This love affair was slow to start. When I first discovered I was pregnant, I was distraught. At 28, I was not ready to have a baby. I wanted to focus on my career! And then as the pregnancy progressed I watched with horror as my body changed to accommodate the growth in me!
When I held Nishna in my arms the first time, I was shocked I think - I could not believe that I had her in me for 9 months. And her eyes touched me - those unfocussed eyes (that possibly saw me through a haze) seemed so deep and ageless.
I don’t think I fell in love with her even then, but I lost my sleep. I would wake up at the slightest movement from her, hold my finger under her nose to check if she was breathing and also place my hand on her chest to feel it rise and fall.
I was still grappling with the enormity of it all....feeling like Mother Dairy and hating Praneet for looking the same and continuing with his life!
I don’t remember when I fell truly madly deeply in love with Nishna! But she filled up my senses and left room for nothing. And I have enjoyed every phase of her life! I have watched her transformation from a painfully shy child to the confident , articulate young girl she is today.
And today is when I perhaps I enjoy her the most.
Nishna's day is inundated with her friends and school. She loves to dress up and spends an inordinate time on bb chat and skype with her friends and her Maasi whose style opinion she trusts. (She thinks I am not feminine enough coz I don’t dress up and don’t spend time on the activity either!). She is learning to refine her wit like Praneet’s to come with pithy one liners that say it all. She loves music and dance and the house always hums with her music. And she is misery personified with Udai!
I am not her best friend and she finds faults in me. But I have learnt to laugh off the criticism and irritation. I hug her when she is angriest and laugh when she is sharpest! Coz I know that under that agitation, is my little teenager who is grappling with too many issues. Struggling with finding her identity, making her place in her peer group, keeping her head above trouble, feeling the pressure of our expectations and handling the raging hormones and all its stresses! And I know that she can only turn to me (atleast for another few years) when she needs answers to questions that are not even well formed in her head.
I have no idea what Nishna will turn out like, what she will do and what the future holds for her. All I know is that my love affair with her changes every day and is enduring! And if I could, I would protect her from every pain , suffering , failure and disappointment! But I also know that atleast in this relationship, the biggest favour I can do is to let her go and find her self....and I know she will keep turning to see me standing there!
Live Life Queensize my darling ~
Friday, January 13, 2012
Sunday, January 8, 2012
Nani
Udai was about three months old on his first Holi. I handed him over to my Nani, his great grand mother ,so he would not get too messy while we played Holi. I happened to look at them and saw my Nani looking gleeful with a bottle of beer in one hand and Udai on her lap. Delightedly she told me that she had just fed Udai his first sip of beer! And I should definitely tell him that when he grows up!
That image of Nani is frozen in my mind. And represents to me all that this spunky lady is. She turns 88 today. She has seen her world go topsy turvy - forced to leave her homeland, lost her young daughter, lived with debilitating asthma , gave birth to a late born daughter (she never realised she was pregnant and thought it was gas!) ,lived through the death of her husband, celebrated the happinesses of all her kids, birth of her grand kids and now the huge bunch of great grand kids. And today she is frail of body, but as Nishna puts it - she has the sharpest brain!
My grandparents lived in West Punjab and during Partition, Nani camped out on the terrace of their bungalow among vats of boiling oil to be poured on Muslims in the neighbourhood who wanted to carry away the beautiful Rekhi girls. My grand-dad managed to extract his whole family from there and bring them across the Wagah Border since he was in the Army. Then he went missing for 6 months and during this time, Nani refused to wear white or behave like a widow because her heart told her that he was alive and would come back home.
Once she was not allowed to enter the house because she had tea with the Muslim CO’s wife and had to take a cold bath in the outdoors before coming in!She was smart and beautiful but headstrong and would not learn English though my grand-dad kept urging her to do so!
Nani’s world fell apart when my grand-dad passed away 25 years ago. And she stopped wearing pink coz my grand-dad had loved her in the colour and she looked most gorgeous in it.
Nani has changed with the times - whereas my Mom was not allowed to even talk to the friends of her brothers, Nani has been enthu about the relationships of all her grandkids and great grandkids and we have all shared many confidences with her. She tells us all to live fearlessly and follow our hearts and dreams so there are no regrets in life.
She loves to dress up well and is vain about her jewelry. She loves to try new foods. At this age too, she travels everywhere - to her sisters and brothers , to Mumbai to us and to my cousins in the Mid-East.
Thanks to the foresight of my grand-dad, Nani is financially independent and this gives her the dignity and confidence to live her life like the proud woman she is.
Nani couldn't care less who the PM of this country is. What concerns her is what each of her children likes to eat and what is bothering them in their lives. She loves to have her whole family over and fusses over all of us.
I wonder sometimes what she thinks about? About her childhood and all the carefree times she had? About my grand-dad and the companionship his death robbed her of? Of her near and dear ones who have passed on? About her kids and whether they will all be together forever? I wonder if she feels lonely.
We are all blessed to have her in our midst. She is the fevicol that holds the whole family together. And she is the one who has instilled the love and value for family and relationships among all her kids. And one hug from her frail body tells me that there is hope and happiness in everything in life.
Happy Birthday Nani!
That image of Nani is frozen in my mind. And represents to me all that this spunky lady is. She turns 88 today. She has seen her world go topsy turvy - forced to leave her homeland, lost her young daughter, lived with debilitating asthma , gave birth to a late born daughter (she never realised she was pregnant and thought it was gas!) ,lived through the death of her husband, celebrated the happinesses of all her kids, birth of her grand kids and now the huge bunch of great grand kids. And today she is frail of body, but as Nishna puts it - she has the sharpest brain!
My grandparents lived in West Punjab and during Partition, Nani camped out on the terrace of their bungalow among vats of boiling oil to be poured on Muslims in the neighbourhood who wanted to carry away the beautiful Rekhi girls. My grand-dad managed to extract his whole family from there and bring them across the Wagah Border since he was in the Army. Then he went missing for 6 months and during this time, Nani refused to wear white or behave like a widow because her heart told her that he was alive and would come back home.
Once she was not allowed to enter the house because she had tea with the Muslim CO’s wife and had to take a cold bath in the outdoors before coming in!She was smart and beautiful but headstrong and would not learn English though my grand-dad kept urging her to do so!
Nani’s world fell apart when my grand-dad passed away 25 years ago. And she stopped wearing pink coz my grand-dad had loved her in the colour and she looked most gorgeous in it.
Nani has changed with the times - whereas my Mom was not allowed to even talk to the friends of her brothers, Nani has been enthu about the relationships of all her grandkids and great grandkids and we have all shared many confidences with her. She tells us all to live fearlessly and follow our hearts and dreams so there are no regrets in life.
She loves to dress up well and is vain about her jewelry. She loves to try new foods. At this age too, she travels everywhere - to her sisters and brothers , to Mumbai to us and to my cousins in the Mid-East.
Thanks to the foresight of my grand-dad, Nani is financially independent and this gives her the dignity and confidence to live her life like the proud woman she is.
Nani couldn't care less who the PM of this country is. What concerns her is what each of her children likes to eat and what is bothering them in their lives. She loves to have her whole family over and fusses over all of us.
I wonder sometimes what she thinks about? About her childhood and all the carefree times she had? About my grand-dad and the companionship his death robbed her of? Of her near and dear ones who have passed on? About her kids and whether they will all be together forever? I wonder if she feels lonely.
We are all blessed to have her in our midst. She is the fevicol that holds the whole family together. And she is the one who has instilled the love and value for family and relationships among all her kids. And one hug from her frail body tells me that there is hope and happiness in everything in life.
Happy Birthday Nani!
Thursday, January 5, 2012
The Help and Me
In sheer anger I threw out my driver of six years - a guy with quirks, but one that I trusted implicitly with my kids. The tipping point - that he took off for a holiday when we went on a break and did not come back on time.
This at a time when I just finished reading ‘The Help’ and also read all the controversy generated on the treatment of help in India. The Help is set in the America of the ‘60s when segregation was still the norm and we are pretty much still stuck there too.
Perhaps other Indians are better than me, but these are the things I continue to do with my help - I have a separate bathroom for them ,they use the crockery and cutlery set aside for them, they do not sit on the table with me to eat, they are not encouraged to sit on the sofas or beds in my house and they have a long list of chores assigned in the day.
What I don’t do -I don’t lock up foodstuff,I do not take out quantities of food for the help to eat, I don’t stop them from watching TV when their work is done, I don’t stop them from talking on their mobiles , I don’t deduct their salaries for days they have taken off and I don’t allow my kids to be rude or condescending towards them.
I am very fortunate to have help that serves me well, but if anything is misplaced or missing, my suspicion is first directed towards them. Yes, when they start to tell me about looming expenses, I fully expect them to ask me for an advance and begin a conversation in my mind on how best to negotiate. If they ask for a vacation I resent it coz I will have to do most of the work myself. I also screw up my nose when I think my driver has not taken a bath in the morning. And I do not like my help being overfamiliar when I have guests at home. I do not like my driver taking a day off in the week because it throws my schedule out of gear.
In my mind , I believe I treat my help far better than my parents’ generation. I sponsor their kids’ education, take care of their medical expenses, gift them liberally on festivals and also give them advances for weddings and other exigencies. But there is a niggling doubt that I am not really honest in my true feelings towards them.
Truth is, like the whites resented giving the blacks rights, I resent my dear Constitution makers for having given the help the same rights as me. Even if I do believe that every human has a life and an equal right to live the way they want to, I am not happy that my help has the wherewithal to negotiate (shamelessly) with me on salary, vacation and other issues, that the help can sulk and walk out if I do not permit anything and that they are not loyal to me! I resent the fact that they have me wrapped around their fingers! Ofcourse, I behave like that with my employers too, but then I think I am superior because of my education and class!
India is witnessing a huge class upheaval and a lot of this is manifest in the changing equations between homemakers and their help. All homemakers - working or otherwise, are feeling the pressure and the pinch.
The fact is -the help is not wrong. Most of us don’t know the minimum wage that the help has to be paid, we do not give them a moment’s rest ,they are on their toes 24\7 and their needs are the last thing we pay attention to. I am not referring to that half hour nap the maid might require because she has been up from 6 in the morning preparing for kids and breakfast. How many of us have really listened to them?What village they come from? How many people their salary supports?What kind of acco do they have in Mumbai , what time does the water come in the chawl and what are the stressors in their lives?
A meal that we eat in an upmarket restaurant might be equal to the month’s pay for the help and yet we resent if the maid wants some downtime, has stomach cramps during her periods and might have a boyfriend she wants to meet. We resent the fact that the help has easy access to the outside world with the omnipresent mobiles, that they want to watch TV and they like to dress up when they go out. And this whole obsession with their loyalty - let's be honest - we are also loyal to our employers up to a point and we leave them when someone offers us a higher pay or a better lifestyle; so why take off on these people?
The Help is the backbone of our society and the least we can do is to not let our children grow up with the prejudices we have ! I don’t want my help’s children to be employed as household help in the future and hope they will create a better life for themselves. Someday, my kids and my help’s kids may sit together for a meal...that will be the day of equal rights and opportunities in India.
This at a time when I just finished reading ‘The Help’ and also read all the controversy generated on the treatment of help in India. The Help is set in the America of the ‘60s when segregation was still the norm and we are pretty much still stuck there too.
Perhaps other Indians are better than me, but these are the things I continue to do with my help - I have a separate bathroom for them ,they use the crockery and cutlery set aside for them, they do not sit on the table with me to eat, they are not encouraged to sit on the sofas or beds in my house and they have a long list of chores assigned in the day.
What I don’t do -I don’t lock up foodstuff,I do not take out quantities of food for the help to eat, I don’t stop them from watching TV when their work is done, I don’t stop them from talking on their mobiles , I don’t deduct their salaries for days they have taken off and I don’t allow my kids to be rude or condescending towards them.
I am very fortunate to have help that serves me well, but if anything is misplaced or missing, my suspicion is first directed towards them. Yes, when they start to tell me about looming expenses, I fully expect them to ask me for an advance and begin a conversation in my mind on how best to negotiate. If they ask for a vacation I resent it coz I will have to do most of the work myself. I also screw up my nose when I think my driver has not taken a bath in the morning. And I do not like my help being overfamiliar when I have guests at home. I do not like my driver taking a day off in the week because it throws my schedule out of gear.
In my mind , I believe I treat my help far better than my parents’ generation. I sponsor their kids’ education, take care of their medical expenses, gift them liberally on festivals and also give them advances for weddings and other exigencies. But there is a niggling doubt that I am not really honest in my true feelings towards them.
Truth is, like the whites resented giving the blacks rights, I resent my dear Constitution makers for having given the help the same rights as me. Even if I do believe that every human has a life and an equal right to live the way they want to, I am not happy that my help has the wherewithal to negotiate (shamelessly) with me on salary, vacation and other issues, that the help can sulk and walk out if I do not permit anything and that they are not loyal to me! I resent the fact that they have me wrapped around their fingers! Ofcourse, I behave like that with my employers too, but then I think I am superior because of my education and class!
India is witnessing a huge class upheaval and a lot of this is manifest in the changing equations between homemakers and their help. All homemakers - working or otherwise, are feeling the pressure and the pinch.
The fact is -the help is not wrong. Most of us don’t know the minimum wage that the help has to be paid, we do not give them a moment’s rest ,they are on their toes 24\7 and their needs are the last thing we pay attention to. I am not referring to that half hour nap the maid might require because she has been up from 6 in the morning preparing for kids and breakfast. How many of us have really listened to them?What village they come from? How many people their salary supports?What kind of acco do they have in Mumbai , what time does the water come in the chawl and what are the stressors in their lives?
A meal that we eat in an upmarket restaurant might be equal to the month’s pay for the help and yet we resent if the maid wants some downtime, has stomach cramps during her periods and might have a boyfriend she wants to meet. We resent the fact that the help has easy access to the outside world with the omnipresent mobiles, that they want to watch TV and they like to dress up when they go out. And this whole obsession with their loyalty - let's be honest - we are also loyal to our employers up to a point and we leave them when someone offers us a higher pay or a better lifestyle; so why take off on these people?
The Help is the backbone of our society and the least we can do is to not let our children grow up with the prejudices we have ! I don’t want my help’s children to be employed as household help in the future and hope they will create a better life for themselves. Someday, my kids and my help’s kids may sit together for a meal...that will be the day of equal rights and opportunities in India.
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