Heirloom Tote

My grandmother has a slow, particular way of working that doesn't result in immense output. Neither does it result in anything showy and grand. Rather her work is modestly proportioned and the pleasure lies in the perfection within it. For example, she was not inclined to feasts and complicated dishes but to her everyday cooking she brought something alchemical so that it was always elevated beyond the commonplace.

She had been taught the gentle arts, I suspect by the nuns of her school years, and was an adept needlewoman when young. Here too her work was modest, neat and polished. She didn't make very much given her large brood and unfortunately very few samples remain of her work. For a long time she had a bag she had made (it's macrame) and then perhaps as she has got older, it got misplaced. Last year I found it amongst a pile of other things and retrieved it. Sadly, a part had faded, otherwise it is in extremely good tick. After a lifetime of moving, I am sentimental about very few things. One is a photograph of my grandmother when three, to this I decided to add the bag. Here are pictures below:

I think the thread used for the bag is not dissimilar to the one used in spinning a top. The highly even nature of the knots indicates the care my grandmother took with making it. Apart from the bag itself, which I think dates back to the 1940s, it's handle has survived well thanks to my grandmother's care. It is wood and simply carved and something about it is very handsome and reassuring.

The other bag is a beaded bag from Shillong.

A particular, sweet ache

I think I would like to visit Portugal.

Though much nearer home, fado (kind of Portuguese blues) is sung in Goa too.

Driving Ms Moulee - III

Given the nature of Mumbai traffic, I spent a lot of time on the roads. And had plenty of time for chats with Pyaremohan (nickname for my bro’s driver).

Pigs seem to feature in many ways in Pyaremohan aka PM’s life. He had bought a piglet a few months back intending to fatten it up for Diwali. The pig had been duly photographed and looked rather fetching. His wife, who fed it daily, had grown attached to it but the pig, showing good sense, hid behind her whenever PM approached. I suggested to him that in the home movie playing in the pig’s mind he was the dark, evil villain. For some reason this made him laugh no end. Sadly the pig was killed on Diwali for a festive meal.

One afternoon was so hot that I decided to get a fix of sugarcane juice. We took ourselves off to the best purveyor of the stuff in Mumbai from I don’t know – time immemorial – the Rajawadi Rasvanti Griha (RRG). PM had never had the ambrosia offered up at this place and promptly stretched himself out on its spindly bench, drink in hand, and started querying the owner. PM does this all the time, seeking to affirm that he is a man of the world who can get something for nothing. The RRG owners are characterised by their vow of silence so wringing conversation out of the owner proved way harder than wringing juice out of the sugarcane. RRG Owner: 1, PM: 0

Thanks to a loan from my bro, PM now had a motorcycle. Which he polished and kept lovingly and referred to at least as often as his wife.

Karwa Chauth was on during my visit. The proceedings of the day and on PM’s return home were explained in great detail to me. So tender was this that I am quite sure the man is still very much in love with his wife. I asked him why he didn’t keep Karwa Chauth but received no answer.

I had bought a pot of Australian cold cream for PM's wife and sister. Only to find that he intended to use it to help soften and lighten his complexion.

The wife wanted a gold necklace for Diwali, which fact PM mentioned to me everyday. Each mention was followed by his observation that “Sir” (my bro) was the greatest employer in the world. It is widely known that I am dim-witted and take everything at face value. Nevertheless his persisting with the story and a few other incidents finally attuned me to the PM way of thinking which was intended to make me apply my wayward mind to the problem of what could be done to benefit his family. In this case it was of course arranging for the necklace. This simultaneous exaltation and request for handouts can be faintly exasperating (I think Robyn Davidson’s Desert Places touched a bit on this). On the other hand the social system in India works in this very same mysterious way and those of us not adept at deciphering the language of supplication and favours may well be foreign and exasperating to the likes of PM. And to be fair, a few tales of evil employers rung true, rare is the person in India who is not anxious to extract every last bit of a rupee paid and even rarer is the person who does not confuse a salaried domestic employee with a slave.

We went a couple of times to Powai and PM sadly proved true all stereotypes regarding his gender by refusing to ask for directions and getting us lost each time.

Conceit

I read David Brooks' column at lunch time. And its true that 90% of the people you meet believe they are doing a great job - and the other person is rubbish.

Lazy Sunday

Lazy Sunday. After a hot beginning to the weekend, it rained all morning. Further proof that Sydney is inching towards the Melburnian “four seasons in a single day”. Consequently, apart from the grocery shopping, I haven’t been out today and have been entertaining myself with magazines. And a book gifted to me by my cousin as part of a Mad Men themed present, The Golden Age of Couture. Expectedly, the book had plenty of stunning women in stunning clothes. As also brief write ups on designers I was not aware of like Jacques Fath.

Only one picture really captured the behind the scenes toil to create these dresses and here it is below:
Though it may not necessarily be toil. One of the few movies I watch on and off is Brodeuses. As far as the story and the film goes, it is slight, lovely yet nothing out of the ordinary. But it is slow and contemplative and captures the rhythms and joys of women’s work, which for some reason makes for hypnotic viewing (at least to this viewer). In the movie, the work happens to be embroidery for the haute couture houses. Trailer which is kind of ordinary, here.
And now onto something even slower, contemplative and silent. The DVD lined up for tonight is Into Great Silence.

On a Building Site

I am still jet lagged but thought I should post something before the month slips by. India was of course hectic and it will take awhile to unpack my thoughts. This time I did manage to meet a few people and make a few out of town visits. One was to Poona which has changed a lot since the mid 80s when taking the Army bus into town every fortnight from Kirkee was the highlight of our lives. Poona remains a slow city, a trait it shares with Bangalore, perhaps the coolness of the air is responsible. Vaguely alarmed by the vast number of people we know with more than one property in India (we have our old flat and little else), we did a mini recce of "investment" flats in Poona. It makes sound economic sense but the idea of multiple residences is something I am still not fully comfortable with. Plus the residences in India suggest nothing other than monotony and ennui. From singularly unaesthetic building blocks to independent houses that are mainly concrete with touches of the grandiose, nothing made one want a second home. Inevitably, we came to no decision on buying a flat.

One of the places we went to was still in the early stages of construction. As is common in India, the hired workers lived on site. Apart from the nascent building itself which served as transient accommodation, there was a small, temporary brick establishment which boasted a garden of sorts (at another such place, our driver scored a couple of free gourds). It was clean and well tended and the garden was probably a source for much of their diet. People who build these residences are considered marginal and displaced. In my youth many a middle class writer, filled with burning anger at the injustices of life, felt compelled to point out the inherent irony in people without houses building houses for others. And yet, without romanticising the poverty, the workers seemed to have a camaraderie of sorts and their ability to create this temporary life - and share it as with our driver - was to me remarkable.

Apart from the vegetable patch, we also came across the goats below as well as a couple of chickens. Both looked well fed and I have no doubt they are intended for the cooking pot. As it happened, our driver too had been looking after a piglet which was fat enough by Diwali to cook a festive biryani. In Sydney, they would be part of an "alternative" ecological lifestyle, here they were the persistence of old patterns of life which require economy and prudence in managing a home.

A Village in Mumbai

I had forgotten the unexpectedly rural nature of the little pocket of Mumbai where my grandparents house is located. It is a "cooperative housing colony" i.e. cheap residences built on marshy land as post independence Mumbai expanded. The initial tiny and roughly built residences are now quite changed as those with money built the squat, concrete and storied bungalows beloved of modern Indians announcing their arrival into the ranks of the comfortably off. Somewhere in between, the residences were modest and aesthetic cottages. Few now remain, the picture on the right below is of two residences that were the norm in the 70s and the 80s. It is also a long time since I saw common house sparrows (picture below left) and they along with squirrels seem to have made a comeback of sorts. And while cows are common in all parts of Mumbai, the picture on the left below has a somewhat bucolic setting.

Rarely for Mumbai, the residences are set on their own land and boast tiny gardens. A fair few were in bloom. The three above are trumpet flowers, rangoon creeper and ixora.

Travelling around Mumbai, you are lost in the ceaseless, anonymous roar of the city. But the colonies, enclaves and societies of the city are tiny domestic worlds with ordinary rhythms and routines and sometimes as with my grandparents place are unexpectedly quiet. The banana seller above has been making the rounds of the colony for many years as do other vendors of small goods.

And I quite liked the signage above for the school bus as well as the one hung by an irate householder whose intent is clearer than his spelling.

Mumbai

is very hot. I had quite forgotten how muggy October is.

In the morning when I take a walk, the harsingar tree (quite lovely) has shed overnight. It's a tree that is rare in Australia, in spite of obsessive gardeners bringing species from all over the world.

My grandmother is old. She seems querulous, absent minded and happy in company by turns. Her sisters are old too. But the passing of one of their husbands seems to have put a bit of vigour in them in the way arranging funerals usually do. My cousin, eighteen tomorrow, and always by far the youngest at my grandmother's place still looks like a fresh flower placed in the midst of a mansion that has seen better days.

The traffic is abominable. It is almost as if cars have been stacked along the road from land's end to the northern reaches and they make their incremental moves until they reach their destination. I am not sure how my brother has managed to work for near on two years here.

Every single person I have met has asked me about the attacks on Indian students in Australia.

The first few days of domestic help who come in to wash and clean are always unnerving.

Sadly, the maid and chauffeur at home are both careless about educating their daughters. No matter how dull the son, money and care are poured in equal measure into his education. In spite of government incentives, the daughter’s education seems incidental.