A big house with a spacious terrace, wide open area, well manicured lawns, golf course right across, a movie hall in the vicinity besides the canteen and hospital facilities, this is where an Indian army officer, in general, dwells. There are clubs providing the forces' kids recreation. You get a phone, a vehicle and a helper. Not to mention the free ration. You also get rail tickets annually for visiting your home town. Could one possibly ask for more? 'No', you say, but then WHY THE HELL is the army looking at stacks of premature retirement applications piling up higher than the Petronas Towers?!
Well read the fine print... in the correct font size! The huge, beautiful, golf course facing house is given, but subject to availability. That is, the smaller the station , the greater your chances of getting a house. But it's not as if you'll be on the streets during the waiting period! You'll be given a room or two immediately. After a couple of months you'll be given a small house (it could be facing the golf course), and then by the time you are ready to move to the next station, you'll get your dream house. But wait, did you check for seepage on the walls? If you didn't, be warned! It is something the M.E.S has still not found a cure for! And please don't complain about packing and unpacking, that's what the pretty wife is for! Moreover she has help at hand...our helper.
About whom the lesser said, the better. They'll dust the house for you and reassemble everything broken to pieces, in exactly the same way as it was, when you had so lovingly bought it and carefully packed after each tenure. You give them stale rotis to be given to the stray 'gai' grazing outside, he gives it to Maj Ghai, your neighbour! On your way out you ask him to take off the cooker after two whistles, he comes running to ask if you're going out who will whistle??!
And while the pretty wife is packing unpacking, she has to fulfill her obligations towards the army. After all she is using the unit vehicle and using the services of a helper, what is she doing in return? So make her dance however unfit and double left footed she might be. Sing, act, compere, model or whatever it is that catches the senior lady's fancy. And God forbid if she actually happens to be talented! That would spell doom for any career prospects that she might have. "Tell her to leave her job, isn't her husband important for her?"! And oh! she also has to teach pickle making and other antiquated things to wives of jawans, who by the way are more educated than we'd like them to be.
Last, only because the article would otherwise be too big to read, is the free ration. Eggs the size that require to be doubled when measuring for cakes, etc. Rice that needs to be half the required quantity because of its thickness. You feel satiated just on seeing them! The time for pressure cooking the dals would have to be doubled owing to its solid nature. One thing given in large quantities and good quality, just before expiry, is cheese. Amul cheese tins, you could build a jersey cow each month out of the cheese!
I won't discuss the technical aspects of being an officer who is moving out faster than a jersey cow to greener pastures! But its sad. My father was in the army, who took premature retirement. Both my brothers were in the army. One has recently hung his uniform prematurely. I got married in the army, adamantly refusing getting married anywhere else. Last year I prayed that my husband's application for early retirement gets through as early as possible! And we celebrated the night he got the final approval...
Monday, September 8, 2008
Sunday, August 24, 2008
A fauji wife's rough guide to Leh
“I believe some officer has been posted to Leh and his wife is extremely excited about it! I want to meet her...” This was the wife of a senior Air Force officer. The extremely excited wife that she’s talking about was ME! 1992. Our postings after the ATC course in Bangalore were out and almost everybody was seemingly happy going to familiar places, but for me...”Leh? Are families allowed? Where will I stay? With in-laws?(no!) Where will we keep our luggage? How in the world will I live without you?” (We had been married for only a year then and hence the last question!)
For the first few hours that the postings were out, my very life was a question mark. Till a few wise and experienced officers and their wives, God bless them, informed that families were allowed and it wasn’t all that bad a posting. “...wasn’t all that bad”...a ray of hope, “... families were allowed”...the ray was positively brighter! The next couple of days I collected whatever bits of information that I could, you see those were not the days of internet and the likes. And with each bit my hopes grew. “It’s kind of barren but beautiful”, “its colder than you can imagine, but it’ll be an experience”, “you’ll have to stay in the mess, no cooking”(yesss!), “there’s dearth of people there so you get to be a radio jockey easily”! And the wife was extremely excited...”Leh, wow, when?!”
But nothing in the world could have prepared me for Leh. I stepped out of the aircraft and felt the cold air, and quickly inhaled breaths of crisp freshness. I looked around and was engulfed in the spectacular scenic beauty. Not your regular Himalayan flora, neither the regular mountains, but awe-inspiringly different. In fact each mountain seemed to be of a different shade. There was mauve, purple, brown and I swear, pink too. My husband too looked more handsome! Must be the mountain air or the fact that I was seeing him after two months! We then left for our mess. En route we passed the famous Kali temple. It’s rumoured that if you don’t pay a visit within ten days of your arrival, you will be posted back to Leh again! I, of course, very religiously, did not!
One cozy room, thanks to my caring husband, and a view to die for, whichever window you peered through, comprised the housing part. Coursemates and unit folk with whom we chatted and dined together every single day, comprised the living part. The food would come from the mess, remember ‘no cooking’. Yet we wives managed to keep the flame alive for tea, coffee, etc. The containers and tins collected there itself were dutifully handed down to the families newly posted in.
The market was colourful, with curious foreigners, eager faujis and contended ladakhis jostling and bustling around. We often shopped for Buddhist curios and Tibetan handicrafts. Besides brocades and velvet the locals also sold the summer bounty, riper, juicier, greener and bigger than ever fruits and vegetables. Truly paradisiacal.
The summer matured to autumn. The picture became prettier still. It got chilly and the leaves shimmered, glistened and gleamed gold. The trees, in fact, became resplendent treasure troves. Besides gold there was ruby, amber, amethyst, red jasper, tiger’s eye and remnants of emeralds. It must have been here that Keats composed his ode to autumn. It was magical.
And the excitement continued. Each glorious sunrise brought with it more unique experiences than the day before. The stunning scenery changed with the different angles of the sun, with the different seasons. The frigid cold of the winters, the icy winds, the frozen Indus, the frost bitten finger tips, the sun burnt cheeks, the kerosene ‘bukharis’ providing the much required warmth, besides the caps, gloves, socks and sweaters we knitted sitting in the sun, are now all part of the happiest memories of one of the best postings ever.
Its experiences like these and more that enrich us, keeping us contended and making us hard core ‘fauji wives’! We become adaptable, adjustable, universal...we may not have the affluence of the moneyed, but we have opulent and rich souls...to the core. Hard core, like I said!
PS - Sorry, but those who haven’t been posted to such inhospitable places will never understand the excitement!
For the first few hours that the postings were out, my very life was a question mark. Till a few wise and experienced officers and their wives, God bless them, informed that families were allowed and it wasn’t all that bad a posting. “...wasn’t all that bad”...a ray of hope, “... families were allowed”...the ray was positively brighter! The next couple of days I collected whatever bits of information that I could, you see those were not the days of internet and the likes. And with each bit my hopes grew. “It’s kind of barren but beautiful”, “its colder than you can imagine, but it’ll be an experience”, “you’ll have to stay in the mess, no cooking”(yesss!), “there’s dearth of people there so you get to be a radio jockey easily”! And the wife was extremely excited...”Leh, wow, when?!”
But nothing in the world could have prepared me for Leh. I stepped out of the aircraft and felt the cold air, and quickly inhaled breaths of crisp freshness. I looked around and was engulfed in the spectacular scenic beauty. Not your regular Himalayan flora, neither the regular mountains, but awe-inspiringly different. In fact each mountain seemed to be of a different shade. There was mauve, purple, brown and I swear, pink too. My husband too looked more handsome! Must be the mountain air or the fact that I was seeing him after two months! We then left for our mess. En route we passed the famous Kali temple. It’s rumoured that if you don’t pay a visit within ten days of your arrival, you will be posted back to Leh again! I, of course, very religiously, did not!
One cozy room, thanks to my caring husband, and a view to die for, whichever window you peered through, comprised the housing part. Coursemates and unit folk with whom we chatted and dined together every single day, comprised the living part. The food would come from the mess, remember ‘no cooking’. Yet we wives managed to keep the flame alive for tea, coffee, etc. The containers and tins collected there itself were dutifully handed down to the families newly posted in.
The market was colourful, with curious foreigners, eager faujis and contended ladakhis jostling and bustling around. We often shopped for Buddhist curios and Tibetan handicrafts. Besides brocades and velvet the locals also sold the summer bounty, riper, juicier, greener and bigger than ever fruits and vegetables. Truly paradisiacal.
The summer matured to autumn. The picture became prettier still. It got chilly and the leaves shimmered, glistened and gleamed gold. The trees, in fact, became resplendent treasure troves. Besides gold there was ruby, amber, amethyst, red jasper, tiger’s eye and remnants of emeralds. It must have been here that Keats composed his ode to autumn. It was magical.
And the excitement continued. Each glorious sunrise brought with it more unique experiences than the day before. The stunning scenery changed with the different angles of the sun, with the different seasons. The frigid cold of the winters, the icy winds, the frozen Indus, the frost bitten finger tips, the sun burnt cheeks, the kerosene ‘bukharis’ providing the much required warmth, besides the caps, gloves, socks and sweaters we knitted sitting in the sun, are now all part of the happiest memories of one of the best postings ever.
Its experiences like these and more that enrich us, keeping us contended and making us hard core ‘fauji wives’! We become adaptable, adjustable, universal...we may not have the affluence of the moneyed, but we have opulent and rich souls...to the core. Hard core, like I said!
PS - Sorry, but those who haven’t been posted to such inhospitable places will never understand the excitement!
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