The Kulfi-Waala

I remember you – o kulfi-waala – I remember your call, the long and throaty “kulfiiaaaaaa” reverberating through that little dark street where you came every week at the same time to sell your delicious kulfis. I remember the little girl I was, holding my father’s sleeve and begging him to buy me your kulfi yet again this week. I remember the cheers of joy from me and my brother when he agreed to buy us some. I still remember, o kulfi-waala, the fear that you may not hear my father call out to you from our tiny window on the third floor. I remember asking him to call out louder, lest you may leave the street before you heard us. I remember my mother shyly telling my father “mere liye malai vaali”. I remember the eager anticipation with which I waited for you to knock on our door. I remember the awe with which I looked into your earthen red kulfi pot. I remember my mouth watering and demanding the ‘badi vaali kulfi’ this time. I remember fighting with my brother for an extra bite from his kulfi this week, because last time he had had a bite from mine. I remember you chatting with my father, telling him about your life as a kulfi-waala. I remember not paying much attention to it, and concentrating instead on my delicious kulfi. I remember my mom complaining about why you have increased the price of the kulfi from ‘do rupaye’ to ‘dhai rupaye’. I remember hoping that you will return again the next week.

You did return, did you not, o kulfi-waala? Alas, we had left.

My bored mind looks for something to do
And I decide to step into a third person’s shoe
I look at myself from a distance
With mirth and pity at what I’ve turned in.

Spending 9 hours of the day in the closed walls of my cube
I look quite silly staring at the tube
While the warm sun shines outdoors with vigor
I sit clueless with no windows to peer.

Another day goes by, another life faked
Every single minute is too much to take
I yawn to heart’s glory while they speak about claims
How they should log and how they should adjudicate.

I had dreams of traveling the world
Living by the sea and risking love
Being the master of my domain
But here I am, a prisoner in my own reign.

What’s with all the talking?

Coming from a country with a million people, I don’t see the sense in having to ‘talk’ to people just to be nice and polite. I mean, it takes a lot out of us Indians to keep coming up with something to talk about to our colleague, our hair-dresser, our cab driver, our server, our pizza delivery guy, or even someone on the elevator. I mean in India we never bother conversing, leave alone the ‘How are ya’s to every passer-by. With so many people around, imagine how exhausting it will be to greet every person you bump into on an over-crowded 7.20 am local from Borivli to Churchgate!

Things are ofcourse different in the United States, and probably at other places where it is considered impolite to stay silent in a situation where a conventional conversation could pursue.

A few months back I went in for a haircut. I preferred to avoid the small-talk and was quiet throughout. I’d rather have my hair-dresser concentrate on my haircut than on what to talk to me about. Towards the end she asks me (rather bluntly I would say): “Are you always so silent?” I was taken aback at the question, and answered with an “Almost always” instead of a more truthful “Only with strangers like you!” I never felt the need to strike a conversation with her, and yet thought I could leave her a handsome tip based on how satisfied I was with my haircut. But ofcourse, my right to remain silent did not apply here. The next time I went in for a haircut, I decided to go through the trouble of talking, just to feel more ‘normal’ and gel in with the rest of the crowd. I observed how everyone else was constantly conversing with their hairdressers. I wondered what they were talking about!

I was spared the effort to open the conversation by my hairdresser herself (thankfully a different one this time). She asked me what I did for a living. A perfectly harmless question, I thought. At the same time there was another voice in my head going: Why the hell do you wanna know that? Seriously lady, what business is it of yours? Just gimme the freakin haircut and I’ll be on my way. I’ll leave you a better tip if you just shut up! “I am a software engineer”, I went. “Oh!” she said “do you enjoy what you do?”. Whoa Whoa Whoa! Aren’t you getting a little personal here? I mean, to ask me if I enjoy my job! That’s clearly violating my personal space! “I don’t” I blurted, “but the money is good.” She gave me the godforsaken judgemental shocked wide-eyed alien look. “Oh, atleast you’re honest about it. I mean, the paycheck at the end of the month is important after all.” But I knew the damage was done. It was too late to salvage the sinking ship. “I do enjoy a lot of other things you know, just that my job is not one of them. I do blah and blah in my spare time, and then I take up blah and blah on the weekends…..” I went on glorifying the completely senseless tidbits I spend my time doing, making them look like exotic creative pursuits. I was constantly thinking what she was thinking about me – here’s a gal who can afford expensive haircuts from the paycheck of a job she hates!

I was trying too hard to impress her, I think. Shouldn’t it really have been the other way around? At the end of my 25 minute shampoo plus haircut, she knew my profession, the fact that I do not enjoy it, my age, my marital status, my nationality, the languages I can speak, my weekend activities, my hobbies, the restaurants I usually eat at, my favorite cuisine, and whether the guy she saw with me while I came in was my boyfriend or not. She already had my name and number, and she would have my credit card details when I paid her. Hey! Isn’t that enough information for an identity theft? This haircut was proving to be more expensive than I thought.

It was time to leave her a tip. So should the tip be proportional to her conversational skills or the number of times she told me the curls in my hair were beautiful? And what about the haircut itself? Should that be part of the equation? Well it was all too confusing and I was already tired, what with the exhausting conversation I had to make with this complete stranger. I left her a good tip and a thank-you-great-job regime.

Why the Name?

Frankly and most importantly, coz it sounds really cool. I mean think about it – Desert Rose…a lonely beautiful rose in the middle of the scorching desert where it does not and can never belong.

Sounds almost like a cheesy movie plot now, doesn’t it? I like drama, I even see drama in the everyday mundaneness of life. Little wonder then at what I chose to call my blog.