Fear is not Pink

The first time I called a man 'bastard' in public was at a bus stand. I am small in physical stature. That man seemed to me to be a giant. It could have been my perception. It could have been my fear projecting its gigantic shadow on him. But I vividly remember the enormous bulk of a man clad in a blue checked lungi and a dishevelled white shirt. He thrust his hands between my legs as he walked past. I was paralysed by fear and my mind went into damage control mode by telling me it was probably a misconception - maybe it had been a genuine accident. Then he walked by again. And did it again. This time, before I could even formulate my thoughts, I heard myself shouting 'BASTARD' and felt myself breaking into a run after his receding figure. That hulk of a man started running as well. I could not believe it - 46 kgs of my tiny frame racing after at least 90 kgs of bearded, putrid humanity. Around me the bus stand stood still as though in freeze frame. I know there was a mild afternoon breeze rustling the scattered bits of paper and leaves in the unclean bus stand. Buses were revving. Dozens of people waiting for their buses seemed to be either in a stupor or wearing blinkers to the sight of a chit of a college girl running after a heavy middle-aged man. My tormentor disappeared into one of the narrow alleys leading out of the bus stand. My better senses told me it would be foolhardy to follow him. My sense of self, wounded, my faith in humanity punctured, I boarded a bus for home. The minute I got there and saw my mother, I burst into tears.

Fear is not a quintessentially feminine quality. It is ugly and vicious; it mutilates your sense of physical and mental well-being, takes control of your emotions and pummels them all into one single entity - the feeling that your existence is threatened, either in its physical aspect or in its state of feeling at ease with the world around it. The feeling of fear experienced by an infant exposed to a sudden loud sound, by the inexperienced swimmer thrown into the deep end, by prey being stalked by a large, hungry wild animal - they vary only in degrees, their nature is all the same. The zenith of that fear is what Soumya experienced. And the girl in Delhi we christened 'Nirbhaya' - the one without fear - for she had scaled the ultimate fear and survived long enough to say 'I want them hanged' before she left all fear and all pain behind forever. Much as Soumya did. These two names have become immortalised in our collective consciousness as representing that fear that every woman experiences, every single day of her existence. The fear that she may not make it through the day with her identity, her physical integrity and her self-perceptions intact.

Is there a woman out there who does not have such a story to share? I am yet to meet one who does not! That time in the bus stand was not the first time I was subjected to what we have learnt to simplify as 'eve-teasing'. Nor was it the last. But it was the first time I had been propelled to react. The first time I realised the perpetrators of such acts were mere cowards who would run away if confronted. The first time I learnt that my fear could be overcome. I never allowed myself to forget that or those people in the freeze frame of that day who allowed a grown man to get away with harassing a barely-out-of-school girl. Fear of that man and fear of turning into those people was an invisible black badge I wore on my sleeve to remind myself not to be scared.

I was mother to a baby girl when I was confronted by fear of that magnitude again. I was travelling in a three-tier AC compartment on official duty by a night train to Kannur. I could never relax in trains - to me they seemed to blur the boundaries of personal space far more  any other mode of public transport. Also, I was to arrive at my destination at 4am - another reason for me to stay fitfully awake. On the upper berth opposite mine was a young girl - maybe late teens or early twenties and in the middle berth was her mother. As the train lurched at some point in the night I saw a person climb the steel ladder to the upper berth. I wanted to tell him the berth was occupied but did not want to risk waking anyone. The person climbed all the way into the berth and I found that strange - if he just wanted to check if it was available wouldn't it suffice to just stand at the edge? Suddenly the figure scampered back down the ladder and slunk into the side berth in the next section of seats and in the upper berth the young girl sat bolt upright. I could see her wide open eyes and the fear in them; I could see her panting from the rude, violent awakening from deep sleep; I could see disgust, anger, loathing, revulsion in that face. I looked at the side berth in the next section and my eyes directly met those of the perpetrator. He had sensed I had been awake and was staring coldly back at me. I turned my gaze back to the girl. I could not get her haunted eyes out of my mind. I realised I could not live with myself if I became one of those people in the bus stand all those years ago.

In a few minutes, the train pulled into Kozhikode station. I hurriedly got off my berth and started walking to the next compartment in the hope of finding someone in authority - a security guard, a TTE, maybe even a policeman. I knew the man was following me at a slight distance and images of women flung off trains flashed through my mind. I could not risk getting off the train at any cost. I kept walking till finally, I came across a guard in uniform. In a voice much louder than necessary I told him, 'I need to lodge a complaint. A man in my compartment harassed a young girl in the berth next to mine.' A few of the passengers quickly gathered around as I had hoped they would. From the corner of my eye, I could see the man beat a hasty retreat. The guard and the other passengers escorted me back to my compartment where I walked up to the girl who was still sitting up, hugging her knees and said, 'I saw what happened. Would you like to lodge a complaint?' She stared at me uncomprehending. Her mother, who was in the middle berth only now got the gist of what had happened and she quickly took control of the situation. She almost pleadingly said, 'We don't want to lodge any complaint. We just want to get on with the journey.' She did not ask her daughter for her opinion. The guard and the other passengers dispersed with the assurance that they would keep an eye on the man for the rest of the journey. Till I got off the train at Kannur, I could sense cold, furious eyes on me. I was scared. But far more than the fear was the gratification that I had managed to shame a pervert enough to ensure he would think twice before indulging in such acts again.

There is fear that paralyses you. And then there is the fear that forces you to face it head on because there is nowhere to run. Each time you are faced with a fear that threatens your self-respect or integrity, perhaps the reminder that there is something greater at stake than fear itself will give us the wings to soar above it. For me, it was the face of my daughter, then two years old. And the hope that some day when she is on a night train, someone will be awake and will get over their own fears to offer her solidarity and a sense of security.

A Coffee Lover's Testimonial

7 beans. That is where the magic is said to have originated. I am imagining that it must have been a chilly morning, golden sunshine penetrating the gossamer veil of mist hanging over the lush green hills of Chikmagalur, that dawn when Baba Budan sowed the seven mysterious beans he had smuggled from the whimsically named port of Mocha. And there began the romance that permeated centuries with its enticing aroma and woke generations after generations to inner peace, harmony and wellness. 

Wake up and smell the tea, said no one ever! There is just something about that lingering aroma of a piping hot cup of coffee that rouses the mind, awakens the inner eye to the minutest red of the rising sun and makes you feel like everything is in its rightful place and all is well with the world. There is no right time for a coffee, really. As the popular t-shirt slogan goes 'any time is coffee o'clock.' Statistically, there are more people who drink tea than coffee on earth and yet, tea has nowhere near the emotive appeal, the sensuousness, the symbolism that coffee has. Perhaps it has something to do with the depth of flavour, the richness of taste, the willingness to reinvent itself that coffee has always displayed. That is why it rolls easier off the tongue to say 'shall we discuss this over a cup of coffee?' If all the stories ever related over a cup of coffee were put together, right there you would have the greatest story ever told by any man anywhere.

A person's initiation to coffee is no less of a milestone than first love! It's a rite of passage, almost - a stepping stone to adulthood. In my home, there was a legal age for drinking coffee. My mother was firmly of the opinion that anyone under the age of 18 should have nothing to do with caffeine. Malt or chocolate based milk drinks were fine; plain white milk was ideal. There is a short window, in her calendar, when the children of her house had their first sip of coffee before attaining the age of majority and this was the all-too-crucial Board examinations in the tenth standard. For up to two months leading up to the examinations and for the two weeks of writing it, my sister, brother and I were allowed the adult pleasure of having a thermos of coffee on our study tables. Depending on how long into the night we intended to slave it out, this could go from a single cup to three. Milk was deliberately avoided so we would not develop a taste for the sinful brew. And as soon as the exams concluded so did the childhood tryst with coffee. It was not to be savoured again until we had reached the age when we could lawfully, as per my mother, refuse to drink milk anymore. 

My sister and brother were milk haters. They refused and pleaded and sometimes poured their milk down the drain. They would grab a coffee in the college canteen. Or when out with their friends and sometimes right there at home when my mom wasn't looking. But I was the child after her own heart. Not only did I not develop a liking for coffee, I actually was eager to get back to my cup of chocolate milk in the mornings. Every time I remembered the thermos of black coffee, I would remember the involuntary tremors that would set in in my body after the second cup, making it impossible to go to sleep and therefore stretched out my study time into the wee hours of the morning. Perhaps I have coffee to thank for that gold medal I won for being the school topper in those Board examinations.But I was happy enough to let it go.  At that age, I did not appreciate that that short-lived and casual fling with coffee was opening the doors to a lifelong affair of the heart and soul.

It would not be far off the mark to say I was shamed into accepting my first adult cup of coffee. I had just joined for my Master's degree in Law and it seemed like the universally accepted alternative to 'Hi' in Law School was 'Want to get a coffee?' In a matter of only a few days, I had said 'sorry, I don't drink coffee' about five dozen times and been looked at like I was an alien, been cold-shouldered like a social outcast and isolated like I carried the germs of a communicable disease. The icing on the cake was when the venerable Dr. Mitra ordered coffee for all during his common session on Constitutional Law and I meekly volunteered that I did not drink coffee. 'Coffee for 8 and tea for one, then,' he barked into the extension to the canteen. 'Sir, please, no, I don't drink tea either.' He gave me a strange look before speaking into the extension again: 'Coffee for 8 and a cup of milk for the baby.' The class burst into laughter. I just about stopped myself from bursting into tears. Never in my life again have I used the phrase 'I don't drink coffee' and how much richer my life emerged for that! Thank you and your affable insult, Dr. Mitra! 

From then on it was honeymoon for coffee and me. Coffee before and after every seminar, coffee with my guide for paper presentations and discussions. Coffee for morning and coffee for late nights. By the time I left Law School, I was a regular caffeine junkie! Over the years, I have toned down and settled for less caffeine but even now, one of the few things that remain immutable in my life includes my gigantic morning cup of coffee. My love for the frothy brown has also widened to include a love of coffee mugs in an assortment of shapes and colours. The one non-negotiable condition? It should contain nothing less than 300ml of the seductive liquid. 

From exotic Ethiopian Kahwe to Irish fIourish, there is no end to the variety you can experiment with coffee. In terms of pure coffee pleasure and caffeine satisfaction, nothing comes close to a full-bodied South Indian kaapi - the perfect blend of full-fat milk and sugar with the tantalizing richness of satiny, black coffee essence dripping through a bed of freshly roasted and ground coffee beans in a South Indian filter! I am no coffee snob. I am perfectly at ease with my instant coffee too, provided it is the 100% variety and not the mixed types. Just opening up that bottle can fill you with instant calm and positivity! Cappuccino takes second place to its Indian cousin but with some flavorings it can still redeem itself. I am not a fan of latte - it seems like a coffee that cannot make up its mind! Espresso is too heavy for the morning: it is more of a workplace and meetings thing. It's a colleague, not a friend. Someone you can spend hours talking work with but not someone you could open your heart to! And cold coffee! Cold coffee is like that old friend from kindergarten days. You are excited to find them, thrilled to talk to them but after a while run out of conversation with them. It will be a while before you think of calling them again! Would I pay good money to relish a sip of coffee that has at some point passed through the intestines of an elephant or a wild civet cat? Not really. I am good with my gleaming granules of practical instant coffee for my morning nirvana! And thanks, Vidya Varma, for reminding me of that sinful indulgence we popularised in the PG Women's Hostel - coffee with condensed milk! If you have the physical wherewithal to give it a shot (and what a shot it is!) indulge yourself with some creamy, sweet condensed milk coffee for pure, luxurious relaxation!

For an unexpected date with my husband, a chance meeting with friends, nothing comes close to a cup of coffee to set the mood and pace. It takes you through a day when you can't eat. It takes you through a day your appetite took over your senses. It takes you through the tedium of a day full of people, it fills in the vacant spaces of a lonely day at home. A cup of coffee is more than a cup of liquid golden perfection. It is happiness, memories, sunshine, nostalgia, craving, satiation. Gentle on that cup - it is life you hold within!