MBAs, BOP & Acronyms

Hello again, dear friends! Sunday evening and I know we need a mood lifter right now. Well, Rajesh Thomas brings us a few much needed laughs and shares some interesting facts in this enjoyable piece! Happy reading.

by Rajesh Thomas

A thought that echoes through the hallowed corridors of the Head Offices is that what is lacking in the plantation industry is new ideas. But the sage wisdom passed on by successful old timers says that planting is primarily man management with large doses of commonsense, interspersed with attention to detail, something most of us learn the hard way and some of us when it is too late.

In one of the larger planting companies of South India, the Head Office in its infinite wisdom thought a good way to upgrade the talent pool of the mangers on the estates was to induct some of the new-fangled MBAs from the IIMs as assistant managers. Little realizing that these highly qualified MBAs may not be suited to planting and degrees do not mean a thing on the estates unless the people who hold them have an aptitude for the life. Anyway a few of these whiz kids eventually landed up for interviews.

In one of my previous stories I had mentioned about the interview process ( called the extension interview ) in the South Indian tea companies where the candidates are required to spend three or four days staying with the estate managers, wherein they are assessed of their suitability first hand.Please see 'The Interview' http://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/2019/04/the-interview.html and 'The Extension Interview' by my good friend V.R.Srikanth http://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/2019/07/the-extension-interview.html . These stories shed more light on the extension interview.

So, during the extension interview the candidates were taken to the field and the factory by the respective managers or assistant managers and learned a bit about how things work in a tea estate. Coming from the big city life on the estate was very different and fascinating to them. One of the candidates after his first visit to the factory and on his field visit with his manager, where the manager was explaining the field numbers, the young tyro asked him, "Now tell me from which fields you get the BOP grade?", leaving a rather bewildered manager to explain that all grades come from all fields.

This experiment came to nought before it started, when during the final interview, the General Manager (a very senior planter, who had spent his entire career in planting and was a few years short of  retirement) asked one of the candidates whether he had any questions for him. The only question the management prodigy had was, "All this bungalow, servants and clubs are nice but tell me how long will it take for me to sit in your chair?" leaving the venerable senior rather shaken.

Another planting company was looking for additional sources to augment income from estates and it was decided to venture into a bit of horticulture from areas unsuitable for tea cultivation within the gardens. The Bird of Paradise plant was selected to be grown, as it was thought to be hardy and the flower was supposed to command astronomical prices among the florists. Bird of Paradise flowers resemble a brightly colored bird in flight and in some places, they are also called the crane flower for the same reason.

As it was found, mentioning Bird of Paradise plant in correspondences and instructions a little tedious, it was abbreviated to BOP plant.

With work progressing on the planting of BOP plants, the D day arrived when the first lorry load of BOP plants arrived at the estate amidst a lot of excitement. The Tea Maker (equivalent of the Factory Babu in the north) burst into the estate office animatedly and exclaimed “I heard a new clone that produces only BOP grade has arrived and I want to see the plants “. The BOP plants like the MBA graduates turned into a wash out, this time due to marauding herds of Indian Gaur and troops of monkeys.

*BOP (Broken Orange Pekoe ) is a grade of tea, which is commonly used in tea bags and for every day use. The origin of the word "pekoe" is uncertain. One explanation is that it is derived from the transliterated mispronunciation of the Amoy dialect word for a Chinese tea known as "white down/hair". This refers to the down-like white "hairs" on the youngest leaf buds. Another hypothesis is that the term derives from the Chinese báihuā "white flower" and refers to the bud content of pekoe tea. Sir Thomas Lipton, the 19th-century British tea magnate, is widely credited with popularizing, if not inventing, the term "orange pekoe", which seems to have no Chinese precedent, for Western markets. The "orange" in orange pekoe is sometimes mistaken to mean the tea has been flavoured with orange, orange oils, or is otherwise associated with oranges. However, the word "orange" is unrelated to the tea's flavor.] There are two explanations for its meaning, though neither is definitive:

The Dutch House of Orange-Nassau, now the royal family, was already the most respected aristocratic family in the days of the Dutch Republic, and came to control the de facto head of state position of Holland. The Dutch East India Company played a central role in bringing tea to Europe and may have marketed the tea as "orange" to suggest association with the House of Orange.

Colour: The copper colour of a high-quality, oxidized leaf before drying, or the final bright orange colour of the dried pekoes in the finished tea may be related to the name. 

Meet the writer:

 Rajesh Thomas introduces himself:
"A second generation planter. Born and grew up in the planting districts of Southern India. Started my career in the High Ranges and Annamallais Planting Districts for twelve years. Had a stint in Africa for two years. Since 2009 been planting in the Nilgiris.

Read all of Rajesh's stories at this link: https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/search/label/J.Rajesh%20Thomas

ADD THIS LINK TO YOUR FAVOURITES : https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/Indian Chai Stories.
Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea! 

 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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull.
 Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea!

 

Here Comes the Bride!

Hello, friends! Here is another delightful read from Sarita Dasgupta. I'm sure it will brighten up your Friday evening!

by Sarita Dasgupta

Truth be told, I had not wanted to marry a tea planter. Having grown up as a ‘tea’ child, the grass was definitely greener on the other side – the city. I worked for a while as a trainee copywriter at an ad agency in Kolkata and then as a receptionist at a five-star hotel, trying out both to see which I liked better. Of course, the former won hands down, but then I decided to apply for a scholarship to do my Masters in English at Oxford.

Fate intervened in the form of a certain young tea planter, and within three months of our meeting, we were married, and I was a tea memsahab!

Although slipping into the life of a tea memsahab is perhaps much easier for a tea ‘baby’ than a girl from any other background, it is not without its pitfalls!

When I got married, I didn’t know how to cook. This my husband didn’t believe because he had the vague impression that every woman knows how to cook. Fortunately for me, he had a decent Cook, though I heard later that this individual had planned to leave if I threw my weight around too much. In fact, the cake he baked to welcome me had a rather long message iced on it: “Treat your servants well and they will serve you well.” In the act of cutting the cake, I paused to read the rather long and unusual message (for a wedding cake!) iced all around it. Thank goodness I passed muster, and he stayed on!

One Sunday, when the Cook had gone to the weekly market to buy vegetables, some friends landed up and asked us to join them on a picnic. My head reeled! What could I take for the picnic? Somehow, I managed to make a fish curry (the gravy was as thin and runny as water!) and got the Bearer to boil some rice. Both were edible enough, though I did get a speaking look from my husband when he saw the runny gravy. He realized I had spoken the truth when I’d told him that I couldn’t cook.

It was after this incident that I decided I had to learn to cook. I soon realized that every curry the Cook made tasted the same because he used the same spices for every dish! I leafed through the recipe books I had been given as wedding gifts by helpful family and friends, and tried to teach him, and myself, some dishes.

When I suggested that we try something new, he looked down his nose at me loftily, and pronounced that he had cooked for this sahab and that memsahab, none of whom had had any complaints. All the people he named were conveniently retired and gone, leaving me with no way of corroborating his claims, but I made a tactical retreat for the time being.

I renewed my efforts with great diplomacy and eventually got him to try out new dishes, mollifying him by lavishing praise on his efforts. Eventually, he became quite a virtuoso!

After a few years, he contracted TB and had to be excused from work for three months, during which time I made sure he had a glass of milk and an egg every day, and generally looked after him. Once he was cleared to re-join work, the doctor warned him off alcohol, and, for a few years, he heeded that warning.

Alas, when my husband got his billet at Attareekhat Tea Estate, in Mangaldai District, the Cook took up with a woman who brewed and sold bootleg liqour. He started drinking again, as a result of which, not only did his health suffer, but so did his cooking! After quite a few talking-tos and warnings, much as I was fond of the man, I had to give him an ultimatum – he either gave up alcohol or stopped working with us. Unfortunately, he chose alcohol, and so, much to my sadness and regret, we parted ways after fifteen years.

                                        **************************************************

 An ordeal I still remember was at a cocktail party I attended as a very new bride. It was held in honour of one of the company’s Directors who was visiting the estates. He was a fatherly gentleman (I think one of his daughters was my age) who kindly asked me how I was settling in, and how I spent my time. To my horror, my husband’s boss’ wife, who is a very dear friend today, but whom I could have happily murdered that evening, told him I could sing! Obviously, the gentleman asked me to sing a song.

I tried to demur, but I was drowned out by words of encouragement from the others present, so not wanting to be unsporting, I reluctantly agreed. With a battery of eyes turned expectantly on me, and my horrified husband looking like a hunted animal desperately seeking a place to hide in, I felt my throat close up. As the silence grew longer, I managed to gulp, clear my throat, and start singing a Hindi song with trembling lips and voice. Fortunately, my voice settled after the first few bars, so that I could give a creditable performance, but my lips, and limbs too, kept trembling till the very end. The Director said kindly that I had sung a difficult song very well, and there were encouraging smiles and applause from the others present. Ever since that occasion, whenever I was asked to sing, my husband would have that same hunted look!

Bishnauth Gymkhana Club, Bihu Nite 2009

 

I was barely married for three weeks when the big New Year’s Eve bash was held at East Boroi Club. As we were at Halem Tea Estate, where the club is located, I was asked to help with the decorations and other preparations. It was all great fun and I was really looking forward to my first New Year’s Eve with my husband.

The evening was going really well till a rather tipsy but persistent man kept following me around asking for a dance. My brand new husband was livid and looked as if he was ready to bash the chap’s face in, although the person was a senior (though from a different company). Before a contretemps could occur, a senior planter saw what was happening and stepped in, firmly leading the man away. Thanks to him, I managed to avoid the unpleasant experience of getting on the dance floor with a tottering, tipsy partner on my very first New Year’s Eve as a tea memsahab.

We went on to become good friends with the man in question (who was rather nice when sober) and his wife.

                                  *****************************************************

Three months after our wedding, my husband got transferred from Halem to Monabarie Tea Estate. The bungalow we moved into was previously occupied by a bachelor, so I wasn’t very surprised when I was told that there was only grass growing in the kitchen garden. Imagine my puzzlement when, instead of grass, I saw some kind of plant growing all over the place. The gardeners exchanged shifty looks when I asked them what the plant was, and shuffled their feet in discomfort. Concluding that it was some kind of wild plant they couldn’t identify, I told them to uproot all of them and prepare beds for the vegetables I planned to grow.

It was only later, when I got my leg pulled by others on the estate, that I realized what kind of ‘grass’ was growing in my kitchen garden!

When we got married, my husband had just completed three years of service, so he hadn’t been eligible for a car loan till then. His trusty old motorbike didn’t have anything for a pillion rider to hold onto, so obviously I had to hold onto him whenever we went out together. While passing by workers or clerical staff on the estate’s roads, he would hiss at me to remove my arms from around his waist or my hands from his shoulders. I couldn’t understand why he was embarrassed. I was his wife, after all!

On one occasion I was sitting sideways because I was in a sari, so when we were going past a group of workers and he, predictably, told me to remove my hand from his shoulder, I flatly refused, telling him roundly that his wife’s safety should matter more to him than his misplaced sense of propriety!

I’m sure he was very relieved when a couple of months later, his loan application was approved and we became the proud owners of a black Ambassador bought from his Burra Sahab who was retiring from service. The car had an illustrious history, as it had first belonged to the Visiting Agent of the Company!

Perhaps that’s why it was temperamental – having belonged to senior people, it didn’t relish being used by us plebeians! 

                                       *******************************************************

When we got married, my husband had a beautiful dalmatian who had belonged to his father. When my father-in-law passed away, my husband brought him to Assam. This lovely dog was great company for me on my walks within the estate. Most of the workers passing by on their way home from work just glanced at him warily and gave him a wide berth, but one evening, a woman screamed, “Leopard! Leopard!” and started running. The other workers took off too. I thought she had really seen a leopard (not uncommon in the tea estates) and whistled to our dog, who had bounded after the screaming woman, no doubt thinking it was some kind of a game. He came lolloping back to me, and keeping a sharp eye out for the leopard, I started walking home as fast as I could. When I recounted the story to my husband later, he gave a shout of laughter and said that our sweet dalmatian had been mistaken for a leopard because of his spots!

After that, I made it a point to reassure passing workers that he was my dog, and not a leopard before any nervous person among them set up a hue and cry!

*** Towards the end of my first year of marriage, our daughter was born, and I transitioned from Bride to Mother… and that, as the saying goes, is a whole other story!

Meet the writer: Sarita Dasgupta

Sarita enjoying a warm cup of Kawakawa tea in New Zealand. 

Read about it here

 

"As a ‘chai ka baby’ (and grandbaby!) and then a ‘chai ka memsahab’, I sometimes wonder if I have tea running through my veins! 

I have been writing for as long as can remember – not only my reminiscences about life in ‘tea’ but also skits, plays, and short stories. My plays and musicals have been performed by school children in Guwahati, Kolkata and Pune, and my first collection of short stories for children, called Feathered Friends, was published by Amazing Reads (India Book Distributors) in 2016. My Rainbow Reader series of English text books and work books have been selected as the prescribed text for Classes I to IV by the Meghalaya Board of School Education for the 2018-2019 academic session, and I have now started writing another series for the same publisher.

More stories by Sarita here : https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/search/label/Sarita%20Dasgupta

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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull. You will find yourself transported to another world! 
 
Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea!
ADD THIS LINK TO YOUR FAVOURITES : 

https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/

 

Company Dak

 by Suresh Bakshi

Hello again, dear readers! I'm happy to welcome Suresh Bakshi to Indian Chai Stories. Here are two delightful pieces he has written from a visiting "company sahib's" point of view. Looking forward to reading many more tales from you, Suresh! 

The Clarification 

None of us noticed the expenditure being debited under CAT Account; presumably because the tea estates were going through an unusual year of high profitability and the expenditure so debited was relatively insubstantial. Till of course the boom subsided and cost control became the operative word. None of us in the Head Office knew anything about this 'CAT account. 

Coats and Trousers ? - uniforms for the hospital staff perhaps - Cutters and Tools? Carpenter and Timber? Coal and Tar? These were some of the names the abbreviations suggested.

 Matters of import necessitated a visit upcountry, and after visiting the tea growing areas and the factory, Tim Monroe - the Estate Manager - and I sat in the office. I mentioned to him the decline in prices, the stagnant crop situation, the increase in both labour and material costs and that the Board, polite as ever, had nonetheless made it clear that profit projections had to be realised. We mulled over various problems and finally agreed that profits as budgeted could be achieved by effecting savings on non essential expenditure.

After the day's work was done Tim and I were in the Bungalow, he enjoying a whisky soda and I a beer and in passing I mentioned, ' Forgive my ignorance Tim', I said 'In all these many years its only now that I have learnt of the CAT Account. What expenses are these - Would you be knowing off hand ?!

A puzzled look came over him and he hummed as he thought and took some time to answer. "Oh the CAT Account - expenditure for the milk and the fish - for the cats in the food-grains godown. They look after the rats you know".

"Oh come Tim," I said with disbelief "surely we can't be spending so much on fish and milk for the cats that eat the rats." Tim said he would check with the Head Clerk and clarify before my departure from the estate.

I stayed with Tim and his wife Bessie for three days and was served the most delicious milk based puddings and the most delectable and varied selection of fish dishes each day for lunch and dinner. 

The Receiving End

I am emptying my office desk now; retirement has finally come. Some files have letters seen by none than me. Very private and confidential. Those not required by my successor are best destroyed; of this I think I will be the sole arbiter - I opened the file and I will be its destroyer. One is an old file opened some 30 years prior, the cover a mellowish brown and the papers darkened by age and by the gloom of their preserve.

Oh the naughty indescretions! These secrets are best destroyed and in they go to the shredder. I am about to destroy this particular letter but reader you may wish to share its contents. Old Tom Mackintosh of Morabund Tea Estate - dead for some years now, and the estate too sold. He had addressed it to me by name :

" I have to confirm my telegram of today's date reading 'Most urgent airfreight one dozen Aersol Insecticide Bombs, overrun by cockroaches'.

The above are required immediately to control the hoards of cockroaches and fleas which infect this Bungalow The condition of the cook house and surrounds is disgraceful. There is no excuse for the waste,ashes and debris of many months being left in the back compound. A tractor trailer has been working for a whole week and the area remains half cleared. Scavening dogs are in permanent residence.

A new kitchen range (Ray Burn) is required, the old stove being nothing less than a collection of burnt scrap metal.

The bungalow requires considerable repair. Many of the door choukats are rotted inside, only the paint and varnish holding them together.

The hollow spaces left by the rotten wood work and various holes are alive with cockroaches - Sunday's bag amounting to half a kerosene oil tin full. Four cold weather dresses which my wife left out to air last Monday were all eaten by Tuesday - some £50 worth in one night.

The previous Manager has left his trunks etc. locked up in the Bungalow godown, the key for which has been removed by his bearer, whereabouts unknown. Will you please give your immediate consideration and arrange immediate supply.

In conclusion may I remark that it would be a pleasure to be transferred to a bungalow that is well kept. Over the last two years my wife has been forced to assume the role of an unpaid char woman, a character part that is not appreciated."

I beg to remain

your faithful servant 

(TOM) MANAGER"

 

The letter has various exclamation marks but in my hand written notes on the side, sanction had been accorded for the stove and the aerosol cans airfreighted within the week: a notation on the letter reads : 'Wait till the hordes of elephants come in October.' I intend not destroying some letters and will share the many dilemmas faced over the years with readers. 

 

 Meet the writer: 

 

Suresh Bakshi

Born on 15th June, 1943. Studied in Joseph's Academy, Dehradun and St. Stephens College, Delhi. Worked for 28 years in MacNeill and Barry, MacNeill and Magor and The Assam Company (I) Ltd. Began his second career with Welham Boys' School, Dehradun, from where he retired in 2003 as the Senior Tutor and finally for a brief period as the Principal. His interests include birdwatching, gardening. He is passionate about reading. He has had his articles published in the Statesman, Hindustan Times and The Assam Tribune, amongst other periodicals. His wife Reeti is also a keen gardener and has many other interests. Their two children, Diya and Vikram, are both settled in the U.S.A. 

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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull.
 

Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea!

Playing 'Goodwill Ambassador' in Margherita

A very happy New Year to all of you, dear readers! I'm delighted to share another charming story from Murari Saikia today!

It was early March ’84, a balmy spring Sunday morning in the salubrious climes of Margherita. I had just returned from the factory; manufacturing for the weekend done and dusted and the factory locked and sealed.

I was lounging in the ‘jali’ verandah trying to make up my mind on whom to ‘raid’ for some beer and lunch and while lost in my thoughts, I heard someone addressing me from beyond the porch.

‘Sir, sir!'

Peering out, I could make out it was my third Tea House babu, standing a little away from my vehicle.

He looked quite distraught, so I asked him what was the problem, and the man blurted out in Assamese, ‘Sir, my wife is expecting and I had taken her to the hospital, the doctor is away and the sister says that she’s to be transferred to Digboi AOC hospital. The ambulance has already gone out with some patient, we don’t know when it will return!! Sir, my wife’s case is urgent. Emergency, sir’.

I knew what was coming next; he had come to request me to help him with my car - it does happen at times, especially in situations like the one my poor staff was in! I told him to fetch Dhaniram driver and that he should be ready to move, ASAP. The babu bolted and in a short while, Dhaniram was standing outside, to take my instructions.

I told him in the usual bagan lingo, to take the babu and his wife to the AOC hospital and return as quickly as possible after dropping them off, adding that I had to go out, so he’d better hurry back!!

Dhaniram left with my trusty steed - the ubiquitous Ambassador - while I bid adieu to my plans of going out for beer and lunch. I ambled off for a bath and that done, sat down comfortably in the jali verandah with my legs perched up on the center table, a book in hand and a mug of chilled beer by the side. Lunch would have to be a mish-mash of whatever was available in the fridge. The day drew on, but, Dhaniram had not returned, it was past three in the afternoon. There was no means to find out what was happening either. Thinking that he’d be in shortly I went off for a nap. Dhaniram was one of the trusted guys and he drove well too, I reassured myself.

It was past twilight, but, no sign of Dhaniram or my car…I was beginning to get worried while a lot of thoughts plied through my head. Time ticked on, and I realized the other lads and I would not be able to get to Digboi club in time for the Sunday movies either, none of the other Assistants had any conveyance (four wheeled types), I was the only guy with a vehicle, and the other chaps depended on me!!!!

After another nerve racking hour for me, I could see the headlamps of a vehicle at my gate, and as the car drove up the short driveway, I realized it was my car, in one piece; as good as she was when driven out in the morning!

As Dhaniram alighted I was about to bombard him with a mouthful. He disarmed me with a toothless grin under his handlebar moustache, and with a flourish brought out a folded piece of paper, ‘from the babu’. On my query as to why he was late, Dhaniram in his own way informed me that 'the babu requested him to wait, and he had to take the babu to the market to fetch some things, and babu has explained everything in this letter. I was fuming at the undue liberty my staff member had taken and mentally made a note to ‘give it to him’ at some point of time.

Dhaniram stood by, while I was seething in anger as I read the note which went thus:

“Most respected Sir,

I take pleasure in bringing to kind notice that wife has fine baby boy child. 

I beg your kind pardon for not releasing Dhaniram and vehicle quickly, I was without help and movement. Kind Sir, I thank you deeply, my wife also. Sir, the baby would not be there without you. 

Your ever obedient,

Shri……” 

My wrath vanished in a jiffy after reading the note...the baby would not have been there without me!!

As they say, it’s 'cha ki baat' - it could only happen in a tea garden!!

Meet the writer:

Murari Saikia

I was born in Dibrugarh in 1959 and grew up in Shillong. After finishing school from St. Edmund’s College (School Dept.), Shillong in December 1975, went off to Delhi University and graduated from Ramjas College in 1979. Joined FSL (Nestle) around mid-79 and was in Calcutta for a short while and thereafter joined tea in 1980-81 - almost by accident!! 

After a career spanning 36 years in the plantations of McLeod Russell & the Luxmi Group, I retired from the gardens in 2017. But, the love and the lore of tea have not left me. I am still actively involved with the industry currently with Parcon (India) Pvt. Ltd as a Visiting Advisor. 

It’s always a pleasure visiting the gardens and meeting up with some very good old friends who have weathered the storms together, and as always it’s also a treat to meet the younger generation of planters and get to learn a thing or two from these lads too, while throwing back the sundowners!!

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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull.
 

Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea!

 

A Christmas To Remember

Hello, again, dear readers! I'm delighted to welcome Sudipta Bhattacharjee to Indian Chai Stories. Her story will make you smile even as you wipe a tear from your eye: it's all about what makes Christmas really special -- family, love and sharing. 

'There was an aura about Christmas in Kolkata...but I got my first glimpse of a real Santa Claus in a tea garden in north Bengal's Dooars !'  

There was an aura about Christmas in Kolkata, possibly induced by my schooling at La Martiniere, where 'carol evening' was an event to cherish just before the school closed for the winter vacation. The midnight Mass at St Paul's Cathedral, the festive mood on Park Street and plum cakes from Nahoum's made the occasion memorable.

But I got my first glimpse of a real Santa Claus in a tea garden in north Bengal's Dooars and had the joy of opening my first gaily-wrapped Christmas present from under a tree at the Damdim Tea Estate Club in 1975. The joy of that occasion is imprinted indelibly in my mind.

The 45-minute flight from Kolkata to Bagdogra in December offers a view of the snow-capped Himalayas and in those days, sumptuous meals were served even on short-duration flights. My cousin Joydeep, a wee bit older than me and a class senior, was returning to his parents in the tea garden from Mayo College, Ajmer, and I accompanied him from Kolkata. Two young teenagers enjoying their first flight on their own, a joyous Christmas break from boarding school, with a new class to look forward to on our return. 

The late Tanima Sengupta, wife of Damdim Tea Estate manager late Sukumar (Dhruba) Sengupta, with her son Joydeep and niece Sudipta (the author) in the bungalow garden on Christmas eve, 1975. Don't miss the roses, Tanima's pride! Pix by Sukumar (Dhruba) Sengupta, captions Sudipta Bhattacharjee

Damdim was picture-perfect

My uncle, Sukumar (Dhruba) Sengupta, worked for the Tata-Finlay garden at Damdim and was at the airport with my aunt Tanima to pick us up. The drive to the garden near Malbazar was picturesque, especially with the tea belt stretching out for miles on either side.

Damdim was picture-perfect, the manager's bungalow set in sylvan surroundings. My aunt's green fingers were much in evidence; winter blossoms adorned the flower beds around the lawn and much to our delight, there was a tennis court adjoining the swimming pool on the grounds. My cousin and I both played tennis in our schools and were delighted to be able to practise before the American-style championships to be held at Chalsa that week. 

Joydeep and the author (Sudipta) take a break after a practice match on the tennis court of Damdim Tea Estate in Dooars,  West Bengal, in December 1975. Photo by planter late Sukumar (Dhruba) Sengupta, Joydeep's father, who was the garden manager at the time

I had lost my mother to cancer on Christmas eve the previous year, and my uncle and aunt were both very caring, helping me heal as the anniversary of the greatest loss of my life drew close. To keep me from brooding, my aunt asked me to accompany her to the club as she made arrangements for Christmas. I helped her pack the presents for children, as well as prizes for games. Stalls were set up, the club was readied for a grand party and my spirits imbibed the joyous ambience.

Almost simultaneously, we headed for Chalsa every morning for the tennis meet. My cousin, an excellent player already, won the singles final easily, while I got a tome of the Webster's dictionary after winning the girls' doubles. It was the only 'book' prize I ever earned for sports (the others are usually trophies), so I have preserved it to this day.

On the last day of the tennis tournament, there was to be a party. The young boys and girls who had met for the first time at the contest were looking forward to the social. As we headed back to Damdim to change and return, our car met with an accident on the hilly terrain. We walked to the nearest tea garden, whose manager was courteous enough to let us sit while another car came to pick us up, but we had to miss the party.

So it was only in the fitness of things that I got to experience a wonderful Christmas at Damdim's Club. We reached the venue on Christmas to find a fairytale setting. And then came Santa (later I learnt it was the manager of the neighbouring Rungamuttee Tea Estate) roaring his ho ho ho and ringing a big brass bell! He took the children on his lap and handed them the large gifts I had helped my aunt pack so beautifully. After all the children of the garden staff got their Christmas presents, he beckoned me. I hadn't expected a gift as I wasn't really a 'garden child' but he handed me an oblong box and patted my head as he wished me a Merry Christmas.

I tried my hand at the various stalls set up on the ground and won a bottle of pineapple jam at the hoopla! The fete-like atmosphere culminated in a Christmas party where the elegant ladies and dapper men danced their way into the night. We youngsters merrily shook a leg too!

On returning to the bungalow, I opened my gift. It was a Scrabble, much to my delight. I tentatively picked up two of the wooden alphabets, face down: an M and an A. I knew my mother was blessing me from heaven. I have the Scrabble board and every one of those alphabets still. 

After all, that Christmas gift from a distant tea garden ultimately made me a wordsmith!

-- Sudipta Bhattacharjee 

Meet the writer:

Sudipta is a career journalist who joined The Telegraph in Kolkata as a trainee in 1985 and retired at the end of August as Resident Editor (Northeast). She moved to Shillong in 1992 after her husband was transferred to Meghalaya on a three-year posting and continued to report for The Telegraph from there. She travelled to the United States on a Fulbright Research Fellowship in 2004-5 and returned to base thereafter. Her tryst with tea gardens began as a four-year-old to Kakajan in Upper Assam, where her uncle, Sukumar (Dhruba) Sengupta was posted. She and her family visited him in Majuli Tea Estate in Assam in 1970 and 1973 and by herself in December 1975 to the Dooars, when he was posted at Damdim Tea Estate. She has visited gardens in Darjeeling (where a tea tasting session was hosted for her), the Nilgiris and Munnar, Sri Lanka and hopes to share her experiences through this blog, of which she is an avid follower.

Sudipta is now adjunct professor of media science and journalism at Brainware University. 

 More Christmas stories here: https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/search?q=christmas

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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull. 
Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea! 

 

Traditions'r'Us

Still haven't recovered from the post-Diwali blues? Christmas will be here soon, and here's some cheer for all our readers - a new post by a new writer! We've 'celebrated' family over the last few weeks at Indian Chai Stories, and now it's time for friends. One of our well loved Christmas stories on this blog is Rajesh Thomas's account of what it felt like to play Santa Claus. Today, Kamran Mohsin tells us what it was like to be his Man Friday at that same Christmas celebration. Enjoy your read!

Traditions 'r' Us 

by Kamran Mohsin

The High range has had many glorious traditions and one such tradition is the children’s Christmas party at the Club. Two assistant managers are randomly chosen, one would be Santa & the other his man Friday. There would be a grand entrance where Santa & man Friday would come swooping in & since the children were still children in those days & not the ‘glued to the screen PUBG / Mine craft playing wizards’ that they are today; they would return home with a treat & a present (from their parents of course) and a big smile. For them, it was a day full of laughter & cheer, watching ‘Simba the white lion’ and it was something they looked forward to every year. It was their big day at the club. The club on that day was full of ladies, mostly young mothers & their children. Knick knacks, balloons, and party poppers could be found all over the place. Being from the same planting district & more dangerously, the same company, we knew them all & they knew us. A cock-up here, therefore, was not an option.

The task at hand was quite simple. Make a grand entrance, wish everyone merry Christmas without scaring the bejezuz out of the little children, give them the treats & presents & pose for a few photographs (of which I have none unfortunately) & get out while your dignity was still intact. It was the man Friday’s job to hand over the presents to Santa & Santa’s job to hand over that presents to the children. One by one.

But life is not so hunky dory & so this is where the twist comes in. 

The reward for partaking in this fanfare and putting on that fancy dress & making a mockery of yourselves would be a bottle of rum. Old Monk, no less! Furthermore, as per tradition, that bottle of rum was to disappear between Santa & his side kick before the fanfare started! And as per another tradition of the high ranges, they were both expected to complete the above task, no matter how intoxicated they were & finally after it’s all over, get back to their estates in one piece.

I never knew Santa had a man Friday until I was cherry picked to become one and my good friend Rajesh was to be Santa himself. Which was great for us because 1) we both got half a day off from the daily rigmarole of the estate & more importantly, 2) free booze, DUH!

So, on the designated day, both of us arrived at the club on our steeds, straight after lunch. Bang on time, as usual, in keeping with another tradition in the high ranges. Punctuality.

We were given a club room all to ourselves where we would make the monk disappear & also change into our outfits, all while waiting for our ride to come pick us up before our grand entrance into the club. But I am getting ahead of myself.

We had the happy hour to celebrate first & the ‘old monk’ was staring us in the face. Between the two of us, Rajesh was a seasoned hand, while I was still finding my feet. But booze was never wasted, free or otherwise. Another High Range tradition! I know I had a couple of big swigs & was on the wrong side of tipsy while Rajesh, Rajesh had the rest of the monk all to himself and handled it like a pro. 

Like that seasoned boxer who tires his opponent out by soaking in all he can throw at him & then when the opponent has no more to give, our man delivers a tight right uppercut & seals it with a left hook. In no time I was happy where I was but Rajesh was happier still. In this happy state of ours, we began attempting of get into our fancy dress. 

Edmund & Tenzing must have had an easier first attempt, I can promise you that. Rajesh was into his Santa suit eventually & I don’t recall what I got into. If we knew any better, we should have gotten into our suits before saying hello to the monk. But being young & courteous assistants we didn’t want to keep the old chap waiting. Another high range tradition upheld by the young guns. Courtesy.

Now, how we finally got into our costumes is a blur. And so is the time when they handed over a flimsy bicycle for us to ride & make our grand entrance in. One lousy push bike between the two of us! I mean, we knew there were budgetary restrictions but this took the cake. I could swear it was a jeep and we were driven into the club but Rajesh insists it was a bicycle.

Apparently, I rode it & he was sitting behind me, hanging on tight for dear life! Anyhow, it’s been 25 years & you can’t blame us for not remembering the details. So off we went. Crossed the club cattle grid and all! So far so good.

And then I have some faint memories of lying flat in front of the kids on the club portico. Thank god for the balloons lying about that cushioned our unceremonious dismount. The kids found that amusing to say the least. So we made our grand entrance with a ‘bang’ then!

Eventually, I found myself in the club lounge where a small stage was set up upon which Santa would do the honors. Happy hour was over, now we had to deliver, Santa & I. Speaking of Santa, he was nowhere to be seen after we ‘hit’ the portico! A search party was sent to gather Santa and carry him to the stage. He seemed in good ‘spirits’. Anyhow, all good things must come to an end. Presents were given I am sure; although I cannot confirm if the right child got the gift his or her parents wanted them to get. It’s all a bit of a blur. I am also not so sure about what else was said and done on stage during the fanfare. No one’s complained ever since, so I am guessing Rajesh & I must have accomplished the task given to us with flying colours. It was the tradition to maintain the tradition & the two of us did it with ‘mucho gusto’. Or so we were told.

I am also assuming we rode back to our estates in one piece later that evening.

Like I said, the blur is real & it’s been 25 years! Happy days!

Meet the writer: 

Kamran Mohsin

I joined the tea plantations with Tata tea in Munnar straight out of college in 1995 and eight years later found my self in the warm heart of Africa: Malawi, doing much the same and perhaps more. After ten years in Malawi, I am now based in Mombasa, Kenya for the past seven and visit the game parks here more often than I did my fields back on the plantations. I am an amateur photographer and being on a safari is the closest I can get to the good old planting days where the great outdoors was home.

 More Christmas stories here: https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/search?q=christmas

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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull. 
Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea! 

As it happened: Dry Wit

by Murari Saikia

Some incidents always remain imprinted in one’s mind, and even age doesn’t fade away these typically ‘cha bagan’ experiences. As they say, it only happens in tea.

 As instructed, (while the ‘kit allowance’ was handed over after I was ‘inducted’ into the company), I bought myself two pairs of ‘stout’ canvas shoes, which I picked up at the Bata store in the Grand Shopping arcade in Calcutta, in addition to cotton shorts and polo neck T shirts, socks etc, shopping around in New Market along with the other lads who were also selected for postings in Assam and Dooars.

I was posted to Assam. When I landed in the garden, Tarajulie, I was surprised, yet very happy to find that I would be sharing the bungalow with an old class mate from school, Biraj Barbara, a second generation planter, who had joined a couple of months before me. Had lost touch with Biraj for a couple of years as he left school two years before we took the Sr. Cambridge exams, and yet he somehow managed to complete his graduation a year ahead of me and the rest of the class!!

Anyway, back to my tale. It was June 1981 and the monsoons had just commenced. We used to be ‘kitted up’ in our ‘battle dress’ for kamjari and by the time I came back for breakfast, more often than not, I would be soaking wet. Anyway, young Anil our ‘trainee bearer’ would place my other pair of shoes with a pair of dry socks out in verandah for me to wear when I went out for work again. It would invariably rain once more between breakfast and lunch time, so, the cycle of getting soaked would carry on. In the afternoon, I would once again find my other pair of shoes nice and dry, the thicker parts at the toe would be a tad damp, but, what the heck, much better than wearing a squishy wet pair of shoes! 

This went on for a couple of days, but I never gave it a thought of how Anil was drying up my shoes. Realization struck me on around the third or fourth day and I decided to find out the ‘secret’ of how I would get dry shoes (in spite of the rains) when I found my shoes were a little warm to the touch……..

As usual when I came in for lunch, I wrenched out my wet shoes and socks sitting on the verandah steps, Anil came by with my glass of the compulsory ‘nimbu pani’ and carried away my dripping shoes and socks… I quietly followed him to the back to see what he’d do to get my shoes magically dry, the pouring rain notwithstanding.

Anil opens the screen door and gives a couple of violent jerks to expel the dripping water and then, walks back into the kitchen and opens up the large cast iron oven door and shoves in my shoes and socks to be ‘baked dry’….I could also spy a pair of Biraj’s shoes sitting side by side the tin bread box where our Morg cook Pradip places the dough to bake his tasty breads and croissants for us!

It’s very important that the chotta sahib gets dry shoes to wear!!! 

Meet the writer:

Murari Saikia

I was born in Dibrugarh in 1959 and grew up in Shillong. After finishing school from St. Edmund’s College (School Dept.), Shillong in December 1975, went off to Delhi University and graduated from Ramjas College, in 1979. Joined FSL (Nestle) around mid-79 and was in Calcutta for a short while and thereinafter joined tea in 1980-81 almost by accident!! 

After a career spanning 36 years in the plantations of McLeod Russell & the Luxmi Group, I retired from the gardens in 2017. But, the love and the lore of tea have not left me. I am still actively involved with the industry currently with Parcon (India) Pvt. Ltd as a Visiting Advisor. 

It’s always a pleasure visiting the gardens and meeting up with some very good old friends who have weathered the storms together, and as always it’s also a treat to meet the younger generation of planters and get to learn a thing or two from these lads too, while throwing back the sundowners!!

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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull.

 

Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea!

It’s always Tea-Time in my World

It's family time at Indian Chai Stories! Please welcome Noreen Wood - last month, Noreen had  sent us her brother Norman's story 'Shobha the Bison'. Three generations of planters in their family, and you will love reading what Noreen has to say about growing up in the tea estates of the Nilgiris in the 1950s: ' Life on a tea estate in Southern India was unique... everything a child could ask for.'

It’s always Tea-Time in my World

by Noreen Wood

Twenty-two miles up from the hot, dusty, South Indian town of Mettapalayam is the quaint hillside town of Coonoor, nestled 6000 feet above sea level in the Blue Mountain Range called the Nilgiris. The eucalyptus trees and green tea gardens growing in abundance give the mountains their blue-green colour. With no airport, the town is accessible by cars, buses, or lorries using a narrow, winding road with sharp hairpin bends cut into the hillside. Coonoor is not accessible by broad gauge trains either, the slope up the mountains is too steep for that. The narrow- gauge train track is fitted with a rack and pinion device between the two rails to keep the train from slipping as the track is the steepest in Asia with an average gradient of 1 in 24.5 (4.08%) and maximum gradient of 1 in 12 (8.33%). The little blue and yellow train starting from the Mettapalayam Terminus, crawls up the mountain and takes roughly 3 hours to reach Coonoor and then on to Ooty, a popular Summer resort and tourist attraction for families who flock to the Hills to get away from the heat of the plains.

I was born in the Nilgiri Hills and spent my childhood on one of the tea plantations in the area. Growing up on the tea plantations was a way of life that was handed down from one generation to another in my family. Life on a tea estate in Southern India was unique to a few Anglo-Indian families who loved the call of the wild and the adrenalin rush of big game hunting in the thick jungles that surrounded most tea estates. The remoteness of the place often dictated the way we lived. It was the 1950s and there was no electricity in these remote places, so we made do with kerosene lamps and battery- operated radios. However, the hydro lines were soon brought to our area and we ran around the rooms switching on every light in the house.

Boarding school was never optional for children of planters, so we went to school in Coonoor under the stern discipline of the nuns and we were allowed to go home on the weekends. From the close confines of the convent walls to the open fields and wilderness of the tea gardens, it was everything a child could ask for.

The big event was always the shikar hunt, organized by my father and other family members into the dense jungles that stood on the periphery of the tea gardens. Hunting deer, wild boar, and wild fowl was routine. My grandfather, father and brother all kept and maintained guns in their homes on the plantations. They were kept away in a safe place under lock and key and were only taken out when a hunt was on. The red cartridges were as commonplace to us as toys on the floor of any other child. My uncles and cousins were also good shots, and after one of their hunts we had enough fresh meat to last a week, and sufficient dried meat (“ding-ding”) to last a month.

My life on the tea estate is many, many moons away and now that I have lived in Canada for almost 40 years, the memories keep flooding back into my mind like warm April rain. The taste of tea never leaves my lips. Coffee has always been the beverage of choice for many Canadians and tea is seen as a brew to be taken when one is feeling sick or under the weather. During my career as a chartered accountant in Montreal and Toronto, my colleagues soon got used to seeing me put on the kettle for a cup of tea in the late afternoon and brush the eccentricity aside with a remark that “she is sort of British” (as opposed to Canadian).

The assortment of teas from Fortum & Mason (UK). The teas from Assam, Darjeeling and Ceylon topped the list in flavour and fragrance. The painting in the background is the painter's impression of the Nilgiri Hills which we had commissioned to a well known local  artist, Deepa Kern.

All through the years that I have lived in Canada, I have continued the tradition of afternoon tea with my family or alone at the office when I was working. Recently I received a gift of an assortment of teas from Fortnum & Mason, a store in the UK that specializes in tea (see picture). Canisters of tea from Darjeeling, Assam, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), and teas from China, Kenya, Rwanda and Russia arrived in the package, enhancing and expanding the pleasure of sitting down to tea with family and friends. My daughter and I sit down for a chat every week over a freshly brewed pot of tea. 

My 4 year- old grandson loves to sip tea from my cup and he says, “I love it” smacking his lips. The Japanese have their Tea Ceremony and we have ours. It’s always Tea- Time in my house. Tea is and has always been a strong link to my roots with the tea gardens of Southern India. In a coffee drinking world in North America, tea still has its place in my life and over the years I have got my Canadian friends to appreciate the taste of tea. At lunch and dinner parties in my home, the coffee machine sits silent in my kitchen while the kettle sings sweetly as the water comes to a boiling point for the tea pot.

There have been times when I am driving home on the straight three-lane Highway, with the snow blowing across the lanes, making it hard to see, and I imagine, if only for a moment, that I see green tea fields stretching as far as the eye can see, the yellow buttercups dancing at my feet and my father far away in the distance, instructing the coolies to start the day’s roll-call.

Meet the writer: 

Noreen Wood is a retired Chartered Accountant living in Montreal, Canada. She currently is the Financial Trustee for her Family Trust School in Coonoor, Nilgiris which is run to benefit disadvantaged children in the area. Her experience of eight years as a teacher in Frank Anthony Public School, Bangalore teaching Physics and Mathematics and her 30 plus years as a Chartered Accountant with CA Firms in Montreal and Toronto gives her the ability to run the school's accounting and financial affairs from her desk in Canada. The school employs 58 staff members and has a student body of 925 from LKG to Grade 10. 

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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull. 
Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea!

Personali 'teas'

by Conrad Dennis

Any tea aficionado will proudly exalt the many types of tea and emotively describe their brightness, briskness and strength. I’ve penned a few anecdotes about the equally strong and bright men who, like tea, possess unique character… men behind the cup that cheers.

May what I do flow from me like a river. Moments of solitude  

My attempt at writing is primarily to inject a sense of humour into a profession that at best demands a tremendous amount of hard work under extremely trying conditions by a dedicated band of men and their wives (who are an indispensable part of the tea canvas). To the non-tea populace it is difficult to comprehend the effort that goes into curating their daily cuppa. To start at the very beginning… which as the song goes “is a very good place to start”.

One of the primary requisites for a prospective Duncan Planter was a clean bill of health from Dr C.K.M Thacker, the Company “Chief Medical Officer”. After clearing the interviews and armed with a letter from Duncan House I found my way to Hindustan Building on Chittaranjan Avenue. The imposing edifice reeked of heritage and the cage lift embodied it. There were no buttons, just a semi-circular burnished brass appendage akin to an old fan regulator. I was sure the wizened old operator predated it. One look at the file in my hand and he just clanged both the collapsible gates shut and we rattled up. He stopped on the fourth floor and let me out with a supercilious look that seemed to say, remember… I brought you up!!!!

The receptionist gave my letter a cursory glance (she possibly recognised the letterhead and guessed the contents). I was ushered into a large airy room to be greeted by a gentleman who was short, rotund with horn rimmed glasses and a clipped British accent. He was just an amazing blend of Billy Bunter and a character straight out of P.G Woodhouse.

I was told to strip and he conducted a very thorough examination, at the end of which I was told to stand in the “on your marks” position as if poised for a 100-yard dash. A gloved hand then reached down and cupped me not too gently from behind and he said “cough”. I was getting dressed when he was finishing off a similar examination on an overzealous lad who mistook “cough” for “off” and leapt eagerly forward…. They were still rubbing him with ice cubes when I left for Harrington Nursing home for my chest X ray. I cross checked with Mr Krupa David and Mr Navin Huria and they both confirmed that nothing had changed since the late 60’s. How’s that for consistency?

One of the many colonial throwbacks is the children’s Christmas party, looked forward to by one and all. The clubhouse would be dressed up with balloons and decorations, the Christmas tree in a place of prominence with a brightly lit star on top. The goodies - all prepared by the District ladies - were simply scrumptious.

Every yuletide one hapless Assistant was cornered into becoming Santa and he would be driven to the club on a festooned mode of transport which could range from a jeep to a bullock cart and anything in between (a far cry from the reindeer and sleigh we read about in all Christmas tales).

The year was '83 and my friend Kevyn David from Matelli was shanghaied by his Bara Memsahib to be Santa for the Chulsa Polo Club party. Traditionally, to bolster the surrogate Santa for the ordeal ahead he was plied with the better part of a bottle of “Honey Bee” brandy…neat. This helped lighten the load of a sack of toys and dealing with a hoard of children of all ages. The more mischievous would tug, poke and pull at the hapless Santa (this made a few of his Ho Hos cries of discomfort not joy). By the time Kevyn reached the club house he was so high he could have just reached out and touched the North Pole.

Traditionally Santa had to engage the children in light banter before handing over the gifts which I would pull out of the bag one by one and hand him while calling out the name of the child. Santa in his enthusiasm went a step further and with a “Hic and a holler” wanted to kiss the kids (the younger of whom were in their mother’s arms). It could have been the alcohol fumes or just his persona but each and every little one burst out crying. Kevyn, not one be out done, yelled above the cacophony, "If I can’t kiss the babies, I want to kiss the mummies!"… I had to drop the bag of gifts and restrain Kevyn from making good his threat. There were deliberations on whether to scrap Santa or get Kevyn to stay on for a few more Xmases… the more sensible said let’s just water down the brandy next year. It then made sense as to why generally bachelors were the chosen ones. There was no Mrs Claus to post mortem the poor man’s performance (!!!) once the party was over in both the literal and metaphorical sense of the word.

With Sam Sing having been sold I rode off, not into the sunset but to Hantapara Tea Estate in Dalgaon District to be part of Mr Somraj Kocchar’s team. Little did I know that after a few months with him I would wish I had joined the army or taken up something more restful like becoming a lion tamer.

He was one of the most knowledgeable people I have met in all my years in tea. He had a tenacity and an innate ability to spend nights in the factory or hours in the field till he resolved the problem at hand. His expertise covered field, factory, Accounts and labour laws to a level that left one in awe and admiration. He had the most enviable command of the English language and even his charge sheets were literary masterpieces which took a while to explain to the errant worker “in a language he understands”. He could prune a bush better than the best pruner using a 3” folding knife and his speed, standard and style of plucking was amazing. He was a perfectionist and expected all in his team to measure up to his exacting standards. We all fell short in some area or the other.

He had the habit of driving up to the section at 2.30 in the afternoon just when you were planning to get back for lunch and he would put his foot on the mudguard of his jeep and say, "The bush under the Albizzia in the north of the section is not flushing freely…Why??”

He was checking: did you know north? did you recognise the shade tree? could you tell that there was a pest called thrips which caused a bush to have a supressed growth? He was a task master and I learned a tremendous amount from him about tea but more importantly I learnt what he didn’t propound or tolerate: that you could get a lot more out of a person or a team with a little understanding and compassion and by being fair and firm. Even if you go strictly by the book oftentimes one needs to read between the lines and if you don’t you kind of lose the plot. It is then that the lines get blurred between being disciplined and dogmatic.

Apparently even the cows in the tea area did the disappearing act at the sound of his jeep. 

The Senior Assistant was an equally tough task master. He sat me down one evening after work and told me that he didn’t know the meaning of fear, he didn’t know the meaning of compromise, he didn’t know the meaning of quitting, he didn’t know the meaning of weakness. In fact, he didn’t know the meaning of so many words that I was tempted to buy him a dictionary for his birthday which was the following month. He is an amazing planter and we remain good friends.

To quote John Milton, "They also serve who only stand and wait" ...on us, hand and foot, caring for us and cooking for us. This is to acknowledge a man who was my veritable Jeeves.

It was in Hantapara that our old house help Babu Khan who had been with our family when I was growing up, expressed his wish to come and take over domestic charge of my bungalow. He was an amazing cook and I readily agreed. Babu Khan arrived on a train one cold wintry evening and the days of warm plates and excellent food for the first week of the month began (following that, money ran out, and thereafter was the start of the most innovative culinary preparations of potatoes, eggs and whatever seasonal vegetables were available in the Mali Bari for the rest of the month). My colleagues DK Arora, Darvesh and Arjun were regular visitors only during those first weeks.

A few months later I drove down to Kolkata for what is termed “long leave”. I made the most of the holiday catching up with friends and the latest in entertainment. It was at a Navy Ball in the Park Hotel one evening when I met Brenda (an ex La Martiniere, Lucknow lass whom I was meeting again after the last “inter Martiniere” meet many years earlier) and to cut a long story short, she was crowned the “Navy Queen” … I proposed before returning to the Estate and we got married in February the following year. Babu Khan was at the wedding keeping an eagle eye on the gifts and generally feeling proprietary about the whole show.

On the way back we travelled in a coupe on the Darjeeling Mail with Babu Khan on the same train. At six am the next morning we were awakened by a peremptory knock on our door accompanied by loud argument. I opened the door and found Babu Khan standing outside with two steaming earthenware pots of tea balanced on a very battered tin tray. The poor Chai Walla was screaming to get his tray back so that he could peddle his tea to others before the train pulled out of the station. Babu Khan would have none of it and was futilely explaining that it would be sacrilege to serve tea to his Sahib without a tray.

PH Bungalow-isolated- between two rivers and backed by a forest. Electricity from one small temperamental genset with a fixed quota of diesel... candlelit dinners lost their romantic appeal

Things were a little like a Hindi soap once we got home, with Babu Khan discouraging Brenda from coming into the kitchen, wooing her with promises that he should just be told what to cook and for how many people and voila, enjoy the meal. She would have none of it and since we have now been happily married for the last thirty-five years no guessing who bit the dust back in the day.

I have to confess though, that sometime past our fifth anniversary Brenda wistfully said that she wished Babu Khan was with us… she would happily abdicate the kitchen to him and enjoy her independence.

Mohan and Gowri visited us in Hantapara in ’86 and I think Gowri would disagree with the likening of Babu Khan to “Jeeves”. With his tall, gaunt look, beaky nose and white jacket just beginning to fray at the sleeves he was more akin to a character from Adams family, his whole demeanour seemed to say … I’m at home and wish you were too. 

Some of us are not luminous but are good conductors of light…

Mr Jogesh Biswas was a success story at Kilcott Tea Estate in the early 50’s. He had worked diligently over the years and reached the coveted and powerful position of Head Clerk or “Bara Babu”. Mr K.J. Perry (the Manager at that time) was an avid investor and when Jogesh Babu was told to send a telegraphic request to buy 100 shares, (trusting his Bara Sahib’s financial acumen), two telegrams would be sent and he would buy ten shares for himself… and so on. 

Over a period of time he had a reasonable number of shares in Kilcott tea Company and even attended one of the AGM’s in Kolkata. A definite first in that era that must have raised a few eyebrows and caused a few stiff upper lips to quiver in the panelled meeting hall. What is wonderful is that his son in law Bacchu was initially a Duncan planter who retired from Lakhipara and his grandson Abhijit Raha joined Duncans and rose to became the Manager of Kilcott…connecting the dots from generation to generation with pride and accomplishment.

As we live through one of the most trying times in human history let us develop the ability to look into a puddle and see beyond the mud, find happiness and peace in little thing, connect with friends and family with whom we have lost touch. I am confident that we shall overcome.

Stay strong and stay safe… remember even the worst day has just 24 hours.

Meet the writer:

Conrad Dennis is a professional with over 39 years of experience in the plantation sector. He has worked in Darjeeling, North Bengal and Assam and has headed a team setting up new tea estates and a factory in non-conventional areas of the Dooars. He oversaw the production and profitability of the Amalgamated Plantations Tea Estates in North Bengal and the Packaging. Division. He also is the Editor of the APPL Foundation’s E- Journal “Organic Growth” which seeks to connect organic Entrepreneurs and share the innovations and benefits of a shift to Organic Agriculture. 

Conrad is on the Institutional review Board of the Tata Cancer Hospital (Kolkata) and is part of the Ethics team that clears any Research and trials on treatment and drugs that seeks to control/cure the dreaded disease.

 After having retired as General Manager of Amalgamated Plantations he has moved to the social sector and is the COO of Mission Smile a Medical NGO that conducts free Compassionate Comprehensive Cleft and palate Surgeries to underprivileged children throughout the country and on Missions abroad.

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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, long, or short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull.
 Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea!