Salaam Bombay -The Other Extreme
I didn't realize how long my entries were until I looked at them myself, so I'm going to try to keep this one short...uh, shorter.
Where was I? Ah yes, we had experienced living with the financially-not-so-well-off for a few days, and once the protestors headed back, I saw a side of Bombay life that was on the other end of the economic spectrum. Kate has a college friend who went to Cornell's hotel school with her, and we stayed with this friend who now was the Project Assistant Manager at the ever so luxurious Taj Hotel. After being sandwiched in jam-packed trains for two days, we were treated to a driver who took us to an extremely posh and ridiculously expensive country club for dinner. Over the course of a day and a half, we mingled with the young elite of Bombay, the creme de la creme of Mumbai's 'well-to-do's. In the beginning it was nice, but after a while the exorbitant prices and almost surreal behavior of the people around me seemed to surround every situation with an awkward blanket of superficiality. Don't get me wrong, our hosts were wonderful and socially aware people- most of them grew up in the United States and were now working in India. I should have felt right at home then, right? Strangely enough, they hadn't heard of Mohammad Rafi, called Karan Johar 'Ka-rahn Jawhair', and kept mentioning all the things which made Indians such a wonderful people, in an almost tourist-esque sort of way. "You are more Indian than we are, Pragya", one of them remarked after I explained to him what a ghazal was. Bizarre, how you think the people you would have so much in common with end up being the people you are worlds apart from...
After the short-lived glitz and glamor of the rich and the (possibly) famous, we were once again plunked into reality when we boarded our train to Jalgaon. Four people were seated in our seats and patiently showed us that the ticket we had for 00:10 was actually for the day before. Funny how no one saw it before. Actually, at the time it wasn't really that funny, but in retrospect it does bring a smile to my face. Two sons of one of the helpful aunties on the train helped us obtain a 50% refund on our now invalid train tickets and purchase new tickets for the next morning, not to Jalgaon but to Bhusaval. Our sleep deprived morning consisted of taking the 6 am train to Bhusaval, a bus to the Ajanta caves, spending 3 hours there (absolutely stunning, by the way), and taking the bus to Jalgaon where we had hotel reservations at Hotel Plaza. We reached Bhopal the next day, and I can not tell you how good it felt to be back at the place I'm beginning to call home.
Where was I? Ah yes, we had experienced living with the financially-not-so-well-off for a few days, and once the protestors headed back, I saw a side of Bombay life that was on the other end of the economic spectrum. Kate has a college friend who went to Cornell's hotel school with her, and we stayed with this friend who now was the Project Assistant Manager at the ever so luxurious Taj Hotel. After being sandwiched in jam-packed trains for two days, we were treated to a driver who took us to an extremely posh and ridiculously expensive country club for dinner. Over the course of a day and a half, we mingled with the young elite of Bombay, the creme de la creme of Mumbai's 'well-to-do's. In the beginning it was nice, but after a while the exorbitant prices and almost surreal behavior of the people around me seemed to surround every situation with an awkward blanket of superficiality. Don't get me wrong, our hosts were wonderful and socially aware people- most of them grew up in the United States and were now working in India. I should have felt right at home then, right? Strangely enough, they hadn't heard of Mohammad Rafi, called Karan Johar 'Ka-rahn Jawhair', and kept mentioning all the things which made Indians such a wonderful people, in an almost tourist-esque sort of way. "You are more Indian than we are, Pragya", one of them remarked after I explained to him what a ghazal was. Bizarre, how you think the people you would have so much in common with end up being the people you are worlds apart from...
After the short-lived glitz and glamor of the rich and the (possibly) famous, we were once again plunked into reality when we boarded our train to Jalgaon. Four people were seated in our seats and patiently showed us that the ticket we had for 00:10 was actually for the day before. Funny how no one saw it before. Actually, at the time it wasn't really that funny, but in retrospect it does bring a smile to my face. Two sons of one of the helpful aunties on the train helped us obtain a 50% refund on our now invalid train tickets and purchase new tickets for the next morning, not to Jalgaon but to Bhusaval. Our sleep deprived morning consisted of taking the 6 am train to Bhusaval, a bus to the Ajanta caves, spending 3 hours there (absolutely stunning, by the way), and taking the bus to Jalgaon where we had hotel reservations at Hotel Plaza. We reached Bhopal the next day, and I can not tell you how good it felt to be back at the place I'm beginning to call home.
posted by Pragya | 5:37 AM
2 Comments:
At the risk of writing something politicaly contentious, its that 'holier than thou' non-indianization that played a part in fueling the hindu right. Different states are in different stages of this. Me being from one of the backward ones in this aspect (not anymore), it was hard for me to comprehend at that time, why would one feel culturally threatened or insecure, or feel the need to defend it so virulently. I dont agree with their agenda, but atleast now i can see where some of them (those with whom you can carry a conversation with) are coming from.
This may seem funny to you, but of course you are more indian than an indian, many in india are more american than american and strive to be more so. Fretting incessantly that they arent enough of that, mandatory visits to overseas chains help somewhat, as well as picking up the lingo of 'its like' and 'you knows'.
After all there's Mr Bush's 'democracy' to be embraced :)
BTW, one of the earliest records of democracy was Vaishali, Nalanda was situated at the same place, more or less, but later in time. But ask anyone, most will swear by the fact that democracy/republic is an European tradition. Even in the American context, the settlers were traditionally monarchic, while native american's (or 'indians' if you please) were democratic
enough of nocturnal rambling :)
Keep writing long posts! I love them all!
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