India — Life in the hutch

Tag: India

The tiffin box

March

One of the things that I wanted to see in action when we moved here was the tiffin. I had learned of them a number of years ago through a news clip on a tiffin service that was being offered in Toronto. This company provided hot lunches, for delivery or pick-up, and it came neatly packaged in a multi-layered metal container like the one pictured above. It was my understanding that the word “tiffin” referred to the container, and I really wanted to see if they are actually used in India.

It became apparent to me, just days into our stay in India that not only are tiffins used, they are EVERYWHERE. We mostly see workers carrying them, but there are also a number of school children who carry them to school, as well as caterers and food cart vendors (or wallas) who use gigantic ones. Most have two, three, or four uniform containers that seal as they stack on top of each other. They are held together by a latch on each side, and seem to be liquid tight. Our driver, Subbu, even has an insulated sleeve for his, so that he can keep his meal either hot or cold.

I have now learned that the meal itself (usually lunch) is actually the tiffin, and the stacked container is the tiffin box. Traditionally, these tiffins consist of a dal, a curry, some rice or bread (naan, roti, paratha…) and possibly a raita or a dessert. Some cities in India, like Mumbai, even have a vast network of tiffin wallas, who deliver hot lunches from home to the men who are at work. I am not sure if Bangalore has such a network, but I am sure that Willy would love to have a hot lunch from home delivered to his desk.

I have fallen in love with the idea of the tiffin box, and know that I will be bringing one home to Canada, so that I can bring my own tiffin to work with me. Early on in Tamara and Chris’ recent visit, Tamara and I were talking about them, and she mentioned that she might like to have one if we could find one that was reasonably priced and not too big or small. This past Tuesday was their last day in Bangalore, so I offered to pick one up for her if I could find one while out shopping. The lils and I were pleased to find that our grocery store had a good selection, and we picked one up. Actually, we picked three up, as Woo and Goose decided that they MUST have them as well.

They can’t wait to bring their lunches and snacks to school in their new tiffin boxes. In the meantime, they demand that their meals be served in them at home!

7 comments » | India

Wordless wednesday – Agra Fort

March

1 comment » | India, Photography, Wordless wednesday

My defenses are down

March

The first time I saw a cockroach in our house, I freaked out ~~a little bit~~ a lot. They are the one bug that really gets to me, my nemesis, my kryptonite. It was in our bathroom, the one attached to our bedroom! I called Willy and had him dispose of it, then glared at him and emphatically stated that “THIS WAS NOT PART OF THE DEAL”, even though I had had an inkling. Based on what I read and knew of this climate, I knew that I would likely have a couple in our house. The problem that I was having was that I had forgotten how big they could be in a tropical climate.

So big that that night, I lay in bed worrying that one would attack the littles while they slept. Irrational, yes, but it was THAT big, and it flew! I got through the night, and the next few weeks without seeing anything, and I started to relax. Until I got out of bed in the middle of the night and saw a black blob in the bathroom. Not having my glasses on, I moved in a little closer to see what it was, figuring that one of the lils had thrown a sock in the tub. I got just close enough to see what it was and it scurried. Away from me, thankfully. Given that it was the middle of the night, and I could see that it could not climb out of the tub, I put on my big girl panties and went to the kitchen to get a container to trap it in.

But they fly.

When I returned to the bathroom, it had escaped the tub and was on the ledge, scurrying to the dark of the bedroom. That tupperware flew out of my hands and somehow managed to trap it. Knowing that it was safe for the night, I eventually got back to sleep, and happily let Willy dispose of it in the morning. We’d been in the house for two months at this point, and had had two of these nasty buggers. I hoped it wasn’t the start of a trend.

A few weeks went by, and I started to relax. Then one night I walked in to the bathroom, unsuspecting, and it was. This one was fast, and moved to the door and into the darkness of OUR BEDROOM. Willy was summoned, and tried to catch it, but it hid under the too large to move wardrobe. We went to bed, but I couldn’t stop worrying about it, so Willy offered to get up and flush it out. He was successful and I was able to sleep.

Our last visitor came about six weeks ago, and made a rather startling entrance. We were sitting in the living room and something thudded on the floor near us. It seems this one decided to commit suicide off the second floor and ruin our weekly wine night. At least it was easy to catch, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

Lately the fact that it has been so long since one of these big buggers showed up has been starting to bother me. I think that we are due so I have been doing my best prepare myself. I walk into the bedroom, turn on the light, then go to the bathroom, turn on the light. I lean my head in and peek, venturing in only when the coast is clear. This was working perfectly till the freaking light in the bathroom burnt out this week. The light that is located on the ceiling, at the highest point in the house, in the house with no ladders. It’s likely only twenty feet up, but it seems like eighty.

The back-up light is switched inside the bathroom, BEHIND the door. There is no way to turn it on without going in the room. This has messed me up to the point where I am paralyzed, and stand in the doorway trying to decide how to get in the bathroom without going in the bathroom to turn on the light. There is much hesitation and several aborted attempts before I actually make it in, only to forget why I am actually there in the first place, or to realize that I forgot to turn on the bedroom light first, so anything could be scurrying into the bedroom, now that I have left it as a safe haven. I try not to think about them, but at night, my mind goes into overdrive.

So I am happy to keep all the geckos in the house, as I am told they should help. I just won’t let my rational side see that the geckos are all pretty much smaller than the roaches.

6 comments » | India

So poor

March

There has been a lot of talk in the local media this week about the poverty rates in India. The poverty is one of the hardest things that I have faced since moving to India. Almost 40 percent of the population is believed to live below the poverty line and many of those live in slums in the larger cities. Cities like Bangalore.

When Willy and I first arrived here, we were informed that the “poverty line” for India was set at approximately 35 rupees per day for urban areas, and 25 rupees for rural areas. These amounts translate into roughly 70¢ and 50¢ Canadian. Those numbers continue to shock us both, as we can’t fathom being able to live on $15 – $20 A MONTH. Yes, the cost of living is much lower, but not that much lower. We see it daily, from the moment we step outside of our community, our little bubble.

There are small and large areas of slum dwellings pretty much everywhere you go, everywhere you look. There are a number of families that squat in an open lot between the parking lot of the lils’ school and the lane that we walk down to the school building. They live in shacks that have no electricity, no running water, but they have the luxury of a few feet between their house and their neighbour`s, something that this not seen in the large and packed slums that we also see in our travels. Official estimates say that approximately 10% of Bangalore’s population lives in slums, but I can see that the numbers are higher, much higher (by our definition). It is generally accepted that 30-40% of the population live in slums. Bangalore is a city of 9.5 million people, which means that at least 3 million people live in slums. That is more than three times the population of Ottawa. It`s sobering. I know too that we have been protected, that we haven’t seen the worst of it. We catch glimpses of it when we travel to the poorest states, like Uttar Pradesh, where Agra and the Taj Mahal are located. Or travel to other large cities like Delhi and Mumbai, where 50 – 60 % of the population lives in slums.

Poverty has been in the national news this week, as the latest figures on the percentage of the population deemed to be poor have been released. It seems that the numbers have dramatically dropped over the last five years, and officials state there has been a decrease of almost 7 per cent in the national poverty rate. In five years. This decline is more significant in my state, Karnataka, where the drop is said to be closer to 10 per cent. This appears to be a substantial development at first glance. When one delves just a little bit further, they see that this reported drop is tied to a similar drop in the figures used to determine the “poverty line”, a move away from the anecdotal figures that we have been told, and away from the UN determination for poverty. The new current figures use a rate of 28 rs (urban) and 22 rs (rural).

I don’t see how this arbitrary lowering helps the poor in India, other than telling almost 100 million people that they are no longer poor, and that they very likely will lose the meagre subsidies and coupons that they received when they were “poor”. There is also little that I can do in my time here, poverty India is systemic, is generational, is structural. It hurts in ways that I never anticipated.