I love connecting with friends and family, visiting my favourite haunts and escaping the cold New York weather, but, after a while, my entire being itches to return home. As much as I love the lifestyle here, I enjoy the space the US affords me.
My friends in the US are envious when I speak about life in India, with house help, drivers, gardeners and every conceivable ease of amenity. I rarely need to lift a finger. I am so spoiled; even to run a small errand, I either send a driver or get into the car and get driven the short distance to carry it out.
In New York, there is no question of sending someone else to run my errand. I have to do everything myself. Of course, help is available if you require it, but it comes at a price and that price is not cheap when compared to what we pay in India. I walk to the grocery store, clean my home, chop ingredients, cook my meal and carry out all my errands either on foot, by subway or an occasional cab.
But I am in command and therein lies the difference.
It’s not that in India we cannot do things ourselves but it is that much more difficult. If I drive to run errands, I spend more time looking for parking than actually carrying out my errand and that too after having spent an age negotiating people on the road as well as cars, animals, cyclist and rickshaws. Walking is virtually ruled out because the pavements are encroached with people selling anything from food, drink clothes, edibles, inedibles, jewellery, florists and vegetables. It is like running an obstacle course. The other day I decided to walk to the movie theatre, barely a stone’s throw from where I am staying.
In New York, it would have been a no-brainer to walk that distance. No one would even dream of driving. I insisted my mum walk instead of us taking the car and instantly realised my mistake. Forget the afternoon sun beating down on us and sweat drenching our clothes, but for an older woman like my mum, she could not walk on the pavement. The bricks were half destroyed, the pavement was uneven and narrow in many places. There were all sorts of unmentionables littering the pavement. My mum walked on the street and luckily since it was a Sunday, she did not have to face a battalion of honking cars.
I now understand why pedestrians choose the street over the sidewalk.
Once we got to the theatre, we were just in time for the National Anthem. I thought it was an ironic moment considering there is so much else that can be done in the name of patriotism than the merely symbolic gesture of singing the National Anthem.
Though I am keen to get back to my life, I have mixed feelings leaving this time around. I just lost my mother-in-law and it brings home the fact our parents are not getting any younger. Each time I leave the country, I wonder whether I will see my folks again. That is the most difficult part of living abroad.
To top it off, my 83-year-old Dad recently fell and fractured his hip. As a result, he is wheelchair bound for a while. In the month and a bit since he had the fall, I hired ward boys, trained them and had a routine going. I was finally satisfied and felt I can leave knowing Dad is in good hands. But fate plays tricks. Both the ward boys decided to go away on leave at the same time and the turnaround of replacement ward boys has been a bit of a nightmare.
The older ones are good but get tired lifting my Dad and the younger ones are rude and have an attitude. One of them actually replied back at my admonishment while continuing to zip his trousers. Even if I was not his employer, it is a rude gesture.
There is a lack of professionalism among ward boys. They come and go as they please since they can be replaced. But it is unfair to the patient and his/her family who invest time in training and while they are already worried about the health of the patient, such shenanigans do not help matters. In the US, caregivers are extremely professional. They may not be as warm and loving as the ones in India but you can rely on them.
During Gudi Padwa, my mum’s other domestic staff also took time off, leaving my aged parents without support. This just reinforces in me how dependent we are on staff in India and even though it is a harder life in the US, at least we are self-sufficient and can do everything ourselves.
In India, we become too reliant and even complacent. I have a few friends who have decided to stop having full-time help. They have someone to clean and help in the house but in the evenings they take care of everything themselves. After much angst with unreliable domestic staff, they decided this was the best option.
Ironically, my mum fired her maid who immediately started working for her neighbour, but now accosts me in the elevator begging me to request my mum to take her back because she does not like working for the neighbour. It is appalling, ii it is not amusing.
There is no sense of loyalty, no sense of what’s right and what’s wrong. Poaching seems to be accepted practice.
Like I said, I am looking forward to returning because at least I am in control of my life.
My only hesitation is in leaving behind ageing parents. But I will follow the tonic prescribed in the Hindu scriptures of ‘doing our duty without attachment’. It may be a salve but it helps ease the conflict in the mind.
Au revoir Pune. Till we meet again. Trumpbound sniff sniff.
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