It’s unfair that the rain in Mumbai hogs all the news, so even though the unprecedented cloudburst over Delhi this week was every bit as spectacular, and the traffic jams would have given the financial capital a run for its money, all the media did was gripe about drains and silting and pinning the blame on somebody instead of passing the buck. It’s true that, unlike Mumbai, you’d be hard put to find stories of people helping each other during the course of the flooding — the Delhi driver was more likely to run you over than extend a helping hand — but even so, it was a momentous event that required more human interest coverage.
Human interest was high in our car, as we remained stuck in a gridlock of traffic, surrounded by swirling filth that was more likely to be the backwash of sewage than rainwater. The traffic signals had failed, the traffic cops had presumably been washed away by the deluge, there were no street lights, and it was raining down so hard on the car’s roof, we could no longer hear the car radio. We had been on a Florence Nightingale visit and were now on our way back home, and my wife was already both upset and hungry.
“I should have kept back something to eat,” she shouted over the downpour, ruing the packet of goodies we’d left with the patient. “Tut-tut,” I said, “we’ll soon be out, don’t worry — besides, we do have emergency rations in the car.” It was lucky happenstance that the grocery we’d shopped for earlier was still in the car, and while most of it was in the boot, some of it was lying on the back seat: Enough to appease the hunger of a small army, certainly.
As I concentrated on inching forward, was scratched on the fender by a Qualis, had the side mirror smashed by a passing bus, and was bumped by a scooter rickshaw, my wife made a meal of a packet of almonds. “Not too good,” she said, foraging through several packets of biscuits before settling on bourbons as her choice, alternating between bites of chips and coated peanuts. “Here,” she thrust a fistful of foodstuff in my direction, which I had to decline — any loss in concentration would have meant the difference between staying aground or afloat.
Having eaten her fill, but finding us within metres of the start of the jam, she sighed in boredom and said she might as well pass the time speaking to people. She called her brother in the US to report that we were stuck in the rain, and since we paid our tax in time, the least the chief minister could do was send out rescue helicopters. She called her mother to complain that had I listened to her and taken an alternate route, we might be home and dry. She called her mother-in-law to report what she had said to her mother. She called my sister and her sister, our son, a friend in Greece unmindful of the time difference, and was upset when a neighbour was not at home to take her call because she, too, was stuck somewhere in a jam.
We hadn’t moved three kilometers in three hours, and seemed likely to spend the night on the road, when she said, “If it’s all right with you, can you please take me to a pay toilet, I need to use the facilities,” adding somewhat unnecessarily, “It’s urgent.” In another half hour we were home, during which time there were no more telephone calls or conversation, only a pained silence. Exhausted, I poured myself a drink, to find my wife telling our daughter, “If it wasn’t to keep your father company, I would have walked home a long while ago.”
