Splat!
The first drop of water had landed on the windscreen. The sound of moist kisses lay heavy on the tar road ahead that had begun to resemble a mosaic of dots in competing hues of ambient emotions unchained by the wet weather. I was driving around the bend that once opened into a huge park, now brutally torn down to a traffic circle. My grip on the wheel loosened and so did my coherence as my mind struggled to keep a handle on the manicured surroundings that had a plasticity about them, which was in equal measure suffocating and revolting.
I was born in Delhi, but raised in this sleepy, feudal town some 300-odd kms from the national capital. We call it Jaipur. Most, outside India, speak of it as Jypore, a label that has been popularised by a brand in vogue with perfumed elites. But unlike the eau de parfum, the only fragrance that pulled us to the edge of excitement and nervous release was the rustic aftertaste suspended in a breeze, heavy with expectation, after the first of the raindrops have consummated with the willing desert soil.
Rajasthan, the largest state of India, is most parts desert in the west and
forgiving nature as you proceed east. It's like in Australia, where nature in
its complex extremes abounds in either direction of its expanse. Jaipur thrives
in the benevolent east spared of the heavy and scattered rain that breeds the
wetlands of a bird sanctuary in Bharatpur and the tiger reserve in
Ranthambhore. Thankfully, it isn’t a part of the dry run miles into the west where
it sprints across the border and into the neighbouring Pakistan.
If there was one thing about the city, it was its inherent nonchalance about forward leap, a brooding redundancy that it strangely prided on, and a character predisposed to opposing change. Heritage was our legacy and tourism a natural derivative, which largely sustained the economy until a few years back when the first signs of visible change settled in.
As a kid, we were tenants in a huge haveli (mansion) built completely out of stones on a 2-acre property that overlooked a huge park from its vantage point. Even with a dozen families residing, all of them on rent, there was no dearth of space till the time I graduated and was shoved out of the place by a demanding fate. Every house in that row, and the next, and the one beyond, had at least an acre on it and trees were the natural owners of the property outside of the man-made contraption.
Bani Park, our address then, had nothing to do with the park in the vicinity, but who can cull a childhood fantasy, which had latched onto the belief that it was the harbinger of our domicile status. Some still wonder where the Bani came from? My uncle in New York would send us letters addressed to Bunny Park wholly refusing to believe it could mean anything else than a chubby rabbit. Some locals would place the origin on the Rajasthani word Bani which refers to a female of native Rajputs who once ruled and cultivated the city. The Park in the address, wasn’t just a name, it was a way of life. The park outside complemented that existence.
Childhood was spent playing cricket in the neighbourhood, where we would take to swapping grounds depending on the family that would suit up to the idea of boy gangs invading their peace for most parts of a day. On days when we ran out of favours, a half-a-mile long walk in any direction would throw us up a ground with favourable topography that supported the Gentleman’s Game. T20, the stripped-down version of the 50-over ODI, may have just turned fashionable, but we were already betting on 20-over games back in the 90s. The rules of the games changed depending on the territorial attributes of meddlesome trees, overreaching boundary walls and painfully squeezed-out rooftops. But what remained constant was that ball landing in an inaccessible zone, which included the property of a hostile neighbour, and an open sewer line, would render a batsman out irrespective of the deftness of the shot. The other constant: One tip-One hand catch was always out! It was the unwritten code among rival gangs who set out to win a match whose only prize was the ball used in the game.
When we were not playing Cricket, we we're jumping about the trees, stealing pomegranates and guavas off laden shrubs and exploding crackers in crevices to discover the most annoyingly loud noise that rattled the peace of elders and brought them looking for the urchins who had vandalised their unsuspecting ear buds.
The beauty about the Jaipur then was the roads were immaterial. They were a part of landscape but not the conspicuous, vital organ that needed tending to keep a hungry, living beast of a city alive. Motorists were few and far between. Houses were sprawling bungalows with a view and trees. I don’t remember seeing any guard at any of the houses then. Compound walls were low enough to lend you an eyeful of the many treasures that awaited plundering on the other side. Last year my uncle was deeply troubled after reliving Jaipur through the backseat of my car. "The malls, they are same, the same flyovers, the same high-rises, same everything. It could be Delhi, it could be Bangalore, but it's definitely not Jaipur anymore," he whined.
This day, as I took the road leading to our old home as a short cut to avoid traffic, I was greeted by maddeningly slow crawl of the same traffic. It must have been years before I was returning to this memorable part of my life. The road I took leads straight to the park where on one corner stood the monolith of a building, which we once called home. The neighbourhood had changed. Quite spectacularly, I must admit. The bungalows lay mostly stripped of their spaciousness. My eyes wandered off the rooftops screaming at the sky to make more room. It was an odd feeling. One caught between a city in labour, painfully withdrawn and the guarded joy that accompanies the birthing of a new something.
I hadn’t seen the park as my eyes were having a difficult time making out the houses where the Ahluwalias lived; on the right lived a Rajput family; and the Raos were on the left. Ah, that would be our home, I chuckled. Splat! Landed the first drops. Then, the rain smothered the windscreen. I slowed down, my fingers instinctively nudging the engine into second gear. The huge stone building stood there. Desolate and barren. Most of the trees were naked and dried corpse of once thriving mango orchard that greeted visitors. I made the turn around the park that seemed strangely afar. I realised then it wasn’t a park anymore. They had reduced it to just another one of the many traffic circles that facilitate the navigation of motor cars. The roads had taken over. The park was no more. The fantasy had crumbled. I took two rounds of the traffic circle suffering the impatient honking and the alien neighbourhood before taking the next exit out of the place in comforting observation that Bani Park’s existence was never rooted in the
traffic circle.
The first drop of water had landed on the windscreen. The sound of moist kisses lay heavy on the tar road ahead that had begun to resemble a mosaic of dots in competing hues of ambient emotions unchained by the wet weather. I was driving around the bend that once opened into a huge park, now brutally torn down to a traffic circle. My grip on the wheel loosened and so did my coherence as my mind struggled to keep a handle on the manicured surroundings that had a plasticity about them, which was in equal measure suffocating and revolting.
I was born in Delhi, but raised in this sleepy, feudal town some 300-odd kms from the national capital. We call it Jaipur. Most, outside India, speak of it as Jypore, a label that has been popularised by a brand in vogue with perfumed elites. But unlike the eau de parfum, the only fragrance that pulled us to the edge of excitement and nervous release was the rustic aftertaste suspended in a breeze, heavy with expectation, after the first of the raindrops have consummated with the willing desert soil.
 |
| Wall mural, distorted by rains, says life is a story. |
If there was one thing about the city, it was its inherent nonchalance about forward leap, a brooding redundancy that it strangely prided on, and a character predisposed to opposing change. Heritage was our legacy and tourism a natural derivative, which largely sustained the economy until a few years back when the first signs of visible change settled in.
As a kid, we were tenants in a huge haveli (mansion) built completely out of stones on a 2-acre property that overlooked a huge park from its vantage point. Even with a dozen families residing, all of them on rent, there was no dearth of space till the time I graduated and was shoved out of the place by a demanding fate. Every house in that row, and the next, and the one beyond, had at least an acre on it and trees were the natural owners of the property outside of the man-made contraption.
Bani Park, our address then, had nothing to do with the park in the vicinity, but who can cull a childhood fantasy, which had latched onto the belief that it was the harbinger of our domicile status. Some still wonder where the Bani came from? My uncle in New York would send us letters addressed to Bunny Park wholly refusing to believe it could mean anything else than a chubby rabbit. Some locals would place the origin on the Rajasthani word Bani which refers to a female of native Rajputs who once ruled and cultivated the city. The Park in the address, wasn’t just a name, it was a way of life. The park outside complemented that existence.
Childhood was spent playing cricket in the neighbourhood, where we would take to swapping grounds depending on the family that would suit up to the idea of boy gangs invading their peace for most parts of a day. On days when we ran out of favours, a half-a-mile long walk in any direction would throw us up a ground with favourable topography that supported the Gentleman’s Game. T20, the stripped-down version of the 50-over ODI, may have just turned fashionable, but we were already betting on 20-over games back in the 90s. The rules of the games changed depending on the territorial attributes of meddlesome trees, overreaching boundary walls and painfully squeezed-out rooftops. But what remained constant was that ball landing in an inaccessible zone, which included the property of a hostile neighbour, and an open sewer line, would render a batsman out irrespective of the deftness of the shot. The other constant: One tip-One hand catch was always out! It was the unwritten code among rival gangs who set out to win a match whose only prize was the ball used in the game.
When we were not playing Cricket, we we're jumping about the trees, stealing pomegranates and guavas off laden shrubs and exploding crackers in crevices to discover the most annoyingly loud noise that rattled the peace of elders and brought them looking for the urchins who had vandalised their unsuspecting ear buds.
The beauty about the Jaipur then was the roads were immaterial. They were a part of landscape but not the conspicuous, vital organ that needed tending to keep a hungry, living beast of a city alive. Motorists were few and far between. Houses were sprawling bungalows with a view and trees. I don’t remember seeing any guard at any of the houses then. Compound walls were low enough to lend you an eyeful of the many treasures that awaited plundering on the other side. Last year my uncle was deeply troubled after reliving Jaipur through the backseat of my car. "The malls, they are same, the same flyovers, the same high-rises, same everything. It could be Delhi, it could be Bangalore, but it's definitely not Jaipur anymore," he whined.
This day, as I took the road leading to our old home as a short cut to avoid traffic, I was greeted by maddeningly slow crawl of the same traffic. It must have been years before I was returning to this memorable part of my life. The road I took leads straight to the park where on one corner stood the monolith of a building, which we once called home. The neighbourhood had changed. Quite spectacularly, I must admit. The bungalows lay mostly stripped of their spaciousness. My eyes wandered off the rooftops screaming at the sky to make more room. It was an odd feeling. One caught between a city in labour, painfully withdrawn and the guarded joy that accompanies the birthing of a new something.
I hadn’t seen the park as my eyes were having a difficult time making out the houses where the Ahluwalias lived; on the right lived a Rajput family; and the Raos were on the left. Ah, that would be our home, I chuckled. Splat! Landed the first drops. Then, the rain smothered the windscreen. I slowed down, my fingers instinctively nudging the engine into second gear. The huge stone building stood there. Desolate and barren. Most of the trees were naked and dried corpse of once thriving mango orchard that greeted visitors. I made the turn around the park that seemed strangely afar. I realised then it wasn’t a park anymore. They had reduced it to just another one of the many traffic circles that facilitate the navigation of motor cars. The roads had taken over. The park was no more. The fantasy had crumbled. I took two rounds of the traffic circle suffering the impatient honking and the alien neighbourhood before taking the next exit out of the place in comforting observation that Bani Park’s existence was never rooted in the
traffic circle.
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