Kishore Singh: The need for incentive

When it became known that Mary, our cook of many years before she decided to retire, had decided to visit us for a working vacation, friends began to call ahead to book themselves a table for dinner. That would have been fine except my wife was travelling at the time and our resident chef decided to take off, leaving poor Mary floundering in an unfamiliar kitchen. Which may be why she mistook quinoa for oats, or chickpea flour for custard - but on the whole, with a few minor hiccups, she had us eating out of her hands.

Mary might have been delighted at the adulation but it brought with it summer guests who, as the heat intensified, sought refuge in our home, so I'd soon collected a ragtag group of gadabouts, all experts in nonsense and trivia. With other friends having fled Delhi, it was hard to escape from their hold. This included the foodie, who insisted we should not deviate from a salad diet in summer no matter what the provocation. I might have taken him seriously if he was not helping himself generously to Mary's Andhra mutton at the time.

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That's the problem with the non-migrant, stay-at-home summer occupant who seems to gather oftener around the watering hole. So my foodie friend, who's also a good deal overweight, decided that a community yoga session in the morning was the only way to galvanise some of us into losing weight. He also decided that the venue for this honourable activity would be my balcony "since you're alone, buddy", though it soon became apparent that the reason it had been moved and seconded was in the hope of Mary offering south Indian breakfasts. On the first day of our appointment, three friends turned up for yoga but a half-dozen timed it for breakfast. By the second day, all pretense had been given up. On the third, most sent their drivers to have their breakfasts collected, as if Mary and I were running a catering service.

It isn't just the greedy I've had to deal with. The long days seem to have turned a few into busybodies. So, Sarla, my wife's best friend, decided that our house needed a makeover and ordered an upholsterer to lay siege over it. Next,Sarla's sofas and chairs were transported here for refurbishing. She offered the upholsterer's services to others and soon the house resembled an interior store and my driver was often sent off in search of foam and glue. When I reminded Sarla that the original premise was to effect some change in my house, here's what she said: "Darling, you don't have the guts to change anything without your wife's permission."

While I do not think of my wife as an easy touch, I'm certainly a softer one. Why else would her friends constantly be borrowing things from me in her absence? Now I'm tasked with making sure that everything is returned before her imminent arrival. My collection list reads like this: an electric kettle, the living room carpet, two pots of crotons and the yellow dinner set from Sarla; the ironing board and a couple of party sarees from a neighbour; the dining table, console, table lamps and a fridge from Padma who had an "interested party" coming home to "see" their daughter; an ice bucket and decanter from Suzy's husband. Maybe I need to throw in a dinner cooked by Mary as an incentive to make sure they turn up with everything that's mine, in time….