Uma - and the men in her life at nine

Uma is nine but what she sees now, what she hears and experiences will shape her into the adult woman that she will become. Is it in her parents’ hands, that they ought to choose whom she mingles with? Is it irrelevant? Does it matter in the long run who she ran with, giggled and fought with when she was nine? Given how Uma is, yes it does. In her case it did. If you know her now, you will see that whatever she has absorbed at that age, whatever she has concluded at nine has stayed with her through her life’s journey, especially the male influences of her life. Men were not the thorns that would tear her soft plantain like being like her grandmother had harshly threatened, in the ancient bid to keep her off the male species for good or till the time was ripe to embrace one, as decided by the elders. Men to her were a fascinating encounter with herself; they treated her like a woman while she oddly always recognized a kindred spirit in them. This dilemma of wishing away femaleness while reaching out to some sexless utopia in the brain cells of the male homo sapien was as taxing as it was precarious. One wants a friend but invariably finds a willing lover. Once the ‘love’ part is taken care of the male moves on. Leaving you bereft of a never-was-friendship and the so-called-love. It is this jagged rusty sword that she must walk on, a woman on wire, hands aloft, praying for salvation from this conundrum. Friendship between a boy and girl. What is it? Does it exist? Knowing her we also know that Uma is curious and what she can find out via experience she will. Thus all her interactions with boys are those in which she willingly subjects herself to their shenanigans. Outrageously, reaching out where most women might not dare.

It is tough possessing a male brain in a female body, Uma consoles her nine year old wearied self.

Uma has not seen sunlight for a while now. Mornings when she is pried out of her stupor and into a navy blue and white uniform, she can barely see her own mother, standing in front - stuffing lunch box, water bottle, home work notebooks and other necessary scholarly paraphernalia into the commodious confines of her Red Leather bag. Newly bought from Calcutta, this bag was one of the accoutrements of her young life that she was inordinately proud of. At one level it seemed a little untoward to be in love with an inanimate object, reveling in its splendour especially when she was still mourning her Thaathayya who had so suddenly died on her. On the other, well this was life, to be celebrated, just as he had always taught her. Wasn’t he the very man who pointed at the sky and said that THAT was God showing you a film everyday, for free? When she had been left out of the filmi jaunts that her joint family indulged in during Summer Holidays in Hyderabad she had found solace in his wisdom. They had all gone for NTR’s latest Daana Veera Soora Karna leaving her in the company of an old man of seventy. Despite her sullen silences at being slighted thus, he had managed to convince her that a three-hour man-made movie could never match a lifelong scintillating unpredictable spectacle that only the Creator was capable of funding and directing.

His being her first death she took it seriously, contemplating on the soul and the like so as to be better prepared for future losses but her grandfather had taught her well. On the nature of transience and of life being impermanent of that she had no doubt but coming to terms with the existence of man as memory versus man as flesh and blood, that was another matter! She really wished there was a post office for souls so she could address letters to him and maybe he could whisper replies to her? Breeze was always going about whispering wasn’t she? Give her some solid work to do instead of prancing gaily with nothing on the agenda. Really whoever was up there was not very practical. Managing of resources should be handled by women, as Amma tells Nanna at every given opportunity, hence Uma is sure God is a man. He seems to have done such a shoddy job.

“Is he in the sky? Where is the projector?” she asks of her grim grandfather, devoid of cynicism, for that has yet to find home in her heart. After all she is not yet ten. Her hands scratch the mosquito bites on her thin arms, mosquitoes she shoo-es away, mosquitoes she will not kill.

“Do you want him to be a he? Our eyes are the projectors, God is smarter, we come individually equipped….what we project we experience as life, its all within” His calm eyes have not moved from the chess board, one hand on the Knight.

“Can I make him a she? Who is more powerful?” Uma is delighted that she is endowed with some power after all, living in a joint family as the youngest grand child can make one feel extremely vulnerable.

“God is who you want it to be. It could be yourself….CHECK…at least that is what they say” He has managed to check mate himself, since today is Sunday and Das uncle his friend and chess mate does not come on Sundays. This one day his wife has staked her claim over his evening which is otherwise spent at Uma’s ancestral abode planning a single chess move for hours.

“I should remember to tell this to Venkat” Uma reminds herself.

He being on her planning and coordination committee. Uma, ever since she has read about the Peacock Throne and Koh-i-noor being whisked away and now bedecking the diadem of an alien Queen, is hell bent on rescuing them from such humiliating environs. In this she needs, to put it politely, a sidekick. In all the books she has read there has been no solo adventurer who could strike out on her own without being assisted at various junctures by like minded male ‘friends’. While Venkat might take this friendship seriously, she endures him only because he can help her retrieve the lost treasures of her newly independent and let it be said very poor nation.

Venkat she realizes like all boys wants to own her, envelop her and claim her, correct her, mould her and dominate her, little deducing that there is more to her than retrieving stolen national treasures. The other day when the whole of Cachar district was enveloped in darkness - no power, no water for fifteen days - it had started raining, pouring. Everyone had gotten out of their bashas to collect water in buckets, men started to bathe in the torrential outpour, children shouting stomping in the mud and she too, yet a child, albeit only physically had stepped out to grab her share of fun.

“Uma go inside, you are a girl” Venkat had appeared out of nowhere hissing orders at her.
“So?” Uma is incredulous, does this boy know who he is talking to? The future Prime Minister of the country. At least that’s what her horoscope had said and Amma reiterated this each time Uma did badly at school – “Is this what you want? That our great nation which has produced such stalwarts should have an idiot like you for a prime minister?”- Only last month Mrs Gandhi had come visiting their border station worried about the influx of Bengalis into Assam and had smiled at Uma, making eye contact at the tarmac where a few officers' wives (and a few kids) were given the privilege of meeting the real life ‘Durga’. Like recognizes like. This foolish boy has no idea. If he behaves badly I will call an Emergency and immediately put him in jail.
“So, act like a girl and go inside. Do you see any other girl dancing in the rain? If Lavanya was doing this, I’d thrash her” Venkat is fuming and managing to emit enough smoke in a tropical storm.
“First I am glad you are not my brother, Second, I’d thrash YOU if you were my brother, Third you can go home, I don’t like rude guests. I didn’t even call you in the first place.” Uma is pretty sure the last two sentences will count against her morally. She knows she has said something unsavoury, her mother will definitely thrash her if not Venkat but she is defiant. “You can complain to my mother, I don’t care”.
“and you can find another Commando, I won’t teach you jungle warfare and I won’t provide you my battalion to rescue your stupid Koh-i-noor, only girls want to rescue a diamond” he said ‘girl’ and ‘diamond’ in a tone of disgust and disapproval. Venkat’s father is a Commando of which he is inordinately proud also the main reason Uma has inducted him in her rescue mission.

Though Venkat had stayed on that night at her house, she had wisely kept out of his sight and at dinner had acted extremely normal so as to belie any suspicions on her mother’s part. Being a boy he was foolish enough to fall for her strategy assuming erroneously that she still liked him, as if!! After this incident he has somehow coaxed his mother to invite her often to his house, to stay over, play with his sister Lavanya and eat ‘Noodles’. Maybe he was trying to indoctrinate her? She should watch out. The rest she can sagaciously endure but the Noodles part chokes her throat.

Uma is a product of a joint family. She is also a much-desired granddaughter. She has never had to eat what she dislikes and she does not eat without being told a story. In fact each morsel better be accompanied by an intriguing plot, a twist and a mouth gaping suspense or the ‘mudda’ shall remain in her Pinni’s hand for kingdom come. It has taken hours and countless tales for her unmarried aunts to get her to finish one meal. They enjoy it may be, this experience of motherhood without the expected pains but Uma definitely took from all this pampering that stories are an essential accompaniment to Rice. The other dishes are all descendants of a traditional society which eats only at home, cooks all the three meals afresh while chanting in wet clothes in Sanskrit and never eats without offering Naivedyam to the Gods. In such a scenario ‘Noodles’ were never heard of nor mentioned. It was assumed for some reason that Gods were Indian and that they preferred Indian food. Frankly, imagine the kind of God who likes Noodles! Imagine preferring it over Pappu Pulusu!! It would be hard to worship a God with such poor taste.

So every Tuesday evening she is packed off in a 3 tonner with a bhaiyaa and some gunny bags of Onions to the Army base where Venkat and Lavanya reside far from the Air Force camp which is where she resides so she could be subjected to the horrors of these worm like slimy slithery beings crawling down her innards ostensibly to provide her nutrition. This would be accompanied by the Oohs and Aahs of the Narayanan children who jumped up and down with excitement at the prospect of more coming from the kitchen. Uma being a shy child concerned more with others' feelings than her own, at least in public, could not convey to her hostess that she much preferred the Thair Saadam that was kept aside for Uncle. It seemed like his wife disapproved of such old fashioned culinary habits that inadvertently revealed the rural background of a cosmopolitan Colonel.

Aunty would surely exclaim her disgust loudly if she asked for curd rice instead of noodles and voice it to Uma’s father with whom she had already fought over the greatness of America’s’ culture. To which her father had replied slurping more loudly, just to annoy her further, that all Americans were peasants who loved to work hard but should first to spell luxury and grandeur correctly. While Mrs Narayanan was dumb struck by the impertinence of a junior officer who did not even heed the basic courtesy of allowing her to have her say in her own house, he continued, despite Amma’s protestations that for culture to develop it took at least 5000 years and one did not do it by decimating the previous population. It ended with Aunty proclaiming that ‘no wonder India is so backward and poor and USA way ahead in everything, our minds are so small and always hankering for the past…..’ and Nanna, after being kicked and kicked by Amma finally let go, resolving NEVER to enter Colonel Narayanan’s house again.

To keep up a charade is what they did best. So Aunty continued to invite Uma for sleepovers and acted as though nothing had happened and her own mother encouraged it and broke the rule of ‘no sleep over at boys’ houses’ which was the excuse Amma had used often when she refused Uma permission to go to Mo Mo’s. “This is different, Lavanya is your age and I trust Mrs Narayanan, we share the same values”, a very mysterious reason. What was wrong with boys anyway? It seemed like no one liked them, all the Aunties were forever warning her and other girls about boys this, boys that. She liked them and she was not afraid of them and most certainly was not going to be cowed in by them. Venkat, Darrell, Mo Mo. They would all grow up to be like her father, wanting to be right all the time. What was worse was that Nanna was right most of the time and they might not be! They did not seem to be learning anything…….unlike her of course, she was always either in the library or doing her home work. She has a prophecy to fulfill.

This irritated her, her father’s trait to be right because her father ended up embarrassing anyone and everyone and had no friends left in the camp but on the other hand she grew to respect a man who could stick to his guns when everyone else complied, he knew what he was talking about and could rattle off history like he had lived it. “No wonder you don’t get promoted” Amma had grieved many a time, which superior likes to be told off in public that “Sir, 1857 is not just a Sepoy Mutiny, it’s the FIRST WAR OF INDEPENDENCE which united Hindus and Muslims who saw through the divide and rule policy of the British…….., we are a sovereign nation and we should desist from using colonial terminology, especially in the Forces”. After which the Station Commander had made sure that Nanna was transferred as far away as possible, a border camp, a hardship posting “That is how I landed here in Kumbigram” he likes to regale the new comers to the camp. It won’t be long before they too start getting history lessons over dinner! She can’t wait for such discussions. She has grown to love these altercations to see each time how people wriggle and cough and slink away humbled, pompous people who had strutted with a wave and a hearty gesture drawn in by the rare aromas of Pappu Pulusu and Paravannam in the middle of an Assamese Jungle. (She did not think that Noodles let off an aroma. And anything that did not smell good, wafting through air announcing its presence, enticing you to taste it, well that could not be called food! You could call it a snack maybe.)

“No sir, as long as the constitution of India allows it, it is within the legal right of a Prime Minister with Presidential consent to find an alternative if need be a military solution to internecine strife.” Nanna thunders at his dinner guests who with morsels stuck in their gullets gape at his booming voice and reddened face.
“Not that I am supporting her mind you, I can’t say her name you understand, I ought not to be discussing this as a military officer, my nation comes first, yes sir but we are going to dogs I say, to dogs. I did not fight ‘65 and ‘71 for this, no sir.” Her father once he starts just needs an audience, he can go on and on with no feedback except people’s stunned faces, mostly they are stunned at his oratorial capabilities, which are always backed, by solid facts and statistics.
“My father sir, he too put his life in the line fire for this country. Those were martyrs then sir and now? Corruption and incompetence, we have nincompoops in high places. Undeserving louts. Despicable third rate buggers. Is this why I left a lucrative profession to fight for my country so that others may ruin it?” Uma is sure that most of the uncles here are not well versed with such colourful vocabulary, not everyone is a Theatre lover like her father. He just needs a stage! Amma meanwhile is apologizing for him and feeding everyone seconds of Caramel Custard.
“You should let others speak too sometimes” she gently admonishes him each time this happens to which he invariably replies, “Fools, they don’t know either history or geography”

Uma hears Mo Mo calling to her, to come and play. If there was Khalong at school, after school there was this Manipuri boy who made sure he included her in everything he did. Sometimes, she hid from him to acquire some solitary experiences. This whole moving in packs was not to her liking. It felt like they were an elephant herd marauding their way through a thicket. She was more inclined to feel that she was a lion. The queen of the jungle who liked to hunt alone. Though come evening the whole camp would be abuzz with mothers dressing up their children to ‘go out and play’ which needed a different set of clothes, canvas shoes and neatly tied hair. Mothers it seemed were deploying all their energies into what was to be worn when. Why wouldn’t just one frock do for the whole day?

Soon Mo Mo, his sister, Uma, her sister, Darrell, his sister and hordes of others would cycle around, run into the jungle to pluck ferns, watch the bachelors play badminton, drink soft drinks at the mess, coax the bhaiyyas in the mess kitchen to feed them some leftover aloo tikkis and watch Bangladeshi Television which was officially not allowed in India but nevertheless eagerly watched by everyone for its foreign programming. They would all reach the officer’s mess on time to catch ‘Famous Five’ at five. If Venkat was dropped off by his father then he would join in too but ended up fighting with Mo Mo to sit next to her.

“Mo Mo sleeps naked” he told her once so that she would develop misgivings about her friendship with this strange boy. Which instead fascinated her more. This was the first time she had heard of people sleeping without clothes! What if there was an emergency and he had to jump out of bed, would he rush out naked? Apparently his sister Bam Bam too slept naked. Which meant they would need bedsheets all the time! Terrible, even in summer to sleep with bedsheets. The thought of naked bodies sprawled in slumber without a decent coverlet seemed too radical for Uma.

“We believe that they sleep more soundly that way, their souls are well rested without the burden of clothes” is what Veda aunty had told Amma, why she had felt the need to explain this native behaviour of theirs was not clear, maybe she had heard the kids whispering about among themselves? Veda aunty was beauuuuuuutiful! She had been the first actress in Manipur to appear in films before she married uncle and she taught Uma Manipuri dance. If she said sleeping naked was good for the soul it had to be. Aunty was graceful and delicate and when she danced Uma was so proud that Veda aunty was her first dance teacher.

It was an odd feeling chatting with Mo Mo the next day, he had come over to show off his new bicycle, knowing that he slept naked. It somehow seemed hmm not right that she knew something intimate about him, while he himself was unaware that she knew. So she gave in when he goaded her to join him in the jungle. Her guilt overcame the injunctions of her mother – Never set foot there alone without an adult - the path which was right behind their two room accommodations, this being a non-family station and everyone looking the other way at this small breech of law, winded itself into a lovely wood with a stream and sunlight wriggling in through tall tropical trees. So with her sister tagging along, who her mother insisted must accompany her at all times, they set off into the unknown. They had been here only once before when the whole camp went for a picnic, cooking over chulhas and woodfire, singing and playing in the shallow stream. The path though narrow and slippery is a straightforward one. Leading to the main spot in the jungle, an opening with pebbles along the gurgling stream where one can sit and dip one’s toes in the cold water.

However before they can get there they hear a rustling behind them and they scamper worried that it could be a Tiger. Much as it fascinated her the idea of an encounter with a Tiger, she is not sure if this is how she wants it. Uma has envisaged a face-to-face tête-à-tête not this ambush from behind. She is inclined to run or climb a tree but what about her sister? Uma being older has certain responsibilities. Mo Mo by now is far away apparently not suffering from any feelings of guilt or responsibility. She is disappointed in him that a boy who sleeps naked so that his soul can develop is cowardly enough to leave two young girls to fend for themselves. She wishes for Veda aunty to put some clothes on him and make him into a man.
Mo Mo does possess some conscience because he shows up the next day and apologizes to Uma, “for leaving you in a lurch”. The vocabulary was enough to confirm her doubts that his sorry had not emanated from the guilt-ridden heart of a friend but from the pressure of a parent.

“I wanted to run and get some help for you” Mo Mo is looking down, crestfallen, dragging his naked feet along the rim of the new BSA SLR, he does not dare to look at her directly.
“What if it was a man-eater, we would have been dead!” Uma having just read the Man-Eater of Kumoan will not rest until she has showed off her knowledge of men and Tigers and of Tigers that eat men.
“I knew it was the Bamboowallah, I was just trying to scare you, ha ha ha!” Mo Mo in his retraction and attempt at misplaced humour has just dug his own suicide pit, poor boy.
“Why are you sorry then? For scaring us? And why didn’t you come back, we could have gone to the stream AFTER you scared us, no?” Uma asks pointedly and walks away with a stride befitting a lioness.

How long could parents manage to control their child’s behaviour, at what point would the child start taking responsibility for his own actions? Maybe never? Maybe once the parents are removed from the scene. Like Darrell’s. His father has just died and what terrible fate awaits him! Poor boy. Uncle was burned to death that is what they said in the camp. She was not sure how to face him now or even how to deal with him. Previously all his pranks got a sharp response from her and sometimes a knock on his head. They both played the game very well, she seeming to scold him, being offended by him, exasperated at his boyishness while he was great in his role of a mischievous monkey, smiling at her askance, as though sharing a secret with her in public, looking into her eyes that made her feel like she was thirteen and not nine. Like that time during Holi when he insisted that she apply the silver paint on him while she demurred, “Judy says not to, she will complain to your mother” Uma had been hesistant, looking toward his elder sister who was sixteen and therefore the belle of the camp, always surrounded by bachelor uncles. “Oh F…Judy, I am telling you ain’t I?” he commanded her, rolling his eyes at ‘F…’ and looking directly at her at ‘ain’t I?’

Amma did not like her mingling with Darrell. Not only was his grammar bad, his manners and language somehow did not fit the mould of a typical well brought air force kid. No one had ever heard Darrell wish ANYONE. He was only twelve but behaved like a rowdy. Cussing and brushing aside any notion of danger with a click of his tongue. Uma was dead sure that had it been him with her in the jungle that fateful day – when the Tiger almost got her but didn’t, it turned out to be the Bamboowallah – Darrell would have saved her, protected her and would have preferred to be the Tiger’s meal for her sake. Some men were made that way and you can see such strains early on, even when they are young boys. What bothered Uma was that the boys who braved and saved seemed to use a lot of bad language and were not polite while the boys who were obedient and said sorry were useless when it came to confronting Tigers, even imaginary ones. And then there were the aggressive ones like Venkat who within the confines of society managed to get what they wanted, appearing to be cosmopolitan but in actuality possessing some very old fashioned ideas: on women, their place under the sun and on who should lead the rescue team at the Buckingham Palace. Maybe boys got better when they grew older? Maturity was surely lacking in all of them.

No one could on the other hand accuse Uma of being immature and she was just nine. She would live to see at least seventy. Her lifeline was long and she had a sturdy constitution. She started feeling a little lost and sorry for herself. Where would she ever find a man who was adventurous, brave, chivalrous, well read, well mannered, a leader who could lead, a philosopher who was wise, a raconteur who could regale, confident enough not to be deterred by her intelligence yet slave to her wishes?
Like Draupadi her life was fated to be divided up among men, taking a quality here, finding a quality there, convincing oneself that this was enough. Similar to the fate of so many women she saw around her who praised their half baked husbands sky high in public, pampering them like children, doting on their sneezes and sighs, fulfilling their every bid and demand, cowering under their commands, despite the enormous pressure and the pain, keeping them contented, the husband in question being a drunkard, a gambler or a wife beater, even a philanderer, who cares?

Uma was sure that Darrell could not spell ‘philanderer’. It mattered to her that he know how to spell correctly. This was another of those frivolous things her Thaathayya had warned her about. People, their intentions, their actions were much more important than what they wore or what they said.

“Sometimes your mother is angry and she scolds you but she still loves you doesn’t she? In fact she is scolding you because she loves you…” he had elucidated in a warm drone reclining on his easy chair. “It does not matter what is said but why it is said, intention is everything,” he had concluded dozing off.

Much as she would have liked to give meaning to Darrell’s statements she couldn’t. Most of the time he talked for the heck of it, to make an impression and to be the centre of attention. There was neither substance nor gravity in what he said. If her dislike was limited to that Uma would no have minded so much but her distaste was more for the form, that he spoke wrong grammar, used slangs, had a limited vocabulary. This flippant reason to brush off a perfectly good boy seemed to her a very offhanded. How had she become so callous? She should do something about this.

“Do you like Limca or Gold Spot?”
“Do you like me or Mo Mo?”
“Do you like Lady Diana’s new haircut or the old one?”
“Do you like Jim Reeves or Cliff Richard?”

She wished that his succinct nuanceless questions had included some choice of books or characters from novels or even television serials. He was all Pop. Darrell from Bangalore. Though she had to admit that he was the ONLY boy who had asked her what she liked. He had sought her opinion. This saved their friendship.This and the fact that her mother and most of the camp disliked him.

Each time when she visited his Anglo Indian house-hold, she felt alienated from herself. Her centre shifted elsewhere and all the walls that she had heretofore not known to exist swirled up and showed their ugly faces. His house had a looming poster or a painting of Jesus everywhere she looked. Uma was used to Jesus in school but not in drawing rooms. Nanna who disapproved and vehemently opposed the habit of conversion prevalent among Muslims and Christians blamed Walia uncle for giving up his native Sikhism, for his Anglo wife, for taking up Presbyterianism. “This is what happens when you sell your mother, you get burned,” he snorted agreeing with the general consensus in the camp that aunty had done away with uncle for insurance money.

Then there were lots and lots of records. LPs of Freddie Mercury, Engelbert Humperdinck, others whom she had heard during mess parties and many others she had never heard of. She could hardly see any books or magazines and this seemed the one thing that separated her house from Darrell’s. How could he talk correctly if he never read anything? One could not expect to learn a language by singing Bachelor Boy!

“Darrell do you like books or movies?”
“Movies of course!”
“What would you like to watch most in summer hols?”
“Exorcist”
“Shall we read the book first?”
“It’s a book? F…NO”
“Its an adult book, they won’t lend it to us but we can steal it out of the library”
“You talk like a boy!”
“We should get a dictionary, there will be words we won’t understand”
“Will you like me more than Mo Mo if I read a book with you?”
“Yes.”

Jesus Christ! What was she getting into. Just nine and already manipulating men. She was a she-philanderer.
A vixen, said the dictionary.