An Indian girl spends her life dreaming about everything she will do when she grows up, only to have her dreams shattered by the reality of marriage. But she holds onto hope. Read to see if she can still manage to make something out of her aspiratio...
When I was 13, a Punjabi family moved in, in the flat above ours. Mother was the happiest that day, out of all others that she'd spent in the Government of India allotted housing quarters. Mrs. Chadda, our new upstairs neighbor had called her Parjai Ji, the Punjabi synonym of Bhabhi Ji, which was the generally accepted Hindi term for Sister-in-law in Rajasthan.
It wasn't like she hadn't adapted to the environment here, like her family had feared. She had made friends with all the ladies in the town, mostly because everyone had at least one kid who shared classes with me or one of my sisters. And the lunches she packed for school picnic were a hit amongst everybody. All the mothers wanted to know how her Dahi Bade and Chole Bhature tasted better than the ones in the restaurant.
So Mother taught everyone her north Indian delicacies and learnt how to make the perfect Dal Baati Churma and Gatte ki Sabji from them. After some years when Father got promoted, we moved into the colony for senior officers and there was more diversity in that one lane than I'd seen in my entire school. Her magic worked once again over kittie parties and soon she had perfected Pav Bhaji, Idli Sambar and Litthi Chokha.
But Mrs. Chadda was the first and the only one to be shown the insides of her iron trunk. When they opened it, out came her weight in dress material and Phulkaris that were kept hidden over two decades. The ladies spent several hours discussing everything from fabric to designs, from lace to the beads on them. I noticed for the first time that there was something similar about the way both women draped their sarees, which set them apart from the sarees of Mrs. Banerjee, Mrs. Lovelekar, Mrs. Iyer, Mrs. Shukla, Mrs. Gupta and many others.
That day I heard mother recite an incident from her early years in the town. She was 19 and newly married when Father took her out to the Friday screening of the new blockbuster movie. Overjoyed to be meeting all the people from the town, she had worn her most decorated Salwar Kameez, one which had sequins sewed all over the Kurta, with embroidery and lace on the Chunni. The women, all dressed in either sarees or traditional Rajasthani Lehengas had taken one look at her and decided to not speak to the couple for the remainder of the night. Upon the closing of the theatre, when walking outside, silently through the dark, they had heard someone tell someone that the new boy in Surveying was Mohamadden, since his wife was wearing a Salwar Suit.
Even Mrs. Chadda gasped when she heard this and I couldn't figure out why. There were a few Muslim children in our school and we never treated them differently.
That year when we went to Punjab, I asked my cousins if the Muslim kids in their school were treated differently. They laughed me off, saying that they don't live there anymore; they all went over to Pakistan after the partition. And they were quite right in their stance, there really weren't any Muslim families in the village, or in the ones nearby, I only learnt this when I grew up.
But why my mother and her new best friend were scared of being thought of as one with Islamic faith, I couldn't figure out. It was
On the Annual Day Fancy Dress Competition at Kendriya Vidyalaya in 1992, my class was asked to represent the cultural backgrounds of India. I went home and asked Mother if I could wear her green Silk Suit with the pink Phulkari Chunni, now that I was almost her as tall as her and had developed my lady bits. I was sure that it would bag me the winning position, but she made up a story about how that dress had been destroyed by termites. I was heartbroken and sad and decided to skip dinner that night.
A few days later when we returned from school, mother had laid out 4 brilliantly fashioned dresses on the Sofa. My sisters pointed each one out and discussed excitedly which latest heroine had worn which piece in the new and upcoming songs. Upon asking where she got them, she told us she brought them from the market, but I could recognize the material that was destined to be made into Salwar Kameez.
I didn't confront her about it, and wore the elegant A-lined floral dress made out of silk with puffed sleeves that made me look like an actress. I introduced myself as a Goan Christian girl on the stage and did a little dance on the trending song 'Galyan Sakli Sonyachi, Hi Pori Konachi,' which I later on realized was a Marathi song. Nonetheless, I won the first prize and didn't see it wise to ever doubt Mother's capabilities ever again.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
