[Reader-list] "I make joints between parts"

[Aarti]

Dear Shveta,

Thank you for this post. What I find is the evocative, almost intimate, 
nature of this description of a realtionship with work and technology. 
There is something very delicate, nazuk, about the section on his 
thinking about the relationship between the making of circuits and an 
evocation of a ruptured realtionship back home.

Thank you again
really looking forward to reading more such accounts
Warmly
Aarti


Shveta wrote:

> I make joints between parts
> by Lakhmi Chand Kohli[*]
>
> New places carry memories of the old. I create freshness by placing old
> materials into new places. I guess, in this way, I rub some of the 
> aura of
> the old into the new. I am an electrician... Maybe! You see, this name 
> has
> been given to me by people. I only make transformers. I buy parts from 
> the market, make transformers out of them, and sell them in the 
> market. Because I have been doing this for a long time, I have many 
> skills of an electrician.
>
> Earlier, people used to call me to their homes to take care of any
> electrical problems. But I don't go to peoples' houses any more. I have
> nothing to gain from it. It's not that one doesn't earn well in this way.
> It's just that things spoil again a few days after I fix them. People get
> abusive when this happens. "Rascal, what did you do that it got spoiled
> again?" So I just stopped that kind of work. I still go to some peoples'
> houses, but only a select few. You see, people don't have much time to 
> meet
> others; so I make meetings possible for myself through my work.
>
> Making transformers is my work. The beginning was very difficult. 
> Because I
> didn't repair transformers, but made them and sold them in the market.
> Buying supplies without an income was difficult. Somehow, I managed.
> Initially, my earnings were little. Because to make a mark in the market,
> my supplies had to be of a good quality and I had to put them together
> myself" very carefully, minutely.
>
> For a transformer, one needs a circuit board (Rs. 27, Anchor company),
> cabinet (Rs. 50), main switch (Rs. 30), fine wire (Rs. 2 per meter),
> transformer card (Rs, 35) and coin, rotor, meter etc. In all the cost 
> price
> is Rs. 150-200. Moreover, it would take me two days to assemble a
> transformer. I would sell each between Rs 400-600. I used to get 
> orders for
> numbers to be made, and couldn't defend my interests in the market.
>
> But I am doing well today, even though the cost of raw materials is 
> high. I
> am faster at my work; my hands are more skilled. I can turn out three to
> four transformers in a single day. I also have helpers.
>
> Sometimes I get very angry at my helpers. Because they work like girls 
> and
> also act very smart! They dress up like heroes, and worry they will dirty
> their clothes. It's amazing how scared they are of dirt! But they will
> learn and get used to all this. I know because when I was younger, and
> worked as a help in my master's shop, I was just like them.
>
> In the beginning when I used to make joints between parts to make a
> transformer, I used to feel life was joining and becoming seamless. Like
> different parts being held together, still retaining their difference, 
> but
> making a whole. This shape, the "whole", used to appeal to me. You see,
> that's because back home, in our village in Punjab, my father and his
> younger brother's families used to live together. When I decided to shift
> to Delhi, my father's younger brother's son asked me, "What shall we do
> with your room and land?"
> I replied, "Plough the land, and give the room out on rent. We will 
> divide whatever is earned equally between us".
>
> He said, "That only works in your favour! Why should I do the work, and
> you earn from it?"
> My father heard this and left the room. Our relationship with my 
> father's younger brother's family has never been the same since then. 
> Whenever I join parts together, I am reminded of this relationship. I 
> wish there could be some joint I could connect our two families with, 
> filling the cracks that have been formed between us.
>
> But forget all this! I have formed so many new relationships and 
> earned so
> many different names with this work that sometimes my own name seems
> strange to me! Time transforms a personality. And along with that, or 
> maybe
> because of that, one gathers so many different kinds of names as years
> pass, and the meaning and significance of each name also keeps changing.
> But what is most significant to me is who chooses to call me by which
> particular name. You see, no one is called by the same name by everyone.
>
> Is it that when you form a relationship with someone, the name you are
> called by changes, or is it that as the name you are called by 
> changes, so
> does the relationship?
>
> --------------------------------------------
> [*]
>
> http://sarai.var.cc/source_material/the_old_and_the_new_by_lakhmi_from_broadsheet_no_3.html.html 
>
>
> [Translation by shveta and frankhuzur at rediffmail.com]
>
> Text from Issue # 3 of Cybermohalla Broadsheet, "Bade Bade Shehron 
> Mein Kuchh Namm Baatein".
> The issue engaged with the technological universe in the localities in 
> which the CM labs are located.
>
> Editors: Lakhmi Kohli, Yashoda Singh, Love Anand, Suraj Rai.
>
> Write to cybermohalla at sarai.net
>
> For more texts, see http://sarai.var.cc
> --------------------------------------------
>
>
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