We Are Not In Pakistan by Shawna Singh Baldwin

Slice of life, stark, nuanced stories, centered around the themes of immigrants, terrorism, and racism, Shauna Singh Baldwin’s collection of short stories makes one confront the very real fears of our times. Her remarkable insight into the working of the minds of her characters that are from various parts of the world – Ukrainian, Irish, Mexican, Pakistani -- trying to dig in roots in their new soil and at the same time threatened by an alien world around them. Like a bill stand with a paper spear that goes through each bill, each of these stories is speared through with fear and unease that leaves one worried and sad for the loneliness and the marginalization that humans suffer and the realization that with all our awareness too we are only growing towards the darkness.

My favourite stories from this collection are, Only a Button, Fletcher and The Distance Between Us.

The disturbing quiet of a housewife, the oh, no, oh no that keeps resonating in her head even as she complies with the demands of her marriage in Only a Button will always stay with the reader. When her mother-in-law calls her husband and tells him to ask her to look for a button she has lost in their apartment during her visit, the thoughts that go on in the girl’s mind, her helpless and the underlying truth of the marriage that - This man she loves is the one person she can’t tell how she feels – is the truth for many who, like her, continue to live in denial of it.

Victor placed a call to Kyiv. “Olena says she cannot find it.”

He should have said, Olena cannot find it. That might have kept Matushka quiet. He could have said, We have been trying to find your button ever since you called, and we have looked everywhere, but we cannot find it. He could have said, as one says to a child, Don’t worry, it’s only a button. We’ll find another just like it.

Fletcher, a wise and perceptive Lhasa Apso as the narrator, brings to surface the dilemmas of the human mind and the games people play to control others. Masterfully, the author studs the narrative with wit and wry humour that balances off the underlying gloom.

The Distance Between Us is a sensitive portrayal of a Sikh professor living in the United States meeting his 21-year-old daughter for the first time. On the one hand, he is the object of racial hate and on the other, he is filled with affection for a daughter he did not know existed.

The title of the book comes from a story by the same name in which sixteen-year-old Kathleen living in the United States with her Pakistani grandmother keeps reminding her that We Are Not in Pakistan in response to her grandmother’s Pakistani ways and views.

*I first read this book when it came out in 2009 in India (published 2007) and I read this again now because this is my depth year which means I go back to books that I enjoyed, read more classics that fell through the gaps while trying to hold too much, and read more books by the same authors to gain insight into their craft.

The Paris Wife by Paula McLain

Tears are still caught in my throat; I’ve just finished reading this intensely riveting novel, brilliantly told.  The narrative never falters, the interest never slackens as the reader is drawn into a sweeping tale of the early writing life and first marriage of Hemmingway, in the voice of his first wife – Hadley Richardson.

Because of the interest in the private life and craft of the great writer, all details were savoured – from his dressing and hairstyles to his disciplined writing schedule – he was dedicated to a fault – the daily grind and the agony, the delight in having written ‘something!’; his vulnerability in relationships and lack of trust that came from his early childhood and family situation as also from witnessing the horrors of WWI in which he was wounded with shrapnel lodged in his legs, and in covering the Greco-Turkish War (1920-1922) as a correspondent – of a man who did not seem to trust his allies and dropped his early mentors and closest friends. The sureness and confidence he had in his writing, he did not in his relationships.

I felt a keen stab of loss when all his early, painstakingly-written manuscripts were lost by none other than the beloved wife. His consequent coming to terms with it at once and not holding her responsible, was heroic. On her part, I did not think Hadley showed enough remorse and not for long. But when he begins to write afresh and the writing is finer and sharper, I felt perhaps all writers should lose their initial drafts to get rid of the scum and reveal only that which is deep and true and beautiful.

Though I often looked for one, I finally had to admit that there could be no cure for Paris. Part of it was the war. The world had ended once already and could again at any moment. The war had come and changed us…. (that was) Why we couldn’t stop drinking or talking or kissing the wrong people no matter what it ruined…The crisp and beautiful prologue prepares one for a peek into the life of the ‘lost generation’ – the absolute empty, meaningless lives of the rich, famous and the super creative in Paris during the early 1920s after the WW1, when allegiances forever shifting, and no relationship was sacrosanct. ‘Paris was Ernest’s smorgasbord.’

I felt every feeling that Hadley did in love and when it was slipping away till it had, irrevocably. But her character, very believable, came across in hindsight, as miss goody two shoes – she’s too nice and warm and beautiful to be real flesh and blood. When Hemmingway leaves her for Pauline, they have their tiffs and outbursts but when the friends ask her to fight back, she only says: ‘People belong to each other only as long as they both believe. He’s stopped believing.’

Deep down she knew that it was over and had weighed her chances well: What could I do or say? He might ultimately fall out of love with Pauline and come fully back to me – that was still possible – but nothing was in my control. If I gave him an ultimatum and said she couldn’t stay, I would lose him. If I got hysterical and made public scenes, it would just give him an excuse to leave me.

Her helplessness and hopelessness were heart-breaking. But Hemmingway was a victim too – a victim of his mind, a flawed human. ‘You make your life with someone and you love that person and you think it’s enough. But it is never enough, is it?’ It was absurd and very infuriating that he and Pauline were living as a couple with Hadley and he expected Hadley to accept it because he loved her too. He wanted both. ‘The arrangement could be deadly, but couldn’t marriage also be, if it banked the coals in you? You could grow very quiet in a marriage. A new girl got you talking and telling her made everything fresh again. She called you out of your head and stopped the feeling that the best part of you was being shaved away, inch by inch. You owed her for that. No matter what happened, however terrible, you wouldn’t forget it.’

The most poignant part was when he calls to speak with Hadley almost forty years later (the last time they speak with each other) – a world celebrated writer, so defeated in bearing out the consequences of his choices and leadings of his heart.

दो लोग and Two by Gulzar

‘…one may cut a mountain in two, but people? 

It’s a hard task, Bhai, to cut one people into two. They bleed.’

This story of a group of Partition ‘refugees’ is in three parts. In part one, we are introduced to the main characters – Fauji, Lakhbeera, Tiwari, Master Karam Singh, Master Fazal and some more – all residents of Cambellpur (now Attock) a small kasba in the Punjab before the Partition. Simple people, living simple lives who do not understand the meaning of the division of a country – ‘Does a country break?’ They ask. This is the part that I found most ‘revealing’ and heart-wrenching because all partition stories that I have read, except Baldwins’s What the Body Remembers, have talked about the aftermath, the stories of the people trying to grow new roots. But this part, where the kasba-folk is trying to make sense of what partition would mean for them is very unsettling.

Karam Singh, a Sikh asks his Muslim friend Fasal, ‘If Pakistan is created, will you leave me and go to Pakistan? He did not know Pakistan was to be created right there, where he lived. And he would be the one who’d be forced to leave. When Master Fasal explains to him, his concern is still for his friend, ‘…do you want Pakistan? If it’s good for you, I will surely fight for your rights. My yaar wants Pakistan. All right then, Pakistan Zindabad!’

They piece together the idea of two nations from the rumours a truck driver brings of the rumblings beyond their world, news some hear on the radio that comes alive for four hours each evening and which they believe is the government’s voice. When the Hindus and the Sikhs begin to leave, it not just they but the Muslims watching the caravans leave in the silence and safety of pre-dawn, watching from the rooftops, who despair.

‘Where are they running off to?’ somebody asked.

‘Towards Hindustan.’

‘So where are we? We are in Hindustan, after all. Pakistan hasn’t been created yet.’

‘Who knows where it will be formed. This side or the other side. Is there a place where there are no Muslims?’
-
At times, one smiles at the naïveté of these people, but immediately, the pathos overwhelms. They talk:

Will Lahore remain here or will it go to the other side?

Where will it go? It will remain where it is.’

With the advent of the year ’47, they hear the words ‘camps’ and ‘refugees’ for the first time and the Hindus leave, saying, ‘we’ll return when things settle down’ – this still tugs at the heart – the helplessness of the people who did not want partition, who just wanted to live in their own homes, carry on with their lives with friends and family. When the exodus begins – the Muslim truck driver decides to drive his friend, the cleaner, the Sikh Lakhbeera to the safety of ‘the other side’, along with others who have the money to pay for their safe passage. They embark on the long, dangerous journey. On the way, they rescue two young Sikh girls and a small Sikh boy who begs them to take his old grandfather who cannot walk anymore.

Still, no one has a clue where they are going. They watch the Muslims going in the opposite direction.

‘They are going to Pakistan,’ Fauji said.

‘Where is that?’ asked Panna.

Fauji had no answer. ‘It will be somewhere. Someday.’

PART 2: The truck breaks down and the group disperses ‘like dry leaves in a storm’ to join the millions walking towards Hindustan. The story follows the life of some of them.

PART 3: An Englishman who has lived in India and whose daughter was born in the Rajputana, now Rajasthan, is betrothed to a Pal who has become a Paul in England - a Hindu refugee in India from Pakistan. This part highlights the fact that in England, as in any other third country, there is no difference between Indians and Pakistanis who meet as ‘lost lovers’. Paul wants to go back to visit his home, to visit Pakistan and his bride-to-be, Hindustan.
But ‘batwara’ does not end. People keep getting partitioned – the hostilities that mean nothing to them keep flinging their lives asunder. The ‘84 riots – the senseless massacre of innocent people is told from the viewpoint of a Sikh shopkeeper who is saved by a Muslim truck driver. The old ‘refugee’ mother of his, when she asks if the Muslims have burnt their shop, is told that ‘these are Hindus’.

‘There were a number of people in khadi egging on the mob’, earlier too, victims of partition talk of those that are leading the rioting and looting, spreading rumours and instigating hostilities ‘will rule us one day’. Then comes the Kargil War of 1999. Without giving away too much, I’ll quote another ‘refugee’, an old fakir on the bombings, ‘There they go again, the rascals! They didn’t let me sleep all night.’ – a rather detached, matter-of-fact statement by someone not just tired of war but hopeless. It ends with the poignant lines below.

The stories will tug at your heart and you will feel the utter helplessness of victims. Not pass-me-the-tissue stories, they prise open despair. But the novel is also about abiding friendships, love, concern, hope and duty that are beyond the confines of religion – the friendship of Fauji and Lakhbeera, of Karam Singh and Master Fasal; of a Muslim father whose son in law has been killed across the border, who pays for the safe passage of a Hindu girl and her son; of the Hindu servant who does not leave Pakistan because he could not abandon his dog; of the Muslim butcher who saves the life of a Sikh schoolmaster. These keep our faith in humanity restored. The images are stark, the emotions raw. I was choked with emotion several times due to shared experiences. 

Should you read it? Seventy years after partition, to not forget the terrible tragedies that befell our own – this side and that of the border, the religious partitioning that has kept the embers of hostilities ablaze – yes.

Hindi or English? Hindi, if you can, English if you must. I read it first in Hindi and loved how beautifully it captures the subtle nuances of the dialects that our ears are accustomed to. It best captures the sensibilities of its ‘rustic’ characters. But because present-day Hindustani has cast off a lot of its beautiful vocabulary, it is also a little difficult to understand some words. I understood TWO in English better but the translation, with which two skillful translators and Gulzar sa’ab himself have struggled, is uneven, there are repetitions and phrases that one wants to reassemble again – but the story still reigns and still keeps one hooked.

Personal note: My parents-in-law migrated from the Mianwali district of Pakistan (of which there is mention in the book), they also came with the ‘we’ll come back when the ‘halaat’ are better’ reassurance. They were both 15 and before they settled in Jaipur, tried to first dig in their roots in Jalandhar, Rewari and other parts of divided Punjab. So, by the time I came into the family, like most others, they had closed that early chapter of their lives and were reluctant to talk about their homes across the border till I started compiling stories for them, searching the internet for images of present-day Mianwali. Then they shared some stories. When my father-in-law had to leave with the rest of his family, his father, a doctor in the Army, posted in the Kalabagh Salt Mines was away. Daddyji asked his best friend, a Muslim boy to somehow inform him that the family has left for Hindustan. The friend not only walked 15 km on foot to take the message to grandfather, but he also wrote a letter to inform Daddyji that the message had been delivered. By the time we started to search for this friend, memories had already faded beyond recognition. That is why this book is relevant because we must keep the memories alive. Because ‘ये बंटवारे थमते ही नहीं’…

PS: Have been looking for this book for over a decade now. Will appreciate all leads and help with finding ‘Wichara Watan’ by Harish Chander Nakra.

My reading list in the Times of India, Bangalore today.
There's no direct link but it’s on page 8 if you want to read it in the epaper.

The lovely shall be choosers...

Elder sister told me one day that waiting at the doctor’s, Leela Naidu had said to her, I want to be as slim as you. Someone wanted to be slim like my sister? I picked my bike and rode off. Neither slimness of girls interested me nor some Leela whoever.

Then one day this woman in a red saree, her gray hair stylishly swirled back in a French roll looked out of the pages of some Femina or Illustrated Weekly, advertising kitchen appliance or food. Sisters whispered, ‘elegant-elegant’. I was transfixed by her beauty and air of quiet dignity.

Jerry Pinto who I admire for his writing and for his heart in the right place, its ‘Leela-shaped hole’ and all, the SRK of writing in so much that I haven’t seen another writer blow such effervescent ‘I love yous’ at his audience, collaborated with her on this. So ‘Leela - A Patchwork Life’ by Leela Naidu with Jerry Pinto was picked up with much gladness. 

The Foreword by JP was a letdown. Leela was among the world’s ten most beautiful women and he had the good fortune to know her intimately but the way he runs down other journalists when they have to write about her and ask him to share/whet/correct/fill-in disappoints. Our stray-loving, bucket-bath-bathing-to-save water journalist-teacher I expect to understand the job of journalists better. His tone is almost of a kid holding a doll close to himself  refusing to share it with other kids. But otherwise he chooses his nuggets to write about well and is at his evocative best. So I will not hold it against him. People evolve.

Leela takes over and draws us into her wonder-full life lived in Bombay, Geneva, Paris, London. Beginning with the sensational story of her grandmum hosting a naked Count – the Count Yousoupoff who was among those that killed Rasputin presumably; she tells us how her aunt Sarojini Naidu handing her a box of chocolates and a bunch of gladioli, sent her off to the outhouse to ‘see Mickey Mouse’. 

‘I knocked on the door and was called in...sitting on the bed was Mahatma Gandhi.

“You are not MICKEY Mouse!” I said.

“No?” Gandhiji asked.

“Your ears are big but they are not big enough.”

“Is that all?” he asked and turned around to put on the side light.

“And you don’t have a tail.”

He laughed at that and put on the light.

“So I am not Mickey Mouse.” Gandhiji said, “but who am I?”

“You are Gandhiji,” I said.

I put the flowers down and gave him the chocolates. He took them and began to eat them immediately, as happy as a schoolboy with a box of tuck.

“How do you know who I am?” he asked.

I don’t remember if I had explained....But I do remember his strong arms around me as he hugged me.’

Her tone is friendly, the descriptions candid. The men! Oh the men! Roberto Rossellini suggests a doctor for her; she’s ‘adopted’ by Jean Renoir and his wife, M Cartier gets her rani haar restrung when it breaks suddenly sending the beads rolling in the hotel lobby, Salvador Dali sketches her and takes her to a private showing  of his sketches... and none of this seemingly affects her! The ‘men’ come first and the ‘discovery’ of who they are later.

Overall it isn't quite where my other idol’s memoirs are – A Princess Remembers, Memoirs of the Maharani of Jaipur – with JP’s ‘collaboration’ and all. Written almost as if for academic reading – chapters as ‘facets’ of Leela Naidu –the translator, the Editor.. film maker. 

She does come across as very intelligent, witty and full of the milk of human kindness, never able to stop herself from standing against injustice, confronting the wrongdoers but there is no mention of Leela the wife, the mother... personal joys and heartbreaks. She’s most often a victim of cruel, self-centered people. The skips and jumps do not make it a fluid read. That got a little tiresome. If she had started as she ended, telling JP that the book, ‘would have nothing to do with my life. ...It’s only about the funny anecdotes and sad historic ones I came across.’ I would have been less disappointed. 

The Illicit Happiness of Other People

I have been harboring a half-suspicion about this for close to a decade - the ‘Chennai peoples’' inexplicable desire, pursuit and impetuous display of academic excellence. Now that Manu Joseph, who is ‘one of them’ has spewed it, I feel validated and relieved of my burden of impression.

The newspaper version of his Hindu interview, last week, has been purged of the ‘beeped’ words so one kind of loses the tone and emotion of the speaker. 

Strip away everything and it’s just boredom. And especially when you’re young and growing up in Madras: you can’t touch girls, you can’t go out with girls, it’s a s**t city; all the f****rs are doing entrance exams… Still, I did briefly lose my nerve when I was 20; I wrote some of those MBA entrance exams, went for the XLRI interview. I remember they asked me: what is the difference between “basilica” and “cathedral”? But fortunately, circumstances ensured I would come back to journalism.

Hahaha! Good sense prevailed.

My first neighbors in Bangalore were very nice, temple-going Chennai peoples. Two things wafted out of their home at all times. One, the delicious smell of sambar, and two, …I’ll come to that. 

Now, husband, mine, was at once baptised by the ‘Tamil’ sambar. He of few words but never short of praise for food had himself eating out of Mrs V’s hands - the end of her ladle that had become the extension of her hand. I was suitable ignored for confessing some knowledge of their cuisine, and was rude enough to learn to cook some too, while he at every meeting expressed spanking-new astonishment that ‘Pongal is a dish?’

Many mornings, Mrs V came with a dosa balanced on her dosa flipper and totally dismissing me as a claimant, asked smiling if ‘he’ was there. Now my ‘he’ was hers along with her own. He-Man was made to eat with both of us watching like his eating was our collectively responsibility and source of joy. Her face shone with sweat and excitement when He-Man extolled the finer points of her cooking, while I prayed that he would hurry, lest her face explode.

The second thing her home emanated was her talk with her 5-year old son. Not Tamil, not English, they spoke in numbers. Always. This was what we heard day and night, ‘Putta, 22 plus 31?’ The kid had to respond before the mother’s question mark was intoned. I have a suspicion they left their doors and windows open to let out their glee. 

Another young mother, Ms K, nose-in-the-air was telling us how no classical dance school in Bangalore was good enough for her two-year old. I stood hearing her lament till she left because ‘he’ will be home, na. Immediately, my Bangalore born and raised neighbor, stung and stung, remarked, ‘These Chennai people!’

More recently, on the train back from Chennai to Bangalore, I spotted a little girl, 3ish, with thick silver anklets looking about eagerly to make new friends. After a prolonged peek-a-boo with an older girl, she went up to her seat, her tongue hanging out with ‘shy’. 

The moment she ‘told’ her name, the mother’s ears perked up long distance and out came a sweet-sounding, cajoling but firm instruction, ‘Devika, tell the spalling of your name!’ !!

How early can one start! Non-Chennai peoples need reservation!