10. We No Person

To be in an alien place means new encounters, which are the biggest surprises and challenges. In my artist «residence», my studio, which had been put at my disposal by the Cultural Council of Swiss Cities (KSK) for six months, I came to live with people I had not chosen myself. On the one hand, there is the family owning the residences, on the other hand, their employees who worked for us, cooked, cleaned and organised the place. The family lives in a colonial palace fronted by a meticulours English lawn, adjacent to our row of bungalows. On Sundays, they would usually show themselves on the balcony, dressed in white.
    At the start, I had a hard time accepting that someone cooks and cleans for me and does things, which I have done myself for a lifetime and will continue to do myself. I am not a Madam and I do not wish to be one. Manoth, the gardener, called me Nesa Madam, following which I addressed him as Manoth Sir. He would wind himself out of it saying «I gardener, no Sir», to which I would reply «I artist, no Madam». And he would laugh. During the month of Shiva he walked barefoot back to his village with other young men, carrying holy water from the Ganges for their relatives. He once asked me if I could lend him money, he would return it after the weekend. I handed it to him, and the following Monday he showed up with a fragrant handful of jasmine flowers in front of my door and gave it back.
    By and by I began to understand that he and the other employees were grateful to have their jobs. Even if the salary is meagre in my eyes, they make a living of it, they survive. With our cook Chinta, I tried to converse on a minimal English vocabulary about her life, about women and her two daughters. She is strong, fighting for her family's survival. She is the only bread winner at the moment, making about one hundred Dollars a month. Although her daughters have completed college, of which she is really proud, it seems impossible for a young girl from a lower cast to find a job. For Chinta, the most important is to find a man for her eldest daughter soon. It would be impossible without a substantial dowry. They would all do it this way in their circles, she explained, and no-one would accept a marriage that was not arranged. They would be treated as outcasts by their relatives.
    Then there is Anup, the manager, a sensitive man who had been married off at seventeen. His wife had died a year ago, and he was now looking after his little son and his parents.
     And there is Subas, with his ever dreamy face. He has two children as well, they would be nine, ten years old; he does not know exactly, he cannot read and write, and both had been born in the hut they inhabit. He makes about thirty dollars a month and has to feed his family with that amount, his mother and two kids. Their daily struggle for survival is a reality, and they share it with a majority of the population in this country.

On a human level, they do not count much for the family in the palace. As I returned one evening from Sarnath, I found Manoth in the garden, sitting on the floor, trying to re-arrange some plants. Behind him stood the patron, dressed in white, reprimanding him loudly. Sir left and returned with a shovel, which he threw in front of him, continuing his shouting. I sat myself into the garden with a glass of water. This did not seem to impress him. As he left, I turned to the gardener, who was close to tears, and tried to explain him that no-one may not treat him like a dog.
    It hurt to see the disrespect he faced from his employer, as well as from most others. Those who work here expressed it once quite clearly: «We no person». This was about the shortest summary of the violation of human dignity I could imagine.