215. Air India Flight Attendants
Air India en route to Delhi, a trio of flight attendants pushed their serving carts down the same aisle, dispensing drinks and chilly smiles before creating a traffic jam at row 37. Was it their first day on the job?
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Air India en route to Delhi, a trio of flight attendants pushed their serving carts down the same aisle, dispensing drinks and chilly smiles before creating a traffic jam at row 37. Was it their first day on the job?
His was the first auto-rickshaw in the queue. He chatted with us as he negotiated the Delhi traffic. Then he negotiated with us – we should hire him to tour us around Delhi for the day. Persistent beyond belief, we agreed.
Paula loves her job as a tour leader. She enthusiastically raves about everything we’re going to do and see on our trip. She shares funny anecdotes starring past tourists in embarrassing roles. I wonder what stories she’s telling about us.
Sarah’s on a 5-month excursion. India is her proving ground and she proves concerned about illness. Hands are disinfected with foamy cleanser. She refuses the delicious street foods; won’t eat in the roadside dabahs. What kind of holiday is that?
Something about people from Perth is that they play things close their vest. Sam is a quiet observer, sitting surveying us. I wonder if she judges me harshly for being talkative. By the second week, she reveals she’s a mum.
Sue is a cutthroat Uno player. My grandmothers would have loved her crafty strategies and her wicked, gleeful giggle when she wins a hand and tallies her score. She inspired us to buy Uno cards and kick up our competitiveness.
She wailed “My baby!” when her son announced we’d marry. Unfortunate, unintentional emotional bruising followed; hey, he was my baby, too. It’s taken many years of mutual mellowing (and 6500 miles of distance, perhaps) but we get along great now.
An aging, weathered man in clean but faded clothes asked us a question at the gudawara. When we answered “Japan”, he reminisced about his travels there. Then we discussed a grammatical error on a poster. Certainly not what I expected.
Smiling broadly, Alu anointed us with red paste, “Our guests are gods.” She let us try making chapatti then dished up a feast, serving Sai Baba, the real family god, before we enjoyed her laboriously prepared curries and carmelised kir.
Savitri stood with her parents when we came in then retreated to a safe distance. Clad in a yellow salwar kameez, her eyes glittered as she watched us. I tried to ask questions about school, but she gently, girlishly demurred.
Raju plucked my hand and gestured with his springy head, “Come dance!” I made a poor partner to his wild gyrations and fluid spinning. Ten years old, he comes from the village to perform Rajistani dances for tourists at dinnertime.
JP presides over the metal thali at Ajay’s restaurant, filling little dishes with his homemade yogurt and five-year fermented lemon pickle. He ensures we all have condiments in abundance. His grey mustache curls across his cheeks like a Hindu god's.
Jun is the once glimpsed daughter of a friend. She has her mother’s creamy complexion plus her father’s height and beaky nose, which makes me believe she’s going to be a self-confident knockout in a couple more years. Beware, boys!
I met Marn as a preteen. Then she was a troubled college student, an on-track career woman and now she’s a working mother. 18 years have passed and even though we’re in the same family, we only ever meet anew.
Dr. Arora sat at Tod’s bedside in Jaipur, taking his history, checking his vitals and chatting about a trip to America. He’s a practical, fatherly general practitioner – offering advice while writing up a prescription without drama or fear of lawsuits.
Shakti’s cooking class in Udaipur was part demo, part hands-on, and part good advice. Beyond the classroom, he’s relaxed and generous, dishing Tod third helpings at breakfast. In the market, he buys from beautiful women who give him extra mouli.
Tarun gave us a tour of his family home. He opened his closets to reveal his wife’s saris hanging in colorful rows and folded in stacks “Women need lots of dresses,” he smiled, proud to treat his wife so well.
Crab is taller, funnier, even sweeter in person than he is as a chat friend. He took a day off to show us one of his favorite Delhi spots, treated us to lunch and invited us back. We’ll come again.
Kaye offered her spare room when I traveled unexpectedly to Adelaide. She drove out to the airport to say hello next time I blew through town. I’m glad to have such a sweet and generous surrogate mum in South Australia.
Kristin, red-headed, right-brained, and full of ideas, is a glass artist who has nearly given up her own art in pursuit of teaching others to explore their creative side. She encourages everyone with happy words, gentle suggestions and sunshine smiles.
Jonathan is surprisingly American, which seems strange for someone who grew up in India and has lived in Japan for 20 years. He does not fully marinate in cultural immersions, but his kitchen marinades trump cultural ones at every party.
Hon-ki was my first encounter with functional illiteracy. She couldn’t read or write even her native Chinese, but she spoke two languages and her schooled children helped her with forms. She cleaned our Singapore accommodation and gave us homemade charsui.
Martha was my intellectual nemesis in high school. She scored 4% better than I did on the SATs and graduated top in our class. At MIT, she shaved her head. I didn’t get around to that til I was 30.
“Sit here next to Don; she can help you today,” said my new teacher. Don? She? Dawn was a plain-looking farm girl as tall and broad as the 4th grade boys. Embarrassed in that initial moment, we never became friends.
By the time I’m called in for impossible deadlines, Scott’s already sleep deprived. He shakes off his exhaustion to ensure that his hard-working staff are taken care of with delivered dinners, snacks, genki drinks - everything he can offer except sleep.
A Lutheran deaconess with a quirky sense of humor, Sr. Louise was also one of the keenest Scrabble players on the planet. Aunt Lou beat the pants off everyone in the family. Her standard Scrabble dictionary was an unabridged Webster.
Squeen wasn’t her real name but she was a grown up and I only knew her as Squeen. Blonde wasn’t her real haircolor either. She let me make cream puffs with the kids and watch Betamax videos when I babysat.
In sixth grade, Lynette was the first girl in class to get breasts. They grew quickly! Most of the rest of us were envious, but I think she was embarrassed by her bounty. By high school others had surpassed her.
In 1968, Guy was my seat in the moving van. I was two. We played with the map while Dad drove. He was also the college-aged son of my father’s new boss in New Jersey. Did he have a guitar?
We met via the well-meaning school crossing guard. He was charming and swarthily handsome but equally jealous and controlling. His goal was to have a child as soon as possible. Mine was to never have babies. We didn’t last long.