Hats and Doctors: Stories Read online

  We walked around the garden, ate the plums and picked flowers. Mr Bhalla bathed in the water, cold as ice, and bowed down to the image of Shiva, but he neither made an offering, nor gave any tip to the guide. When we all started walking towards the bus the guide fell behind him asking for baksheesh. He sent the guide over to me. The entire time, the guide had been walking only with him, but thanks to him we had also learnt every single minute detail about the beautiful spring of Verinag. I gave him eight annas. He asked me if this was on behalf of everyone or just from me? I told him that this was from me and to take theirs from them.

  By that point, Mr Bhalla had gone ahead and was sitting in the bus. Right up until the bus drove off, the pundit continuously asked him for baksheesh, but he didn’t give him even one paisa.

  Someone had given Mr Bhalla the nickname ‘Gop’ when they saw him bathing, like a cowherd, in Verinag, and from then on, everyone called him ‘Gop Sahib’.

  And thus, with the mention of Mr Bhalla, all the memories of the hours spent with him during the bus journey to Srinagar’s Amira Kadal swam before my eyes. My friends had written some letters to Srinagar’s artists, and when the bus arrived there, Mr Kachru, Mr Butt and Mr Santosh—all three young artists from Srinagar—had arrived at the bus station. We took our time in getting the luggage unloaded, chatting and enjoying tea in the waiting room.

  As we were going in a tonga towards the Tanki House, where Mr Kachru lived, we saw ‘Mr Gop’s’ caravan coming along near the Amira Kadal—he himself in front with his wife, then his sister-in-law and daughters, then the Chopra family, then the uncle and the niece from Delhi. It appeared he had taken all of them under his leadership.

  As for us, we stayed with Mr Kachru for two days and then moved to a houseboat, and we didn’t encounter Mr Gop again; but one day, in Gulmarg, we suddenly ran into the uncle and the niece—they were staying at the same hotel we were. When Mr Bhalla came up in conversation, the uncle, Mr Garg, laughed and said, ‘You know, the first day he led us around so much, my legs still hurt to this day. He convinced us he would get us a nice cheap room and dragged us through half the hotels in Srinagar. I have rheumatism, it’s hard for me to climb up and down again and again; he found fault with something in one place, and then with something else in another. Frankly, we got bored. Finally we told him, “Listen, we refuse to stay in a hotel. Sure, we might get ripped off, but we can’t stand this hotel game any more … so we’ve found ourselves a houseboat.”’

  I suddenly recollected the uncle’s story as we were walking along the banks of the Lidder, so I asked Mr Chopra: ‘So what hotel did Mr Bhalla end up staying in?’

  ‘What hotel!’ Mr Chopra twirled his walking stick with a guffaw and whacked a tiny pebble so hard it flew up and fell far off in the waters of the Lidder. ‘When Mr Bhalla had seen every hotel from Residency Road clear across to Amira Kadal and none was to his liking, and Mr Garg had gone to a houseboat with his niece, we too gave up hope. But the friend who had invited us to Srinagar, his house was outside the city, so we thought we would just stay at a hotel one or two days. That was why we ended up with Mr Bhalla. Finally, we said, “Yaar, just arrange any room at all, we’re tired out; the little girl is tired.” Then Mr Bhalla took us to a laundry—he had brought a letter from Delhi addressed to its proprietor. The laundry people gave us the addresses of two or three hotels, but we had already been to all of them. Then Mr Bhalla said that he had also brought a letter addressed to another laundry person … but, Artist Sahib, we had got tired of all this. We took a tonga and went out to our friend’s place.’

  ‘But how come Mr Bhalla was friends with all those laundry people?’ I asked suddenly.

  ‘Why, being a laundry man himself!’ Mr Chopra chuckled. ‘He runs a big, popular laundry in Delhi.’

  ‘Your wife was saying that he destroyed your life, so did you all stay together?’

  ‘Oh my, where could we stay, Artist Sahib!’ said Mr Chopra, kicking another pebble. ‘We stayed with that friend of ours for two days, but that place was so far from the city we tired of it quickly; then we met up with another friend whose house is in Amira Kadal. He had two rooms empty. He insisted on bringing us to his place. One day we ran into Mr Bhalla with his wife and sister-in-law; I asked him, “Tell me, what hotel are you staying at?”

  ‘“We’re spending four annas a day and having a great time enjoying Srinagar,” he told me.

  ‘When I expressed astonishment, Mr Gop told me that he had spent two days in the Gurudwara at Amira Kadal. When the Granthi had absolutely refused to allow them to stay any longer than two days, they went to the house of a laundry friend of theirs near the Majestic Hotel, in Maisuma Bazaar. His laundry is on the second floor. It has a small balcony; he just stuck his luggage there. The shops there close at nine o’clock. Kutchery Gate is out that way; it closes at six o’clock. At night Mr Bhalla would sleep below on the footpath. In the morning he would give two annas to the coolie, who took the bed upstairs and put it in the balcony. Two annas in the morning and two annas in the evening, he got everything done for just four annas.

  ‘When Mr Gop had finished explaining this, his sister-in-law boasted, “Just tell us where you’ll find such a cheap hotel?”

  ‘“Yes, you can’t find anything that cheap in all of Srinagar,” I said, praising them, “but you must have had trouble with bathing and washing and relieving yourselves.”

  ‘“Oh, what does it matter here? Even in a big city like Delhi we get up early and go out into the fields,” remarked Mr Bhalla proudly.

  ‘“But there aren’t any fields that close by here,” I objected.

  ‘Then Mr Bhalla told me that his entire family is in the habit of waking up at the crack of dawn. If either his or his wife’s eyes don’t open, then the little girls wake them up. After getting up at daybreak, they trudge two or two-and-half miles to Shankaracharya. They do everything there and they also take darshan of the God Shankar. As they come up the mountain, they also bathe in the Dal Lake and that’s where they wash their clothes as well.

  ‘“But why do you go so far,” I asked. “Why don’t you bathe in the Jhelum?”

  ‘“The water in the Jhelum is so dirty,” responded Madam Sister-in-law, turning up her nose.

  ‘But the very next day the sister-in-law let slip that only Kashmiri boatwomen can bathe in the ladies’ bathing house next to the Jhelum. Outsiders would not be able to bear it.

  ‘And then I found out that she sometimes bathed there herself.’

  I listened quietly to what Mr Chopra was saying. Although I had seen some of the true colours of Mr Bhalla in the bus on the way, I still had trouble believing it all. ‘But he told me they would stay in a houseboat in Srinagar,’ I observed. ‘They would roast chicken every day and order tandoori parathas.’

  ‘My God, since when does he eat chicken? His grandfather and great-grandfather probably never even tasted it!’ retorted Mr Chopra, with irritation. ‘He stayed with me for ten days, I know full well what he eats.’

  ‘He stayed with you?’

  ‘What happened was that one day he came to see us at our place. I had two rooms. Actually our friend was expecting some guests who were delayed by fifteen days or so, and our friend had insisted on inviting us there for fifteen days. The rooms were very spacious and open. Gop Sahib’s eyes popped open when he saw them; he said, “You’re having a great time here.” For some reason, I replied, “If you’re having trouble over there, feel free to come here. These rooms are mine for ten more days. Why don’t you take one?”

  ‘I just said it casually but Gop Sahib immediately went off and brought back his luggage. He wanted to do his cooking right there as well, but there was no kitchen and I didn’t think it appropriate to make improper use of my friend’s generosity, so I didn’t even let him light a coal grill. He also proposed that we cook below on the footpath. He tried to explain that this was where the fun of a picnic lay, when the food was cooked right out in the open road. Although I myself be
lieve in this type of simple living, his cooking downstairs on the street seemed tantamount to an insult to my friend. So he went to Pyarasingh’s dhaba across the way and ate one five-anna thali in the morning and one in the evening. The husband and wife and sister-in-law would order three thalis and feed the children with them. They took us there too several times but, my friend, we just couldn’t get ourselves to eat there. We ate at the Majestic. Whenever we ate at Pyarasingh’s dhaba we always told Gop Sahib, “Listen, order us parathas and the special. We just can’t take this urad dal.”’

  ‘We have also eaten at Pyarasingh’s dhaba,’ I said. ‘The chicken there is quite good. You can get half a plate for eight annas and, for two and a half rupees, a whole roasted chicken.’

  ‘I asked Mr Bhalla,’ said Mr Chopra, ‘“Why don’t you get some, you can get it for cheap here.” But he was of the opinion that one could get chicken in Delhi as well; in Kashmir one should eat fruit.’

  ‘Maybe they ate some fruit at a store at some point,’ Mrs Chopra laughed. ‘We, Artist Sahib, never saw even an apricot in his hand.’

  We all burst out laughing.

  ‘But Gop Sahib is very fat,’ I observed.

  ‘He’s bloated from eating urad dal,’ retorted Mr Chopra brusquely.

  For a few moments we continued to walk along silently. A new bridge was being constructed over the Lidder. It rested on thick iron ropes and the government order was that only one person could cross at a time. We walked across, one at a time. Below, the Lidder’s water flowed wildly—knocking against the rocks, tossing foam in the air, free! There was no trace of blue or green in the water. The Lidder churned like a molten moonbeam as it flew along the breast of Pahalgam.

  When we arrived on the other side of the bridge, I asked, ‘Where did Mr Bhalla stay in Pahalgam?’

  ‘Where did he stay!?’ Mr Chopra asked. ‘When we started out for Srinagar, he didn’t want to vacate the room at first; he kept saying, “You’re going; we’ll stay in your room.” But our friend’s guests had arrived; he had told us before that he couldn’t give us a room for longer than fifteen days. So, after much persuasion he consented to leave—but when he heard that we were going to Pahalgam and that we hoped to get a room or two there, he immediately fixed upon a plan to go as well. He started by saying, “Pahalgam is a wonderful place. What’s the point of going to Kashmir if you don’t see Pahalgam—otherwise, there’s no point in coming to Kashmir. We plan to stay there for twenty days.” The Deputy Director of the Visitors’ Bureau in Srinagar had become my friend; he had said that his subordinate was a clerk in Pahalgam and owned a house there. “I will arrange a room there for you,” he had told us. When I mentioned to Mr Bhalla that I had plans, he pretended to have already made a plan himself.’

  ‘How did the Deputy Director come to know you? Did you know him from before?’

  ‘No, sir,’ laughed Mr Chopra. ‘It’s a very amusing thing. We actually didn’t even have a settled place to stay in Srinagar. It’s true that a couple of friends had invited us, a couple of other friends had given us letters addressed to their Kashmiri friends as well, but we had no way of being sure what place would be right for us. So I had given out the address of the Visitors’ Bureau as our mailing address. When I got off the bus, I found out that the bureau office was right across the way, so I thought I would go over there first. The chaprassi directed me to the Deputy Sahib’s room. A rather young officer wearing a suit and lace-up shoes was sitting at the table, chatting with two or three persons who were either officers or officers’ relatives. When he had finished with them he picked up a newspaper and began to read. He had taken no notice of my arrival. The thing was that my clothes were looking a bit filthy after the long trip. You people had changed your clothes after bathing in Batote, but I just can’t stand bathing in that cold water so early in the morning….’

  ‘But you could get a bucket of warm water there for four annas,’ I interrupted.

  ‘We were actually about to order two buckets of warm water, but Mr Bhalla stopped us. He said, “We’ll bathe in the Verinag Spring—it’s such healthy water, the Verinag’s; even terrible diseases in advanced stages can be cured with that water.” But when we got to Verinag I put my hand in the canal in the garden—it was freezing! Mr Bhalla did bathe in that water and change his clothes, I just didn’t have the courage … My clothes were quite dirty. So I said to the Deputy Sahib in English, “Sir, can I trouble you for a moment?”

  ‘He replied without lifting his eyes from the newspaper, “What is it?”

  ‘Then I said what I had to say. “I am very busy,” he replied, and told the chaprassi to take the gentleman to the clerk.

  ‘My blood boiled; I asked, “What work are you busy with?”

  ‘He pushed the newspaper away. I continued, “A friend of mine had nothing but praise for the Visitors’ Bureau in Kashmir. I didn’t know that the officers here were so uncivilized that they considered lifting their eyes to look towards some visitor an interruption to their work.”

  ‘I’m the editor of an English-language newspaper. I know English like the back of my hand. He was quite surprised when he heard my fluent English and said with some irritation, “Did your friend also tell you that the Visitors’ Bureau does the work of the post office?” I replied, “If any visitor mistakenly understood that to be the case it should be the duty of the office to help them as much as possible. Such a duty could be given to a clerk. I regularly send accounts of my travels to my own newspaper. I had thought that I would start out by praising the Visitors’ Bureau, but it seems that …”

  ‘The Director Sahib’s face changed completely.

  ‘“Please take a seat!” he said, half-rising from his chair. His entire manner had changed. When he found out that I was in the editorial section of the Delhi Times, not only did he guarantee that he himself would handle my papers, but he also served me tea.

  ‘After this, I met with him several times. We became pretty close. He gave me all the details about his work and the difficulties he faced. I even wrote an article about it. When I expressed a desire to go to Pahalgam he promised to get me a room. At first, his plan was only to give me a letter. Then he decided to go to Pahalgam himself and returned only when he saw that I was happily settled.’

  We had walked back quite a distance along the other bank of the Lidder. The path ahead was closed due to a small brook flowing down from the mountain. The water had flooded the banks. We descended a bit and made our way forward, jumping over the rocks. Mr Chopra was silent for a short while, so as not to fall while chatting. When we crossed the brook, he resumed his story:

  ‘Now listen to what happened when we got here. Gop Sahib stayed in a Gurudwara when he came here as well. They have that same rule here about staying for two days … He begged on his hands and knees, but the Granthi here wouldn’t budge either. Then he came to me. He said, “My friend, this room is very large, why don’t we come here too?” I told him plainly, “Bhai, this is not my friend’s home, it’s the home of a friend of a friend; how can I keep another family here?” He responded, “You may think of us as ‘other’ but we think of you as our own.” I said, “That’s fine, but other people may not think of it that way …” and I put forth another argument: “In Srinagar there was a second room, here, there’s just one room. You will be inconvenienced and so will we.” Then he started saying, “Don’t worry about our inconvenience, but, yes, you will definitely have difficulty because of us.” I said, “It’s not a matter of difficulty, this just doesn’t seem right. The Vazir Hotel is very close, you can get rooms there for a rupee each. If you want I’ll make arrangements there.” He turned up his nose and said, “The rooms at the Vazir Hotel are very small and musty. If we stay in a hotel we’ll stay in the Pahalgam Hotel. Yes, it costs five rupees a day, but the rooms are very open. And right behind it, there is quite a beautiful view of the Lidder.” I asked him, “What is this room in comparison with the Pahalgam Hotel?”’

  ‘Then wher
e did he go?’ I asked suddenly.

  ‘Why, Artist Sahib, they’re dal eaters. Dal eaters!’ Mr Chopra guffawed.

  ‘Dal eaters?’ I asked with surprise.

  ‘That’s right, Artist Sahib, the Kashmiris contemptuously call tourists like them “dal eaters”. The Kashmiri term is “dali-visitor”, but what they mean is just “dal eater”—people who take pleasure in the paradise of Kashmir while eating only tandoori rotis that come with free dal. If only tourists like them started coming here, who would buy all these Kashmiri almonds and walnuts, peaches and apricots, apples and pears, shawls, woodcuts and papier mâché?’

  ‘You’ve got a point there.’ And at this point, I also laughed with Mr Chopra.

  ‘What can I tell you?’ Mr Chopra was on a roll now. ‘He made me feel ashamed in Srinagar too. While he was staying with me, he suggested one day, “Why don’t you come with us? We’ll take you around by Nishat and Shalimar.” We got ready. At the height of the season, no groom was prepared to take anyone there for less than thirteen or fourteen rupees. After a lot of bargaining he fixed the rate with a pack-saddle groom at ten rupees. First Shalimar, then Nishat, then Chashme Shahi, and on the way back we also went to Nehru Park. When we arrived back at Amira Kadal it was already nine o’clock at night. The groom dropped us off and we were standing in the street taking out our money. He kept saying, “Sir, I’ve worked very hard, I should get some baksheesh as well.” Mr Bhalla took a five-rupee note out of his pocket and put it into his hand, so the groom thought that he would also give him a ten-rupee note, but when Mr Bhalla turned to leave he asked for ten more. Although it had been settled for just ten, he had worked very hard. But Gop Sahib said, “Arré, go away then, I have given one rupee more. Last Sunday we went for four rupees.”