Blog 1802: "With extra sugar, if you please"

Here's another article that I'd written for the San Diego Reader

The air hostess decided not to ask him if he’d like his tea re-made. He was reclining in his seat, eyes closed, ipod playing; the tea cup ensconced by both his palms and a smug smile glowing on his face. She pushed the trolley. There were plenty of passengers left who were displeased with the excess sugar in their tea.

He took the last sip from his cup but continued holding it with both palms. He wasn’t prepared to let go of it. Not just yet. It had been two decades since he’d last had tea this syrupy.

His was one of those families that had migrated from a village to a city. His dad was the last member in the family tree who had been born in the village. Every couple of years or so, the family used to visit the village during his school vacations.

He remembered those times better than any memory he had of the city.

Their village was an obscure little place in the middle of the Thar Desert in Rajasthan. The kind of place that folk stories thought was meant only as a stopover for hungry caravan riders and tired camels. A place where supposed genies thrived and miracles occurred inside every earthen pot. A place which had neither a telephone nor a TV… but which they, nevertheless, called home.

He remembered the first time he’d gone there. He’d fallen in love with the sand. He loved picking a fistful of sand and watching it fall from his palm, blowing with the wind as it did. He loved going out with his dad every evening with a jar of water, making balls of wet sand, arranging them in a line and then having a camel walk over the line. Rarely, if ever, had he been that thrilled.

He remembered the first time he rode a camel. The camel got up on its hind legs first almost throwing him in front and then straightened up its front legs… almost shrugging the poor chap off its back. He was impressed: by his own ability to stay put and by the camel’s attempt to cast him off. He had always thought the camel looked cool. It had an indifferent countenance at all times, walked like it couldn’t care less, dragged its feet without any hesitation and ate food like it was chewing gum.

He remembered the peacocks and how his dad would wake him up early and sit with him in the verandah watching the peacocks pick on the grains he’d spread for them. If they were lucky, they’d see a peacock spread its wings in full majesty. If not, he’d have to be content with picking up some of the feathers the birds had dropped. He remembered trying to write with the feathers dipping them in ink. He’d given up, exasperated, after a few words.

He still laughed when he thought of the cricket matches he played with the local boys there, especially that one perennially smiling chap who used to do commentary as he ran up to bowl. He wondered what might have become of him. Whether he left the village and made a career or took after his forefathers and tilled the land. He wondered what would have happened if his own father hadn’t made the shift to the city. He could so easily have been just the same as that smiley guy. Maybe nature does play dice, he thought.

He remembered the dinners. The chapatti’s cooked on an earthen kiln, the splash of melted butter on the chapattis, the generous helping of jaggery, the crisp papad baked on the kiln that was had after dinner… he always believed it was the kiln that added the magic to the food. Somehow, the gas stove had missed a trick in being so chic.

He remembered the tea they used to have after dinner as they sat on the terrace and gazed into the nothingness surrounding them. The local folks loved the tea sweet. That was the only form of tea known there… and that was the tea he got used to whenever he was there. He felt teleported to a different world as his dad recounted stories from his time and those he’d heard passed down from generations. Wrapped in a warm blanket, sipping tea, watching the sand dunes change shape as the winds blew, he’d fallen asleep many a night in his mom’s lap on the terrace.

He remembered going with his parents to the fairs in nearby villages: watching the puppet shows, the dances in traditional costumes to songs in an unknown dialect, listening to the cheers from those on the hand operated Ferris wheel and the din created by vendors selling handicrafts and earthenware.

He remembered going up to the terrace by himself at dusk on some days and looking at the camels and the cacti in the distance. He enjoyed the solitude; the emptiness around him. He loved the way the air quickly became crisply cool right after sunset. Now, more than ever, he longed for those quiet moments with himself. He smiled a wry smile. The grass always does appear greener on the other side.

C’est la vie, he thought, as he opened his eyes and searched for John Denver in his ipod. Driving down the road I get a feeling that I should have been home yesterday. Country Roads suited him just fine for the moment. He reclined back in his seat and got lost in more memories from times long gone by.

Back in the pantry, an air hostess smiled amusedly. A passenger had just asked her for some more of the tea she’d just served… “With extra sugar, if you please.”