CHAI- WALLAH
Even though it was extremely odd to find the picture missing, Madhav wasn’t sure how to react to the anomaly. At least not on the outside. He ordered his usual cup of tea with a fan to go alongside. The chai-wallah greeted him amicably, as usual. This daily ritual began almost three months ago when Madhav enrolled for a course to prepare for MBA entrance examinations while still completing his engineering degree, which, like so many of his generation, wasn’t exactly his cup of tea. An MBA would be his way out, he thought.
For three evenings a week he would head straight for the coaching centre from college. Having about an hour to spare each such day, before monotonous monologues about number theory, gerunds, reading comprehensions and geometry would take over, he almost always chose to sit beside the chai-wallah and sip his tea. More often than not his thoughts would wander off to the happier times he had seen in his life. Times when his friends were close, times when he would sit by the lake alone introspecting, times when he wouldn’t have to worry about what he job he would do or how his grades weren’t great. It was about a week into this practice of sipping tea and listening to the chai-wallah lament high price of everything on earth, when he first noticed the picture.
He still remembered dismissing it as a clever piece of advertising at first. His thoughts however, changed over time as he saw behind the advertising, an earnestness, a genuine effort to help people in need. The picture he thought was an embodiment of a hope, a hope for people who could now look forward to a brighter future, quite literally. It was too aspirational, he once thought and yet, as with all things aspirational, it was achievable and that made it something to strive for. A picture they say, speaks a thousand words. This one, spoke many more.
From sitting atop a metaphoric pedestal as a symbol of hope the picture became more personal as time passed. The chai-wallah, with the picture in front of him on a store door, became his daily pilgrimage. Even when his schedule meant no classes, a slight detour became imperative, just to sit there and adore the picture that lay before him. (It goes without saying that the tea-seller was more than happy with all the extra cups Madhav drank. However, he never could figure out what made Madhav to stick around longer than usual and frankly he couldn’t care less. As long as his tea-sipping didn’t stop.)
The attraction was gradual at first but it did not remain that way. Infatuation would come close as a term to describe his condition, even madness. Every evening was spent in thinking about the endless possibilities that lay before him if the picture were to come to life. On some occasions he would smile a dreamy smile looking at the picture, while some days the chai-wallah would find his pallor a little discomforting, almost as if he’d woken up from a bad dream. Grades suffered. MBA would be a distant dream, his teachers told him. Life went on. Unchanged. Until today.
The picture was gone. Absent. Not there. Instead workers in paint-strewn oversized shirts were painting the door which had previously adorned the picture. As he walked away with heavy steps post chai and fan, one could see a tear trickle down his eye.
As it happened, the store had belonged to a leading chain of skin care clinics in the country and they had decided to shift this particular branch, of which our protagonist was an ardent fan, to another location. The picture was that of a woman’s face, meant to reflect the flawless skin one could achieve if she were to avail the services of the clinic.
Simran, a batch mate who’d think of Madhav as more than just a friend noticed a rather strange expression on his face as he approached the class. ‘’Hey! What happened? Is everything all right?’’, she asked.
‘What? Yeah. No. Ok. Yes. Yes. Everything is fine. Just something in my eye.’
- Gursheel Sahni (The writer is a new member of Talking Books in Delhi)
The Talking Books Magazine 