Me, a friend and Rahul!

I am the one in yellow. We were in a workshop where we were supposed to write something on the projected pic.

Nazraana toh tab hota

Driver se manga li bottle
Lal ribbon laga kar de di
Yeh bhi koi nazrana hai?
Nazrana toh tab hota
jab bottle na sahi,
ek hi glass mein
angoor ki beti na sahi
uska ras hi hota
Pub ka high stool na sahi
juice ka ek stall hota
Background mein latest film ka
fata hua poster hi sahi
Colourful mahaul toh hota
Disco lights, DJ na sahi
FM gunguna raha hota
par hum dono saath mein
haathon mein liye haath
kuch hans rahe hote
kuch bol rahe hote
Humare pass waqt hota
Gar yeh hota toh nazrana hota!

(c) Smita Rajan
April 2005

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

(Published in Tehalka Newspaper in June 2004)

Driving in air-conditioned comfort
as I thought unhappy thoughts
Why was I not gifted beauty?
What did I do to deserve
the marks on my face?
Why could not I lose weight
or weight ever lose me?
So drive I did, wondering
what would happen next month
when I don’t have a job?
a thousand worrisome thoughts

The signal was red
Also broken was my trail of thoughts
She was on the pavement
pretty as a picture, babe in arms
her beautiful eyes moving
to car after car in vain hope
braving the unrelenting sun
torn clothes, sad smile less eyes
was she really a pretty picture?

Not in the eyes of a driver or two
who looked upon her
with more hunger
than her babe would have felt.
Shuddering as I imagined her
in the night, homeless,
fighting to stay away from prying eyes
I wondered if beauty was
really a boon?

Back home facing a mirror
I saw my ugly marks fade away
as the mirror turned
into my son’s innocent little eyes
And what I saw in them
was a sight never to be forgotten
Never to be taken lightly
A lesson for all times to come
to cherish and to preserve
Yes, I saw
A very beautiful woman looking back at me!


© Smita Rajan
June 2004

Was it TV?

The other day we were in the car, with my 7-year old in the back. Having eaten candy floss, he complained of stickyness on his face. So I looked for water, poured some on a napkin, passed it on to him to wipe. He did that and said:

"You rock, baby!"

I am still rocking...

My Friend

From insanity he rescued me
to bring me into meaning
held my hand, until
on my feet I was, not leaning

From dreamless slumber he awakened me
introducing me to dreams
to confidence, to living, to life
and to its many themes

He sees right through me
at times, he rips me apart
and yet to show me the way
to talk me through, he has the heart

He's someone I'd very much like
to follow till the end
he's the one, the wonderous one
I would call a friend.

(c) Smita Rajan
28th Aug 2005

Anna and I

(A chronicle of the two weeks spent with Anna, my pen friend from Sweden in December 2002)

Looking at your country from a foreigner’s point of view is a moving experience. It could move any way. Fortunately, mine was largely positive, and I am so thankful for it.

THE LUKEWARM BEGINNING:

Traveling with my pen friend of fifteen years – Anna, was an eye opener. Anna lives in Sweden and was here for her second visit to India. Like all true-blood foreigners, She wanted to see the Taj, so we began with Agra, only to be disappointed later.

The first experience that greeted us as we walked out of Agra station was being mobbed by scores of men who claimed that they were guides offering great deals on private tour of the city. They were so rudely overwhelming, that to escape them Anna and I jumped into the first moving auto rickshaw that came our way.

“ET TU, BRUTUS!”

The auto rickshaw driver asked us where we wanted to go and promptly understood our
two-women-lost-in-the-woods status. He shoved a tour rate card under our noses, and thus began another painful war of words. We forced him to stop at the first visible restaurant, paid him off hastily and ran in for our lives! Luck was not our side that morning, for that place turned out to be very expensive. Having fought our way through Agra city, and paid a fortune for breakfast, we decided to approach the UP tourism office to fix ourselves an “authentic” tour for the day. As we walked out of the fancy restaurant we found “Brutus” waiting for us armed with his rickety auto rickshaw, irritating persistence and that inevitable dirty yellow rate card that we learnt later, seemed to be all over Agra!

I was beginning to lose my cool now. It was not pleasant any longer. We walked out and hailed a cycle rickshaw to reach the Agra tourism office.

“TOUT LAND”

How can a place that runs on tourism have its government-run tourist office close on a Sunday? Beats me! The old rickshaw driver “suggested” an alternative. He said that he would take us to a nearby auto stand, where people are not so greedy. We decided to stop the first auto that comes our way and hire it. This one, too whipped out his rate card at first, but realizing how allergic we had become, was kind enough to keep it away from our sight. We negotiated a fair price, bid adieu to our old man cycle rickshaw wallah, who had already set a rendezvous with our auto-wallah in the evening, for his share of the deal. Once in the auto, we heaved a sigh of relief. I apologized to Anna, I was after all my country’s ambassador for her! She told me about her similar experiences in Morocco and West Africa, but we agreed that these people were the kings of being pushy.

TAJ : THE LAND OF INCONVENIENCE

Shock awaited me at the ticket window of the Taj. My ticket was a mere twenty rupee note while Anna, of the fair hair and skin had to shell out 700 rupees just to be able to see the monument and use her camera there. I mean, what is this amazing difference all
about? Agreed that a country needs to earn from its tourists, but why so much? In return for so much, could the country please assure freedom from the unpleasant touts, proper guidance to foreigners at the points of entry and at least the assurance of having somebody at the city office on public holidays, to help the lost foreigners? Anna did not mind the vast difference, but I certainly did and felt pretty much ashamed. Our later trips into Rajasthan proved my point. In Rajasthan, on an average my ticket was Rs 10 and hers was Rs 100, in all monuments we visited. Now, that seemed fair enough.

A thorough search by the security forces posted at the Taj gate was not too annoying and the Taj was of course magnificent! What was less magnificent was the jostling crowd, certain members of the male species of which, tried to act funny with us. But then, that is not a difficult situation to handle for a nearly professional kick-boxer that my friend is. I too, got to use my modest weapon-the safety pin-on somebody who deserved more than that. It was only twice during my unique trip that I felt conscious of being a women, once during our little “attack “ on the hovering males at the Taj, and the second time later at Udaipur where we wanted to go out a long distance after dinner just to be able to see the city palace reflect its lights on the lake. Anna of course did not share my reluctance and am I glad she did not…it would have meant missing out on such a lovely view!

THE NEVER-NEVER LAND

I don’t think Anna is ever going to get back to Agra. Neither would I, given a choice. I also don’t think any of the foreigners who have had the taste of Agra like we did, would dare to get back there. Is this the kind of tourism India wants to promote? Also Anna complained about the attitude of this woman at the Indian embassy in Sweden. It seems this one did not care too much about selling India as a tourist destination. With her bored expression and an unwillingness to help it would have been easy for any potential tourist to feel rather put-off. Won’t it be a good idea to have smart people where it matters?

SLAVE TRADE

Fatahpur Sikri was a twin sister to Agra. We were being forced to buy the sacred thread and cloth and what not. I was being forced to forget my politeness and snap at those men. Where was their self-respect? One of the touts was getting on our nerves and I could not help but yell at him to go away. His parting shot never ceases to bring laughter to my lips…. “She is still a slave to the goras”!

The only pleasant memory of Agra was the auto ride to Fatehpur Sikri punctuated by about fifty pairs of black bear and human beings walking on the roadside to God knew where? We met them all through our journey. We had been too sleepy to talk during our early morning train journey. So this ride gave us an opportunity to exchange notes about our lives. “Girl talk” packs extreme emotions sometimes. So was ours in which our collective crushes and affairs tumbled out and were dissected ruthlessly. We would laugh out loud completely upsetting the auto driver and then we would weep…there is something so beautiful about emptying your soul into someone, especially someone like Anna.

When we reached the station, we learnt that train to Delhi was running two hours late! …That was Agra for us. I wish I could wipe Agra off our memories - Agra, its touts, its money – making tendencies are all a part of my country, whether I like it or not. And you cannot just chop off parts of your body even if they hurt. But, I would never be able to live with the Agra brand of India, either.

RAJASTHAN : A PLEASANT CHANGE

The next day we left for Udaipur. That was the beginning of the pleasant experience I talked about earlier. Rajasthan is so beautiful! Not just the places, the people, too. The tourism is so professionally managed! Its people make you feel at home and go out of their way to help. When we asked somebody for directions, they were so eager to help that they offered to ride with us for about a kilometer even if it was exactly in the opposite direction to where they were headed. I must also talk about one shopkeeper who sold lovely Rajasthani miniature paintings. Not only did he give us great prices, but also framed and delivered our paintings to the hotel later in the night at no extra cost. I must have been to these places in Rajasthan a number of times, but this trip was unparalleled!

ROYAL TREAMENT

At Udaipur, we had a nice time. Sight seeing was fun, with the tour guide thinking of me as a young lady and flirting with me till kingdom come! So the palace on the lake, according to our guide, was meant to be visited when you became “two from one”. I did not have the heart to tell him that I had already become “three from one”!

That was another astonishing part of my trip with Anna. If my husband was perfectly happy looking after my four-year-old son for the five days that I was away, what was people’s problem? Forget the older generation, even a few of my own friends told me that it was unfair of me to leave my son and go off like that to have fun. Well, they are entitled to their own opinions. So am I …and in this case my opinion is that these women will one day emotionally blackmail their children that they went through so much sacrifice to bring them up etc. etc.! Incidentally, one of these women is out of Delhi on work every second month for fifteen days or so, leaving behind her three-year-old. That, she said was different, because her daughter knew that her mom was out for work and not for fun like me. India is not as emotionally and practically forward as it claims to be… this is one more lesson I learnt from my trip with Anna.

Anna is single as yet, but she tells me that she and her married friends in Sweden, who are also mothers go on such get-away trips every now and then. It is absolutely a done thing there. I now understand how important it is for a woman to take time off for her own self. Back home, fresh and happy, I think I was better wife and mother and ever so grateful to my family for letting me go.

SPACE FOR EVERYBODY!

One thing I always admired about Anna was her ability to think of me and take time out for me during her most hectic trips all around the world. I still cherish her picture post cards sent to me from vague corners of the world in the last fifteen years. On this first trip with her, I realized that she creates time for friends. We took an entire afternoon off from our hectic schedule in Udaipur just to sit by the lake and write post cards. I too, tired this out – writing to my friends when I was having the time of my life. And it felt so very good…as good as the masala chai we sipped alongside. So, one lesson from my trip is that you got to remember your loved ones when you are the happiest…it makes you even happier.

CO-TRAVELERS, FRIENDS FOR LIFE!

Back at the modest RTDC hotel, the friendly guy at the reception called to get our okay on the people he had set us up with to share the hotel taxi to Chittaurgarh the next day. These people turned out to be of the same combination as us – one European and one Indian! Both males. Actually, it was a half Indian traveling with his relative from Indore. Both were perfectly well mannered and much older gentlemen, who proved to be worthy co-travelers. We made a group that lasted till the end of our trip at Jaipur. I assumed the duties of the official translator of the group. Our guide at the Chittaurgarh fort was an old man who passionately hated the Jaipur royal family for betraying their country and helping the Mughals. However, he was a great guide and explained the movement of the Chittaur troops by drawing diagrams on the ground.

RTDC is really a well-managed tourism agency. Their hotels might not be too fancy, but they are surely comfortable. And who bothers about room service when the idea is to stay more out of the hotel, than in. All a couple of tired back–packers like us wanted were clean sheets and hot water.

BACK ALLEYS – THE REAL INDIA

It is true that I got better treatment for being with Anna. People mistook me for an NRI showing India to her friend. So, we were treated accordingly. How else could they explain our relationship? It was fun to see the expressions on people’s faces when they found me speaking in 100% unadulterated and unaccented Hindi! In Rajasthan, as soon as I opened my mouth, people left us alone.

We walked for miles and miles. I had never realized how wonderful walking is before. Real exploration of a new place is possible only if you walk. No wonder why foreigners walk so much in India! We preferred the back lanes and alleys to the main streets. In these back lanes of Udaipur, we found some amazingly great bargains!

SYMBIOSIS

We had the famous and huge Jodhpuri Kachauri for lunch and Rajasthani thali for dinner. After that first day, it was this Thali everyday on Anna’s express desire. She just loved it! If I learnt so much from being with her, for her being with an Indian was not without advantages. Anna wouldn’t have taken a second look at the pan shop without me. I got her hooked to the “meetha” without supari pan and she loved it! Then, I was a handy tool while bargaining and giving directions to autowallahs. She was my trump card for extra special treatment everywhere.

Jaipur was interesting as well. The sight seeing, I realize, is just a small part of foreigners’ image of India. Indians, their welcoming spirit, food, shopping and so much more go on to complete the picture of what India is. For Anna, it was easy to see what life is like for a small middle-class family like ours in a metropolitan city. Now I feel, I want to do the same one-day – discover for myself what a country is all about.

VALUES ARE THE SAME EVERYWHERE

Anna and I exchanged several notes on our countries. Actually we exchanged reams of information. It surprised me to no end to learn that despite the forward and modern status that the Scandinavian country of Sweden has acquired, our values remain the same. Anna told me that when she was a child her mother used to tell her not to waste food on her plate for there were millions of children on the earth who could not eat two square meals in a day. Now that was exactly what I was told as a child! Another similarity was the family ties she has with her numerous uncles and aunts and grand parents!

BACK HOME

We said good-bye to our co-travellers turned -friends and headed home. Anna was to stay with us for a week and then fly home to Sweden to make it before Christmas. This week was as rewarding as the previous one. I had to join work, and met Anna only in the mornings and evenings. She rested, baby-sat my son, wrote letters, baked cookies and cakes for us and went walking out on Delhi roads-in this week. At weekends, we packed a picnic lunch and walked to the nearest park with my son. We shopped together, sat in cafes and talked and talked. I drove her around Delhi and we talked some more. And soon it was time for her to go.

Anna has gone, but the lessons I learnt just from being with her remain. I have learnt to enjoy walking and not curse it. I have imbibed the Sunday afternoon picnics away from the TV and the phone. I have begun remembering my friends a little more – especially when I am happy and it has brought so much joy to me. I have also learnt that my country is simply great! Agreed, that a lot of change – mostly attitudinal and in policy – is in order, but on the whole, there’s just no place in the world that could match the sights, sounds, smells and most importantly, the food of India!!


© Smita Rajan
2002

Hello!

Have been wanting to start my own blog. Well, here I am.

As always, the first entry is Hope, a poem I wrote as a teenager.

HOPE

In the darkness of the night
when there is no moon
Be sure a bright light
will flood your world soon

Keep your hope alive
and have faith in Him
In the meantime strive
to realise your dream

Upon a day sun will shine
when your cup of joy'll overflow
All your hardwork, all your trying
to the world this day will show.

(c) Smita Rajan (1991)