Our village, a place forever entrenched in my mind as home, is like a world on Mars for our kids. The first time we took Jyoti to the village was in 1982 winter and she was five years old. I had taken her there a few times before, when she was a few months old and we still lived in Chandigarh, India, but that obviously does not count. When Jyoti was six months old we moved to America and it took us a few years before we were able to visit Bakshiwala again. Going from the eleventh floor apartment of a twenty-two story high-rise apartment building in downtown Detroit, Jyoti had no concept of a world with mud houses, outdoor kitchens, clay ovens and cow chips lined narrow lanes populated by turbaned men and salwar-kameezed women speaking punjabi only and living amidst buffaloes, cows, goats and hens. She spent the first day watching wide eyed and recording everything like a digital camcorder, then internalised and adopted it all within twenty-four hours as if she had been born to it (which she had).
We started our journey in New Delhi. My parents have settled there after retirement. My mother, Biji, refused to move to the village permanently. New Delhi, India's capital, with its modern amenities and relative distance from the in-laws seemed quite attractive to Biji. Papaji too liked it but for completely different reasons. He loved the overstocked libraries, large bookstores, politically charged environment of the capital city and the opportunity to work as an investment broker. The last one was the clincher of course. Jyoti remembered their home from our previous visit, two years before, and loved the attention an only grandchild gets. My family halted their daily life for those few days and lived to please her. Many relatives from near and far came to meet us. The local families invited us for lunches and dinners. Due to shortage of number of days we accepted some breakfast invitations too. Jyoti met new relatives every few hours. People walked in and out of her busy day at a dizzying pace. She took it all in and kept her world stable by concentrating on a few persons only and using the rest to formulate a general impression of the "Indians". She did not see herself as one of them. Our closely knit family, to her, was like people passing by on an escalator that is going the opposite way. She was interested in them and waved and smiled at them but they did not become part of her mamory bank.
The village is about 150 miles from Delhi and can be reached by a bus, train or car. We decided to rent a car and visit Chandigarh, the city Jyoti was born in, on the way. Biji's parental home is there and Papaji's two sisters also live there. Sachi and I met while working in this city's Post Graduate Institue of Medicine (PGI) and have many friends living there. We spent the two days there meeting all these friends and relatives and showing Jyoti places from our old life, including the room and table she was born on. She was only mildly interested. She had more fun playing with my cousins Meenu and Harry, Billoo's children.
At the end of the second day we piled up in the rental car and headed for the village. The four seater car was holding six people, Sachi, Jyoti and me, Papai and Bablee who had accompanied us from Delhi and the driver. Last minute papaJi's older sister, my aunt Kumari BhuaJi, decided to join us. So we scooted over and made room for her. The twenty five miles flew by in no time. BhuaJi regaled us with many stories, some family legends and some loosely mythalogical in nature, all hilarious. Jyoti spent the ride staring from one face to the other. We were speaking in Punjabi and she could understand only a word here and there. Laughing loudly and gesturing wildly for effect in that crowded space we must have looked like people of a seperate breed to her. At one point, trying to be heard over our cacaphony, she loudly enquired,
"Whose house are we going to now?"
On being told, "To grandma's home" she wanted to know
"What color is she?"
This unexpected query led to another burst of hilarity which dumbfoundedly she joined in too. Coming from a socially segregated world of black and white America Jyoti was confounded by the many shades of skin within our families, something that we were totally oblivious to.
Four miles from our village is the city of Rajpura, sitting right on the GT Road, which goes to our village. We stopped there to visit Mohinder Chacha Ji, papaji's youngest brother, who had, some time back, moved to this city from the village. He was surprised but very gald to see us. He insisted that we have dinner there. He also encouraged us to spend the night in his house. He informed us that Babaji (PapaJi's eldest brother) and chotte (junior) bhabi Ji were out of town for couple of days. Only vadhe (senior) bhabi ji, my grandmother, was at home in the village. But we wanted to be home that night. So sleepy and subdued but determined we crowded back into the car. Mohinder chacha ji decided to accompany us. So we scooted over some more and sitting on each other's lap started for the village. By now it was almost midnight. Rural punjab, full of hard working, early rising farmers sleeps early. The way was dark and deserted. Instead of taking the narrow dirt pathway off of GT Road we opted for the round about but wider gravel road. It took us into the village from the opposite side, car's bright lights piercing the homogenous darkness to rudely shine on startled buffaloes and sleeping neighbors. We drove over fertiliser piles and deep ditches, sorely excercising our abs, before reaching home. Our car stopped outside the back gate. The house is walled-in on all sides with a five foot high brick wall and has two gates, one in the front and one in the back. The one in the back is industrial style and wide to let the tractor, bullack cart and milk cows in. At this time it was padlocked. We banged on it, shook it, rattled it, but of no use. Finally chacha Ji climbed over it and jumped inside. Papa Ji did the same. The rest of us stood outside calling bhabi ji, and rousing the next door houses. Jyoti stood amongst us, holding her barbie doll wrapped in her blanket, with wide eyes that refused to get sleepy. Chachaji went to bhabi ji's bedroom window and banged on it. A black mongrel, Kalu, limped over from the front of the house to stand by chachaji. Kalu has been with us for many years. He is semi adopted by the family. Babaji likes him and feeds him lunch and dinner scraps. Bhabi ji hates him with vengence and chases him out everytime he tries to get in. So Kalu enjoys the best of both worlds, assured of food like a family dog and free to roam the village like a stray dog. After loud bangings the bedroom window opened a sliver and we heard bhabiji inquire,
"Who is it?".
Chachaji yelled back, "Bhabi! open the door. You know who it is for God's sake!!".
"These are dangerous times. Give me your name before I let loose my dog".
Chacha ji looked down on Kalu wagging his tail and answered, "$ % *#@!, Mohinder"
"I know no Mohinder- Shohinder. Go back and come in the morning. The man of the house is not home and I am not going to open the door."
"Bhabi ! @%$#*! for the love of God! Brother Baldev is here with family. Don't make me break this door in the middle of the night".
"Mohinder who?"
I saw papaji doubled over, holding his stomach and laughing histerically. Bhuaji next to me started reciting, in tenor, the first verse from the holy book. The darkness made us feel like we were in a claustrophobic cave. I wiggled inside through the metal bars of the gate. Bablee soon followed. Sachi with jyoti in his arms stayed out, along with bhuaji and the driver.
Chachaji looked like he was ready to pull his hair. I heard him mutter something obnoxious under his breath but reply in a controlled voice,
"This is Mohinder! Your son".
"My sons have better sense than to show up at this ungodly hour. Get scarce!!"
At this point I stepped in front of chachaji and through the window called bhabi ji. The side door soon flew open and we were all let in. After hugs and kisses and some more laughter we settled down. The big room was cluttered with charpais (jute cots) that had been hastily brought in for everyone to sit on. Jyoti sat cross legged on one, tightly leaning against me. Bhabi ji was trying to shoo Kalu, who had cunningly slipped inside during the 'welcoming ritual of paripana and blessings'. She had a light brown knitted shawl on her head and shoulders and was holding a chair with which she was trying to scare Kalu out. Kalu was weaving in and out through the cots and trying to delay the eviction. I found Jyoti furiously chewing her barbie's head and closely following bhabi ji's every move. Bhabi ji's sole surviving incisor was visible in an otherwise empty mouth and she was making angry noises while running after a deceptively innocent looking Kalu. The room was poorly lit and had an intimate homey feel for me. Jyoti had a different opinion of course. She pulled at my sleeve and asked me in an incredible voice, "Mom! Is your grandma a witch?". Mohinder chachaji, sitting on the nearby cot, heard it and amidst thigh thumping laughter answered, "Yes! Yes!! She is". To me on the side he whispered, "Are'nt you glad bhabi can't understand your fancy shmancy American daughter's pashto (indecipherable language)!".
Next morning Jyoti woke up early and explored the whole house, inside and out, from the arms of doting Mohinder chachaji. She was most fascinated by the orange tree with many oranges hanging from it. We do not grow oranges in our village and baba ji's unusual fruit laden tree was a novelty for us too. The children of the village came in hordes to our house that day to see the girl "who speaks only English" and to get some 'Amreeki' candy. Jyoti was too young to be finicky about language or any other difference between her and the villagers and was soon roaming the neighborhood following and followed by the kids. I had changed into my village clothes and looked just like everyone else. I felt relaxed with the knowledge of belonging to that place. Sachi, being the sun-in-law, was wined and dined and pampered and in general prevented from settling down while being encouraged to "feel at home please". Jyoti, with her spotless new Jordache jeans, her favourite micky-mouse sunglasses and sparkling white (for the first few hours) sneakers stood out amidst bare footed, half clothed, turbaned boys and hand-me-down clothed, shy girls of her age; not that she noticed though. She came home after hours of play with them, having learnt (without any effort) many key words of punjabi.
Mere two days later, when we departed, Jyoti had made many friends and was annoyed at having to travel again. She pouted and stood on the back seat of the car, looking out the back window, waving to the group of kids that ran after our car until they could run no longer. I watched the women momentarily stop their chores and wave goodbye to me. Just outside the village we stopped at the railway crossing and waited for the train pass. As a child I would watch boys throw bundles of sugarcane from their fields to the driver of this train and he in return would throw some coal back to the boys. This coal was then bartered at Shah di hatti for some candy. Such happy memories of a carefree time. The car took us to the GT Road and then off to Delhi after depositing Mohinder chachaji and Kumari bhua ji in Rajpura. The green fields of my childhood flew past at faster and faster speed. Rural punjab soon gave way to cities. This place, that is such an integral part of me, would never be home to Jyoti.
