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| Diary |
Magazine | 11 May 2009 |
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| Delhi Diary by Nandini Mehta |
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It’s been over six months since Dr Anbumani Ramadoss’s killjoy decree changed the clubby atmosphere at the Outlook office forever. The air on the first floor, where six of us chain-smokers sit, is now so pristine it hurts to breathe. Without that white weed in our fingers, it hurts even more to find the mot juste, let alone render into intelligible English reports filed by our stringer in Jhanjharpur. We smokers have been banished, along with withered potted plants and broken office furniture, to the rooftop terrace. But there’s been an unexpected bonus—climbing three flights of stairs, several times a day, has done wonders for our fitness levels. So has cutting out all those cigarettes mindlessly puffed at one’s desk. Thank you, Dr Ramadoss.
Another bonus was the new spirit of camaraderie that sprang up among colleagues, as we met on the terrace and exchanged gossip and ideas over a cigarette while soaking up a bit of winter sunshine from October to March. Those impromptu terrace smoking sessions, in fact, turned out to be far more effective as "bonding" and "team-building" exercises than the expensive (and absurd) ones that MNCs send their executives on, where they’re all roped together as they climb a perilous rock face.
But those happy days are over now. With temperatures crossing 40 degrees C, the terrace is deserted. Going down to the street level is not an option—there’s a crowded parking lot there which is not exactly conducive to a relaxing smoke or a conversation. Now, we smokers have really got nowhere to go. So if you find a bit of the old spark missing in Outlook’s summer issues, blame it on Dr Ramadoss. As the old saying goes, there’s no fire without a smoke....
Rants and Raves
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Despite the economic meltdown in the West—or perhaps because of it—Delhi’s expat community seems to be growing and growing. And they continue to live in princely style—for a dollar salary, even with paycuts, still goes a long, long way here. Thanks to their generous patronage, even tiny neighbourhood kirana stores in the colonies expats favour now routinely stock things like Dijon mustard, Japanese rice crackers and Parmesan cheese (OK Editor, stop drooling, I’ll bring you some tomorrow!). We have to thank them for bringing these exotic goodies to our doorstep.
But, as many south Delhi residents have discovered, there’s a big downside to having expats living in your neighbourhood. To put it briefly, they’re "spoiling the rate". Since the salaries they pay their domestic staff often rival those of us poor print-media journalists, we live in constant fear of our cook or maid or driver being lured away (it has happened to me). At the shoeshine stand near my house, expats routinely give a tip of Rs 80 where Rs 5 or Rs 10 would be an acceptable, even generous, baksheesh. It makes us locals feel small, mean and needlessly defensive. The unkindest cut was when the kid at the traffic light spurned the bag of bananas I’d brought him. "Amrikan Auntie has given me a McDonald box," he informed me. When expats self-righteously declare that they have instituted a "minimum wage" for domestic staff, when they hand out exorbitant tips and whimsically decide to introduce street kids to the dubious delights of American junk food, they’re hitting us below the belt, right in our pockets. And in the process revealing the cultural arrogance and insensitivity that lie beneath the bleeding hearts they wear on their sleeve.
Rants and Raves
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The chief delight of Delhi’s glorious, all-too-brief spring season is the succession of trees that come into spectacular bloom, with the deep crimson of seemul, followed by the flame-coloured palash and the delicate purple and pink blossoms of kachnar. But when the gulmohars begin to flower, Dilliwalas’ thoughts turn to cooler climes. And by the time the amaltas and jacaranda are in bloom, as they are now, the great summer exodus from Delhi has begun.
When they’re not holding forth on post-election arithmetic, and comparing the varying predictions of psephologists, astrologers and the satta bazaar, the chatterati are exchanging notes about the ‘in’ places to go. This year, apparently, it’s Patagonia. The last couple of years, it was Tuscany, but the snobometer has now decreed Tuscany as passe and declasse. As one society diva lamented last week, "The whole of Delhi and their bachcha-kachcha and ayahs are renting villas in Tuscany—it’s become like Karolbagh Extension Part III." Of course, you’ve guessed where no one is going this summer—at least not until it’s clear who’s won the elections. The buzz is that tax sleuths have already started keeping tabs on all Indians heading to Mauritius, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Cyprus and other destinations where clandestine money is parked. The cognoscenti, however, whisper that there are other corners of the world that are not yet on the radar of L.K. Advani or the revenue department. So is there more to Patagonia than the spectacular scenery?
Rants and Raves
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