Passing Storms

I ( Shibani) write with a wary thought of having to measure up to the fun-filled previous blogs, even though, the last month has been mostly about tending to the ill, packing and unpacking a household, moving into a half-renovated house, and driving for countless hours on anarchic roads.... Also the doctor in me is used to recording patient histories and giving instructions in bullet point fashion. But the creative side of me (that I am determined to get in touch with through this year) will try my best to relate to you the interesting events of this past month. 

We returned to Delhi after extensively travelling through India as you might have read in Aadya’s blog last month. No sooner had we landed in Delhi, that we had 2 casualties of the “Delhi belly”. Let me in fact get this over and done with so that you won’t have to sit in agonising anticipation of what’s to come. So far the count is 9 bouts of “Delhi belly”, 3 counts of severe dust-inspired allergic coughs, 1.5 “packed up when the going got tough” household help staff, one sullen maid, but happily, only 3 of 43 items remaining on the renovation to-do list, and our saviour: a ‘Spencer’s store where we go to rediscover comforts. (It looks like a cross between a Kmart and Aldi but you can’t imagine what a good thing that is! It even stocks Tim tams & peanut butter !!!!)

The Maruti Ertiga laden with things
for our new house

So the best news is that we bought a lovely car, a 7-seater Maruti Ertiga (with a BIG thank you to my Dad for negotiating the deal), and Saurabh and I have started driving! YES, the traffic is CRAZY, especially in Delhi (see Rishabh's micro-blog at the end for a taste of Delhi traffic), but one good thing in our favour is that we are never in a hurry. We are both the “very” cautious, slow drivers obeying ALL the traffic rules, attracting infuriated honking from the other impatient drivers around us. In the month that I spent driving kids around to their various sporting activities in the evenings in Delhi I gained confidence enough to convince Saurabh to drive with me and a car load of luggage to Haridwar…a 210 km journey that took us the best part of 6 hours! It was the first time that Saurabh drove in India (a “mental victory”, he says). The feeling of independence from having our own car and the confidence to drive it around is unparalleled.

Ustad Amjad Ali Khan
accompanied by 2 tabla players
at the outdoor concert

For me another big highlight of our experience here so far has undoubtedly been the classical music and dance concerts in Delhi. We have been privileged enough to have heard and seen the best known artists of our generation doing full justice to their talent and reputation, and what’s more, mostly for free! Pandit Jasraj, Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, Ustad Shahid Parvez, Ustad Rashid Khan, you name them, we have seen and heard them just in the last two months. Along with the music, I managed to get the girls to watch some Kathak dance recitals as well that we all thoroughly enjoyed.

We did something else in Delhi that I didn’t know you could - we went on a guided tour around the grand Rashtrapati Bhavan (the President's Palace), which has been open to the public for the last 18 months. It was an amazing tour of the 304-room palace (no we did not walk through all 304 rooms). The kitchen museum had original crockery from British times, the library housed over 2,000 rare books, the banquet hall capable of seating 108 dignitaries together at one table (with lower ranked “dignitaries” having to eat at the buffet in the hall opposite the banquet hall!), an open air courtyard which had many decorative nooks and crannies in which the birds used to sit, but which have now been blocked off with nails "to keep the shit birds out otherwise they shit on the palace" as our tour guide delicately put it. And then the most magnificent of them all - the hall under the central dome where the swearing-in ceremony of the president takes place, with an amazing Belgian glass chandelier. There was also a room  which housed gifts given to the various presidents over the years. What intrigued me most was a green marble Afghan table that changed the shade of the green colour when touched! And then there was the dried flower that had been placed on Mahatma Gandhi's dead body prior to his cremation. The other kids on the tour were in awe, but my kids were spooked out to high heavens! After the tour through the building we went for a walk through the wonderful Mughal garden that was made up of smaller separate Rose, Herbal, Bonsai, vegetable and even “spiritual” gardens. Fortunately the flowers were in full bloom given it was Delhi’s blink-and-you-will-miss-it spring. There was of course a musical fountain that “danced” to famous patriotic songs from Bollywood movies !!

A red vintage car
(part of the rally) 

On mum's birthday (on 2nd March) we set off early in the morning to watch a vintage car rally through the heart of New Delhi. With 9 people in the 7-seater car, we parked on the side of the road along the rally's route and enthusiastically waved them on.

Alright, moving on to Haridwar. As you may have surmised, we have finally moved in to where we are going to live for the rest of the year: J-120 Shivalik Nagar, Haridwar, Uttarakhand. It's a nice 7-bedroom home (with 8 toilet/bathrooms!), located in a fairly quiet corner. 

Saurabh and I came up here from Delhi first in January to check out the house. We are glad we did as we managed to insert into the lease, a looong list of things to be done, repaired, etc. in the house before we could move in. Saurabh’s Dad and I made another day trip in February to check up on the progress, and this time drew up a list of only 44 pending jobs. When Saurabh and I moved in 10 days later (with the rest of the family to follow after 4 days just in case there were pending jobs), we found it in EXACTLY the same state as before! In the first few days tradesmen merrily sailed through the house working at a snail’s pace. After that  the whip was well and truly cracked. 

A neighbour high up on his Guava
tree, picking up ripe Guavas for us after Holi celebrations

So on the morning that the rest of the family was to arrive, we still had 36 outstanding jobs but a literal army of tradies descended upon the house and the electrician and the carpenter actually completed their jobs! But the plumber gave up. 10 days later he is back as I write this, hammering away at something. Fortunately now Saurabh’s Dad is supervising him, so that means I can sit  and write my blog! But even though the settling in has been somewhat tough, what has really helped us is the warm hospitality extended by Abhiram, Rakesh, Madhavi and their families. We thank them all from the bottom of our hearts. Our neighbours also have been very friendly and welcoming, sharing fruit and home made sweets as well as bringing us in the know on what to do and what not to do in these parts. 

Mummy & Papa on the terrace also having
 some fun

Celebrating Holi (our festival of colours) this week in Haridwar was an experience! The kids armed with water pistols positioned themselves on the terrace and started squirting water on the poor, innocent passersby. Finally one particular neighbour could take it no more. After having been drenched by Aarushi 4 times, he rang the door bell to reciprocate. Dad then valiantly stepped out and returned an hour later covered in pink, holding a bag of sweets in one hand and a bag of freshly picked divinely sweet guavas (my absolute favourite!) from our neighbour’s tree in the other. We then all got into the spirit & had a great time. 

The more I see of it, the more I feel that this town really does epitomise the variety and paradox that is modern India. We are in Shivalik nagar, which is in the western part of town, adjacent to an area called SIDCUL (State Industrial Development Corporation of Uttarakhand Limited). There is a swanky mall with McDonalds, Dominoes, Spencer's (as I mentioned at the beginning), a cinema, etc. and then a precinct of nearly 300 high-tech manufacturing facilities and corporate offices amidst roads as smooth as you will find anywhere in Australia and landscaped divider and median strips. But 7 km from here to the east is the old, heavily congested part of town where the roads are in a terrible state of disrepair and traffic is chaotic and slow. And then amidst all that, you suddenly come upon the fast-flowing, emerald-green Ganga (as this is where it descends from the Himalayas to the Indo-gangetic plain), where hundreds of thousands of Hindus come each year to take a dip and scatter the ashes of recently deceased loved ones in the hope of attaining salvation. And lo and behold, running alongside the Ganga on the opposite bank is a fairly clean, not-so-crowded paved walking/running track which we hope to be able to use regularly for morning or evening walks and runs.

I can’t let up without telling you about the household help (Chiniya). Saurabh, Chiniya and I went shopping in the mandi (local vegetable market). What happened was quite funny - I would walk around pointing to the vegetables I wanted, the shopkeeper would weigh them out, Saurabh would  dutifully hand out the cash and Chiniya would step up and collect the bag of goodies. At the end of half an hour of shopping Saurabh & me were happily marching along empty handed while Chiniya was doubled over laden with groceries walking a few steps behind us, refusing to let us help. Saurabh especially loved this experience and even made the bold comment “ I could get used to this !!”

And finally I’d like to say something about the prime reason we are here – for the children to learn Hindi. I am amazed at the clarity with which they are beginning to speak it now! I am hearing them easily conversing with all and sundry – our relatives, newly made friends, and also the various household help. To give you an example here is an excerpt of  a conversation the other day between Rishabh & Mummy as Rishabh brought out the iron to iron a couple of clothes.

Mummy: "लो प्रेस वाला आ  गया।  एक  कपडे का कितना लेते हो भाई ? (Oh ! here comes the ironing man, how much do you charge for each item?”

Rish: "पचीस रुपये" (Twenty Five Rupees….FYI, the actual going rate is about 3 Rupees)

Mum: "अरे ये तो बहुत ज़यादा है"  (that's far too much)

Rish: " क्या करें बच्चों को भी तो पालना है " (I have to raise my kids!!!)

So though some days especially when the tradies are driving me batty, I wonder if it' all worth it. And then I hear a kid in the background chatting away effortlessly with my mother in law & I just smile…..

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Here's a mini blog written by Rishabh some weeks ago while we were still in Delhi……

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggggggggggg!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. That's my reaction to Delhi traffic. Here's a typical experience that we had today in the routine Thursday evening basketball drops and pick-ups for Aadya and Aarushi. You see there are two routes to get to the school where Aadya and Aarushi’s basketball coaching is run. When mum had gone for the drop off, our usual and preferred route was uncharacteristically busy because of festivities at a temple in honour of the Indian festival of Maha Shivratri. So on the way to the pickup we decided to take the other route. We cruised up until the T-Junction outside Chittaranjan park market 2 (for those of you who know Delhi) and stopped at a traffic light 200m before the intersection. We were in the correct lane when a bright spark thought “Hey, why don’t I just overtake these people waiting patiently in line?” And so he overtook us all and raced ahead, buuuuuuuuuut couldn’t manage to return to the original lane, thus creating another "lane" on the right hand side. Seeing this, other bright sparks thought, “Hang on, how come he gets to go before me!” And so they followed him and made a bad situation worse. It got to the point when both lanes were of the same length so nobody could move. Seeing this, another nit-wit had the same idea, so now we had a third lane, and the process repeated once more.

So now that a 1-lane road had turned into 3 lanes, the oncoming traffic had to half drive on the foot path. 20 minutes into this we came up with the idea of sticking bumper stickers on bad drivers' cars saying “मैं बेवक़ूफ़ की  तरह गाड़ी चलता हूँ” ("I drive like an idiot"). Another suggestion from Aadya was “my car is messed up because I drive messed up”.  If you have any other suggestions for these stickers, please comment below.

But despite our little slogan invention games we were getting a bit impatient, and so were the auto-rickshaw drivers, who decided to make the next move. They (probably being pushed by their crabby passengers), decided to overtake on the left, which they could because of their small size. So now they started driving on the foot path on our side, closely followed by the motorbikes and scooties that weren't busy swerving around cars like Tarzan. 

But if you thought we were done, no wait, there was more. A "Government of India official" as per his car name plate, decided that he was far more important and in more of a hurry, and so he got his beacon up, hopped into the lane with oncoming traffic and zoomed away.