Sunday afternoons were sacrosanct for my family, especially the last Sunday of the month as far as the children were concerned. All Sundays were special as the family had a meal together without the hassles of timetables, deadlines and school lunches. But the last Sunday was the crown of the month for the children were promised icecreams in the evening. In those days, the only outlet in Cochin where one could get real icecream was called Dacca cream. The Sunday treat was funded by money saved up through the month by living on a tight budget, and the ray of sunshine that the next day would be pay day.
On one such Sunday afternoon, our siesta was disturbed by the doorbell. I found a tall, lanky man with a five-day stubble, dusty and begrimed, almost collapsing on the door step. He asked for pani. I understood and called for my husband. As I brought him a jug of water, I could gauge from his demeanour that he was no charlatan. He was stuttering and it was clear that he was famished.
So the first thing I did was to send my my seven-year-old daughter, who was being coached early in life civilities of social behaviour, to fetch him some tea. She brought a tray with hot tea and slices of bread and jam, which he wolfed down.
Now his story emerged. He was from Hyderabad, a welder and had come to town with a contractor for a job. He was housed with six others in cramped quarters far from the worksite. None of them had been paid for a month, although they were supplied with food rations. They would be taken to the worksite by lorry but one day when the conveyance didn’t come, they walked to the site which was under lock and key. The contractor had decamped with his machinery and the security man chased them away.
Mohammed Ali — for that was his name — had started walking along the highway knocking at workshop doors for a job. He drank water to ease his hunger and slept at bus shelters in the night. One day, he was given my husband’s name and address. Someone had told him about the small-scale industrial workshop my husband had.
Since Keralites can speak a smattering of Hindi (thanks to Bollywood) he had been guided to our doorstep. He said that all he needed was a job till he could go home. His father had a small shop and maybe he could try to eke out a living there. There shone through his words a glimpse of decency and humility. Unfortunately there was no job available.
Suddenly, we suggested we would pay his train fare home. His face lit up and he laid his stack of certificates, diplomas and character references, all in the original, at our feet. “Keep them with you, sir, till I repay the money,” he said. But we were no loan sharks.
It was the end of the month and all we had was the cash to pay for five Dacca icecreams. The children were taken into confidence and a family search through the house helped us to scrape together enough for a ticket to Hyderabad and a couple of rupees for chai and snacks.
He asked for our address to repay us but was told that he could, if he wished, hand it to my father in Secunderabad when he could. He left after touching our feet and patting the children.
I squashed out all doubts that we had been taken for a ride. All was forgotten in a few weeks but we had to shell out for double Dacca icecreams to our homegrown Shylocks.
Three months later I got a trunk call from my father who said a young man named Mohammed Ali had located them and repaid our money. He said that we should be told that he had got a good job in an engineering firm. Months later on Ramadan, he turned up at my father’s home with a large container of Hyderabadi Biriyani. He said it was an offering of love. My father dissuaded him from such largesse but he didn’t give up his odyssey for almost six years. And as long as my parents were there he took them baskets of the choicest grapes in season, flavourful biriyani, and Hyderabadi sweetmeats.
The climax came 13 years later when a well-dressed, barely recognisable Mohammed Ali came calling one Sunday afternoon. This time, in English, he told us he was on his way to Dubai for a business project. He showed us photos of his young wife and his baby daughter Saira Banu. Like a long lost brother he caressed our teenagers’ shoulders and pulled out from his pocket the most elegant filigreed golden jhumkas which he placed in my daughter’s hands. He told her, “It’s for you my small behen who gave me tea and jam sandwiches that day.”
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