(google image)

It has been two months now and it is still crazy catching up with what is new. September to December is an excitingly entertaining time to be in India with conducive weather letting one enjoy the festivities. Pollution, though a major issue in New Delhi, is relegated to the back of agenda as no matter how stringent anti pollution laws are the crackers are burst with impunity and construction work continues. As a youngster pointed out that every year ‘seniors pontificate but they too are responsible. The air quality did not deteriorate overnight but is the result of years of apathy and neglect’. He celebrated his words with fresh round of ‘bombs’ of different sizes. Roads are choked with vehicles, markets are blocked and iridescent lights brighten up homes and commercial establishments. The ‘pollutants’ list is endless.  

Diwali gets flashier every year with the simple earthen lamps or Diya’s replaced with bulbs ‘made in China’, earthen lamps are lighted during prayer or puja, with Diwali parties including friendly gambling, wearing new clothes and baubles taking precedence. I am amazed at the vibrant Indian colours, the textures, the sheen and shine, the cuts and designs…a kaleidoscopic ambiance. This is when I realise I am so out of touch with the cultural conundrum. Seeing me feel nostalgic a friend wanted to know ‘Are you happy’ to be settling in another land. This is the dilemma as the heart is where the home is and home is where family is…and the reasoning continues. I miss the humongous-scale rituals and celebrations, the special sweets etc. 

One may well ask that with a spreading Indian diaspora, Indian products available in any nook of the world, there should be no reason for ‘craving’. True, as here in Canada there is Brampton (Toronto), Surrey (Vancouver) North East (Calgary) with surfeit of Indian goods and eats but what is missing is the special flavours, the touch of uniqueness so common in our homes. Whatever is available is a smudged xerox copy of the original. Something is missing or lacking and after much deliberation I have come to the conclusion that one of the reasons is that restaurants might be owned or employing immigrants masquerading as cooks and secondly they might be from neighbouring south Asian countries with their distinctive touch that is not particularly Indian. 

Festivals over, September-October, it was time to catch up with friends, raid favourite shopping nooks and old eating haunts for Indo-Chinese, Tandoori, Mughlai, South Indian Dosas and with every morsel want the taste buds to store the data so that next when I am nibbling some insipid fare in the Western world I should be able to recreate the original. Well one may ask ‘why don’t you do your own cooking’. The answer is… I love to eat and not prepare. 

In between my forays I was a guest at the Delhi Gymkhana Club, a monolith institution dating to Colonial India. Love the food and atmosphere but what irked me was the continuation of governmental hierarchy. The Club caters to past and present senior government officers and the hoi polloi of Delhi and membership goes down generations. I am not a member, but as a guest have been coming here with member friends. This was the first time I noticed the heirchal anomaly when I used the washroom, freshly laundered with welcoming open cubicles doors, upright position of the toilet covers, as if in salute. I used one and as is habit shut the cover, closed the door and was walking out when an attendant, 4 of them, told me to please leave it all open. Surprised, I asked the reason and was informed that the ladies, bureaucrats and wealthy, do not like to touch anything. The veiled inference…Madams are and were so used to be feted upon that they do not want to lift a finger. Wow…I walked out on my proletariat feet. 

I am in India haze and mentally preparing to be with children and grand daughter who has asked me to knit a ‘pink blankie for her stuffie while you are vacationing in Delhi’. Grandmothers are for this….