Brian on the Brahmaputra

by David Fletcher

  Well, if it did, it was after the driver had deposited his English cargo at the gates of the Oberoi Grand. They had made it back and the hotel was still there. So too were the charming guards, the intense security procedures and the machine-gun post – and after this gauntlet of protection, the serene interior of the hotel itself. It was as fabulous as before but even more so, for now the management and staff gathered in reception greeted the Nature-seekers with the words ‘welcome back’. Brian didn’t think that this was a contrived sop to their egos. He thought it was the genuine recognition of a rather out of the ordinary contingent of Brits in what was clearly still an almost deserted hotel. The elections had still to take place and the Mumbai attacks were still very much in everybody’s mind.

  This continued absence of guests and the “frequent-stayer” status of the Nature-seekers probably accounted for the scale of Brian and Sandra’s room. It was even bigger than those they’d been allocated on their previous stays, and whilst still technically a room, obviously had pretentions of becoming a junior suite. It had its own corridor, a bedroom that could have accommodated their entire cabin in the Sundarbans probably twice over, a generous washroom with his and her wash basins, and off this, not just a bath and shower room, but also a walk-in wardrobe-cum-dressing room. It was stupendous and so were its furnishings. There were elegant cabinets, a desk, a suite of rather rococo chairs and a couch – and a four-poster bed. This was grand living and grand style, even by British standards, and Brian found himself wondering again. ‘What would people outside this place think if they were let inside? Would they be overwhelmed? Would they be angry? Or would they just not believe it? Would they simply not be able to comprehend the existence of something that was so far outside their normal experience – a bit like those villagers in the Sundarbans who could come to terms with people from England only if they believed they were from Bihar?’

  Brian couldn’t make his mind up, but many weeks after the holiday he was given a clue as to how many of the poor people in the subcontinent might react to the interior of the Oberoi. It was in a documentary programme about the Mumbai atrocities, which included security camera footage from within both the Taj hotel and the Oberoi Trident there – and recordings of the terrorists’ phone-calls with their handlers. It was all understandably obscene. But what caught Brian’s attention in particular was the film of two of the attackers walking around a landing of the Taj and at the same time telling their handlers all about the “large windows” and the “big-screen TVs” and the general grandeur of the place. Even while they were busy booking themselves a ticket to Nirvana by murdering innocent people, they could still not avoid being mesmerised by the opulence of the place. But not because the inside of the Taj, like the inside of the Oberois, was so splendid, but because it was so unknown. These were hicks from the back end of beyond in Pakistan. Not only had they never in their lives come close to reason, but they had also never come close to what might be described as splendour or elegance – or even a big pane of glass in a big window. Brian knew that a typical inhabitant of Kolkata almost certainly had a more sophisticated view of the world than that of a young Pakistani assassin, but he still thought that the reaction of those terrorists at least indicated how anybody who had not experienced sumptuous surroundings might react. And, of course, if they were mesmerised, that’s where most would stop. He was confident that all normal people wouldn’t then go on and murder those enjoying the opulence. But this thought then led to another question in his mind concerning those who did go on to murder: ‘Would it be opulent in this promised heaven they were going to, and if so would they be mesmerised all over again or just a little disappointed that it was no better than what they had finally realised existed back on Earth?’ This was a question to which he never expected to get an answer.

  However, that was all in the future. The present was still about exploring the room – and inevitably looking out of the window – a big one with a big pane of glass. Outside, across the street, there was a substantially-built pay-to-use lavatory, a sort of private convenience for those who could afford it. To both sides of this, and crammed right up to its doors, were drifts of luggage and handbags. For this was “leather alley” or maybe “simulated leather alley”, where those in Kolkata who needed a carrying container for their clothes or their make-up could satisfy their need. There were cases and holdalls of all shapes and sizes and more handbags dangling from towering display boards than Brian had ever seen in his life. Why Victoria Beckham wasn’t down there he couldn’t work out. But maybe price trumps choice, and he doubted that there was anything down there that could be described as even marginally expensive. This was Kolkata, not Beverly Hills.

  Having tired of the view after just thirty seconds, Brian suggested to Sandra that they should probably get some lunch. It was now quite late and he was hungry as well as thirsty.

  ‘Where do you want to eat?’ asked Sandra.

  ‘Well, I don’t fancy changing yet,’ he replied. ‘So how about the bar? They must do some food there.’

  ‘Do they?’

  ‘Well, if they don’t they don’t. But I fancy a drink first anyway. So I vote for the bar. And we can find out whether they do any food when we’re there.’

  This was the sort of critical-path analysis on which Britain had once built an empire.

  ‘Wither do you want to sail, captain?’

  ‘Well, I don’t fancy that Cape Horn stuff. So how about south and then east? There must be some land there.’

  ‘Is there?’

  ‘Well, if there isn’t there isn’t. But I fancy a voyage first anyway. So I vote for an easterly course. And we can find out whether there’s any land there when we’re there.’

  This probably wasn’t historically correct or anywhere near the truth, but Brian was sure that it was just this sort of pragmatism and just this sort of confident single-mindedness that had served Britain well in the past. However, Sandra didn’t seem entirely convinced.

  ‘Uhmm… I’m not sure we won’t miss lunch altogether,’ she offered. But then she bowed to the inevitable and accompanied her (still shorts-wearing) husband to the bar. He wasn’t the only one who wanted a drink.

  All was well. In the bar they were able to indulge themselves in a pair of gin and tonics (not gin and sodas) – and they were also able to secure for themselves that ultimate in international dining: a generously accessorised club sandwich. There was not only an edible helping of salad with the speared delicacy but also a bountiful supply of wonderfully cooked chips. It was not very Indian and not very healthy, but it was thoroughly enjoyable. Brian finished his completely and even polished off Sandra’s remaining chips. Then as they rose to leave the bar at the conclusion of this delightful repast, their waiter approached the table. He was a very pleasant and very deferential member of the Oberoi’s staff, and he very pleasantly and very deferentially informed Brian that: ‘Sir, excuse me and I wish to cause you no offence, but I have to tell you that there is a dress code in this bar, and that it precludes the wearing of shorts by its gentlemen patrons.’

  His English was better than most that is spoken in Britain, and Brian attempted to respond as concisely and as grammatically as he could.

  ‘Oh, I am sorry,’ he said, ‘but we’ve just returned from the Sundarbans and I hadn’t taken the opportunity to change. Clearly, had I known of the code I would have done so, and you can rest assured that when I return to your establishment this evening it shall be in suitably long trousers. You have my word.’

  This was received by the waiter with a nod of his head and a smile.

  ‘Of course, sir. It’s just that I wished you to avoid any embarrassment.’

  ‘Thank you,’ responded Brian, and then he nodded and smiled too. For he knew that the waiter meant exactly what he’d said. He also knew that he and Sandra had been allowed to spend their money on a drink and lunch before they’d received this advice. This was possibly something to do with the fact that they were the only cus
tomers in the bar, but more likely it was to do with a practised ability on the part of the Oberoi’s staff to balance genuine civility with commercial considerations. Why frighten off paying customers with a premature piece of advice when this could be just as well delivered after the conduct of some lucrative business? The drinks and the club sandwiches were expensive, and there were so few residents in this hotel at the moment that everything helped…

  Brian thought that the waiter’s approach had been impeccable and liked to think that it was exactly the way he would have done it himself. He was therefore not offended in the slightest and, on the contrary, saw it as a wonderful demonstration of how to secure a necessary outcome – in this case the communication of a rather admirable dress code – in the most respectful and pragmatic manner possible. Just like his forbears had built that empire. Only with rather more respect.

  So now there was the prospect of an afternoon at leisure – and free from dress codes. Brian and Sandra exploited this in the only way they could; they took themselves to the swimming pool. Despite all the water that had surrounded them on the Brahmaputra and then in the Sundarbans, recreational immersion had not been a possibility. So now they wanted to put that to rights. And where better than in the palm-fringed courtyard of the Oberoi Grand and in its expansive and virtually empty bathing pool? It was superb. A bottle of water and a bottle of sun-tan lotion as one settled onto one’s padded sun-lounger and the delivery to one’s side of some Oberoi style towels made to Oberoi size dimensions. Greed might never be good, but just occasionally outrageous self-indulgence has its place.

  This excursion into pampered indolence lasted into mid-afternoon. Brian and Sandra then learnt from Derek that the Oberoi had a “special” visitor, someone who had just returned from Guhawati where he’d been doing some cooking or something. Yes, Gordon Ramsey was in residence. Well, of course, both of them so wanted to meet him, they had no choice but to retire to their room immediately, put up the “do not disturb” sign and double lock the door.

  So now they were not only safe from a real-life celebrity, but they were also free to do what all Brits do at the fag-end of a holiday; they turned on and tuned into telly.

  Brian soon discovered (for it was he who did most of the tuning) that Indian television was just as dire as any other television in the world. It had the usual mix of the incomprehensible, the banal, the frenetic and the downright dull. But it had something else that marked it out from any other national telly he had ever experienced: a gigantic overload of cricket and an almost sickening concentration on the sport’s local stars. There were just so many channels that were full of various sorts of cricket-mania that one couldn’t help thinking that it was no longer simply a sport in this country but that it had now gained the rank of “religion”.

  There were matches, bits of matches, excerpts from other matches, lots of different coloured cricket outfits, lots of sunglasses, lots of lingering shots of batters and bowlers – and very little of what Brian would have recognised as traditional cricket or traditional cricket coverage. It was all manic, and in his eyes, entirely nonsensical. Whatever was on screen at any time, on any one of these so-called cricket channels, it had as much in common with real cricket, where people wear whites and take days to avoid a result, as “King Lear” does with “Mother Goose”. Both of these, the Shakespearian production and the pantomime, might use the same tools and the same techniques (in their case, actors and acting) but they are hardly comparable. In the same way, floodlit, hysterical, limited-over, limited-attention-span and dressed-in-green-pyjamas quickie-cricket might use a bat and a ball and the basic rules of cricket, but it has less to do with proper cricket than it does with something you’d find on a Play Station. And Brian liked it just as much as he liked the idea of a Play Station, which was not at all. ‘Poor old India,’ he thought. ‘Just as it might be ridding itself of some of the nonsense of the past it goes and lumbers itself with this. Talk about losing the plot.’

  Then there were the adverts. And Brian was convinced that they’d lost the plot. Because so many of these adverts were for skin-whitening products.

  ‘God,’ he thought, ‘they change their cricket whites for darker clobber, and they then go and change their darker skins for white ones. What the hell’s that all about? And isn’t it a bit… well, weird? Why in a country of dark-skinned people would you want to stand out as being pale – and being… well, dishonest about your heritage? After all, this country has so many problems already that it could do with a “colour problem” about as much as it could do with an upsurge in its birth-rate… or getting its own Gordon Ramsey.’

  Brian finally switched off the telly. He could stand it no more, and anyway he fancied a doze before he went to the bar again, this time in long trousers.

  There, he and Sandra met all their fellow Nature-seekers, some of whom had not swum or dozed, but who had ventured into the big city. This experience had, for most of them, been either exhausting or harassing. It had been very hot in the afternoon, and as white people on the streets of Kolkata they had been very obvious and therefore very attractive to any number of sellers and hawkers. ‘This way please. My shop is just round the corner. I have much in it that will interest you.’ This and other encouragements were offered every few yards along the road, and as Brian knew from similar experiences in the past, even if you want to buy something, this is the last way to attract your attention successfully. If the other Nature-seekers were anything like him, in the face of this sort of continuous bombardment, they wouldn’t have bought a thing. And this was largely the result. Only essential gifts for grandchildren had been acquired and very little else. And whether the grandchildren in question would appreciate the sacrifice that had been made on their behalf was open to question. What could one buy for little Nigel in Kolkata that would interest him if he couldn’t play it on his I-pod or rig it up on his perishing Play Station? Answer: nothing that wouldn’t be a problem with British Customs.

  Brian was aware that he was becoming a little jaundiced in his views. It must have been all that kiddy-cricket on the telly. But now it was time to eat. Maybe his mood would improve.

  It didn’t. The Nature-seeker’s real last meal had been last night – when they’d still been on their expedition and when they’d all been together. But now they were back in “civilisation”, and as seductive as this manifestation of civilisation was, it was not the same. Furthermore Sujan wasn’t there; he was spending the evening with his family, of whom he’d seen far too little in the past three weeks. Then Alan and Lynn announced that they intended to try the Thai restaurant in the hotel. So only eight Nature-seekers remained to share a meal in the main restaurant. It wasn’t very enjoyable. There was too much of a sense of the party being over and of the balloons having already been deflated, and this mood could not be raised by either the conversation or by the food. Brian had a Goan prawn curry, which although tasty was strangely unappetising. The wine also was a let-down. It was another Bangalore Sauvignon Blanc. But unlike the commendable “Riviera” tipples that he’d enjoyed on the Sukapha, this stuff was flat and it may even have been off. It didn’t stop him drinking it, of course, but when he had he wished he hadn’t. And he also wished he’d asked the waiter to taste it. Even at the risk of being told very pleasantly and very deferentially by the waiter that: ‘No sir, this wine has not corked. Bangalore Sauvignon Blanc is meant to taste like this.’

  Everybody went to bed early. Brian and Sandra were no exception. They tumbled into the four poster, Sandra with a book and Brian with a small bar of Toblerone that he’d taken from the room’s mini-bar. When he opened it he found that its surface was more white than brown. It may well have been in the mini-bar for as long as the mini-bar had been in the room. Nevertheless it still tasted OK and Brian consumed it with relish. As he did so he had a thought.

  ‘Skin-whitening,’ he mused. ‘I wonder whether chocolate-whitening holds the key. And if it does, how might I exploit it?’

  Then
he was asleep, and by the morning the thought had been lost.

  16.

  The wine had been off. When Brian awoke he could not believe that there was any other explanation for the state of his head. ‘Great,’ he said to himself. ‘My last day in India and the prospect of hours in the air, and I start the day with a hangover. Pathetic!’

  And so was the sight of Brian’s attempt at dealing with a full English breakfast. He’d thought this might help his condition, but all it did was add a feeling of nausea to his headache. He needed some fresh air. He needed a walk outside the confines of the hotel. That is to say, he needed to confront the city of Kolkata outside the cocoon of the Oberoi.

  He went on his own. Sandra had no taste for a taste of urban life and chose to stay behind. Brian thought this was a good idea. Apart from anything else, there was a half-reasonable chance that a single white individual might not be quite as conspicuous as a white couple. He might be able to undertake his recuperative constitutional unheeded by the teeming masses. Just walk around a block or two of this city without being too much bothered.

  His view proved optimistic. He was fifteen paces from the gates of the hotel when his first “companion” arrived and began to walk with him. This gentleman, it transpired, knew somebody in England, wanted to visit there himself, and just happened to have a shop around the corner that was bursting with irresistibly attractive goods, and that Brian simply had to peruse. The second gentleman, who took over companion duties at the first corner also knew someone in England, didn’t express an interest in going there, but also had a well-stocked emporium that quite clearly could not be ignored by any European visiting Kolkata. Gentlemen three and four were clones of one and two, but had some sort of stall in the “New Supermarket”, a large building at the back of the Oberoi that looked as though it could have been newly built in Bolton sometime in the Thirties.