Mala leaves on Saturday. I hope I will be left alone for the month of June. I have undertaken to bring back two MSS for my publishers. So I work all day long.
Dr Santosh Kutty breezed in and took my BP. It was 150/90, which he said was OK. So I will hold out for some time.
Love
Khushwant
The much-awaited profile that appeared in Khushwant Singh’s column on 1 May 2004 read as follows:
RHYTHM IN TWO JOBS
One does not have to be a full-time writer to become a successful poet or novelist. As a matter of fact, some of the best fiction and poetry has been written by people in different professions: teaching, journalism, law, architecture and medicine. One living example I know is Amrinder Bajaj.
Bajaj came into my life about six years ago, when she was introduced to me by my family doctor whose niece she is. She was nattily dressed in silk with diamonds sparkling in her ears and a nose pin. The very image of a Delhi socialite going to a cocktail party. Also, very shy and demure. How deceptive appearances can be. Some months later a desultory correspondence between us started, largely concerning her articles and poems. With every article she appended a few jokes, which I hadn’t heard before. A large part of my repertoire of naughty jokes are compiled from her letters.
I have deviated from my subject, which is to highlight her skills as a poet. I give one example, which will speak for itself.
Don’t carve my name on temple walls,
Don’t scar time-polished stones.
Would you mar ancient monuments
To prove your love for me?
Don’t etch my name on tree trunks
Till the sap, trickles down as tears.
Would you lance innocent hearts
To prove your love for me?
Don’t teach the red-beaked parrot,
The monotone of my paltry name;
Would you cage a free-flying bird
To prove your love for me?
If at all, please install my name
In the shrine of your heart.
Let it remain thus engraved,
In the one place it ought to be.
***
3.4.04
Dear Khushwant Singhji
I cannot thank you enough for letting me ride the wave of success piggyback on your shoulders. Some of your stardust has rubbed off on me and I have become a celebrity of sorts for being important enough to gain the attention of a person as eminent as Khushwant Singh. There were snide remarks too like ‘koi purana kissa lagta hai’ (I wish it were true), that you had a penchant for ‘soni sikhnis’ and you wrote more about my beauty than anything else, which was not true. You wrote about my silks and diamonds and nose pin and not about my fading ‘beauty’ per se.
Why have you stopped replying to my letters? Have you outgrown me? As far as I am concerned, these lines of Meera pertaining to Krishna seem apt: Jo tum todo piya mai nahin todu re,/ Toso preet tod Krishna kaun sung jodu re.
I continue to amuse you with the latest dirty jokes I get to hear.
A boy brought his girlfriend to his father for approval. After getting her family history, the father declared, ‘You cannot marry this girl.’
‘But why?’ asked the boy, perplexed.
‘Eh teri bhain lagdi hai.’
After a few months the boy brought another girl for parental approval. Once again the father rejected the girl on similar grounds saying, ‘Eh vi teri bhain lagdi hai.’
The frustrated fellow took his third girlfriend directly to his mother and said, ‘Maaye tu hi dus mai ki kara. Every girl I want to marry turns out to be my sister according to father.’
She replied, ‘Phikr na kar putter, eh tera pyon hi nahin lagda.’
The bus was crowded and with every jolt a man would be pushed against the girl standing in front of him. This got him so excited that he got an erection, at which the girl said, ‘Edhar khade hone ki jagah nahin aur tu beech mey isse khada karke khada hai.’
Love and thanks once again.
Amrinder
***
20 May 2004
Dear Amrinder
I do not know what you are talking about? I answer every letter I receive the same day I get it. I was expecting a gushing letter of thanks from you soon after the piece appeared. It took you three weeks to say that. And your jokes are getting staler by the letter. You better put more spunk in them. I’ve got through a lot of writing assignments being left alone. Also a lot of whisky. Today Mala has arrived to spend a week with me – then Rahul will come to fetch me.
The weather is glorious. My BP is 130/80, which the doctor tells me is more than OK. But my pecker is just a blob of flesh hanging between my thighs and only wakes up when it wants me to pee, which is far too often.
It’s turned dark – lots of mosquitoes. So I’ll turn in for my dinner.
Love
Khushwant
I did not know how and when I had become a self-appointed court jester. Neither did I realize there would come a day when I would be admonished for sending stale jokes! I’d just have to work harder to keep the job! But I hastened to clarify my stance.
23.5.04
Dear Khushwant Singhji
I got your letter soon after I posted mine, whining over your supposed lack of interest and there was no way I could retrieve it.
I remember a story my mother used to tell us. According to her, there is a mention in the Guru Granth Sahib of a kanjri who was taking dog’s meat for her lover. She hastily covered it with her dupatta when a kritghan (ehasaan pharamosh) passed by, lest his evil eye fall on it. He is considered that low, even by the lowest of the low.
To be thought ungrateful by you was more than I could bear. I rang you up on the very day the piece appeared in the newspaper but no one picked up the phone. So I sent a letter to your Delhi address for I had no inkling of the fact that you were in Kasauli. My letter must have first reached your home and then with the rest of your mail, sent to Kasauli – hence the delay. Do not for a moment think that I can ever forget what you have done for me.
When are you returning? Delhi does seem empty without you. Please let me know, so that after you have rested and recovered from the weather change I can come over to thank you in person.
As for the problem with your pecker, I was tempted to rectify it as a challenge but gave up the idea almost immediately. The very fact that the inactivity in your middle bothers you is commendable at this age, though I did hear of a 90-year-old millionaire who could not believe that the child his 19-year-old wife conceived was his. There followed a paternity suit and DNA test which proved that his wife was right.
My jokes have become jaded because the spontaneity has gone. The strain of adhering to my self-imposed role of a jester in your court has begun to tell, hence the deterioration in their quality. Then there are others that are too vulgar even for my sensibilities, and so are a definite no.
Love
Amrinder
52
29.5.2004
Dear Khushwant Singhji
The profile has begun to pay dividends. SM of OP Publishers became suddenly aware of my MSS, called me to his office and has agreed on principle to publish my doctor joke book. The written contract will follow by post. Should I send you a photocopy when I get it?
For a man who publishes joke books, SM seemed singularly lacking humour for he did not laugh at the couple of doctor jokes I told him to give him a taste of what lay inside the MSS. He thought it was too big. I said that we could edit it or better still divide it into two, provided the response to the first was good. He said that they give 7% royalty to every author, old or new. Even you get the same. Moreover, as they have their hands full at the moment with other work (including your 7th joke book), they can start work on my MSS only by November so that it hits the stands by March. He asked me if I was willing to wait that long. As if I had a choice! He also asked me if you would write a ‘foreword’, which seemed a bit premature. As they write a lot of books on
medicine/ alternate medicine he toyed with the idea of capitalizing on my profession and wondered if it was possible to write something like ‘From Conception to Childbirth’ in my capacity as a gynaecologist. Neki aur pooch pooch, I thought. When I told him that I have been writing such articles for magazines for years, he asked me to send him some so that he could gauge my style and discover my ‘strengths’.
I never knew that there would come a day when I would apologize for sending a veg joke but this one was too cute to let go.
A doctor was called to a remote village to attend a case of childbirth. As no one else was at home he asked the woman’s five-year-old son to hold the lantern while he delivered her. The boy watched avidly as the doctor held the baby upside down and spanked its bottom to make it cry. Conversationally, the doctor asked the boy what he thought of his little brother.
‘I think you should spank him some more.’
‘But why?’
‘He shouldn’t have got in there in the first place.’
Have you heard the Punjabi song ‘Gori galla te vich toyee; usse mar gayee ni oye hoi.’
A parody of the same goes as follows: ‘Gori tanga te vich toyee, usse vad gayee ni oye hoi.’
A prostitute’s daughter asks her: ‘What does all this talk of love shove, marriage mean?’
‘Don’t even think of it,’ replied the mother. ‘They are all excuses for doing it free.’
Love
Amrinder
***
Kasauli
31.5.04
Dear Amrinder
I know KM but who is SM? Don’t send me any contract, as I know nothing about them and sign away any sent to me as long as they pay me my royalties – not many do. Also no MSS, as my hands are full, clearing up my arrears of writing assignments. I will be happy to write a foreword for you but then I will not be able to review the book. I can’t do both. You/SM make the choice.
Mala returned to Delhi yesterday. I have another 20 days to myself. Rahul will come to fetch me back on 19 June. It is still very chilly (and pleasant) here. I have more than my share of unwelcome and uninvited visitors who breeze in to have my ‘darshan’. I never allow any to stay more than 10 mins. But it does take a toll on my time.
Publishers are very money-minded and prone to fleecing writers when they can. A publisher that has done several of my books had the cheek to offer me Rs 5,000 advance and 10% on the sale of my compilation of obits. I sent their contract back without signing it. One lakh cash down and return of copyright after 3 years – I wrote to them. I know they will give in. I have added two more on to the list – one on Dom Moraes and another on Jack Peel who was my closest English friend. He died last month, at 95. His last letter to me from hospital was three words long: ‘How are you?’
My Kasauli sojourn comes to an end in 12 days. Over the weekend I had a lovely Bengali girl Diya Hazra stay with me. She is with Penguin Viking. On the 10th Rahul comes up to spend a week and take me back to Delhi – hot as hell I am told and the same routine of unwanted visitors and telephone calls. C’est la vie ’that is life’, as the French call it.
The sun is about to set and I am going in for my sundowner.
Love
Khushwant
Enclosed in the envelope was a page with jokes that another fan had sent him.
IRS
The only thing that the IRS has not taxed yet is the male penis.
This is due to the fact that
40% of the time it is hanging around unemployed.
30% of the time it is hard up.
20% of the time it is pissed off and
10% of the time it is in the hole.
On top of that it has two dependents and both are nuts.
Effective January 1, the penis will be taxed according to size.
The brackets are as follows:
10–12 inches Luxury tax $30
8–10 inches Pole tax $25
5–8" Privilege tax $ 15
4–5" Nuisance tax $3
Males exceeding 12" must file under capital gains.
Anyone under 4 inches is eligible for a refund.
Please do not ask for an extension!
After Khushwant Singh returned from Kasauli, I gave him a few days to adjust to the change in weather before contacting him.
Adorned in a grey-and-white leheria chiffon sari with grey pearls on my throat and solitaires in my ears, I reached his home at the appointed time. Khushwant Singh looked quite fit and happy. He gallantly kissed the back of my hand and asked, ‘What about your book?’
‘SM is KM’s brother,’ I said, and repeated more or less all that I had mentioned in my letter, ending my monologue with ‘he hasn’t sent the contract yet’.
‘I’ll look into it,’ he said. ‘Did you get the jokes I sent you?’
‘Yes. They were very good.’
‘If anyone read our correspondence, they would be shocked.’
‘People do expect you to be jocular – I heard your seventh joke book is due for release – but what I write is not expected of a staid doctor like me.’
‘How is your love life progressing?’
‘Love has gone out of it after the diamond fiasco, but massage and great sex still remains. I enjoy it better without the emotional baggage.’
‘That is how it should be.’
‘Not bad for a post-menopausal woman of fifty-four.’
‘How old is he?’
‘Five years younger to me.’
‘What would you like to drink?’
‘Water.’
‘No, not water.’ He asked his servant to get bel sherbet. Soon, we were sipping the cool, translucent yellow liquid from tall glasses.
‘I have bought your special “sherbet” for you – Chivas Regal. I like the sound of it.’
‘But not the taste.’
‘No, not the taste. I was lucky to get a litre bottle from Singapore, through my son’s girlfriend who is with the Indian Airlines.’
‘It is the best that is available. Premium brand,’ he said, taking it happily.
‘How was Kasauli?’
‘The weather was beautiful and I got a lot of work done.’
‘I too went to Manali for a week. It was wonderful. My sister had gone to Kasauli and told me that the place has a large number of monkeys.’
‘Plenty. And quite aggressive too. Rahul had come to fetch me and stayed for a week. He bought some fruit and was returning from the market when they pounced on him from behind, spilling the contents of his bag on the road. There are langurs too; and I tried to reason out why they weren’t aggressive. Perhaps because they subsist on leaves and do not have to compete with man for food like the rhesus.’
‘Dogs are better any day. Simians look and behave like men – abominably. What did you write there?’
‘I completed two books. Visitors would not leave me alone. No prior appointment, nothing; they’d just drop in for a “darshan”, wasting my valuable time.’
‘People don’t understand.’
‘On the way back, I stopped at Chandigarh. My books had been translated into Punjabi and they wanted me around for the function. I told them that I could stay only for the release, since I had a train to catch. But no, they put me in a five-star hotel and a stream of visitors poured in throughout the day. I could not sleep in the afternoon, became irritable and drank in the Shatabdi all the way back, ignoring the sign that read “yahan madira peena varjit hai”.’
‘You could always say that you don’t know how to read Hindi.’
He laughed.
‘When I returned, there was a huge pile of mail awaiting me.’
‘It is indeed worthy of praise that you reply to all.’
‘To each and every one, even if it is a one-liner. I feel that it is discourteous.’
‘That is very sweet of you.’
‘Writing their names and addresses takes more time than the reply. Would you like to attend another book release of mine?’
‘
Yes.’
‘Not exactly mine. It is a book my son has written on me.’
‘I read about it in the newspapers.’
‘Amitabh Bachchan is coming to release it at Le Meridien.’
‘He is quite a crowd-puller.’
‘Yes. I must remember to send you a card. They will be very strict this time as there will be a number of gatecrashers.’
This reminded me of the other book release and I asked him how he knew the Rajmata of Jaipur.
‘I have known her for quite some time. She is rather stingy in returning hospitality. After drinking heavily at my expense here, all I got was a Campa Cola when I went to her place! This time, though, she had put me up in a five-star hotel and treated me generally well.’
I glanced at my watch and saw that the thirty minutes he usually allotted me had passed. ‘My time is up,’ I said as a matter of fact.
Smiling self-consciously he said, ‘I have work to do.’
This time, there had been lapses in the conversation that we had to make an effort to bridge – a situation that had never arisen before.
53
3.7.2004
Dear Khushwant Singhji
Is it possible to love two different people at the same time, or am I turning into a slut? There was a doctor in my days at AIIMS for whom I had a soft corner. In fact it was an intense emotional attachment, the like of which I have felt for no other. I think he too reciprocated my feelings but could not tell for sure. It was just teasing banter and a feeling of warmth in his company till my parents forced an arranged marriage upon me. I did not rebel for I had no solid grounds on which I could do so. There was no commitment on either side, he was away when my engagement was solemnized and I did not even know his address!
The rest you know – my marriage failed for reasons other than this and years later I responded to the attentions of a person who fell in lust with me and continues doing so till date. Over the years there would be chance meetings with that doctor and the floodgates of painfully sweet emotions would open leading to a spate of poems but nothing else. The intensity of my feelings for him amaze me. Perhaps he was unfinished business, for we never got the chance to look beyond the pleasing external veneer. That was what immortalized the Heer–Ranjhas and Laila–Majnus of yore – they had not the time to get down to daal aate ka bhav.
The Afternoon Girl Page 20
