In the small hill town of Kotdwar (where I come from) when 66-year-old Sushila Bisht (who also happens to be mom) wants to pick up bread and eggs for breakfast, she just reknots her hair into a tidier bun, smoothes the creases off her sari and tells her husband, the retired brigadier (always immersed in Dainik Jagaran) that she’ll be back soon. She then pushes open the iron gate outside her house, and accompanied by the stray Khujli (that scratches a lot) walks down in her bathroom slippers to Harshpal ki dukan, a few yards down the road.
There, her steel bucket waits for her, freshly filled with one and a half litre of still warm cow’s milk, cycle-delivered by the dudhwallah from the village nearby and so does Harshpal, his hands folded in a customary namaste. Before she can tell him what she wants he is filling up a newspaper bag with eggs, gently lifting each from the cardboard box with little cubby holes where they all rest, keeping aside the one with a crack in the shell. He stops when he reaches six and tells her, a little apologetically, that he does not have brown bread today. Shall he give her white instead? “Ab bhaijik tabiyat kan cha,” he asks conversationally. (How is bhaiji feeling today?)
Bisht’s neighbourhood shopkeeper not only speaks to her in her local Garhwali, he also knows exactly what she wants, and is concerned about what’s happening in her family. He also home delivers 24x7 on a phone call or a request from across the wall of his house. Yes, they are neighbours too. Would Sushila trade this kind of comfort level for the modern day privelege of shopping in an air-conditioned mall, where impersonal touch operated glass doors open silently to a world of gastronomical indulgence and escalators carry you up to some more materialistic pleasures?
I have my doubts. Or, at least, the covertly old fashioned, backward looking romantic in credit card carrying me (I still fumble when I have to use it) hopes not. Because, for a small-town girl, the rate at which modern marketing megapolises are devouring the small, roadside kirana shops is reason to worry. I shudder to accept the fact that fading signposts of an India that my generation grew up in might just disappear one day soon. Doesn’t it bother you? Because it bothers me no end that the Aapka Stores, the Sabzi Mandis, the Arya Pustak Bhandars, the Apsara Tailors the Jagna Pansaris are shutting shop so fast that they might soon exist only in our hazy memories. And there too only till Alzheimers takes its toll.
For those of us who live in small towns, shopping remains miles (or maybe malls would be a better word) apart from the rest of the world. Our vegetables don’t come from a shelf. They come from a thela or a wicker basket or even a patch of green growing in our backyard. The chicken we eat does not come from inside roomy refrigerators, in plastic wrapped, stylishly branded packets of legs, breasts or wings. We just look the other way when a handpicked bird is cleaned and chopped by a knife-yielding Rehman (the butcher) who knows we prefer it skinned not whole. The fresh fish lying glassy eyed on an ice slab awaits our inspection and we are asked if it is needed for spicy mustard curry or a snack for the kids (in which case maybe the bina-kante-ki would be better). We are on first name terms with Masterji (the tailor) who is familiar enough to delicately point out if he notices excess weight (size badal gaya lagta hai). And if we go for a holiday not only does Khan bhai (the dhobi) know where we are going but he also wants us back in time for his wife’s Id sewain.
Veggies are picked up from roadside hawkers in the narrow sabzi mandi that leads to the dudh-jalebi wali gali. There, young boys in synthetic shirts sprinkle their greens with water from a tin can to make them heavier and sing out the deals they are offering (turai sasti makhan wali/ aloo das ka der kilo). They cheerfully bring prices down by a rupee on a few minutes of haggling and almost always throw in some fresh green chillies and coriander free. In their enticing maths, nimbus always come one for a rupee and six for five. You jostle handcarts to get closer to the fal walla and keep an eye out for sneaky cows ready to pull out a carrot from your bursting cloth jhola. And if, absentmindedly, you forgot your wallet at home, stress not, you will happily be sanctioned a loan by the fruit seller because the apples are excellent today and you must take some home for maaji.
For clothes, we go to the two stores in town - the humbly anonymous Choti Dukan near the post office or Khadi Bhandar further down the road, preferably after the October sale begins. I confess we are in complete awe of the big city folk who trot the globe and identify their jeans by styles (boot cut/ flared/ skinny/ stretch); their footwear by brands and design (wedge/platform/stiletto or Inc5, Woodland, Jimmy Choos – why not shoes?) and call their glasses by names that sound like people - Dolce&Gabbana, Christian Dior.
Yes, we dig their natty shades. But mostly, we dig our gardens. Sometimes, we get looked down upon by the big city folk. But that’s quite all right because often (and this is completely between you and me) we find them funny too. Though malls are interesting on week-long outings to the big city, and they do make our eyes go round, I certainly would not want one springing up like an ugly gargoyle in the empty plot next to my house. I would much rather have the mango tree there that’s too old to give fruit now but happily plays apartment block to the virile squirrel with one bad leg, his ever increasing brood of frisky babies, and the chauffinch couple that are mostly being rude to each other.
So would Sushila, I think. Long live Harshpal ki dukan!
Dainik Jagaran: Popular Hindi newspaper; Khujli: Itch; Harshpal ki dukan: Harshpal's shop; dudhwallah: milkman; kirana shop: corner shop; sabzi mandi: veggie mart; nimbu: lemon; maaji: mother; dhobi: washerman; choti dukan: small shop
This article has appeared in the Sunday magazine, Deccan Herald
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