Gardening and Other Hobbies: February 2012

Monday, February 27, 2012

Lakshmi and Anu

Lakshmi and Anu
Once again I was alone, as my daughter had left home to does her PG. Would have opted for a part time help but for Zephyr who loved human company. There was this very close friend of mine, who had a good part time maid who worked part time in 8 houses and it was taking a toll on her health. My friend suggested that I keep her on my 6am to 6pm assignment with permission to be away for a couple of hours to do my friend’s household work too. Are houses were about 3 kilometers apart so she suggested give her cycle to commute between our houses. I agreed to that because I knew she was good at her work she had been at my friends place for a year. What I did not know was that she was a good gossip too. She was used to working in 8 houses and narrating at each place what happened at the other places. Now she had only two houses to work in and not enough tales to carry so she started spicing it up on her own! She created a lot of problems between me and my friend before we realized what she was up to. One day we confronted her in both our presence and the cat was out of the bag .There after she realized this was not going to work, so she at least reduced the gossip it was in any case too much to expect of to stop gossiping.
Lakshmi’s husband was a carpenter who worked and earned well but drank away to the last rupee. Lakshmi slogged to keep the family going with the help of her son who was an apprentice to a carpenter. There was no knowing when Lakshmi would not turn up for work and for how long, it all depended on how badly her husband in his drunken state beat her up. She would turn after a couple of days looking so pathetic that you would not have the heart to haul her up. What do you tell a women who turned with a swollen face or an injured hand or a broken tooth? At one point I got so tiered of her erratic work schedules that I asked her to leave but she talked me into keeping her daughter Anu. I agreed not knowing what I was letting myself in for. The girl was a cheerful kid , just 15 ½ years .She had only two interests in life drawing Kolams( rangoli ) and watching the TV.I tried to get interested in continuing her studies she tried to please me for a week then told me I have no interest in learning , I only like to draw kolams . The book I had given to write English alphabets in was filled cover to cover in Kolam designs after a month or so I gave up trying to teach her instead gave her color pencils and an empty note book to do kolam designs. I did all this despite the fact that she was lousy at work in the hope that she would learn to work in a month or two. But she was totally uninterested in work it was like her mother had left her at her grandmother’s place for a holiday. She enjoyed her stay drawing kolams and watching every Tamil TV serial in every channel throughout the day. It was only when she heard the car drive in when I returned from office that she would rush to clean the house, the dishes would be lying in the sink since morning when she helped me in the kitchen with the cooking. I tried Sam, dam, vend with her with no results. I got her small little gift like a nail polish or a hair clip or fancy earring etc as an incentive if she did all the jobs assigned to her, I tried scolding her (I do not think I ever scolded anyone as much as I scolded her), I tried sitting down on Sundays and explaining to her why she should work well and be a support to her mother and help her to put the two younger kids back into school. She would agree with me but her work would be undone or some shabby work done in between serial watching. The only thing that worked with her was threatening to send her away. Her endearing quality was her love for me, however much I scolded her she would never get angry she was always cheerful, I think that was the reason I kept her for full 4 months though right from the job of waking her up, making her have a bath, sweep and mop the house for each task I had to really strain myself. The last straw was when I found a Kolam design on the wall! I gave up training her to be a good maid and a source of help to her mother. So she was off and her mom Lakshmi back at work promising to come regularly or at least inform if she was not coming.
Thereafter, the same routine continued, Lakshmi would come to work one day disappear another day pop up again after a couple of days crying that she was beaten up black and blue. The last time she came back she assured me then onward I would not have a problem she was going to stay in my house as she had left her husband and kids in their home in the village and had come back alone.
She had to vacate rented accommodation in Chennai almost every third month either because of the inability to pay rent or more often than not because of drunken brawls at home which the neighbors complained about. She said she had learnt her lesson and she was staying in my house and working at my place and wanted help to get her daughter a job which I did in a friend’s place where she had to just look after a baby and not do household work. She said I need to give her, her salary only when she goes to the village for diwali which was 3 months away so that she can put her two youngest kids in school. Everything was fine for 3 months as far as work was concerned she and her daughter Anu working in my friends place saved up quite a tidy sum for their first trip to village after the new arrangement. She missed her kids a lot and wanted to carry gifts for them since I wanted her to put the kids in school and not waste away their life’s I did not want her to spend her savings so I got new clothes not only for Lakshmi but for Anu and the two younger kids paid her salary which and was very sure she would return two days after diwali but two months passed by with no information. much later I came to know from my friend whose place she used to work in whom she had a pending loan with them and that there was a massive fight between Lakshmi and her husband and Lakshmi doused herself and the kids with kerosene and tried set all of them on fire and that they survived but were under treatment for burns. I decided not to keep her even if she returned,scared that she may make more such attempts. She has not returned to this day.

Mary

Mary
Mary was the one who reached the benchmark of Shobha of Bombay. She was a superb housekeeper and absolutely reliable. After a week of starting work she said okay now I know what is expected of me, I’ll take care. She just took over.
She kept herself and the house very presentable. By then we had a Labrador pup added to the family and that did not make her job very easy. He was teething and chews and rips apart anything he came across a socks, cushions, towel, duster, broom, footwear just about anything. Zypher the pup must have made her pick and clean the place all the time he was not taking a nap which luckily was quite frequently. He in any case like rest of the family doted on her.
The reigns of the household just slipped into her hands smoothly. She took my daughter’s bicycle to the vegetable market got fresh vegetables , decided the menu for the day, watered the plants, saw that the overhead water tank was full, literally ran the show. My daughter’s friends would drop by to have “Mary’s Sambar or “Mary’s Fish curry”. She was a good cook too. Unexpected guest, did not daunt her, she would have a meal ready in a jiffy.
Mary had only one area of doubt that was on GOD. She came from a village called senji. Apparently most of them in the village were Hindus converted to Christians and the first generation converts. Many of the old Hindu customs continued with a Christian twist. For the Pongal festival they would still decorate their cattle but would take it to the local Church! Poor kid to add to her confusion in the village they went to the Roman Catholic Church whereas in Chennai her local guardians whom she visited every Sunday took her to the Pentecost Church, which had their own peculiar rituals. To add to the confusion her questions on God were directed to me who did not believe in any religious practices, though I was on a spiritual search I really could not answer any of her questions with absolute confidence as I was still in the process of questioning the religious practices. She was only a 20 year old with the natural interest of a girl her age in films, dressing up etc but her Pentecost relatives told her she should spend all her spare time in reading the Bible and that it was because she did not have adequate belief in the Bible that her father continued to be a drunkard. She would keep switching TV Channels between Tamil film songs and the religious sermons. She felt very guilty about her interest in film songs.
She would ask me why I don’t go to Temple every week. She found it difficult to understand my explanation that I did believe in a cosmic power but could not give it a name as so and so God. I used to tell her all of us including all of nature around us is “God “to me. She would consider that seriously until the next Sunday!
She thought quiet deeply not just about God. One of her questions really amazed me. We had a cot on the terrace which we covered with a sheet. Because of the bright sunlight the colored sheet would fade quite fast. Whenever she went home for Christmas holidays of two weeks she would come back darker as she had to help her parents in the field .She would be desperate to get rid of the sun tan once back at work at our place. It was on one such occasion that she came up with this question. One day she asks me - Why is it that the color of the sheet becomes light when exposed to the sun but I my skin color becomes darker in the sun?!That was Mary for you! I had to explain about the pigment in our skin etc to her. Mary was very keen to become fair she had a dark complexion. She was quite pretty but refused to believe that, for her beauty meant fair skin. She pinned all her hope on the fair and lovely cream that she secretly applied on her face. Secretly, because she did not want her Pentecost relatives to know of it.
Mary was with us for 2 1/5 years .She left to get married.

Zubaida

ZUBAIDA

Once again I was between maids and had spread the word around that I needed someone for both the house hold work and cooking. Since my daughter was away at the boarding school and there was just myself to be fed I decided that I could cook for myself.

I over estimated my capabilities. Very soon I was quiet sick of my “survival cooking”. I was diabetic and found that I was not making adequately nutritious food. My excuse was, I did not have adequate time but to be honest I guess the fact is cooking has never been one of my main priorities! Being quite mediocre in that department whenever the occasion demanded something exotic or really yummy, I always opted to outsource.

So the search for a good cook was on, the watchman, the driver, the dhobi, and the neighborhood maids had all been informed. The dhobi’s wife comes one evening saying “amma there is a lady who has not worked anywhere before ,she comes from a good family but has been married into a family that is not so well off , she has two kids and is not able to make ends meet so wants to work. However there is one issue, she is a Muslim “That is Okay with me, bring her over let me meet her and then decide “I said. She came late evening with the dhobi woman. A well dressed, pretty women, rather a girl, must have got married very young. She was so well behaved and simple in her demeanor I really jumped at the chance.

Next day was the orientation program. Not having worked anywhere else as a domestic help she needed guidance on what needed to be done. I took a day off to explain where what was kept and induct her into the cleaning process.

Then onwards she took over. She would be at my place at the crack of dawn, before her neighbors woke up, she did not want them to know she worked as a maid. From 5am in the morning to 8 o’clock she would finish cooking and cleaning. Before she left she would take such pains to see there were no tell tale signs of her having come to work , she would comb her hair , retie her sari , take her purse and carry bag so that when she returned home it would appear she had just stepped out to pick up some provisions for her house. Her parents lived in the same neighborhood and she did not want them to know she had to do household work to support
her family. This went on very well, she cooked some of the yummiest food and I had to be cautious to see that I did not put on weight.

One night after I had returned from office, I was surprised to see her at my place with her two little sons. They must have been 9 and 6 years of age, the elder one’s name was Amir Khan and the younger was Sharukh Khan! Really handsome boys, so I told them that looks like you plan to be like your namesakes in Bollywood! They were very thrilled with that. Obviously a star struck family. Zubaida said she had come because she need a loan badly as she had to pay fees for the boys next day which her husband was to arrange from his workplace, which he was not able to . She was almost in tears as she said the school had given an ultimatum and she did not want the kids schooling to be stopped.
Though I have had bad experiences of loans to maids, which often disappeared along with the maid, it looked like a genuine case so I gave her the amount. She promised that she would pay it back in installments from her salary. She continued to work for me for some time and every month she would pay back the loan in bits and pieces.

During this period I met with a personal tragedy .One morning at office I had a call from my Dad to say that my Mom was hospitalized and I should come home. I knew Mom was having a fever for a week and she had told me it was a viral fever so I was surprised she was hospitalized. Dad was not able to tell me more, except that it was apparently not a viral as she continued to have low grade fever and typhoid, malaria etc had been ruled out, so doctors were keeping her under observation and for further tests.

I immediately organized a ticket to Trichur, closed up the house, told the neighbors to inform Zubaida that I would be away and that when I return I would inform the Dhobi and she need not come until then.

By the time I reached Trichur the next morning there was no further progress in the diagnosis but I knew from dad’s face that it was worrying him no end. I had a bath and went to the hospital; mom looked fine to me except for the fact that she had slight fever. I thought Dad was worrying unnecessarily. My brother was with my mom at the hospital. Since I and my dad were there with mom he said he was going to meet her doctor .As he was leaving he said “Why don’t you come with me”. I accompanied him to the first floor of the hospital as soon as we reached the landing of the first floor he asked me to sit down, saying I need to talk to you. I immediately sensed there was something amiss. “Usha, Mom has Leukemia “He said, his voice quivering. I sat with a thud. I could not believe it.” Mom does not look ill, are you sure?” I asked, hoping against hope there was some error somewhere. He said” No, I have seen her reports and it is AML, she has max 90 days left.”

Though my brother was a doctor I hoped he was wrong and said I would like to meet the doctor .He said we need to take mom for the biopsy but the blood reports were quite conclusive. We went to the doctor who was one of our relatives he took one look at my face and turned to my brother who told him “ I have told her” I asked the doctor “ Uncle is there a chance that the biopsy may prove the blood report wrong” He said “ No Usha , it is confirmed.” He then called my brother to examine the blood stained slides. They discussed the medical details, I just sat numb. I only asked should we tell dad. The doctor and my brother both agreed that dad and mom both could be told that Mom had to go for a biopsy, as that would mentally prepare them ,for the worst. Well to cut painful long story short, it was confirmed Mom had only max 90 days left. I decided to take 3 months off from office and be with Mom for her last days.

So it was after Mom passed away on the 87th day and after the rituals that I came back to Chennai, in the mean time I called one of the neighbours and asked him to inform the Dhobi woman.

The day after I got back to Chennai I sent for the dhobi woman , she came and told me “Amma Zubaida has gone” I thought she has taken up another assignment as I was away for so long so I said “ask her if she will come back if I pay her for the 3 months I was away” She responded with tears in her eyes “ Amma , almost two or three weeks after you left Zubaida was working at her home making ‘upma’ for her sons when the stove burst and her sari caught fire . She struggled for life for two days in the hospital.”

As it is my nerves were strained watching Mom die and I come back and here this! I just sat down and howled my heart out. What the dhobi woman said after that made me cry even more. She said when she gained conscious in between the two things she said was, her two sons were hungry and should be fed and if something happens to her not to ask for her salary for
the days she worked because she had taken a loan from me and she owed me money.”

I was so touched, until then I had only experienced maids who don’t return the loans they take. Here was a dying woman who must have been in so much pain, talking about the money she owed me. My faith in people honesty which I questioned sometimes was restored. I also thanked providence for having made me give her the loan, though at that time I had a doubt that this may be yet another maid disappearing along with the loan.

Every time someone breaks my trust and to stop myself from trusting others I remind myself that there are Zubaidas’ of this world who are honest and may have a genuine need for the loan. Every time a maid asks me for a loan its Zubaida’s lovely face that before my eyes and I don’t have the heart to refuse despite the innumerable times I have been duped.

Ammu

Ammu
Lalitha insisted that I keep her daughter Ammu after sarasa’s marriage. Sarasa warned me that I would not find Ammu suitable. I never the less agreed as lalitha had borrowed a hefty sum for Sarasa’s wedding saying she would work for me and I could recover from her salary. Now she wanted her daughter Ammu to work she promised whenever she was free she would come to work in place of Ammu.
Ammu was the pretty on e in the family. Lalitha and all the other girls were dark and unkempt but Ammu because she was the beauty in the family got the best clothes and did the least work. The family pampered her, made a big deal about her looks and they were always referring to marrying her off to a wealthy family on account of her looks. She had grown up with these stories and was not used to the idea of having to work for her living. Though only 16 she had marriage proposals from comparatively well off families. She was a reluctant domestic help. She would help me out in the kitchen till I left for work. She was expected to do the cleaning work after I left, but would spend the entire day watching her and before the mirror grooming her.
The only work she was genuinely interested in was cooking. She did not know a thing about cooking but was interested in learning. One Sunday morning she watched me make egg roast. After a week or two one day she offered to make it herself asked her how she would make it she narrated the steps to me , she would boil the eggs, chop onions and ginger, heat oil in a pan fry the onion with the masala powder and then put the boiled eggs in and stir it for 5 min. Since she had got the process right I said okay and went to take a bath when I came out from the bedroom I could hear a strange ‘click clack’ sound from the kitchen. When I peeped in I found she had put the boiled eggs in without removing the shell and hence the strange sound!
I did not mind her not knowing cooking but the house was always dirty. I prided myself on my ‘induction program ‘for maids but I must admit with Ammu I failed. It was like water off a duck’s back. Because of my long association with lalitha and her family I suffered her also because I had to recover the loan I had given Lalitha.I come home one day to hear my daughter say mom get rid of this girl she is absolutely crazy. When I enquire I find out that my daughter was studying in her room for some time she felt she could smell smoke when she came out and asked Ammu she said she did not know where it was coming from so both of them check the kitchen then my room and they discover it is more in the drawing room. My daughter discovers that the smoke was from the crockery cupboard which was closed but full of smoke .On opening it she found one of the large decorative candles lit and kept in a crystal bowl in the cupboard. Ammu told her she just wanted to see how it looked and had forgotten to put it out! That was the last straw, I told Lalitha I could not manage her daughter so we parted with lalitha promising to return the loan but kept postponing till I shifted house and moved out. That was the last of Lalitha and her family and the loan she had taken.

Sarasa

Sarasa
That is how Sarasa came into our lives. I think it was a turning point in Sarasa’s life. My first assignment was to make the girl presentable. She looked like an unkempt gypsy whose hair had not experienced a comb in many years.
I gave her soap , shampoo , comb, clothes and the extra wash room at home .Her first job every morning was to use the washroom , have a proper bath and see that she was clean and tidy. Within a week people were complimenting her on her appearance, which was a great motivator for her. All the praise, the fact that there were no battles with her step mom, and the Sunday English classes, changed Sarasa to an unbelievable extent. She was no longer the ruffian child she used to be, for one she looked good, even started speaking in more refined way, her whole disposition underwent a change. She was literally a different Sarasa. Gone was the defiant, uncouth, loud brat.
The girl had not seen the inside of a school but her native intelligence was amazing. She was curious about everything and learnt fast. She absorbed her Sunday English lessons with such speed that she could within months manage small sentences in spoken English. Though she could not read she would from the news paper leaflets put two and two together and be absolutely on the dot, on which shop in the neighborhood had a sale on which items. She was a raving fan of one of the local Tamil actor Vijay every photograph of his was cut from the papers and magazines and stored away very carefully.
She was a treat to watch, when I took her with me, to the local supermarket. Her excitement never abated even after a dozen trips. She would run counter to counter chattering loudly oblivious of the curious stares from other shoppers. If, I ever went to the store without Sarasa, I would have all the shop hands enquiring about her, they looked forward to her visits.
On one occasion, she stayed with me for a weekend when her family went to their village. She was quite upset they did not take her with them. To compensate, I took her that Sunday morning to the beach. The preparation for it started almost 48 hours ahead. It was like taking a 5 year old to the beach instead of a seventeen year old. I had my hands full, trying to get her not to go far into the water and get her to get out of the water, when it was time to return home. Passersby gave curious looks, they probably wondered whether she was underdeveloped, not knowing this was a seventeen year olds first outing to a beach.
By the time Sarasa was with me for couple of years she would insist on speaking English, if she could manage it. Some of the phrases she used surprised me, for I do not recall teaching her, but she had picked it up from somewhere, probably from the TV. Once my daughter was home for holidays and was upset over something and Sarasa comes out with “don’t worry, be happy” to my daughter’s amusement.
Soon it was time to part ways. Sarasa was getting married to one of Latlitha’s relative’s son who had fallen in love with the new, well behaved, well dressed Sarasa. Sarasa while she worked with me had put away a part of her salary with which she was able to buy herself a gold chain and two bangles and with the little money left over, she bought me a small porcelain doll, as a show piece which I treasure to this day. My last memory of Sarasa is when she was all decked up on her wedding ,when I last saw her in her new gold bangles and chain and the earring, I gave her for her wedding, bending down to take my blessings

Lalitha ( Chennai)

LALITHA ( Chennai)

By now my daughter was away at a boarding school, Rishi Valley, Madanapalle, my husband I had separated. With just myself to be fed I thought I could inflict my cooking on myself. So I opted to have a part time maid to do only the cleaning jobs in the morning before I left for work.
Lalitha and her family seemed to have monopoly over the apartment I had shifted to. She and her elder daughter cleaned the common area of the apartment before taking on household work in individual apartments. Her husband was the watchman for the apartment .Her second daughter cleaned and kept their own little shanty in the backyard of the apartment which served as the watchman’s house .The third daughter went to school and on her return looked after the fourth child, actually the fourth was a daughter, but always dressed up as a boy to make up for the lack of a son!

The whole family was up and about doing their respective jobs by 5 in the morning. They were like a gypsy family. Would be at work with disheveled hair straight out of bed. All the kids looked like ragamuffins, grimy and dirty. All sourcing of maids for everyone was done by Lalitha , since I was alone there would not much work according to Lalitha so she declared she would work in my house .It did not sound as though I had a choice in the matter! I told her I need someone who will finish my work before I left for office; she said she would do it soon after common area cleaning which she would largely delegate to her elder daughter.

There was hardly 45 min. of work at my place but she would take an and a half. No she was not slow, in fact she was a fast worker, one of the fastest I have seen. But it was like the apartment complex was her fiefdom she was a busy body who had to know what happened where. One small sound outside, she would drop the work she was doing like a hot potato and dart out to find out who had come or gone, who was having argument with whom... Had she been educated I am sure she would have opted to be a journalist working on one of the gossip columns. She knew exactly who was marrying whom, who was going to have a baby, who had a guest at home, where and why they had come, who was having a fight with which neighbor, etc. She would ferret out all information and only when satisfied, that there was nothing else to learn would she return back to work. I had to as I cooked, to compulsorily listen to her report on important issues of the apartment complex. My pleas to her to keep quiet fell on deaf ears. She needed an audience for her daily reports and everything was reported at peak volume.
Every ten days or so there would be mayhem in the apartment complex. Lalitha and her elder daughter Sarasa having one of their serious fights. They were constantly at each others throat. Sarasa was I discovered the watchman’s daughter by previous marriage. She just hated her stepmother for some reason. Her father, our watchman was actually a mason and Lalitha was a worker at the construction site. Both of them had worked at our apartment complex once the work was over, they decided not to move on to the next construction site; but to stay on at the apartment as watchman and household maid respectively, as it was less taxing than the construction work.
Sarasa had not been to a school, her childhood was spent at one construction site after another looking after the young step sisters. Though she was always fighting with her step mom she loved her three step sisters. The best food she got from the houses she worked in was always kept aside for her sisters. Lalitha was a real slave driver as far as Sarasa was concerned. She would make Sarasa do all their own household work, like giving her kid sisters a bath, washing clothes, cook their dinner and also pester her to work in as many houses as possible in the apartment complex. One day I talked Lalitha into leaving Sarasa in my house the whole day instead of both of them bickering on a daily basis. I offered to teach her cooking and wee bit of English on Sundays. Lalitha agreed, as the fights between the two were really getting out of hand.

Lakshmi

LAKSHMI

This was one person who loved what she did. All maids always had a sob story to tell on why they were domestic help, this one too. In fact to me it sounded worse than other tales I had heard. She had a series of miscarriages and every time she delivered a baby none survived beyond 5 to six years of age .She had lost 4 to 5 kids. Probably it was some genetic problem. Only once she told me her tales of woe. She was a survivor. She was never bitter. She had just decided to be happy. She was always cheerful and boisterous in her love of life.

In retrospect, people come into our life, I think on a purpose. I was going through a difficult phase in life .I had given up working after 20 years. Relocated from Gujarat to Chennai on account of my husband changing his job. I did not find it feasible to come from Gujarat to Chennai for seeking a job as my husband had already shifted and I and my daughter were still at Gujarat. I took a risk of leaving a job I had been in for 16 plus years, which I loved and coming to Chennai and then looking out for one .It was also an attempt to keep a sinking marriage afloat. Probably that was a mistake, without the job to keep me mentally occupied I was full time pondering over the problems with the marriage, depression being the outcome...

Hardly two months into being in Chennai, I was just beginning to start applying for a job and here was my husband talking of starting off a business in Delhi at times or switching to another job in Bangalore. By then,I was in mood to deal with the uncertainty any longer. I told him I had enough. I was staying put in Chennai till my daughter finished her schooling. By then my daughter’s schooling had started and I was keen we do not shift her from school to school , state to state , one third language to another. He never the less decided he wanted to go ahead with his plans to shift and I decided I had enough of striving to make the marriage work.

All this digression from the Lakshmi incident was to highlight my mental state at the time Laksmi came into my life. She was God send. With my state of depression and my non existent culinary skills my poor child would probably have starved in addition to facing the tense situation at home. At least Lakshmi ensured everyone has sumptuous food on the table and of course her constant cheerful disposition was a blessing. From the loud boisterous “Good morning ‘Motacoose’ (that’s what she called my daughter never understood what that meant), at Six sharp in the morning till she left at 1 O’clock, it was sound of fun and laughter .She would go back home after lunch and be back at 5 in the evening for preparing dinner, so by the time my daughter was back she was around with her laughter and chatter.

She had a store house of amusing incidents to narrate; I wonder now, whether she made them up because she sensed my unhappy state. Considering the mess my life was in at that point in time I think it was her constant chatter that stopped me from completely going over the bend.

She was with me for those difficult 2 years. Because of the situation, the next academic year I yielded to putting my daughter in a boarding school. At least she will not have to deal with the everyday unpleasant issues at home. With her also gone, Lakshmi’s presence was like sunshine in an otherwise graveyard like situation.

Soon my husband left for Bangalore and I shifted house in Chennai itself. I met a neighbor friend a few months after shifting and amongst catching up with one another she asked me “ Usha what made you give away such fabulous saris to Lakshmi? “ Only then I realized she had been siphoning away things from home which I had not even noticed given my mental state. This was the second time someone was stealing things from home. But this time round I did not feel cheated. I just felt that for what she meant for me at that time she just deserved all that she took!

Lakshmi

Savitaben & Kokilaben

Savitaben and Kokilaben

Soon it was time to pack up from Bangalore. This was the only time when the shift was on account of my transfer .Until now and also future transfer were on account of my husband getting transferred or changing his job. This time I had to shift as I had done my stint in the Regional offices of the firm and it was time to be at the HQ. As that involved quite a good job enrichment opportunity I decided to make the move to Anand, in Gujarat.

Even before my household items were being off loaded at Anand by the packers and movers, I had four to five maids vying with one another for jobs. Anand is one place were I did not have to go through the ordeal of searching for a maid. From the half a dozen who came searching for a job I zeroed in on two – Savitha ben for the household work and Kokilaben for the cooking. This was a strategy I picked up from my Aunt in Delhi. Her logic was on days one of them didn’t turn up ,you at least had the other. So one does not get saddled by all the work. That seemed to make a lot of sense and since there seemed to be a buyers market as far as maids were concerned, in Anand, I opted for this.

The discussion of terms of employment was rather unusual; at least I was not used to it. It sounded like a legal contract the way the terms were being spelled out. Every little item was spelled out in the minutest of details, if 10 chapattis ‘x’ amount if 12 chapattis ‘y’ amount an additional ‘a’ amount for a ‘sabzi’ ‘b’ amount for ‘dal’ etc. It was not just the cook but the cleaning lady too. It appeared to be standard operating procedure. ‘x’ amount for washing clothes an additional ‘y’ amount if dry clothes needed to be folded and put away so on and so forth.

I did think that we were in for legal battles after that but I learnt to the contrary that everything went smoothly after that. The contract was adhered to in letter and spirit. Any extra work on any day would involve an extra payment that was all.
But work that had been contracted for just happened without any ado.

Rain or shine Kokilla ben would be there on the dot .She carried key to 10 houses mine was the 11th scheduled for 11 am. She would flit in and out of house like a honey bee. Hardly 30 minutes in my house the chapatti, exact number contracted for a sabzi a dal and a snack for the evening would all be ready served at the table and she would be off to the next house. Six sharp back again to make the chapattis for dinner.Kokilaben did not do the dishes, it would bee stacked neatly in the utility area with water poured into it and left for Savitaben. I thought this would be a potential area of conflict. When my Aunt in Delhi shared with me her strategy of two maids, she had warned that I would have keep aside an hour on Sundays, to resolve conflicts between the two. On no occasion were there any problems between the two. I guess that was the detailed pre employment agreement was all about.

Seeing their absolute trustworthiness, I gave a set of keys to Savitaben too, that gave her an opportunity to work early mornings in another house for which she was so obliged that she would go beyond her contract and clean inside of all the cupboards .On no occasion did I have to point out any undone task or shoddy work everything was done to perfection. Not a single item was taken from the house though both worked in my absence.

Anand was one place I never lost sleep over a maid problem. On the rare occasion either of them took leave they would somehow manage to get the word across, so you never felt you were stranded.

I always wondered what made them so different from the maids else where. That initial hardcore commercial discussion seems to be the secret. Elsewhere they promise the moon and they dish out the minimum requirement. Where as here they deliver what they promise. Word of mouth, no written contract but that was sacrosanct. There was so much to be learnt from them. Even by corporates. The goal setting, the execution of goals, the total quality orientation, the reliability, the time management, the team spirit, the accountability, and so much more.

Rita

Rita

An elderly lady, educated, coming from a family that was fairly well off but fallen into bad times on account of her husbands craze for betting on horses. She undoubtedly was an excellent cook and house keeper. Not much of a company for my little daughter, but by then my daughter was spending the first half of the day in a play school she loved to go to. She would come home have her lunch and sleep for the next 3 hours. So Rita had to deal with her only for a couple of hours till I reached home.
Rita really endeared herself to the family with her evident love for my daughter. Some time after she had been with us one day I had asked her to come prepared to be delayed the following day as there

would be some extra work on account of it being my daughter birthday and we had a whole lot of little kids coming over in the evening. Next day Rita shows up in a kancheepuram sari and a gift for my daughter’s birthday. She won our hearts with that Gesture and of course there was her talent for cooking which everyone loved.
Everything was going smoothly, when one evening my husband asks very hesitantly “what’s happening around here?” He had a strange expression on his face – amused, surprised, doubtful, all simultaneously. I asked him what he meant and he holds up his whiskey bottle half full. So I tell that’s whiskey and he responds “its whiskey alright but highly diluted wiskey.For some time now I had a doubt someone has been consuming a wee bit and then pouring water to ensure so that the level remain where I left it.

”Oh my God the maid? “I exclaimed.
Though we laughed over it ,I was worried , so I came back from office on a couple of occasions, at odd times ,to check out if the maid was in her senses or sozzled!She appeared to be okay and in any case my husband assured that it was apparently only a small peg a day. So we continued with Rita, though of course all alcohol was kept under lock and key, thereafter.

Yasodha Amma

YASODHA AMMA

After a long battle with a sundry group of part time maids who came and went at regular intervals, I gave in, and decided it was time to get over my fear of keeping a live in maid .The uncertainty of whether a maid would come in or not every morning appeared to be a greater trauma than the constant watch over the live in maid not getting into problems. One of my colleagues found a way out by suggesting I keep an elderly live in maid so that I don’t have another ‘Shobha’ experience. Well that made sense and yet another colleague who had rubber estate in Kerala offered to get one from there when he returned from his hometown.

That is how Yashodha Amma came to stay with us. An elderly lady probably in her early 40s .She was up early morning would have her bath even before we were up and about finish her prayers and would have a fresh and clean appearance with the sandal wood paste on her forehead. She really was clean and fresh all the time in
her starched off white ‘set mundu’, the typical Kerala wear of two piece sari.

She looked like an elder in the family. Cooked the typical Kerala meal and all of us were happy for the ‘taste of Kerala ‘, which we otherwise had only on our vacation to Kerala. She had us enjoying those longed for taste on a daily basis. Until then we never had a cook from kerala. It was always When in Rome eating as the Romans do. North Indian food when in Delhi, Marathi flavors while at Bombay, kandiga cuisine while at Bangalore, Gujarati food in Gujarat, Chennai grub at Chennai etc. Because of this my own cooking could not be classified into any particular genre or was it just a result of not being a good cook?!Yashodha literally had us eating out of her hand, given this back ground.

I guess it was too good to be true .despite all the praise we showered on her I always thought she was not happy. In retrospect perhaps it was sheer boredom but every day evening when I returned she would complain about people staring at her through the windows .I thought she just was scared to be in a new place, she did not know the local language and hence could not speak to anyone. But each time the complaints become more paranoid. Slowly she stopped looking normal too there was this sort of crazy look in her eyes which had me really worried .I spoke to a couple of doctor friends they said she probably needed a psychiatrist she seemed to imagine some one was following all her moves through the windows and was out to harm her . She became quite neurotic about this .Despite her culinary skills we decided to part ways I did not want to have another attempted suicide on my hand.

Venni

Venni

This is going to be one long saga and painful one. The hunt for a maid was on at Koramangala , Bangalore . Someone at the office said there is a person who comes from the stationary store to deliver stationary in the office ,he is looking for a job for his daughter in our campus. We lived in a beautifully landscaped office cum residential campus in Koramangala. He came to see me the following Sunday at home along with his 17 year old daughter. He was keen on her working on the campus as he came to the office almost every day and the campus was well guarded so he thought it was a safe place for his daughter. He said every month one weekend he would come and take his daughter home to meet her mom and sisters.

That’s how Venni came into our household. She was seventeen, had studied up to the 8th and then discontinued her studies and had gone to work at another house but her father said that place was not safe as everyone went to work and she was alone the whole day, here at least it was well guarded with watchman round the clock and since everyone worked in the same office all neighbors were known to one another. I took it as natural for the father to be cautious about were his daughter worked though in retrospect it should have struck me that he was more concerned than usual .

She was neat and clean, knew how to go about household work and eager to help me in the kitchen and pick up cooking. I was relieved that without too much of a hassle I had got someone. Venni was also very good at handling my daughter who was by then quite a handful.

Things went well for a couple of years, though at times my mother in law, who came on a visit, did mention to me that in the afternoons she gets telephone calls and is on the telephone for quite awhile . I asked her about it she said it was her mom or brothers and sisters who called and I had no reason to disbelieve so I let it be.

Venni had become a part of the family by then. Every first Saturday of the month she would collect her salary and go home for the week end and come back late evening on Sunday. Initially her father used to come and pick her up and drop her after the first six months he said she could be sent on her own , she would also return on her own.. There were no complaints, she came at the usual time was very contentious girl always did all her work well and most importantly she and my daughter got on very well. She took care of her as well as a mother would.

Towards the end of her second year with us we did notice she was taking greater pains over her appearance. She came back from home with jasmine in her hair, started wearing half sari, bangles, generally decking herself up. I ascribed it to her age and just ignored it. One afternoon at office Venni’s dad after delivering stationary came to see me. Very hesitantly he asked if I could send Venni home that week end as her mother wanted to see her.” Anything special? “I asked, since she was 19 I thought perhaps they were planning her marriage.” No” he said, “since she has not come home this month her mother wanted to see her”.

I was shell shocked. It was holidays for my daughter so we had driven down to Kerala, spent two weeks there left my daughter with my parents for her vacation and returned the previous day which was a Sunday.Venni had gone home for the two weeks and returned the previous evening. I told him I was away for two weeks and had sent her home and she had come back the previous evening so what was he saying. Her father went pale; he said “Amma, Venni told us she is going with you to Kerala she was not at home for the last two weeks.

I wish I had gone home immediately and confronted her. Since I had work at office I told her father to come back in the evening after his work and we sort this issue out then. I further messed it up by calling her up and made her father speak to her , as he was very agitated ,. He asked her were she was last two weeks she told him, she had gone to her friends place instead of going home as there were two weeks and she would have got bored at home. Her father left after that saying he would come home at 8 at night on his way back home.

Around 4 in the evening, I get a call in the office from my next door neighbor asking me to come immediately as Venni had gone to her house looking very ill and wanted me to come home. I rushed home to find Venni collapsed on my neighbor’s sofa crying .As soon as she saw me she fell into my arms pleading “take me to the hospital”. She would not respond to my question what was wrong with her. She kept saying “take me to the hospital, take me to the hospital” When I insisted she said “I have consumed ‘BAYGON’”, an insecticide used to kill cockroaches.

I rushed her to St. Johns which was close by. They pumped out the contents of her stomach, called me aside to tell me “the girl is pregnant” and since it was a suicide attempt they did not want to keep her there. I had to shift her to a Govt hospital and the police was informed. Dealing with the police for the first time I was terrified and the Govt hospital experience a nightmare. By then Venni was unconscious and having convulsions which was a terrifying sight. I was sobbing and the police man on duty sat nonchalantly chewing pan and assuring me at regular intervals he had seen many such cases and giving me all the gory details. The doctor on duty had probably seen many more such cases as he sat at his night shift duty station deeply engrossed in the Jeffery Archer book!

It took 48 hours for the girl to gain conscious .Of course by then her parents were there by her side. I was worried they would blame us but they told me that they were aware of her affair with a boy from the school she studied in and that was the reason for discontinuing her studies and the reason for putting at a more secure place as she was continuing to see the boy at place she earlier worked in. She had spent the two weeks we were away with this boy. I tried to talk the parents to promise to get them married as soon as the boy gets a job. But he was just a year older than her. I don’t know what they did. The hospital discharged Venni, she pleaded with me to take her back as she was scared of what her father would do to her for the disgrace she had brought to the family. I was too scared to keep her after that so I cleared the bills at the hospital handed her over to her parents and went back home .It took me two full days of sleeping to have the strength to get back on my feet. And it took me a long while ,to pick up the courage to keep a live in maid after that.

Ammu ( bangalore)

Ammu

This was one of those one off experiences. It is in direct contrast to the first incident in this series. This too is about Self esteem, just that in this perhaps mine took a beating!

This was my first and last attempt at getting a maid from a service provider, an agency that arranged for such and allied services. It was one of those expensive propositions since it covered the agencies overheads too. However I went for it thinking I’ll go in for a professional help.

We had to go pick Ammu up from the agency’s office. There was this pretty poised girl dressed in one of those very hip top and jeans waiting for us I thought it was one of the girls working at the agency but it turned out that was ‘Ammu’ the girl we had gone to pick. We were quite impressed with Ammu, though she did not seem too happy getting into the Maruti 800. She enquired enroute if we had another car too!

However, I think the beautifully landscaped campus seemed to compensate for the disappointed, as she exclaimed ‘oh you live here!?’in disbelief! I sighed in relief a bit too early , as she walked into our 2 bedroom flat she asked where her room was .The look on her face when I told she would be sharing one of the rooms with my daughter had to be seen to be believed!

I had to provide extra cupboard space for to keep her clothes as the shelf that all the other maids used was inadequate for her rather extensive collection of clothes. As the days rolled by her collection of clothes almost gave me an inferiority complex. Her last assignment according to her was in home of an upcoming starlet and apparently she was sort of a secretary to her and was expected to dress accordingly.

Within a month of her coming she was grumbling that the room was too small for her as she was not able to do her exercises there! I promised to rearrange the furniture in the room the following Sunday so that she had more space, or else, I told her she could use the semi enclosed balcony.

Sunday morning I had hardly finished my bed tea when I find Ammu standing with all her luggage packed wanting to leave. Her reason for leaving was that she was not used to working in such a small house and she was used to working in bungalows. Well I had no answer to that. I agreed she could leave but asked her to wait till 10 o clock till the agency opened, so that, I could leave her back where I collected her from. But she insisted on leaving on her own immediately. By then I was also quite irritated so I let her go, though in normal course I would have been concerned about letting a young girl go on her own. I asked her if was confident of finding her way, she said she had relatives whose house she knew the way to, and she wanted to go immediately.

Later in the day I went to clean my room and to my shock, I found that the gold chain, bangle and earring I had removed previous day were missing. I got apprehensive and checked all the rooms and found a brand new wrist watch, couple of unstitched dress material, and 3 to 4 sweaters missing. I was fuming mad but, there was nothing I could do. Ammu did not go back the agency. Agency refused to take any responsibility except for promising to give me another maid without charging service charges this time. I was in mood to hire from an agency another time.

That was my first experience of a maid stealing things from home. I did not have a habit of keeping things under lock and key. My mother would keep cautioning me that one of these days I would learn a lesson for such carelessness. Well Ammu proved her right.

Shoba

SHOBHA

She was god send. Till my daughter a year old, the two sets of grandparents took turns to take care of her while I went to work. My mother in law and father in law came and stayed with us in Delhi and when they left my mom came and spent time with us. I will always remain so grateful to them .It would have caused them immense inconvenience to close down their establishments and help me cope with the baby and commitments at the work place. I had no idea how I would get back to work. I was able to be home till my daughter was three months old, by then I had exhausted all my leave. I did not have the heart to leave her in a crèche at least till she was a year old. Luckily the grandparents bailed me out.
Along with her first birthday came the transfer to Bombay, now Mumbai. Luckily unlike at Delhi, in Bombay the firm I worked with had a campus which meant that the office and the residence were in the same complex. That in itself was a big relief; however, I still needed a maid. My first experience with a live in maid. One of the security guards on the campus had a fifteen year old daughter who I employed.

Just fifteen years old and yet so professional. In all these years there have been only one or two instances of such professionalism. She had only one weakness – clothes. She loved pretty dresses and asked me not to reveal to her dad, the salary raise, I offered, once I discovered how good she was at her work. She would put away a small amount every month in a pearl pet jar in the kitchen. I offered to help her start a bank account but no; she loved to have it in the jar so that she could see it grow every month. Any tips from relatives who visited would all go right into the jar. So would all the cash received on festivals or birthdays.

Once the amount in the jar reached a tidy sum, there was no way I could avoid a trip to either Dadar or Bandra. I was new to Bombay and living on the campus I did not have to travel much .I dreaded the travel I had to undertake once in 3 to 4 months.Shobha would drag me to the Railway station .The crowds there was what I was scared of. I dreaded the fact that I would have to board the train in a fraction of a second that was left for the train to take off after what seemed like the whole of humanity poured out at the station. Shobha would carry my daughter in one hand and position me in front of her and push me into the door way of the train at the appropriate moment. Disembarking did not demand much effort, the crowd pushed you out but of course you had to ensure you were not pushed out at the wrong station! Once at Dadar or Bandra I would take charge of my daughter leaving Shobha free to flit from dresses to artificial jewelry to hair bands, back to dresses. Once she had her fill we would head back home with a repeat performance of boarding and disembarking at the stations and flowing out of the station along with the rest of humanity. Humanity seemed to flow towards VT in the forenoon and towards Malad in the evenings. I used to wonder what would happen if one were headed in the reverse direction. There would be no way one could thread ones way in the opposite direction, through that constant flow.
Though Shobha handled the entire household work including cooking, cleaning, baby sitting, you would never find her with a hair out of place. She was neat, clean, always well dressed and calm and collected. She was just as particular with my daughter’s appearance. When she brought my daughter down in the evenings to play she would shoe socks on her handkerchief pinned on her dress, really prim and proper accompanied by Shobha also equally prim and proper.
She kept the house too in the same manner all the toys and story books strewn around by my daughter would be in their allotted places before she open the door to anyone.
When I moved out of Bombay though she could have found a job anytime in Bombay she came with me to Bangalore for a couple of months so that I could get a maid at Bangalore train her and then part with Shobha. Once I found a substitute Shobha was dropped back at Bombay.
Unfortunately for me the one I got in her place Anita only lasted a month, I gave up getting her deloused. There were so many in her hair and she had very thick & long hair, that it was a losing battle so we parted ways in a month.

Mahipal

Mahipal

This was during Delhi days. First time I had a male as a domestic help or so I thought. The guy was very conscious of the quality of his work .The floor he swept and mopped would glisten like glazed tiles of today, though it was mosaic flooring. Clothes too would look bright and fresh once he had washed them, dried it out in the sun on the terrace and pressed them as well as a professional ‘dhobi’.

He was just superb in his work, but every second month he had to go to his village. He stayed alone in Delhi, I guess he wanted to give his salary to people back home in the village. When he went he would be away for a week or ten days. The day before he left as he mopped the floor sitting on his haunches, he would linger on where I sat reading the news paper and having my morning cup of tea. I knew he wanted to ask for leave so I would purposely ignore him. He would sit mopping the same place, till I asked what is it Mahipal ? He would not look up, in fact his head would dip further down and he would mumble “ chutti chahiye“( I want Leave ) I would ask him why has your “Chacha( uncle) died again?” he would giggle and say “ yes, it’s another chacha”

Every time he wanted leave it was the only reason he could think of, his uncle’s death! He knew we saw through his lie but he would still give the same reason. He would giggle every time I asked how many more uncles do you have ? Once in a way to add credibility to his story he would say he is taking leave to give his salary to his family and would be back in two days . He would return 10 days later, once again because his‘ chacha’ died . As he said it he would giggle, yes giggle is the right world , it was not a grown up man’s laughter but little child’s giggle. He was so child like you could never be angry with him, there was this elusive endearing quality about him.

I noticed quite often that he had very effeminate gestures and expressions. When I mentioned it to one of my neighbours , she told me “look out of your window at six in the evening , you will find Mahipal transform” .Six sharp that evening there was this person in a shocking pink salwar kameez with long artificial hair plaited with tassles swinging and a bright smile, lips painted red and kajal linned eyes , who on close examination turned out to be Mahipal.

He was a very affectionate person. Though cooking was not one of his assignments, if he found that I was not well any morning, without being asked, he would put in an extra hour cook something for me to have. After completing his work in other houses on his way back he would drop in to check if I need any help.

Unfortunately, he fell ill, became very weak and decieded to go back to his village .That was the last we heard of him. Wonder what happened to him. He was a tormented soul, torn between being a man and a woman, facing society’s jeers.

Lalitha

LALITHA
I had no clue how to handle domestic help (maids ) not just that , I had no clue how to run the house hold either. Until then someone else ran the show, I just got up, dressed up and showed up! When at home, Mom ran the place with iron hands. No one interfered in her domain, not that she would have brooked any interference. College hostels too the Nuns ran with clockwork precision. Once work life commenced it was YWCA, once again no say in its daily routine.
Suddenly one fine day , after the wedding celebrations ,the statutory visits to relatives, the honeymoon, you wake up to a day when you get hit on the head with the thought that tea, breakfast, lunch, dinner, will not be waiting for you when you show up. You have to get it there on the table for which you need to cook it, to cook, you need to stock the ingredients, replenish them at regular intervals.. a whole lot of planning went into it. Not just the planning , the execution demands that you are up and about well in advance to see the stage is set before the rest of the household gets up, dresses up and shows up! Even before you can sigh in relief that the house hold is fed, you see that mounting heap of vessels in the sink. Oh, you need to do the dishes too! There is the clothes hamper too, bursting at its seams with clothes that need to washed , dried ,ironed and stacked in their respective piles in the wardrobe. Hold on, what about all that dust on the furniture, floor , the window sills ? That needs to be dusted, swept, mopped!
You have no idea how my admiration for my Mom hit the roof. I wondered why I had not noticed all this activity happening in the background. Things seemed to happen silently, no flurry, no frayed nerves.
Within a month of this ‘Circus of life ‘, it dawned on me, that I need help. If I were to reach office on time, after ensuring breakfast on the table , packed lunch and a clean house, followed by a grueling trip on the DTC ( Delhi Transport Corporation) buses , there was no way I could do it all myself. That’s when the first ever attempt to get domestic help started. Once again had no clue where the search started.
There was this cheerful lady , Lalitha, who came every morning even before the fog had cleared in those cold December mornings to collect “ KUDA “which was the term for household waste from the kitchen. She went from door to door collecting “KUDA” emptied it into a push cart manned by her mother- in- law.
One Sunday morning when she announced her arrival with her usual cheerful “ Maji kuda! “
I asked her “ Lalitha , would you, after you are finished with the Kuda collection, help me out with my household work?”.
She looked surprised, but asked “ You want me to clean the Laterine( toilet)?”
I told her “No,I want you to sweep and mop the house, wash clothes, and do the dishes.”
She stared at me in shock , her jaws dropping to her chest. In a minute or two she she says “ Bhenji , I am a Bhangi .”
Though I spoke Hindi , ‘Bhangi’ was a new term for me.
” What’s that? “ I asked her.
She laughs and says “ We belong to ‘Bhangi’ community , we are not allowed inside houses, we clear the kuda and clean latrines”.
I told her “That is okay you can come here wash your hands and feet with soap in the wash room and then do my work.” She did not know how to respond.
She told me “ I will talk to my mother- in- law and tell you”.
From my balcony I could see her and her m- in- law have a very excited conversation . She came back beaming saying she would come to work from the next day onwards.
Next day break, she was there dressed in all her finery. It was like she was celebrating an important event in her life. She was doing work of an elevated status. Something she had not even dreamt of. My heart went out to her. The trouble she took to be extra clean for fear of offending me, and being reverted to being a “ Kuda walli”. I gave her a few of my clothes and told her not to spoil her best clothes by wearing it to work. Her status in the family went up, Ma – in- law inducted her daughter into collecting kuda and Lalitha no longer had to go door to door.
Lalitha was a torch bearer, she had a place of honor in her community. Within six months of her working with me, one of the neighbors called her for household work at their place, once she was done with mine. I shifted house after 6 years of staying in that house. I was expecting a baby and needed to move to a more spacious house. By then, Lalitha used to do my cooking too, as I was having a difficult pregnancy. She worked in three houses in the neighborhood. She was one of the cleanest, best dressed, maid in the neighborhood. People vied with one another for a few hours of her time. By then her sister- in- law too did household work in a few of the flats.
The entire family’s gratitude to me was so touching. It was a humbling experience. Unknowingly, I had built her self esteem. She was able to break out of a mould which she until then believed was a given , not alive to the fact that the world had changed and was willing to accept her as a human being.
The metamorphosis of a caterpillar to a butterfly was truly awesome.

Experiments in writing

Yet another experiment is to be an Author sometime in life....
One serious writing and one fiction is the scheme of things write now..
Initial stages bound to under go change.....Slice of Life ....HR for Line Managers ..are the tentative ideas
As a precursor stared Maid Saga a tribute to all the people who have been part of my life as domestic help ... for a working women they are a main component of one's life ....
Some attempts are related to ISHA Exprience which are seperate blog in itself as it is a completely different dimension....

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Flowers,leaves,trees,vegetables...

Part of my plans for retirement was to take up gardening more seriously since I would have time to devote to it. Once the idea was in the mind I could not wait untill retirement so the experiments with the Kitchen garden, started almost a year ahead of retirement.Sundays and often Saturdays were devoted to Gardening.

Luckily for me Elango my driver turned out to be even more devoted to growing vegetables than i was. He is probably the first generation to migrate out of the village to city in search of livlihood and was obviously missing tilling the soil as he had seen all his child hood his father do and his elder brother continues to do.So between us my garen started yielding ladies finger(okra), brinjal,bittergourd,green chillie,tomatoes,drumstick,greens( cheru keerai,pasala keerai,),parandai(in tamil ). The bittergourd crop was really good could distribute to a few neighbours, the drivers family and friends.Looks like the tomatoes too will yield a good crop.No chemicals fertilizers are added , just cow dung , red soil, and kitchen waste.

Cannot explain the joy of seeing the first sprout from seeds , the first sign of a bittergourd or brinjal begining to form and of course when I pluck and exhibit it to the family I just go ga ga ....

All this is in a wee bit of land in the backyard and the rest on the terrace. Not too sure if the terrace can take the load of mud and concrete pots so most are in cement bags,old buckets, water cans etc.

The flowers and crotons are in the front garden , again not much space, making the best use of what is available. Amidst this there is a small conrete tub sunk in the soild which hold the moulee about a dozen of them two suckers, 2 Angel fish, 2 tiger fish,some guppies which keep disappearing ( looks like the Angel fish is not so angelic must be either eating them or bruising them !)

The terrace also has a cactus collection and a green house where I am struggling given Chennai's climate to make the Orchids bloom have not learnt the art yet but thre are a few blooms though rare it is not a complete failure :)

Hope you enjoy the photograhs though I am yet to gain reasonable expertise with photography (which is yet another plan post retirement:).

Kitchen Garden

an attempt to see if bitter gourd can be grow in container on terrace.Not too sucessful only a couple of small ones have appeared unlike the large ones when sown in the ground.

Egg Plant ( Brinjal ) got just 1/2 a week

Tomatoe Yield from just 3 plants in pots

Green house for Vegetable saplings once they are 9/12 inches they are exposed to the blazing sun on the terrace as long as they are watered twice a day they seem to like it :)

Bitter gourd when planted in the ground are almost 4 times the size of the one in the container

Have not bought coconuts in the last one year 3 trees provide enough for the family ( Mallu - coconut lovers!) for the driver and a few for the neighbours too.

Drumstick more for the leaves which make a good vegetable with rice and sambar though my daughter does not agree!

Green tomatoes with Dal make a tasty combination

Green chillie to add some spice to the Kuttu (the green tomato and Dal dish)

Bitter gourd gave a contious yield for six months or more before I had to replace them

Ladies Finger( Okra) and bitter gourd are the ones really competeing to see who yields more!

Okra &Tomatoe Saplings in the green house on the terrace

Orchids

Want to teach yourself patience try growing Orchids
Had to wait almost a year to see these blooms .
All I can say is it worth the wait.

The blooms above were there when i bought the plant

I am told by my friend in Kerala from whom I got a few cutting that they have lovely yellow bloom yet to see them 6 moths have passed....

natures beauties

I made 5 attempts at growing this plant (must find out the name) very common in Chennai, for some reason kept failing 6th attempt has succeeded ..this time i have planted it outside the compound wall....is that why?!

Lantanas and vinca rosea have invited butterflies to the garden
have not yet suceeded in taking photographs of the butterfly must try one of these days....