Tales of Red Lights in Delhi

No, not that kind of red light…

Delhi, much to my delight, has a lot of traffic signals that have a clock that tells you how long you will have to wait. In the otherwise heart-and-mind-rending exercise of driving in Delhi, this gives you a lovely chance to ungrind the teeth, take a deep breath and switch off your car. It also gives numerous entrepreneurs the opportunity to clean your window, sell you tennis rackets that magically kill mosquitoes, and generally solicit money. Its fun to sometimes engage the little kids in discussion – “Now, wouldn’t it be better to stop wasting your time on me when I’m clearly not going to give you money, and move on to other cars during this all-too-short signal” – and sometimes, of course, just heartbreaking to see the display of diseased limbs, the desperate mothers clutching their children, the dead look in the eyes of children who have seen too much.

There is a family that lives at an intersection near my office. It’s a long light, and I have had plenty of time to observe them on my way to work in the morning. There is a mother that sits at the actual crossing suckling a newborn child, several young children that perform acrobatics in between the waiting cars, and one young man – in his twenties – that seems to collect all the earnings of these children, including, as I found out later, the fruit that I usually give to one particularly cute little girl. The mother looks like she hasn’t eaten for days, and I shudder to think of the quality and quantity of breast milk available to the infant. This last week, I haven’t seen them and hope they have moved on to better things. Not likely, but still.

And then there are the fellow car drivers. We look around, appraise each other. I get a lot of stares – maybe it’s the crazy hair, maybe it’s the fact that I’m dancing in my seat and singing along loudly to some old Hindi song – who knows? Once, the owner of a Hyundai Accent next to me rolled down his window and released an empty Bisleri bottle. Having the luxury of a long wait before the light changed, I got out of my car, picked up the bottle and tapped on his window – “Excuse me sir, this seems to have fallen out of your window…” He muttered as he took the bottle – “Yes it was an accident, I was just about to pick it up”. At another light, on another day, a car full of plump happy businessmen rolled down a window to release a wrapper of Kurkure wafers. “Excuse me bhaisaab, but you dropped something” I called out to them. “No no madam, we threw it out!” came the reply. I rolled my eyes – “Please pick it up bhaisaab”. And they quickly did! I was very impressed. No aggressiveness – it’s like they know what they’re doing is wrong but also take pride in their ability to do it. No, that doesn’t make sense. Huh.

Anyhow, if anyone has ideas on what to do at these intersections – How do we know when the money/food we give actually goes to the person, or are they part of an oppressive brothel-like arrangement as in some of the horror stories you hear? If someone has a dreadful untreated wound, should you offer to take them to a hospital, or are they (too awful to think about) needing to display it to maximize begging income? When a distraught mother knocked on my window to show me a prescription of medicines that she needed to buy for her dying child, how do I know that isn’t the latest fraud? Or in that scenario, should that matter? For God’s sake, can we have shelters that take these women, children and diseased/crippled people in to show them some real charity?

Jaipur Literature Festival 2009

In a word, uplifting. In a few more words, (and to quote one of the panelists on the subject of art), “…A release from the trivialities of quotidian life…”

Where else would a middle class engineer living in Delhi get to rub shoulders with her heroes - the likes of Shoma Chaudhury and Tarun Tejpal? Listen with enraptured attention to a panel consisting of Dalrymple, Thubron, Pico Iyer – each of whom individually fills a shelf in my library. Discover brilliant authors and books – Michael Wood, Simon Schama, Sheldon Pollock. The event was aesthetically, intellectually, and humanitarially (is there such a word?) – illuminating.

Aesthetically – the setting was spectacular. Diggi Palace is a beautiful hotel set in the heart of Jaipur with wide lawns replete with the necessary peacocks, an adorable poolside restaurant and a huge hall that could only be described as endearingly tacky. The decorations were such as to leave in my memory a pleasurable rush of colors – the place had been curtained and streamered (and the people had been dressed) in tasteful excess. Intellectually, the appeal is somewhat obvious – it is a literary festival after all. But most unusually, I loved the hyper-humanitarianism of it all. The stalls for NGOs, the nod to rural art forms and languages, the abundant jhollas… Oh and the fact that all of this was free and open to the public. Unbelievable, is not it? Just a year or so ago, I paid a couple hundred dollars to see a similar festival in Ubud.

No more gushing! Alright, just a little bit more! I sat next to Nandita Das! She is so completely free of ego - she was at one point shooed from her seat by an usher, and she quickly and gigglingly moved to the floor. In an hour or so, she would sit on the large stage in the front lawns in front of hundreds of fawning souls and discuss her upcoming movie. Shoma Chaudhary napped through a session next to me! And embarrassedly mumbled something about being tired when I afterward congratulated her on a couple of brilliant interviews that she had done. (1 & 2)

I am completely starstruck. Perhaps I will write about the sessions in greater detail some other time – right now I will just wallow in lovely memories.

Karachi-3

Party went well. My cousin Nishrin who had come with me from Bombay said that Pakistan was surprisingly "quite civilized" which aroused the ire of all the natives. Later that night, she traipsed up to me (hitherto I'd been quite horrified by her nationalism), and said triumphantly that we had won. One of my cousins who lives a few houses down was going to walk home, but decided that she would first take off her jewelry. See! That would never be necessary in Bombay! I giggled.

Today we are going shopping! Clothes and jootees mostly. I'm feeling a lot less gloomy about the situation since I heard about the arrests and have felt free to enjoy myself. Whew!

Oh and a note about the food here. Meat, meat and more meat. I've been eating the gravy and salad, but my cousin Nishrin finally protested that she had had enough, some palak Please!

Karachi-2

We're all ready for a big party tonight (mostly) in our honour.

The day has been interesting. Went to a nearby police station to register ourselves, then drove around for hours looking at Karachi landmarks and neighborhoods. I find myself looking for differences between Karachi and Delhi, but really, they are remarkably similar. Lots of space, big houses for a small elite. Interestingly, Karachi has few luxury apartments, though more are coming up. Seriously secure gated communities. Went to visit Jinnah's mazaar and his house. I felt uncomfortable - as much as Pakistanis revere the man, I felt nothing, guess we have been as conditioned to revere our own heroes.

This morning, my cousin triumphantly led me to this morning's Dawn: the headline announced that two Indians had been arrested with connection to the blast. See! I read the article - they simply bought SIM cards for the terrorists. The reinforcement continues...

Karachi-1

I can't quite believe I'm in Karachi - considering we were attacked so brutally by a bunch of lads with connections to this city - who set off for their awful mission from this port.

I wasn't quite sure what I expected. A bit of denial - I'd read a couple of columns in Tehelka & Dawn (Irfan Hussein - one non-delusional Pakistani) - that talked about how the majority of Pakistanis believed 1) that Indians (either Hindu fundamentalists or disaffected Indian Muslims) did the attack and the whole Pakistan angle is simply a fabrication and 2) that terrorism wasn't a big deal anyhow since there were regular (almost weekly) attacks and bomb blasts in some city or the other in Pakistan.

What I wasn't ready for was the completely blase attitude of my cousins. They kept throwing out silly statements - how was it possible that they got so much ammunition in, how did the security establishment not detect the boats, what happened to the dead terrorists, what about the Deccan Mujahideen. It was complete denial. And this is the relatively rich section of the population, well read, well educated, with plenty of family in India, who have regularly visited Bombay (and that too, Colaba). They must have been horrified when this happened. Of course, part of these suggestions was simply cousinly teasing - they know how seriously I generally take things. But below all that, there is a genuine ignorance of where the world stands on this issue, and on top of that, constantly reinforcing their views with any little tidbit or rumor they can find.
I brought up Mukhtar Mai and expressed my admiration. At first, they looked each other uncomfortably - then later as they were showing me their city, made a comment that not all Pakistani women are like Mukhtar Mai. That was not at all what I had meant. I assured them that I deeply admired her and in fact wished that more Indian women in similar situations had her courage.

Tomorrow is Bakri Eid. My 15-year old niece is excited to wake early tomorrow to witness the slaying of several goats (almost one in every lawn) as well as the beheading of a camel.

Other than that, am enjoying myself thoroughly. The warmth of my family, the uproarious laughter, the catching up, the endless leg-pulling. Good times

Bhopal Hungerstrike Blog

Now at http://www.bhopal.net/march/hungerstrike_diary.html

Bhopal Dharna Blog
am writing most of the blog:
http://www.bhopal.net/march/dharna2008_blog.html

check it out

Finding my religion

we hug
we commute with infinity
we flirt with divinity
a universal blessedness

we snuggle
in the warmth of fire
of the sun, of life, desire
an eternal furnace

we share
a profound empathy, understanding
a delicate affinity, undemanding
all knowing, all forgiving, timeless

a love
that seeps into, and saturates,
and overflows, and inundates
all crevasses, all emptiness
like god,
perhaps it is god
perhaps god is it

The cliched life of a spoilt insomniac

Trying to sleep
But I can’t

Trying to find myself
But it eludes me

Trying to love myself
But I can’t

Trying to find
A space for myself
It’s a tough world!

Trying not to
Think so much about myself
But I can’t

Trying to stop
Making excuse s for myself
But I can’t

Why this angst
Why this confusion
Why aren’t the answers
Where I thought they would be

What do I want
What am I wanted for
What is the point, the theme, the thrust
Of my story

Trying to shake off
The corsets of doubt
Unleash
Understand
Breathe
Be

Be the glorious lover
Be the fighter for justice
Set off a new epoch
Of compassion and peace

Be the candle leading out
Of the dark underbellies
Be the dreamer sticking up
Of what could quite possibly be

A good world
Filled with plenty
Of everything
An easy life
For everyone

Like I had
Like I have
hmmm
What am I moaning for again?

Ah yes.
Still trying to sleep
But I can’t

Looking for a Cause

Leaving a cushy job at the worlds largest hydrocarbon producer (and most profitable corporation), I like to boast that I want to spend the rest of my life fixing my broken karma. Huh? Yes, I know, I don’t quite know what that means either. Is it doing good? Is it helping the helpless? Is it hataofying (try looking that up in a dictionary – I think I just invented a word!) poverty in India? In the world? Or are racism, casteism, misogyny, greed more pressing evils to address? (Well not greed, the non-poor half of the world swears by it nowadays as the source of their non-poverty, but that’s an unnecessary aside.)

Alright, so what is a wannabe do-gooder to do? I could dedicate my life to teaching kids in a neighboring slum in Delhi how to read. But is that an easy way out? After all, with all my literacy and bossy can-do-ness I could accomplish a lot more. What if Gandhiji had decided that converting people to the moral and healthful wonders of vegetarianism would be his sole goal in life? But then, I’m not Gandhiji. And better to definitively accomplish a concrete good thing (you never know, one of the kids I mentor may actually become the next Gandhiji), than to have pipe dreams, however all-encompassingly highminded they may be. Or is it?

There is the other small problem of a confused, deeply ambivalent mind. Getting a masters degree in Economics in the United States has left a nagging suspicion in my mind that economic growth may be the only solution to poverty. But that of course, is quickly drowned out by all the certainties of the evils of inequality and crass consumerism that necessarily come with growth (inclusive growth is a lovely phrase, it makes speeches of politicians sound much nicer than they would otherwise). I look hungrily at the brilliant example of Kerala with its vibrant equalness and much-admired literacy. And Chavez using the west’s own precious democracy to dislodge the putrid oligarchy that existed in Caracas. But then the damned critics’ cynical questions poke me: would there be a Kerala if there wasn’t a Gulf? If the oil price fell to $1 a barrel, would the poor in Venezuela continue to lavish their praises on their savior Chavez?

A lot of questions – perhaps I’m doomed to spend my life formulating questions. Wish I could adopt an omniscient political belief – an opium for the massive ambivalence – life would be much easier. Really.