Kanta Bai!

When I refer to my maid as “Kanta Bai”, people smirk thinking abt the quintessential Mumbai maid from Kal Ho nao Ho. But that’s really her name…. My hindi is still only good enuf to get into autos and sell glass; not to try my wit in this language

My house is pretty much her playground….. As I work from home, I am usually totally immersed in work by the time she turns up for her “work”. In fact, she coordinates her office time with my boss. U see, he works from UK. We catch up with each other, while he drives to office from home. For him it’s an hour well spend ( and probably kills the boredom of long drive and traffic jam as the stories from India are quite entertaining or may be I am just that interesting to talk to ). Now irrespective of whether he calls me half an hour early or half an hr late, you will see Kanta Bai turning up early/late (as the case may be) for work. This has happened once too often for it to be a coincidence…Hmm….. Now this means, while I am busy on the phone with my Boss, she pretty much does what she wants and runs off to her next house.

The cleaning Bhoot gets into me once in two weeks or when I have guests coming to stay. And on those days, I walk behind her, make her sweep the room twice, wash the already washed plates once more – believe me, I am not being a bitch here. To prove my point, let me tell you of the time I told her to clean the cobwebs. I pointed to one corner of the hall and told her “Saaf karo”… pls note that I did not know the Hindi for cobwebs and had to gesticulate to get the message across.( Love, music and housecleaning transcends language barriers). When I came back after 5 mins, she had cleaned the corner I pointed out and the cobwebs in the opposite corner were left intact – Like I was saving them for a special occasion!

Now if you are wondering why I still employ her, here are the good things abt her. She is absolutely trustworthy! Chandu and I are incredibly careless and unorganised people. From money to gold necklaces to diamonds rings…. At one point or another we both have left all these lying around. In the past 18 months, she has not even picked them up to have a closer look. Of course, the fall side to this is, if the ring is lying on the table, she will not dust the table altogether!!

She never bitches about neighbours, always smiles ( even after I yell blue murder sometimes) and always returns the money she borrows!

Now this is not a blog dedicated to my quirky maid, ‘coz she is not quirky enuf to dedicate a blog to ( read – make me actually sit down and write something). This is about something that happened the other day. Kanta bai came by early morning( 9 am is very early by her standards) and said she will need one week ka chutti. I,of course, did not panic so much as my neighbour (where Kanta works) who has in-laws staying with her, nephews-nieces for summer hols, working husband and a 2 year old hyperactive l’l boy!

But I was concerned all the same. Kanta was all smiles as she apprecatiated the worried look on my face. She had come in early to prepare me for the week ahead and do the cleaning before she left. Though I asked her why she is leaving for her “gaav” all of a sudden, it was more a polite inquiry that did not really demand a response from her. As I had not yet started my office work, I started chatting with her. I guess it was the fact that I was hanging around her (which was very unusual) that made us connect at that moment.

He husband is apparently one of those “no good” varieties. Has work on and off; and comes home drinking more often that not. She has 3 sons; one of whom is nineteen. ( Kanta is only 35 – so u do the math). Apparently the eldest son and the father do not get along well at all. Things in the family got so bad that the relatives have called them all to the gaav to have a Big family conference and hopefully put some sense into their heads! Apparently when things reached the threshold, Kanta told her sister that “I cannot take this any more – I might just go kill myself”, the sister panicked and got the rest of the family involved to resolve this crisis.

Many things flashed through my ahead at that instance – Looking at Kanta Bai, always clean and impeccably dressed and forever smiling, you would never think that there was so much unhappiness at home. (I have even envied her sometimes when I have customers screaming at me for delayed shipments and Boss breathing down my neck for targets not met). I had imagined a poor but hardworking, loving husband. Can’t blame me when you see the enthusiasm with which she collects Chandu’s old shirts for her husband. Always a sucker for happy endings – that’s me!

Most of time I understand only 40% of what Kanta Bai says. Please understand that my Hindi statements are 70% English and 30% Hindi. Kanta’s language is Marathi springled with Hindi words. And with a very unrefined diction, we barely communicate. Once she started speaking about the problems at home, the stories came in one after another. It was then she told me another incident – Kanta Bai works some 5 houses in our colony. She always goes back home for lunch. Even when I offer her food, other than Chai she always packs and takes it home. The previous monday there was a lot of left over chicken from entertaining friends over the weekend at my place. So when she came to work on monday I served her a sumptitious lunch which she ate at my place instead of carrying it home. It was already 330 and usually when she is this late she would have had lunch. This registered in my head but didn’t pay too much attention. Today she tells me that it was her first meal of that day. The things at home were so bad that she could not even eat. God that hurt! I have always told her that she is free to eat anything she wants from my home. She does not even need to ask if she is helping herself to food. But she very rarely does. I am so thankful to God for making me serve her lunch that day – instead of just offering it. Subtle difference… but it made all the difference.

Coming back to why I started writing this blog – kanta Bai is not someone who is used to baring her soul. She does not look for sympathy or try to get that extra penny from me by trying to sell her sob stories. She is one of those Bharthiya naari who firmly belives( proudly, I may add) that it’s a women’s right to suffer at the hands of the men in her life. She should suffer and suffer alone. If we are honest enough to admit, you will see a Kanta bai in your family too. She may be your mom, your aunt or your Bhabhi – but she is there.

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