India Online Journal, November 2001
Author: Jennifer Kumar
All photos and text on this and subsequent pages are property of Jennifer Kumar (unless otherwise quoted). If you would like to link to my site or borrow or use images from my pages, please contact me. More about me here. Thank you.
Day 4
I give up on my body! I am at odds with my internal and external clocks. Neither wants to coordinate with the other. After finishing the last journal entry at 12am, I was not tired, so I studied. After two hours, I felt a hint of sleepiness, so I turned off the light and tried to sleep. It did not work out, for as soon as I switched off the light, I felt more awake than ever, and my heart was also racing. I would have thought I had just taken Sudafed or something of the sort, but there is no Sudafed within 10,000 miles.
Talking about sleep, the photo to the left is a bedding mart. The piles you see behind the shop keeper are mattresses. The concept of box spring is virtually non-existent. Mattresses, also, are different, as they are usually thinner than the "American" ones and can be folded.
By 5 am I got bugged, and woke up. Since the two brothers had spent the night at the hostel last night, I had the room to myself. (They study their PG at IIT Madras, and though they stay at home most of the time, do rent a hostel room for staying under extreme cases, like early morning classes and exams.) I decided to turn on the computer and played Mae Johg and games based on Tetris. Due to frequent power cuts, many people that own a computer also have a UPS, or unlimited power supply, box attached to their computer. This serves a dual function of sustaining power supply at a constant rate and also acting as a temporary back up if the power goes out, as to prevent the computer from crashing. Luckily, I did not have to worry about the functioning of the UPS this morning, as the power did not get cut!
Since the two brothers were not there and the other brother and myself had no immediate plans this weekend morning, Amma had a chance to sleep in. I was happy she was able to get rest. One time last year, she told me that she had not had a full day’s rest since her marriage, over thirty years ago! This is the plight of Indian women. But, also in this particular case she was blessed with five sons, but no daughters, hence no one to help her in housework. Traditionally, though it is slowly changing, men and boys do not help in housework in India. Though, in some Brahmin families they may during the woman’s monthly cycle. For the first three days of the cycle, the woman is to take rest (even in non-Brahmins homes) and stay secluded from the rest of the family. This served two purposes, one in olden times of sanitary problems during this period, and two, to allow the woman three days needed rest from the backbreaking non-stop household work. However, one tradition I noticed is different in Brahmin households during this time, is that the men folk, usually the husband, would take control of the household duties for these three days. I am not sure if Amma had this luxury, however.
The photo to the left is a department store called "Come and Carry". I used to shop there when I studied at MCC. The bottom floor sells food items and the top floor sells other items including greeting cards, clothes, toys, etc.
This morning Aditi was supposed to come receive me at 9am and take me to their house across the railway tracks in East Tambaram. I also had some work this morning, I wanted to attend to before she came. However, she called up at 8:30 and said that I could come alone after lunch. I was a bit relieved because I was so tired due to lack of sleep, so I laid back down at 9am and stayed there with eyes closed till 11 at which time I fell asleep until 2pm.
When I woke up, I realized that I may have missed lunch and that I was late going to the friend’s house, as I said I would be there by 2. Anyhow in India, it all works on IST (Indian Standard Time) for such informal things, so I wasn’t too worried about it. In any case, I dragged myself out of bed and found that lunch was not yet served, and sat down on the floor and ate with Amma and one brother. I thought I would call them after eating, but they beat me to it. I told her what happened, and she said don’t hurry, but come at your pace. I finished packing a few dresses, my study materials and toiletries and then started to their place.
Then the next task was to catch an auto. Somehow, again I was lucky to find an autovalla who did not want to rip me off. He charged Rs. 30, the right price, so I hopped in and went to East Tambaram, making it just at the nick of time, as the railway gates closed behind us. If they were to have come down, that would have added anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes extra sitting in the auto and inhaling the fresh-polluted air.
When I arrived, Aditi, her mother and I all chatted sometime and then they showed the photo of the lucky boy to marry their daughter -- Shankar. Shankar’s family had sent only one photo, it was of him receiving his medical degree at the college he studied in Russia. They told me his mother spent lakhs of rupees of her own funds to send her son to college in Russia, she even sold her house to support his education! The boy looked decent. They had reminded me that he asked for 25 sovereigns gold. This is much more than my previous estimate… this estimates about 1,00,000 rupees just for the jewels!
They had told me I was invited to the Nichyatharththam (Tamil= engagement ceremony) which is going to be held on the 25th of this month. I said I would be most happy to attend. However, I will miss the marriage which is slated for March 2002. This ceremony is to be held near the boy’s house, which is some 2 hours drive from Tambaram.
I did not do much today, I couldn’t even sleep though I tried, as my heart raced faster than a car at the INDY 500 all day! So, I tried to study on and off, which proved only a little successful due to the race my heart was giving me.
Aditi, her mother, brother, and elder sister live together in this three room flat with a kitchen and a split bathroom. The three rooms are each about 10 ft by 8 ft. One of the three rooms is the TV room, while the others are bedrooms, but without beds! Many Brahmins traditionally sleep on straw or plastic mats (called 'pie' in Tamil) on the floor. These mats are stored in the daytime, hence the floor space is open in the day time. Some Brahmins are becoming modern and have beds and cots, but there are none at this house. Each room can be used for sleeping and plastic chairs are kept stored at the sides of the room for visitors. In the ‘bedroom’ they have three almariyas (upright cupboards with locks). This is generally how most Indians store their clothes and valuables. In many cupboards, the second shelf has a double function as a safe and has a second lock there. They also have a kitchen of about 6 ft by 5 ft and a small verandah of 3 ft by 5 ft. A split bathroom means, one small room (about 3 ft by 5 ft) has just the toilet, and the other has just the bath-room (place to take bath—about 3 ft by 5ft). This may seem like a small space for so many people, but this is much more space than about 60% of the Indian population has in their ‘homes’. But I feel this is about average, though about 10% of the population may have more than this.
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