Ma tujhe salaam!

On Friendship Bands, And Other Kinds Of Human Bonds...

This should have appeared two days ago, but I did not realize it that the friendship day has passed by yesterday, until one of my students wished me Happy Friendship Day; another girl came with a ‘friendship band’. Back in my college days, this madness hasn’t reached India: I have some very close friends whom I cherish, and here is the kind of bonding we all share:

“Your friend is your needs answered…. For you come to him with your hunger,
and you seek him for peace…. When your friend is silent your heart ceases
not to listen to his heart; For without words, in friendship, all thoughts,
all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed.”
(From Kahlil Gibran’s Prophet 'On Friendship')

I don’t find any of these wonderful thoughts or feelings reflected in the gross friendship bands; boys and girls of a particular age are not aware of the deeper meaning of friendship. That is understandable – but college-going boys and girls behaving like kids is beyond me. I don’t understand what they mean by putting bands. I think all this got started with the over-aged kid Sharukh Khan and the bubbly Kajol in one of those sick bollywood movies.

There are all kinds of other days, for bosses, for secretaries, for chaukidars, and for martyrs. Of all these, the most nauseating Hallmark holidays, for an Indian, is Mothers’ day.

The scholar and poet, Shiv K Kumar says that in India we don’t have one day earmarked for mothers: every single day of our lives we worship out mothers. Oh yes, there is that thing that Indian males are all momma’s boys; there is nothing to be ashamed of there. Take my mom for instance. She is nonchalant in the most stressful of times, like packing for a long journey, like not getting the train tickets confirmed before time, like a child of ten not returning home even after 5 p.m. Here are a couple of vignettes of her strength, fortitude, and forbearance…

As a young boy of 9 or 10 years, I once came upon a two-rupee note (back then there were no one or two rupee coins) in the cupboard. I grabbed it and went out to the nearest corner shop. I proffered the note hesitatingly (I thought the shopkeeper, who know our family, will report me to my parents). He quietly took it, business as usual, and gave me the éclairs I wanted. After thus sating my appetite for candy, I started feeling guilty and went back home. Mother was in the kitchen; I told her that I found 2 rupees. She said what did you do with it? I said I spent 10 paisa and have the remaining change. “OK, now keep that where you found the money in the first place”. Nor did she say a word to my father about it.

Years later, in fact a couple of decades later, I was in an apartment owned by my company (Orient Longman). There were 4 other apartments belonging to the company in that block. In one of them, my good friend and Arabic scholar Dr Salahuddin Tak (of Anantnag, now with the University of Kashmir, Srinagar) used to stay and in another, our sales manager used to stay. I went to work one morning, leaving my mother and my sister’s 3-year old son (Ashwin). Ma was taking care of the boy since my sister had no one to look after him when she went to work.

Around 2 p.m., I get a call from the sales manager’s house: The long and short of what I could make out was that my mother was locked outside the house (the latch key was inside; luckily, I had a duplicate). The boy was outside too, playing on the terrace. I was worried, it was a cloudy day. I was in the middle of something important. I spoke to Dr Tak, who said he had to go on office work to a printer near our apartment block around 4 p.m. and that he would take the key then.
Around 3 p.m. he came around to my desk: “Pandit, give me the key. I am leaving now. I don’t know what state your mom and Ashwin are; maybe it is raining there” Of course ma had other friends in that block, but we decided that it is best for him to go as early as possible.

Later in the evening, Salahuddin was rolling on the floor laughing, telling me his encounter with my mother in the afternoon. As he reached the apartment block, it was drizzling a bit, just a droplet here and a droplet there. He rushed up to the terrace to find ma playing with Ashwin. He managed to convey to her that he brought the key. And to his bafflement, ma just indicated the top step of the stairway, and said (in Telugu): “Keep it there” She seemed to be in no hurry to get back to the apartment, to be enjoying the breeze, not at all bothered about the few drops of rain. “Into each life some rain must fall” seemed to be her credo.