Ghenwa the Jewel: A Birpara Tale

by Gowri Mohanakrishnan

 
One of the tough examinations I've had to pass in life was the test set by the servants in my first tea bungalow.

Ghenwa was cook cum head honcho of the world beyond the dining room. He looked like some kind of tribal Amitabh Bachchan: tall, thin, arrogant and unsmiling. He was a handsome man, with thick wavy hair, large brown eyes and lips that could smile when they weren't being curled. He couldn't have been much older than me, but he filled me with nervous fear. 

 

I, who had quelled classrooms of undergraduate students not four years my junior with one look, just weeks before my marriage!

Mohan had been living in the Engineers' Bungalow in Birpara for about a year before we got married. Ghenwa was a trusted aide. Mohan left the running of the bungalow to him, and Ghenwa served him with devotion; in fact he quite doted on him. He felt let-down when Mohan produced a bride at the end of one 'chhutti'. From Ghenwa's point of view - I see it now - it meant the end of independence, and a reduction in stature.

 

Mohan didn't want me to bother with the kitchen for the first few days. I was grateful only because I was too chicken to enter Ghenwa's domain. The bearer Joseph was a cute, smiling chap, quite cowed by Ghenwa, like me. He became an ally. He'd serve our breakfast in smiling silence while Ghenwa, after finishing up the cooking and delegating toast making to some unseen hands, would enter the dining room in state and take up his position at Mohan's right hand. He would stand there and declaim - a sort of daily round-up or news bulletin - in what was a strange lingo to me, and Mohan would reply in the same lingo. If Ghenwa wanted to make me feel left out, he succeeded. This colloquy would continue until Mohan asked him in Hindi what he was going to serve Memsaab for lunch. 

The first time I ventured into Ghenwa's store and pantry, I made a hesitant suggestion about the food. He gave me the full Amitabh Bachchan stare, and said by all means, I was free to issue any commands, but he could not guarantee that his saheb would like what I suggested. I fled.

 

I was the encroacher in his little kingdom, and I was too ashamed to tell my new husband how inadequate Ghenwa made me feel. His hafta chutti was probably the happiest day of my week. 

Once this tyrant went home at night, the chowkidaar took over as my chief tormentor. Etowah - that was his name - stole everything that wasn't nailed to the floor. Mohan told me how he'd served him tea one chilly morning wearing his - Mohan's - socks. When Mohan bellowed at him, Etowah swore those were the socks that a departing Chhota Saab had presented him many years ago. 

 

Another time, Mohan surprised him when he had his head in the fridge and several fingers in a bowl of custard! Etowah could also make sugar and milk disappear from bowls without a trace. 

I was wretched. What kind of administrator was I, who couldn't even keep house for two without losing potatoes, onions, oil, milk and sugar by the kilo?

Life wasn't all housekeeping, though, and we had a lot of fun. Also, there were others like me, new to tea and with similar tales of woe. We all met regularly at the club or at one another's bungalows. 

There was a tradition of people coming in from the club in the wee hours to torment newly-weds in the district. We had our turn too. It must have been two thirty in the morning, when we woke to the sound of several cars honking outside our gate. We could hear voices yelling, 'Open up'! Once the crowd of merry makers was in the bungalow, there was much leg-pulling and ribald laughter, and it was impossible to feel anything but happy. Everyone clamoured for coffee. Of course, coffee! That was the reason they'd all 'dropped in' barely two hours after we'd said goodnight, for an early morning cup of coffee!

I wasn't embarrassed when they'd all pounded on our bedroom door and asked how much time we needed to dress, but now, I was red in the face. By now, I thought, Etowa would have drunk every last drop of milk, copiously sweetened with every grain of sugar in the bungalow. Still, I rang the bell and weakly asked him to bring coffee. Everyone around me continued to shout with laughter and have a good time while I sat and waited for the ground to open and swallow me up. What was Etowa going to serve ? There must have been a dozen people there!

The door swung open and in he sailed, with my best (wedding present) cups on a tray, each filled to the brim with frothy and fragrant coffee. The sugar bowl was full, too. My nightmare was suddenly magicked into a happy dream! Today the man had changed his act: he was making things appear and not vanish!

Some months passed, with one or two more riotous night time invasions. These were no 'intrusions of privacy'. We didn't know what privacy was in those days, and I don't think we'd have cared much for it. What we had instead was community - a family that pulled you into its fold - in a world far away from home. If loss of privacy was the price we paid to belong, we were happy to pay in those days!! 

'Family' Picnic

Ghenwa continued to dazzle and hold sway, and he must have been satisfied with my state of surrender. I had a brand new mixi and he had skill, and we'd started calling people over to eat. On one Sunday, we asked one of Mohan's oldest bachelor friends to breakfast. He'd - let's just call him B - he'd left Lankapara early in the morning and run into a colleague - T -in Birpara town. When he heard where B was headed, T called him a lucky man and said he felt like eating dosas too, so would he tell Mohan and Gowri that he'd be along soon with whoever was at the club?

 

That was T's style. Our club – well, all our tea clubs - were filled with eccentrics, both men and women. I could just visualise T going into Dalgaon club and standing at the entrance, announcing, 'Everyone's invited to Mohan and Gowri's bungalow for dosas! Chalo!!!' When B told us about this, my jaw dropped in horror. I could provide dosas, chutney, sambar et al for another couple of people, say three more at the outside, but the early morning tennis crowd from Dalgaon Club?? What kind of disastrous life had I let myself in for when I married this happy-go-lucky moustachioed man? 

The man turned out to be as big a crack-pot as any of his nutty friends. He laughed!! He summoned Ghenwa and told him to expect another dozen people and said, 'Tum pugaa do; sab ko khilayega!' (stretch your resources, feed everyone). He looked at me and said, 'Relax! Our man will manage!' What blind faith, I thought. Ghenwa piped in, 'Hum pugai dega, Memsaab! Aap log pehle kha lega!' ( I will manage! you should all eat first!') at which Mohan and friend B, the invited guest, expressed complete agreement. 

By this time, Burra Saab's jeep had rolled in, and Jusep Driver had unloaded a case of beer. Burra Saab and Memsaab would be along soon, he said, but they wanted us to chill the beer. I was fretting about place settings at the table but the two mad men in my bungalow urged me to eat quickly, and I remember I did eat, even though it choked me to think of what would happen when the crowds arrived.

It was Ghenwa's show all the way. In great good humour, he even treated me with kindness, bringing me my coffee himself with an air of deference. I was in shock, I think. 

 

The crowds came. Burra Saab and Memsaab, a few friends, some tennis players I knew only by sight and of course the villainous T. Ghenwa fed them all until they swore they'd had enough. 'Excellent!' 'Brilliant!' 'Genuine South Indian taste!' was what I kept hearing. The ladies wanted their coffee in what they called 'those little south Indian glasses and katories'. They got what they wanted. After coffee, beer flowed. Burra Saab and Memsaab were full of praise and thanks for a wonderful morning. 

 

Ghenwa had ensured that I didn't enter the kitchen, and I honestly have no idea, to this day, how he managed that show.  

Meet The Writer/Editor: Gowri Mohanakrishnan  

 I was teaching English at Indraprashta College in Delhi when I met and married my tea planter husband in 1986. He brought me to the tea gardens - a completely different world from the one I knew! Life in tea continues to be unique, and I began writing about ours many years ago.

Early in 2018, I started Indian Chai Stories to collect and preserve other people's stories from tea.

The first chai stories I ever wrote were for a magazine called 'Reach Out' which Joyshri Lobo started in the mid eighties for the Dooars planters. Some years later, Shalini Mehra started 'The Camellia' and I started writing there regularly. Shalini put me in touch with David Air, the editor of Koi-Hai, who gave me a page there.  My family has always believed that I can write, and that is what keeps me going, whether I agree with them or not.

Here is the link to all the stories I have written at Indian Chai Stories - https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/search/label/Gowri%20Mohanakrishnan

Is this your first visit here? Welcome to Indian Chai Stories! 
Do you have a chai story of your own to share? Send it to me here, please : indianchaistories@gmail.com. 

 

My name is Gowri Mohanakrishnan and I'm a tea planter's wife. I started this blog because one of the things that I wouldn't want us to lose in a fast changing world is the tea story - a story always told with great seriousness, no matter how funny - always true (always), maybe a tall tale; maybe long, short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull. You will find yourself transported to another world! 
 
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