Expectnation

The Jat lag has gone down a bit (oh sorry, am I offending someone?) and I can actually count ten fingers on someone else's hand. I am back! I got quite a few comments from people looking forward to reading about my India trip experience. That left me confused. Are people interested in my India trip or my India trip? How do I compose this post? How do I meet the burden of expectation? Ambivalent or AmbyValley? Safe or Saif? India or ExpectNation?

I am going to devote a few posts to my recent India trip, but here are bulleted highlights of some things that struck me

1. Money money money rules India
… like never before. Socialism has been buried for good by glitzy malls and cell phone owning vegetable owners. We are open for business, competition and the ilk. Middle class is moving up, upper class has more places to spend money, and the poor will feel the pinch like never before
2. Ka-Mall hi Ka-Mall hai
I visited the InOrbit mall in Bombay besides CitiMall and Infiniti close to my place. Clean spaces, working escalators, suited-buited guards, rich Gujarati house-wives, Ritu Kumar boutiques, food courts serving Rs. 40 popcorns, multiplexes, supermarkets, 2 for 1 deals … this place has everything. It was almost like being in the US except for the excess rush and lots of Indians. Of course, a ton of people were treating it like a tourist trip. Enjoy the air conditioning and do window shopping.
3. Rs.1000 is the new Rs.100
How often have you heard your father give you the ‘in my times, it used to cost 25 paise’ story? I think it is happening to me too. Everything is so costly now that a rupee is now redundant. I used to joke about what I would do with a 5 lakh salary in India now. I think to maintain a middle-class lifestyle with an upward drift, that kind of money would be necessary. A night a the movies, restaurant and café with your family will cost you a cool 1000.
4. Angrez chale gaye Andheri mein theatre chodd gaye
English movies meant a trip to the town for me. Andheri to Churchgate by compulsion and local train. The change brought a smile to my face. I saw Star Wars at a theatre 15 minutes walking distance from my house. Andheri was firmly the centre of Bombay for me. Now it is set in stone. I saw Star Wars and B&B in India with no other decent release and very little time on my hands. The theatres were Fun Republic and Fame Adlabs respectively. I was also mildly amused at them playing the national anthem before the movies. Were they playing it for this Non Reliable Indian?
5. From long ration lines to low necklines
Controversial topic, but I’ll broach it anyway. The necklines are plunging and the hemlines are rising. Does that explain the high temperatures in Bombay? Of course, my trip was largely limited to Lokhandwala which was always known for its hep-cat (that’s an expression I heard a few times on the trip) crowd. A prospect that would have been salivating a few years ago just ended up being mildly amusing for me given my years of stay in the US. I have no comments to make on it save the observation that there is a difference. Good, bad, radical, expected … that is a whole new debate.
6. Ek Mocha Aur De Do Thakur
This is a reuse of a blog title I had used a while back. While I visited the usual Baristas and CCD (Café Coffee Day for the uninitiated), the highlight was a trip to Café Mocha in Juhu. Sipping a Rs.200 milkshake with hookahs around me and the kids ‘chilling out’ made me uncomfortable at times. A gentle reminder that I never belonged here and the dollar conversion notwithstanding, I will never be at ease there. That might change over time, but somehow, this is a part of Bombay I was never familiar with.
7. Kyonki DD hi kabhi TV tha
I spent a lot of time surfing channels 1 through 97 on my parents’ archaic TV. Saw one episode each of Kyonki …, Jassi …, Koffee .., and a couple other serials and figured everything about the story. I cannot understand the Ekta Kapoor effect, but hey, I am just an NRI who doesn’t see too much Indian TV. Saw some Gujarati movies where the hero was the same (Naresh Kanodia), the heroine was the same (Snehalata) , the guy who played the father was the same, the comedian was the same and the stories too were almost similar. They were a riot. Of course, hated the remixes to the core, loved some of the new ads that have come and realized that news channels in India are almost as vacuous as those in the US
8. Well, what did I do this time?
Rock Beach, Vada Pav, Anupam samosas, road-side juices et al. I did get a chance to check it all out. The train journey to VT was fun and the day spent in town (Planet M to Gateway, Samrat to roadside DVD purchase) was great. Of course, since I was attending a couple of weddings, my food cravings were taken care off. Lots of lovely Indian food, no dishes to wash, no clothes to clean, no house to vacuum, what more does one need in life? Spent some quality time with my parents, enjoyed staying indoors in the oppressive heat and loved reading the Times of India print edition while my mom made coffee in the morning for me. Picked up Maximum City and some cheap print books at the traffic signal.
9. Regrets
Could not meet any friends other than Sushil (everyone was busy and couldn’t spare time on the one day that I had reserved for them ), could not go to my school or college, could not travel by BEST, could not spend more time with my grandfather, could not go to Surat to play cricket at my cousin’s reception (long story, fodder for another post), could not see my childhood photographs. However, regrets are good. They leave a reason for going back.

That about bulletizes my trip. I skimmed the surface, and the coffee beneath was hot. Bitter, sweet, pulsating. The India I know but can’t completely relate to. The India that I need to introduce myself to each time I go back. ExpectNation met my expectations to a large extent.

On my way back from Churchgate, I was trying to get down at Bandra station. Rendered immobile by the rush, I was trapped in between, limbs locked in the pack. As the station came, I disembarked, helped along by a push from the back, just in time to avoid the crowd that poured in. I had finally arrived in India.