22/02/11
Delhi life if you know the right people is electro-rock bands and late night clubs in classy hotels blasting techno and serving fancy cocktails til five in the morning. The clientele a mixture of westerners and rich Indians. Nothing too showy, they all seem to be there to party hard, the floor is full of sweaty bodies, mostly men. Inside these places it doesn’t feel like india.
The next day it all feels real again. At the post office we befriend Amlata, a proud Kashmiri women who is excited to meet us as she has children in both the UK and USA (she boasts). She lives alone here in Delhi and whilst she showers us with advice and compliments about living and travelling as single women in india there is a sadness to her and stains on her sari that she no longer notices herself. She asks us to come and eat and spend time with her, i nod emphatically knowing that it probably will not happen in the limited time i have left here. On the walk home there are dogs everywhere, a group of skeletal puppies scavenge slowly and lethargically, one attempts to pick the flesh off a rat in rigamortis but gives up and lies back in the heat, it’s tiny body heaving with exhaustion.
The next day is hot and the air feels wet to, it’s good to while away some hours outside of thought, to read and soak sun a little. As the day wears on and we decide to go out and take a walk around another part of delhi, the sky turns purple, the air is thick with moisture and everything is intense. We tentatively pass up the fashion and craft boutiques to our left and right to see what seems like some old, ruined stone temples in front of us (something one stumbles upon in India). In the grounds children are throwing balls but there is no laughter, boys hang gloomily around the ruins staring ominously into the lake and there are pockets of lovers hidden in corners. The wind whips up. Red dust flying in spirals, beach-sandwich-teeth and blinded eyes. We make a run for it, back past the boutiques, shining and glittering designer saris, sequin minidresses, antique rajasthani anklets and gramophones on plinths and hide in a bar which is cosy and atmospheric and more resembling something you would find in London that in India. We settle down on the sofas and order hot chocolate and tea, only to be told that no tea is available and that these sofas are reserved for the owners. We move begrudgingly and order milkshakes, most inappropriate for the booming thunder surrounding us and I for one am immediately aware that the paleness of our skin did not allow us privileges for a change. Later I look around and see that this place is a popular spot for our type and modern, well-off Indians alike. We are approached by a young, smart Indian man, who asks about the game we’re playing. A conversation about who, where from and why we are here ensues. Our new friend seems putout by our working as English teachers and states that it is useless in the slums. We patiently explain to him about Asha’s work, training women from the slums to work within the community as health-workers. My friends are as animated as I, we have all seen what these women have achieved, we’ve seen healthy, happy people, decent sanitation, paved slums and we are all falling head over heals with the students we teach. He continues to huff and puff and refuses an Asha business card when I offer it.
Finally it’s all there at once. Not the rich and poor but the attitude towards the poor or misfortunate and the mistrustfulness of all. Monday brings my dreaded visit to the Foreign Registration Office to get a stamp allowing me to leave the country come june. Bureaucracy coming out of my ears, I sir, madam, ji my way through the process as I’m shouted and gestured at like everyone else. We take numbers but it means nothing, you have to push for a place. Covered in other peoples sweat, I reach the front to be told my documents are no good, I needed this and that, photocopies, signatures, leases, utility bills… I DON’T LIVE HERE I want to shout, no amount of grovelling is effective. I dejectedly turn to leave walking past the queue of weary looking families, gripping scraps of paper, no glimmers of hope as they approach fat-bellied men with shiny, bushy moustaches and mean eyes, past the mass of Afghanis in the other section getting shoved and hit by toothy, nasty, suspicious looking men in uniforms and out into the street.
I find a chai wallah, there's the normal stares from his other customers and then as he begins to hand me the cup he takes it away again and pours it back into the pot and heats it on the stove. carefully pouring it through the sieve once more he hands me the cup, i taste it. it's scorching hot, creamy, gingery chai, the finest of chais. my amiable chai wallah doesn't have the right change and purposely undercharges me, kindly smiling and declining as i offer his change back. my day is fixed.
i breeze through the next three hours of bureaucracy and come out smiling as i jump into an autorickshaw to jeevan nagar. the kids greet me like a celebrity, the women have a feast ready for lunch. as always i don't remember till later that theses folk have nothing to their name and still give everything of themselves.
