the washer of animals had washed off the stripes of the tiger and was in tears now because the mermaid’s base had broken off! Now that was a crisis that got me to my feet and I hugged them all and we all laughed together over chips, juice, the mermaid, the lost stripes, the lion’s dental problem, the rhino who had turned meat-eater and the fact that the aspiring vet found out that you have to study really hard to be one. Said she, “I think I shall just be the vet’s assistant”!

Straw Struck!

There she is—look at her! Her hair flies out in jagged odds and ends making her look like a mythical Medusa, as the erratic breeze plays out its aimlessly ambivalent mood. She’s standing at the curb waiting for the bus to bring back her child at 2.30pm. Just that today her kid comes back at 3.30pm. She only realizes that as all the kids tumble out of the bus but her own. She sheepishly gets back in the car and drives off, with as much dignity as possible as the other parents look quizzically. Blame it on old age—blame it on the all the straws in her life. Straws…you ask? Yes all the straws in her life.

She’s clutching at straws now, hanging on to it for dear life. All the puny, dried up, dirty brown straws that you would throw away for recycling. And that’s funny because her eyes would be all but vacant hadn’t it been for those straws—it gives her hope. What’s wrong with that, she asks? There would have been no Shawshank Redemption without hope. Hope springs eternal and life is for living. So what if along the way, you meet men (and women!) of straw? They are not what they seem to be. But then none of us are what we seem to be, she says. Scratch under the put on airs and all of us will be like the people of straw we love to blame. I am like those straw men the military do their combat training on, she says. It’s hilarious how she stood her ground clutching at what she could, while her house of straw was huffed and puffed at. Build a house of bricks, you say? But this little piggy is incorrigible! She ran here and there clutching at all the straws around her and held on to all that she could. Why, you ask? Because you can’t make bricks without straw, or paper, or rope, or…even handicrafts for that matter. Besides, you never know when Rumplestiltskin comes around to weave the straw into gold, she says.

After yo-yoing between the to be or not to be, at the moment it looks like she’s drawn the short straw—the shortest possible. She knows she has the unpleasant on her plate right now. Sometimes she bawls about it shamelessly when no one is looking (and my, does she look ugly—like some water color set out in the rain!). Sometimes she laughs when her friend guffaws to point out the funny straw or two (and my, does she look a sight—like some unrehearsed comic sidekick!). Sometimes she’s angry to the point of mutiny (and oh boy, does she look demented—like the mad wife from Jane Eyre!). But most of the time she deals with it. Someone’s got to deal with it, it's like toilet-cleaning duty. Or would you rather the necessary but unpleasant tasks not get done? Hey no one is setting up a straw man argument but at least let’s not get to the talk of the final straws. Lets point her to the straws in the wind that isn’t just messing up her hair—it’s signifying a different future.

Let’s just leave her now. Let her be. She’ll be back at the right time. She’ll be there for her child. She’ll be there for those she cares about—the final straw might break the camel’s back, but let’s hope it won’t break her. You see the final straw, you say? Look at her—she just dodged it, again!

Post Script:The Untold (As Yet)

On Ayesha’s request, considering she is an editor of grueling standards, I have an addendum. I had forgotten to add several salient points of the Himalayan trip, so here are some of them.

The Story of Roopkund Lake: I had the girls hypnotized with my story of an invaluable treasure hidden deep in the waters of the Roopkund Lake and how a mere mortal’s attempt to steal it incurred the wrath of the Nanda Devi—I had added all the necessary ingredients like magic, divine powers and a dash of the reality of carbon dating, to get them to have their soup at 12000ft in Bedani Kund. The real story, if I can put it the T S Eliot way, lies “between the potency, and the existence”. Long long long ago, maybe 600 years ago, there lived a king—Raja Jasdal of Kanauj. It is said that his wife, Queen Balpa (a princess from Garwhal), was a sister of Goddess Nanda Devi. One day, Raja Jasdal decided to go on a pilgrimage on the Nanda Jat Route. Being a native of Garwhal, Queen Balpa could not resist the chance to visit her homeland and even though she was expecting a child, she set off with the king, his relatives, his horses and his soldiers. Unfortunately, it was at the Roopkund Lake that she gave birth. They say that this area is sacred ground—ever since Shiva created this lake from the mountain Trishul, as a mirror in which his consort Parvati could see her face. The fact that the Queen decided to have the baby here enraged the Goddess Nanda Devi who felt that the holy lake had been polluted. So she sent down a cruel ice storm that buried them all. The Roopkund area became a taboo to all, fearful of the power of the Devi, people surrendered it back to her. The mysterious lake was left in snow all year through till the short summer thawed its ice to unmask human skeletons that lay beneath its waters.

And then in 1942, a park ranger called Madhwal accidentally found some of those skeletons, which were sent for research. There were varied speculations as to whether the skeletons could have been that of wandering Chinese, or of General Zorawar Singh and his army, who perished in Himalayan storms on their return from the Tibet War. Radio carbon dating proved the skeletons belonged to 9th century people of Indian origin and that these were a group of tall people (both men and women) of one family, accompanied by horses and considering the evidence of the skulls found, they died because of hail stones as big as cricket balls. Could it be what remains of Raja Jasdal and Queen Balpa? Is it true that the Goddess Nanda Devi sent down a hailstorm? End it your way because research is often inconclusive, but imagination knows no bounds. :-)

The Band of Women: These days one has to hear all kind of clichés and categorizations from the quote that women are the enemy of women and how there is a parallel world complete with chick-flicks and chick-lits. For one thing, people have to understand that the chick has evolved since she hatched and has come a long way baby. It is a privilege to be a woman. It’s even more of a privilege to have women as friends. They help you live a better life. According to a UCLA study, friendships between women are special. “They shape who we are and who we are yet to be.” Not just that, it also helps with the stress—the calming response does not occur in men, because testosterone just hasn’t got what it takes to fight the stress. Not that I am waving a feminist flag to men—no, not at all—but I want to talk about what a redemptive power we shared as mothers, as sisters as daughters—as women. There seemed to be in each one of us a special quality that filled in for the lack of it in the other. There was no fear of the lack of a male presence. There were only possibilities—of climbing higher for better look at the world and us, of laughing in the wonder of snow, of understanding the magnificence of the mountains, of finding warmth in the cold lap of the Himalayas, of laughing at ourselves and over the shared gossip, of trusting each other implicitly, of drawing strength here in the mountains and back when we were on the plains, of the charm and magic of just being friends.

I can’t help but raise a toast to the friends like the ones I have, my sister pilgrims, ranging from seven years to 80 years—you give me a reason to go on in life…“When we are invited to do our best, to flow in peace regardless of the shadowing despair that tempts us. We are all here together on this bejeweled dance floor of an earth, and every one of us has the opportunity to choose our thoughts carefully so that our actions, our health, our very being becomes a co-creation with the Divine (Rebecca Wells)”.

Renaming Ceremony: We are all born with names, but some of us are renamed along the way. There is something about a name—while you kind of become the name you are given, you also learn much more than that, provoking others around to re-christen you. Ash, with her intrinsic ability to size up people always added a quiet tag to the name. Sangeeta the Magnificient, Preeti the Perfect, Aparna the Lovely, Shanti the Serene…. When it came to Nanu, you could see the emotion in Ash’s eyes that one has for a co-conspirator—you can see the empathy they share, the camaraderie born of a sense of we-are-on-the-same-side-and-will-face-the-world-together, to protect each other and be happy when good things happened to the other. For Ayesha, it was Nayanika the Innocent—the one friend who exudes a rare naiveness with an infectious giggle, who always supports, who doesn’t care for the clothes you wear, the car your parents drive, the size of your house or for that matter anything material. With her you can bask in adulterated joy and the belief that she would root for you, even if she was running the same race. For me she was the Lucky Baby and was renamed as so.

Meena already had a tag—the Diva. She was Minakshi the Diva and she had a T-shirt to match. There has been till date no expression that she cannot pull out of her bag—from the scary face to the lost puppy look. The eye lashes flutter according to the demand of the moment, the hands would gesticulate in perfection—who can forget her at 12,000ft, puking her guts out and doing an Odissi dancer’s namaste every time her mother tried to give her a horrible medicine? She is the drama queen who holds centrestage, the Regina Royale, the Pixie with the Punch—her list of names goes on and on till the girls discussed among themselves about what a hurricane she was. Meena retorted, “I’m a Tornado!”. “And you are a Snow Monkey too”, the girls told her back. “So that makes you Snow Monkey Tornado Banerjee”. Why the Banerjee—because she gets a big high from her Eastern roots (after all, all wise men go back to the east). SMTB it had to be and so the Diva was rechristened.

A Birthday Celebration: Said Ash: “Isn’t it amazing! How many people can get the opportunity to celebrate a birthday 12,000ft up in the Himalayas? You just have to be special”. And can there be anyone more special than Aparna? She woke up on 13 May, 2007, in Bedani Kund, after a sleepless night of tending to her sick child, and her sick friends—it was her birthday. There was no birthday cake, or balloons, or any presents. There were a whole bunch of people with nothing but wishes and silent prayers—prayers for her health, for her success, for her family. Prayers in thanks for her friendship. Prayers hoping that she stays forever the lovely person that she is. There were also three children—one was her daughter who drew up a card, even though she wasn’t well, pouring out the love she had for her mother. The other two composed a poem—while one called out the verses she made up, the other became the scribe and wrote them down (because the former had cold hands on account of a lost glove and the latter was a much better artist and illustrator). They handed it out to me to read out to Aparna (they were too shy). That evening in the tent, as I read it out, I do not think there was anyone left without an emotional knot in their systems—the poem said it all. It lay out what Aparna was and echoed all that we felt for her—we could also see that she was moved and close to tears. I think that the poem, a fair version with little drawings on the side, will always occupy an important place in her house and what’s more important, in her heart.

Innovation in the Mountains: Necessity is the mother of invention. No statement is truer than that. There we were at the heights of cold and we can’t find our gloves. We had plenty of socks. So what do you do to beat the cold as you sleep—you wear the socks as gloves! Then of course at the end of the trip, just as you leaving for the heat of the plains, someone not only finds the right hand glove you lost, they also give you an additional one—so you have two pairs of gloves to put on your right hand, but only one right hand available…sigh! What do you do when you can’t carry a pillow because it adds too much bulk to your rucksack—you carry a pillowcase and in the night stuff it with all the clothes that you have and use it as a pillow! What do you do when you don’t want to wipe your hands with tissues and throw them around the beautiful trail—you grab a handful of dried leaves and use them as tissues!

Similarly, in the absence of big brand names what do you do—you just improve on them and sell your wares on the steam of the brand! So Lays becomes Lags and Parle G becomes Raja G but the packing—imitation is the best form of flattery.
Courtesy: All the people who gave the respective ideas—you know who you are.

The Aftermath: My respect for high altitude has heightened. The consequences of a climb must not be taken lightly. It is best to be prepared for what can happen in the high mountain areas. It can begin with a simple headache and leave you gasping for breath. The idea is not to ascend too quickly, not to overexert, not to skimp on the water intake and to be adequately protected from the cold. You can feel fatigue, dizziness, insomnia, shortness of breath, nausea, lack of appetite and swelling of extremities. Each of us felt one of these symptoms at one point or another and some had a combination. The return to the plains began with visits to the doctors for us all—for some of us injections in what Priya calls ‘the seating arrangement’. Accompanying the experiences of our adventure were nausea, fever, swollen joints, swollen feet that were carried around like additional legs, blackened nails and lost nails too. Hey—how about a bit of poetry?

The Leg-ses and Injections
We went up the mountain, Meena, Nanu and I
And Ash and her five aunts, I spy.
With the strain of the climb, extra leg-ses they grew,
But even then complaints there were few.
We went over mountains, thru forests and streams
At the end of it “My Nail!” one aunt screams!
“I’ve lost it,” she cries,
“So have I”, another aunt sighs.
Injections follow in the (ahem!) ‘seating arrangement’,
Nothing else will work, no nail-growing ointment.
“Oh well”, says one more aunt, “Ash will go on to tell the tale,
Of how her aunts went up the Himalayas and lost them each a nail!”

Delhi Diary, 17 May 2007

We rumbled along the roads through the night with generous layers of Odomos—one reason for that were the mosquitoes and another (by far more important) was that as we had bought too much and never used as much as we thought we would. Giovanni’s party was back in the bus, having made a trip to Rishikesh a day before us to plunge into the Ganga perhaps for a ritual cleansing. Narayan after the entire deadly diatribe meted out to him by the girls, made a beeline for the other bus that was mercifully full of boys. Sunil came in and after pretending to sit for a while, stretched out in the driver’s area—probably even snored but we couldn’t hear him over the noise of the bus. It was a silent night except for the bus driver, who once in a while decided to express all his frustration in as colorful language as possible to deride the ancestors of any driver who crossed his path.

When we rolled into Delhi—for me at least it was nostalgia. We passed the Rajghat, Pragati Maidan and other landmarks that brought back so many memories—of book fairs, of friends, of school and college…of the happy times that were made even more happy with the birth of Ayesha right here in New Delhi. I woke her up to see the city of her birth—the capital city from where Nehru announced India’s freedom. Early morning Delhi is an experience altogether. I may be biased for I know many people afraid to visit or live in Delhi for various reasons that are all justifiable—but an early morning here is enchanting—the restful trees in the park fresh with dew drops, the energy of the people walking by, the hint of mist before the smog, the empty quietness of the roads before the day snarls in to displace all that is intrinsically beautiful—I have always felt at home in Delhi.

Early morning showers rained on us as we got off the bus at our hotels in Karol Bagh. Our group was quite a sight—a sight that would give sore eyes to people who saw us. Ash was disheveled after the bulimic bus ride and down with fever, Nanu was just about recovering from the ankle sprain aggravated by the fall from Munni, Meena was looking thin and felt so light as I carried her off the bus—but their smiles told of how they had enjoyed the trek and how much they wanted to now go to the Valley of Flowers. As for the adults, it was a tale of swollen legs and toe nails falling off and at the moment, all just wanted to go home. Aparna was in pure pain that could not be masked by her lovely smile. She needed to be attended by a doctor for which she and Meena immediately set off for her uncle’s house. The downward climb had taken its impact on her feet and her nails had dug back into her—she needed tetanus shots and rest. She would probably have to take a flight out to avoid any chance of infection. Lien too was to stay back in Delhi.

At the hotel after we washed, cleaned up, had breakfast and packed to catch the train at 5pm, I watched Ayesha sleep off the fever and let Nayanika, Preeti, Liz and Priya have their tour around Delhi. Ash and I only stepped outside when her fever came down, for lunch at Pizza Hut and to buy some Delhi Chappals. It was nice roaming the markets of Karol Bagh—to check out the stock of casual pants by a roadside peddler and hear him say, “Full pant bas itna, baki sab to knicker hai (That’s all the trousers I have, the rest are all shorts)”—I knew I was in Delhi! My friends came back to tell me of how they had been the cynosure of all eyes in the posh Khan Market where they had eaten up a whole box of cherries as they walked on the street with their swollen legs (or leg-ses as the kids would put it because it was like they had more than two). They could not get their feet into any shoes, they could not enter any respectable shop to buy and try out clothes because they looked like hobos with their box of cherries, trekking sandals and clothes in a state that screamed out ‘unemployed’. So they just took in the sights of Delhi along with the cherries and came back. I hooted with laughter because after traumatic bus ride, God had spared me from additional legs and lost nails.

But god had not spared me from the Hargopal sisters. If I have to begin my tale of how I was sunk in a satirical sea, I probably have to begin from the point when we gathered our luggage and waited on the roads for the buses that were to take us to the Railway station. Nayanika was bouncing around in a T-shirt that declared, “ Go ahead and push me around, but you ought to know that I have the meanest, baddest sister in town”—and Ash started it all off by telling me, “Mimi, your brother should get a T-shirt like that!”

Oh well, I thought as I stood near a mannequin of the shop wherein I had deposited Ash and Nanu and then I felt Priya’s eyes. She looked at me and looked somewhere else and she did that eerily till I looked at where she was looking. The Mannequin—it had a hairstyle that looked like what my hair looked now—neither feminine chic, nor masculine charm. Vasu might have given me a short elegant cut but the Himalayas had iced out the elegance to make it look like a flattened drapery of sorts with two curled up bangs on the side (which Sangeeta, who could not make it to trek had asked me to pin back with a clip that Aparna had specially gone out to buy). Added to the state of my hair was a checked shirt I wore, giving me an all round look of what Priya called Raju Guide (of the Dev Anand movie). Then she called me Raju Conductor. Then she pointed out that my hairstyle was shared by some of the young street thugs. I looked to see that not only did they seem to have my hair, they had shiny check shirts and one earring like mine. At least I had two, I thought as I reached out to feel my ear lobes and was shocked to realize that I too had only one earring! I ran like a bat out of hell into the hotel to search for my pure gold earring that I have been wearing since I was in school. I pulled off the sheets in the room and had the whole hotel on alert. All to of no avail—I walked back sadly, with a consoling Preeti by my side, who derided Nayanika’s suggestion that I check my shirt pocket. I have always listened to Ayesha’s trusted friends and Nanu is always a lucky baby for me—so as Preeti went on to say that it’s such a tiny pocket etcetera, I slipped a hand in and pulled out the earring! The lucky baby strikes again! After I gave Nanu a deserving squeeze that left her spluttering for breath and holding on to Ayesha for support, I proudly put back the earring and faced Priya again. Unfortunately, after the brief period of consolation I received, Preeti had joined her to point out more young street Rajus. Even Liz chimed out “Oye Raju”, relegating all family ties to me to the background, with an infectious giggle. One busload of our group had left already and Speedy stayed with us very reluctantly heroic, until he slipped off to the station surreptiously. As we sat there abandoned and waiting for our ride, I resigned myself to looking at my bretheren pass by and believe you me—there were many. It looked like I shared my hairstyle with the entire population of unemployed street-hangers out in Karol Bagh complete with shiny check shirts and one earring. Woe is indeed me!

I suffered in silence and dignity (even though I say so myself) as the Hargopal sisters and others made an entertainment of me till suddenly a green lizard leaped out of a taxi. It was one of the organizers in a green T-shirt who shouted animatedly, “Get in the Taxis, the train is about to leave and it only stops at this station for a few minutes!” We loaded our luggage and ourselves into taxis as the leaping lizard danced a war dance around us exhorting us to leave—I mean, when did we tell him we want to stay?

Our motorcade of taxis got us to the Railway station all in one piece, with our luggage in one piece and as the train chugged in we jumped aboard and grabbed the best seats (in honor of Lien—she would have been proud of us!). We formed a human chain to pass on the entire luggage we carried as a group of first time trekkers and then we sat back exhausted as the train hooted like Hogwarts Express and departed from the station. I watched as Minto Bridge went by and I promised myself that I would bring back Ayesha for a visit—with a brand new haircut and this time not stay among my brethren in Karol Bagh. Our adventure was coming to an end but it had set us off on a route to want to discover more about the expanse of varied beauty in our country, and more about ourselves. So I guess it wasn’t an end—just the beginning of another adventure.

Following the Rivers to Rishikesh, 16 May 2007

The morning was entirely targeted to getting ready as early as possible to attend the prayers at the school. The evening before, as our kids were roaming the extremely safe main road of Loha Jung, they had bumped into Dev (the Danny who drove us from Rishikesh to Loha Jung). They made a deal with him to drive us back and reserve the best seats for us (not that they had to as Lien would never let the best slip away from us!) After a quick breakfast, we set off for the school and stood in line with the children. All I can say is that these children had a touch of the divine Himalayas in them. As they walked in they not only touched their teachers feet but also that of all us adults. The pranams of the first child at my feet, brought in a mixture of feelings—I was touched to tears, awed by the innocent and heartfelt respect they showed, and felt unworthy of it—all at the same time. Our girls stood in line with them with folded hands as we joined them in the prayer and the pledge that we would serve our country. The teachers were equally warm in their interactions with us and one of them gave me a poem in Hindi. As we said goodbye, they invited us to come again in 2010, when the Devi was said to come down to the plains from her mountain abode. We wished we could and hoped inside that we were blessed enough.

Back to the bus—we had indeed got the best seats and our luggage in the back rather than the top to avoid getting our clothes wet again. Priya also made sure that all our walking sticks were safely put in as we intended to carry them back home. I walked to one of the shops to show the girls some pictures of the Roopkund lake and the skeletons that had been found there, had a last look at the mountains and got into the bus. But woe of woe—Lepi was missing. Lepi was a Leopard of the very soft varieties who had seen Meena through the tough times she had during her walk up, her bout with mountain sickness as well as the times she missed her Papa Bear moving us all to tears. Lepi walked with her, slept by her side, hugged her when she threw up and was last seen attending the prayers at the school. Then he just disappeared. Lien and Aparna had looked to no avail. Meena’s lovely grin had disappeared and her face was buried morosely into her backpack. It was a sadness none of us could take so I jumped off to have another look for Lepi. After scouring the path that led up to base camp, I met some of the Goans who shook there head when given Lepi’s vitalstatistics. I asked Appa, who for once stopped singing at the seriousness of the issue—he said he has seen something spotty “over there”. Over there, on a wall was Lepi. I ran back to Meena and reunited the snow monkey with her leopard—the smile, hug and sloppy wet kiss I got was more than enough succor for what I had to experience in the bus journey ahead. Winding roads no matter how picturesque, bus no matter how experienced the driver is, and me no matter what my mental resolve—we do not go together—if we have to, then there have to be plenty of sick bags.

The less said the better—Priya patiently handed me bag after bag, wet tissues, and water with a stoic stare. Her tender looks were reserved for Ayesha who got sick too and must have been silently cursing me as well because she kept asking me continuously if this was hereditary. “Why me?” was what she lamented in between bile breaks. I have no idea how Liz was faring but I could see the lovely Aparna, wilted into a crumpled heap in her seat. The Hargopal sisters continued to maintain their dignity and elegance in the front seat, once in a while standing up to check on the rest of us. Lien had bounced back to her natural self after her descent from the mountains, complete with the choicest expletives for the conductor whenever he forgot to shut the bus door. Narayan, the PT teacher was getting ragged by all in the bus for his archaic attitude to girls—he apparently had asked the girls to go learn cooking rather than attend the PT class. In a busload of girls with only Speedy for a male companion, he was totally defenseless. Priya tried to rescue him several times as it was her fan club who formed the majority but after that we just let him get lynched.

It seems there are seven holy rivers in the Himalayas—Sapta Samudrik Tirtha comprising of the Alakananda (Vishnu Ganga), Dhauli Ganga, Nandakini, Bhagirathi, Pindar Ganga, Mandakini (Pindar), and Nayar are said to have flowed from Lord Siva’s head. The prayags we passed are various spots where the Ganga meets different rivers on her journey to the plains. There are five prayags, which are located between Rishikesh and Badrinath:
Dev Prayag, where the Alaknanda meets Bhagirathi.
Rudra Prayag, where the Mandakini from Kedarnath meets the Alakananda.
Karna Prayag, where the Alakananda meets the Pindar Ganga (from the Pindar Glacier). It’s named after the brave Karna, who prayed to his father, the Sun god here.
Nanda Prayag, where the Nandakini and Alakananda meet. Ravana is said to have done his penance here as well as Krishna’s adopted father King Nanda.
Vishnu Prayag, where the Dauli Ganga meets the Alakananda river (from Badrinath). There is a road here through the Niti Pass that takes you up to Mount Kailash, a place I someday I hope to go.
It’s in Allahabad finally that Ganga meets with the Yamuna and the whimsically mythical Saraswati to form the Triveni Sangam.

We had passed the first four Prayags on our way to Loha Jung and now we would get to see them in the reverse order. We followed the Pindar River as it flowed by with unmatched grace, meeting the Alaknanda over white sandy banks. We saw the tall pines and conifers stand guard, as the hills on both sides made way for the rivers. We saw perfectly polished and shaped pebbles in natural heaps and houses rise like quaint little turrets alongside the banks. We saw a massive Shiva statue looming over his temple, hand positioned in dispensing universal blessing--temples dotted the roads we drove on perhaps a confirmation that this was sacred territory. We saw the distant hills melt into the blue sky, bidding us farewell—all this in between jumping out of our seats not in excitement but because of the extremely temperamental roads and the consequences of it thereafter. I at least at this moment was dying to get back into the plains before I died of the puke plague.

When we reached Rishikesh in the late evening, the holy little town was lit up like birthday candles on a cake. It looked lovely but we were way too tired to do anything else but admire it from a distance. When Danny the driver finally stopped near our bus to Delhi—we were all relieved. The girls, I and Priya were too tired to protest when Preeti oversaw the transfer of luggage and chucked our faithful walking sticks away. The group made its way to the café where dinner was to be served, and we were pointed to a restroom on the road if you could call it a restroom. It was a cylindrical tin outfit with a door and served as a restroom for all the nearby fruit and what not vendors in the vicinity. Amazingly it was spotlessly clean and amazingly it had running water definitely siphoned from the holy Ganga . Maybe the cleansing Ganga had ingrained in her nearby residents clean habits too. As I led her to it, I heard Ash say in a very very resigned way—“Mimi, do we have to go in a telephone booth?” After the rocks, the shrubs, the trees, and mountains—I think we had seen it all. Now it was time to go to Delhi.

Back to Base Camp-Loha Jung, 15 May 2007

We woke up to a quiet day and very tired legs. Walking another 10km did not seem to be an option for us—we were really tired. Giovanni had already opted out of the walk and rented a jeep eliminating any chances of bodies hurtling down the valleys—the misgivings that had led to the discord was the incorrect information, the consequent lack of preparedness, and inadequate responses to medical emergencies—all of which could have been avoided to make our trek much more enjoyable.Hopefully, we have all learned our lessons.

There was good cheer all around as we left Ran Ki Dhar by 8 am and walked down to the hamlet below to catch our ride to Loha Jung. Farewells were made to Narayana and Munni—gifts of raincoats, tracks and sweaters and Liz’s plate—as he called out to Meena to never forget Munni. We piled on to the back of the open jeep (after a small tussle between Ash and Nayanika over who got to sit on Liz’s lap) and set off on a ride that was an experience altogether. The jeep hurtled down the road like a roller coaster set free from its rails. What we went through in the back of the jeep—the less said the better! I think it suffices for you to know that we were hanging on for our dear lives. Impedimenta of course was comfortably seated in the front seat and never saw how our bones were jolted short of being dislocated from their respective sockets. We rattled and rolled along; singing hit songs from the latest Hindi movies till possibly the driver got sick of us and put on some of his local favorites. The sun was shining high and we drank in the view. The beautiful mountains and valleys whizzed past us. We waved at the people and pointed out the little streams that trickled down the mountains to each other. All the while making sure that we were holding on tight.

And then a sight that I am sure we all will remember. I don’t know who saw it first but we all looked up to see, what according to Sharda would most probably be, a Eurasian Griffon, gliding above, its wing outstretched over us as if in blessing. It soared across over our jeep much to our delight and at that moment we were so glad to be in the back of this jalopy. Somehow it seemed to me a sign of approval, a sense of completeness if you will—but however hard I tried, I could not get a picture of it. It’s there though, in the mind’s eye, a Griffon in the Himalayas, with outstretched wings protecting what it flew over. I at least would like to think that this bird of prey was on my side.

Then we arrived at Loha Jung. We tumbled out of the jeep, all of us surprisingly in one piece. One look at the Hargopal sisters’ faces and you could see the torture endured, personified. Liz and I kept quiet because we really had enjoyed the jeep ride. The children ran to the big tree outside the base camp and we found that the entire telephone network was down so we could not get in touch with family. Strange, we had not talked to anyone outside our group since the 10th of May. We decided to do some exploring so there we were marching down the main street of Loha Jung complete with our walking sticks in an unconscious tribute to the Dandi March. We were however not in search of salt.

Our first stop was at Chaudhry’s jewelry store—and the company of ladies bombarded questions at “Chaudhry” sitting there till he desperately confessed that he was Sanjay and that he would get Chaudhry for us right away. The real Chaudhry was obviously not very business savvy because he was away playing a game called Guchchi—every one threw their coins into the square marked out on the ground and whoever hit their coin with a marble, won all the coins. All the men in the vicinity seemed to indulge in this particular past-time. That is one thing we noticed—all the men seemed to have a lot of time to relax, sit, gamble at Guchchi, while all the women were working either carrying baskets loads, gathering firewood or grazing the domestic animals. Anyway, we definitely put Chaudhry back to work and back in business. He had to open every box, cupboard, and other hiding places were he had stashed his ware—poor Sanjay even had to take out the rings he wore. Despite the tyranny inflicted on him he offered us tea and in the process won our empathy as well as our money. We left him smiling as his fellow villagers took turns to thump congratulations on his back. I suppose he must have gone back to playing “Guchchi” and still be at it today! We picked up the bells, the sound of which had racked our brains out on several nights, but we had a need to cling to some mementos of this place. “Do you have donkeys around where you stay?”, asked a shop owner. Yeah, sure—lots of them—just can’t put bells around them to warn the others, I thought.

It was lunchtime and hunger pangs set in—Lien had explored the eating joints but it was Preeti who zeroed in on Kundan Singh’s café. “Look at those shining steel and copper glasses—a sign of a meticulous cleanliness,” she emphasized. The menu was announced: Maggi in any way you liked it, eggs in any way you liked it and Dal and Bhaath the only way he had made it. Several packets of Maggi were emptied out with a touch of Kundan Singh’s tomatoes (mine cooked differently—simmered delicately into a soup;-)), several eggs were scrambled, omlette-ed and the dal bhaath was passed around. Kundan Singh had to call in an assistant who was called, surprise,surprise: Kundan Singh! Both Kundan Singhs fussed over us, serving us as well as they could and the result—Truly Scrumptious! The girls were in heaven to the extent that we even heard, “Oh Maggi, how we missed you; how good you taste”! If only I heard that for all my efforts in the kitchen. Truly sated, we sauntered back to Base Camp to see where we would stay the night—wonder of wonders—we got rooms with attached bathrooms!

I hadn’t seen much of the base camp last time and I went around with my cameras till Preeti alerted me to the school nearby. It was a sight that gladdened our hearts. Little boys and girls dressed in white, lined up for their evening assembly. Preeti pointed out that even the girls wore trousers—a smart thing considering the climbing they probably have to do to get to their schools. It was small school, with a few classrooms set up with little plastic chairs. There was a quaintly written leave letter hung there, probably used as a template by the children. The teachers came across to us as sincere and committed as opposed to the ones one read about in the papers who just came in to collect their salary. The blackboard sported details about Uttaranchal and the teacher in Preeti was totally engrossed with the whole experience of the school. We chatted with the teachers for a while and impressed them enough to have them invite our girls for their morning prayers.

Meanwhile, our girls were far from the tired little things we had assumed they would be after a 45+km walk—they were, as Priya informed us, playing on the roofs of some houses, looking like country bumpkins with dirt on their face and their clothes hanging out. Like responsible mothers—we just let them be. Aparna was fatigued enough to not know what was going on, Preeti was busy trying to secure as many chairs as we could for our “personal balcony” which was more like just a stretch of a verandah and I had been plonked in one chair to kind of save it from other aspirants to its cushioned seat.

In walked Goa—the ever-happy ones—once again they had set a record for finishing the trek down really early. They sauntered in as if they came from a walk in the park, with Appa singing to provide the background score. Speedy never sang for us but then maybe it was good he didn’t—he might have been a Cacafonix to his Impedipenta. The last reports we had got was that after biding farewell to Impedimenta and packing us adults into the back of the jeep, he happily rode the pony enroute to base camp—how manly of him when the kids were walking! Then I saw our macho man from Goa and he had his vest back on—and he was dragging along a suitcase of clothes. “Hey Goa,” I called out, “what do you need a suitcase for when all you need is a vest?” “Hey Hyderabad”, he replied, “I got clothes to wear incase it got cold, but it’s really not cold enough!” Oh well—at least it is cold enough to wear a vest.

Apart from not having talked to our families since the 10th of May, we had also not had a bath. Thank god for deodorants, scented wet tissues, lotions and talc—we were still sweet smelling, even if I say so myself—but what we would not do for a hot bath? Preeti was ready to tug-of-war a bucket from Appa successfully and bond with kitchen personnel over Rajma and Jalebis to get them to fill the bucket with hot water several times so that most of us could value what the Bedouins must consider a luxury—a bath. We even roped in our dirty-looking kids to help them shell peas. From the peas though emerged yet another family member—Fern, a caterpillar whom Ayesha loved from the moment it crawled out of the pod into her hand. She was ecstatic about how soft Fern was and how she would be coming home with us. That it was a ‘She’ was an assumption, I pointed out and as for traveling with us—it was not possible. Priya took over to explain that Fern would be happier in the pure clean air of the Himalayas etc., while I timidly looked at a corner where lay the gooey remains of an unrelated caterpillar that I had squashed entirely by mistake and hoped that Fern’s future was better. Thankfully, Fern dropped off an inconsolable Ayesha somewhere and hopefully has evolved into a winged creature of some sort. We have of course a photo of her crawling on Ash’s finger that will be added to the family album.

Dinner was a sumptuous spread, what with an entirely Jain group joining us. The cook, thanks to the PR efforts of Preeti, specially brought in hot jalebis for us. The Goans sang around the bonfire late into the night but we packed in for the night—homeward bound, that’s what we were right now. Homeward bound.

PS: Thanks Sharda, for the correct information on the bird. I really cannot explain to you how beautiful it looked and how wonderful it felt to see it gliding over us. Stay in touch!

Downhill to Camp IV-Ran Ki Dhar, 14 May 2007

It was a bright day that heralded our descent to the mortal plains. Trishul shone and sparkled as the sun dappled its snow-clad peaks. The mountains around us really looked amazingly ethereal—white and blue against the green of the meadows. There we were in this camp, with nothing but mountains all around us but in the starkness lay its beauty. The day began with us being on time but being delayed by Speedy. Manish held back our group and let the Goa group go ahead of us to the Snow Point, which they did singing and hugging as usual with Appa cheerleading raucously. As we waited for our send off down to Ran Ki Dhar, we chatted with Manish—it was a moment to thank him for being there for us. Then we found one child was totally indisposed. An amazing Neha took charge and we did what we could to get him ready. The fact that he could not walk called for a sacrifice from Impedipenta who forlornly gave up the pony—what an amazing discovery—she had feet! After a hurriedly taken group photo we exchanged goodbyes with Manish and he stood on top of the hill with the sun behind him etching a dramatic silhouette into the sky—kind of made me think along the lines in Walt Whitman’s poem, “O Captain! My Captain! Our fearful trip is done…” But then he was indeed a friend during some fearful moments and we had the Himalayas to thank for that.

From 10,000ft to 6,000ft—it was downhill all the way. The entire trek was along the ridge of the mountains. But it was the most enchanting walk, despite being rigorous. We had to walk down stretches of the tree-draped slopes that we had seen from above. The forest was green, cool, and we were enveloped in an eerie sense of freshness that can’t be replicated anywhere in the world. Going down is hard and you have to make an effort to not put pressure on your toes—so we walked with concentrated steps but fully aware of the Rhododendrons in full bloom. Liz was totally herself and we all could echo her feeling when she shouted out to the forest, “I love this!” The track we took was strewn with leaves and while I wasn’t witness to this I believe Speedy decided to ski down the leaves complete with a Rhododendron topped stick, like some Lochinvar aspiring for the Winter Olympics. Impedimenta meanwhile had got back on a horse but again, not ours—when her roving eyes had spied the mount-less Munni, Preeti spurred into action, which meant barking an order out to Aparna who in one reflex action jumped on to Munni. Narayana’s long-desired wish that Meena ki Mummy would sit on his Munni finally came true. But before that it was a battle of lungs as the pony Impedimenta sat on reared back as she let out a war cry matched by Aparna’s much more polite reaction to Munni going downhill—and you thought riding a pony in the Himalayas was easy? Take my advice—walk.

As usual, while Ayesha and I had set off ahead of our group, we lagged behind the people ahead of us, got separated from them and were a bit lost. As usual, I turned to kid (haven’t you read that line “Child is the Father of Man?). She climbed up for a view and saw a little shack and we headed down. We got to a clearing and found that the shack was very ambitiously declared as "NEXT-Hotel and Shop" by a sign tacked to the tree underwhich the first of the Kundan Singhs we met was busy dispensing tea and biscuits. Raja-G (a spin-off on Parle-G) glucose biscuits could not have been a better treat. We were pointed out in the right direction and finally spotted Narayan (the PT teacher) and Binita. We caught up with them and walked down the amazingly narrow track down to a stream. While Narayan was the perfect guide—he had enough of us slow coaches—he asked us to continue down the tracks and loped down the rocks like a superhero minus a cape and reached the stream way ahead of us for a stream bath.

Like all the mountain streams we passed, this too was heaven sent—literally—it probably was one of the many descendants of the Pindar glacier. We threw our rucksacks, flung off the shoes and socks and soaked our feet. The water here was truly divine like all else in the Himalayas—in anxious moments in life I know I shall look back at those calm moments near the stream, where the water flowed over ageless rocks, and ran on witnessing everything but never judgmental. It was cold but I could feel the tiredness wash away. So unimaginably refreshing! Narayan and Sunil (who was with Priya, Liz and others at the very end, had dashed down like Zeus’s lighting bolt) looked reborn what with their shaven faces and scrubbed looks. We could have sat here forever, but there was more walking to be done.

From the stream, it was once again an upward haul. And haul ourselves we did, over fallen logs, loose rocks and stones, past slopes of forests and mountains—with a stop for a bite of chocolate and a swig of water. Now that we were closer to the plains, we passed houses, and colorfully dressed women walking their buffaloes. We saw a tree that looked like a Satyr and solar panels fixed on some houses. Nanu and Ayesha decided to walk ahead with the guide who told us that camp Ran Ki Dhar was, “Bas thoda aage (just a little ahead)”. I walked with Aparna, Lien and Meena and we later found out that the guide had merrily walked off leaving the girls to find their own way, which they did with a little help from Vishal—one of our young trekkers.

Camp Ran Ki Dhar was more of a house than a camp. The camp supervisor looked more like a little guerilla in combat apparel, complete with his headgear—an olive-green beret. Giovanni looked sicker than rested, complete with his headgear—a monkey cap. We were shown into a room where once again Lien had grabbed the best places. I sat on the steps watching our group walk in one by one and admired the resilience of our kids who began playing in the lawns right after lunch. To our surprise, the singing and ever happy Goa walked in—and this time the wife-beater vest guy was without a vest altogether at 6000ft! “Like I do not have abs like that or what”, muttered a Giovanni who definitely would not have had but was still in the dream state that he did—mountain sickness can do strange things to people. Macho guy sans vest did a martial arts demo perhaps in defiance till I alerted him to the fact that I would personally beat him up if his acrobatics knocked off any one of my kids who were playing in the vicinity. And after a lull, there was heave-ho, to-do and it wasn’t the Goa macho—it was Giovanni pitted against Speedy! All the pent-up emotions were out and at each other’s neck- just short of a village fight in Gaul! Our green-bereted guerilla came into use and as the storm was quelled—I missed out on all of the colorful dialogues peppered with references to daughters of thieves,and sons of pigs (far cry from C S Lewis's daughters of Eve and sons of Adam)- all this in Telugu a language known to be as sweet as honey!

The mountains stood in serene silence, oblivious to all the pride and frailties on earth. The sun would go down on them as benevolently as yesterday and rise in hope again tomorrow. The forests that were green today would age gracefully into white with the passing seasons and then be reborn again with time. It made no difference to them who climbed them or who trekked through them. We would begin our journey back to base camp tomorrow and it made no difference to them—but it had made a world of a difference to us.

Meanwhile, one group of our trekkers had managed to get lost. They set off from Bedani Kund, climbed over a couple of hills and got back to Bedani Kund again. They trekked down once more and sat in the clearing near the shop, till the Goa gang passed through. By the time they walked into Camp IV, it was almost time for dinner. After dinner, we packed ourselves into the room like sardines into a tin and lay asleep as the waiting passengers do on railway platforms. We had neither the time nor the inclination to assess how we slept—there were no complaints or discussions regarding the comfort level. The Himalayas had taught us that to be alive is a privilege—the rest are all perks.