[Reader-list] A Place Called Home

[zainab at xtdnet.nl]

A Place Called “Home”

I was headed to the airport, going back from Bangalore to Mumbai. It was
one of those thunderous nights, rain pouring heavily. Sridhar was the taxi
driver. He promised to get me to the airport right on time. I trusted him.

Around Airport Road, we got stuck in a jam. We started conversing. Sridhar
was trained at the National Association of the Blind in Bombay sometime in
the early 1980’s. He then came to Bangalore and started teaching here.
After a while, I realized that personal and social life cannot be
intermingled, he said to me as he continued driving. I then started my own
cargo company, doing work for Blue Dart Couriers, ferrying between
Bangalore and Bombay. After a while, I stopped because the stress
increased. Then I bought a taxi of my own and I drive this taxi now.

Sridhar continued to talk to me about his daughter and asked me for advice
on what career in psychology she should pursue. As we neared the airport,
suddenly I asked him, where do you live? Banshankari, he answered. Is it
your own home? Nahi madam. When I did not have money, I said I will make
enough to buy my own home. Now when I have the money, the prices have gone
up and I cannot afford to make a purchase. That’s destiny. I don’t have a
home of my own.

I carried Sridhar’s words with me. My flight touched Bombay late that
night. A day later, I met with Begum. Begum lives in slum settlement in
Bombay that is due for resettlement. Begum is leading her block in the
slum and is negotiating with builders for in-situ resettlement. Begum
tells me about the negotiations that she is carrying out with the
builders, legal safeguards that the block and she have worked out to
ensure that all of them have a proper place to stay. Eventually, Begum
starts to narrate a story, a story of the place called ‘her home’:

I came to this place more than twenty-five years ago. This neighbourhood
was largely Muslim. I had a different way of living. Since I was quite
educated, I would speak with my children in English. We lived differently.
The neighbours thought I was a Catholic lady. Gradually, they started
coming to me and began to bring their grievances to me. They started
telling me how their children had only one school to go to and that was
far away. I decided to help them enrol their children in school. Initially
they were afraid, telling me, will private schools admit our children? I
said why not. As long as you are paying for their fees, why should they
refuse you? Today this area has two good schools. Then the problem was
that there was no public BEST bus coming to this area. Along with the
residents of this area, I took out a morcha to the local bus station.
Today, bus number --- comes to this area.
I have realized and I must tell you that people of this area are very
loyal. And they will stay loyal to you all their lives. The love that I
got from this place, nothing can compensate that. That love, that is it!
And I will never leave this place and go!
Tomorrow, we will be resettled. The builder here has told me openly that
he is hoping that most of the people here who will be given houses here,
will sell them off and take the money and buy house some other place and
invest the rest in business. I want to tell you that this builder, he
wants to ultimately build malls here, and she raised her teacher’s stick
and banged it and repeated, he wants to build malls here! That’s it! He
wants to build malls here!

I carry only these words with me to tell to you. What it is this place
that they call home?



Zainab Bawa
Bombay
www.xanga.com/CityBytes
http://crimsonfeet.recut.org/rubrique53.html