I met Swati on our field trip during my internship with
Naari NGO. Dark but pale, in fact a little ghostly grey, with her bluish green
veins visible on forehead and down the neck, Swati was about my age but in a
wheelchair. It was in the year 2015 and our task was to spread awareness in
this remote village in the Sundarbans about maternal malnutrition, early
pregnancy, and anaemia. We had two doctors in our team to carry on with the
check-ups and blood tests. Us, sociology honours students of 2nd
year, Lady Brabourne College, Kolkata were to make house visits, make
conversations, explain the issues through storytelling in casual conversational
style and hold a street play.
Our college wasn’t organising this one, few of us, hungry
young souls hunting down internship experience certificates voluntarily signed
up for this during the one week pleasant winter break with an NGO, that our
classmate, Piyali had links with. We had
extensively prepared for the trip with handmade placards, brochures, printed
flyers, and of course the street play. Anushka, an active drama club member who
loved complaining about how the bossy girls from English literature never let
her have a role on stage rather made her do backstage work all the time. Well,
hurray for Anushka on this trip because we had zero idea or interest in acting.
She took her role very seriously and with an air of being the greatest movie
director and with the temper of one, she made us practise day and night. But we
loved her.
This was my first trip without parents and I was excited as
a squirrel, my parents tensed as much. My mom packed me snacks that lasted all
five days for all of us and she would religiously call six times a day. The
“elders” of the team were hackled by my parents most. They must’ve thought they
were travelling with a 7 year old. Embarrassment was overshadowed by excitement . It started off as a vacation
to us, 12 close friends on a trip to the beautiful Sundarbans. We secretly
expected boat rides and tiger sightings. Little did we know a village in the
outskirts of the Sundarbans would only allow us sightings of a stilted variety
of trees and an unimpressive murky muddy swamp. It was all work. But soon I
discovered I did not regret a bit of it, rather it was an experience I would
treasure for a long long time.
We travelled by train to Canning and then took Toto rides to
Amjhara , crossing over the Matla river bridge. It was a small village locally
but if you walked about 20 minutes to its north and west, the area was quite
developed with a hospital, banks, a post office, schools, Xerox shops and a
weekly market. Some work was designed to be delivered at an individual level .
On the 1st day we made home visits and listed down the members,
number of children, married young women and urged all female members
irrespective of age to attend our evening session in the village square.
The village square was an elevated cemented area around a
tree and a makeshift tea stall adjacent to the Panchayat officer’s residence.
We would take out our posters and prop up the white board and the sensitization
sessions would continue. Many wouldn’t come, mostly shy . The Panchayat officer
scared them with false Adhaar withholding tales and from the next day the
footfall would be more. It was then that I saw Swati for the first time,
wheeling herself in and inviting glances from the women huddled with their
sarees covering their heads, whispering sarcastically, “What would she learn
from here?” But this story is not about Swati neither my internship field trip
nor about the village of Amjhara, but about her dreams. And mine.
A girl who lost both her legs at 9 after something poisonous
pricked her in the marshes and no one knowing that she needed to get first aid
and a tetanus shot, had the most colourful, vivid and deep dreams. How dare
she! Just sheer ignorance and a healthy young girl lost both her legs. She was
brave, brave to still dream. She thrived in her dreams when in sultry
wakefulness the neighbourhood aunts told she should have died, she dreamt on.
She was brave when she got hit several times a day by her sister in law who
cited it was punishment because she had to take her to the toilet. She was
brave when her father passed away and mother became too sick and she was left
at the mercy of her brother’s family. She was brave when Aslam told her he
loved her but could not marry a leg-less girl in a wheelchair from a different
religion. She was not for once a ‘bechari handicap’…she wasn’t a glorious
‘fighter’ or a ‘survivor’ who had a story to tell, a Ted talk to make, either.
She was simply normal, more normal than you me and we, and naturally so.
Normal, in the aura and glory of
peaceful subtlety. Her normalcy was what made her unique. The acceptance of a
condition as an integral part of one’s life, not having to make efforts to
accept that and not feeling the urge to keep skimming up the pre and post
stories, not having to fight with ‘why me’, not having to mask with pride of
‘yes I did’ is something that doesn’t come to most of us and that is what makes
me love Swati more and more.
Coming from a well to do family, over pampered her whole
life to the point of being pathologically dependant on little comforts and
occasional luxuries and in an official relationship with the air conditioner, I
couldn’t have done this trip in the summer vacation, but I wish I did because
back then it was a fortnight long and, that, would have given me 10 more days
with Swati. My friendship with Swati wasn’t based on our “aim” of the trip but
was rather very different. I never expected a certificate hungry me to get
attached to a “villager” on my field trip. Never for a second did I feel
sympathy for Swati.
pity? No.
her financial,
educational, physical or domestic condition had no impact on my ‘have to ace
socio honours brain’, it was no different than my friendship with an equally
spoiled semi rich ‘let’s get a nail spa done’ bitc…err. Lady. It was no
different from my friend-cum- healthy competitor in class whom I loved for so
many more reasons other than keeping me at my toes to keep my grades high.
Nothing made her less. nor great. it was as if it was meant to be.
“Tell me about your dreams. All of them. The ones we see in
slumber and the ones that keep us awake in mundaneness.” She broke the ice peering into my face, neck bent to a side, as
I fiddled with my survey sheet unable to find the exact question after the
general information schedule. She wasn’t married, she wasn’t pregnant, she
wasn’t a mother, and I had to think before I could be fluent with what to say
next. It was easier with her sister in law. 3 kids, 2 miscarriages, anaemic and
a diabetic 9 year old, all at 26.
“Huh? Mine? Like, what I want to be?” I was a bit taken by
surprise by her sudden confident ease. I felt
As if an energy flowed happily in our immediate surroundings, rustling
up dried leaves, effortlessly misplacing a lock or two of the tight bun I had
made , initiating a song on the cheap wind chime made of coconut shells and
cowry , tapping a hymn in that space you possess between meditative
subconscious and mindfulness and finally settling with a calm of a firm
positive.
“ No, like, in sleep” she said matter of factly
I smirked sheepishly
“err, I can’t remember one now, why don’t you go first?” I wanted to ‘establish
rapport’. but her eyes gleamed and sparkled and a light like a glass jar of
fireflies played between those droopy long lashes in the deep set dark bony
socket of her otherwise dull eyes.
“I fly in my dreams, I do not touch the stairs, and I kick
back air and move forward, like swimming in the swampy ponds but effortlessly”
“Heyy I move about the very same way, in my dreams too, like
on a hover board but without one, right?” I interjected unmindfully, ‘making
conversation’.
She smiled and
continued “I saw Aslam’s new wife climbing the coconut tree like a monkey as I
swam-flew towards her to see how pretty she was, I was curious, but she got
scared and climbed further up, hopping like a monkey without a tail” she paused
to laugh at her own visual “ suddenly I was her and as I looked down I saw a
vast green ocean with the most beautiful waves, I jumped to float on them.
weightless, till I reached a rock with glistening barnacles. The mermaid held
my hand and took me down to her kingdom. Their kingdom was dry and as they had
fish tails they couldn’t walk, so we were all in wheelchairs but things got
taken care of on their own”
“ Then?” I was immersed by now.
“Papa came looking
for me and bhai caught me in the big blue fishing net, boudi was upset I was
back, but I loved it as much to be back as I was among the mermaids. I woke up”
she said with a simple shrug.
“ That’s beautiful Swati”
“ Now your turn” she said playfully.
Apprehensively I made
up a fake dream about kittens cooking (an abridged Ratatouille on my mind) and
she caught me in the act,
“ You got to tell a real one” she said faking annoyance but
clearly amused.
“I have never shared my dreams Swati, it scares me.”
“I share my dreams sometimes, they light up people’s faces”
she said with a toothy smile.
I tried hard to
remember a real dream. A real happy yet impersonal, less revealing dream. but I
just couldn’t think of one that I could share with her, someone I know barely.
How easily we open up about our lives, our secrets, our
achievements and failures and family. Some of us are lucky to be surrounded by
people with whom we share, we talk. But how many of us have ever shared our
sleep time dreams with someone? Who have we been so close to?
“You know once a mad doctor team had come here for some
survey like you all and they told me they want to record my dreams and write an
analysis” she giggled.
“ Oh so you have shared
before?”
“ Yes only with few people. Like you. Who aren’t like them
all.”
“Like whom all?”
“ Like those who
think dreams aren’t reality”
“Hey i think so too. Dreams are dreams, reality is in
wakefulness”
“Oh you don’t,” she said smiling and confident “ it’s
something you tell yourself, but you know you don’t”. I scampered for words,
Swati went on “if dreams are not real
how do we see them so vividly? Why do they impact us in our wakefulness? Saying
dreams aren’t real is like saying your thoughts aren’t real because you can’t
see or hold them. But isn’t your mind real? Then how come the consciousness is
real but subconscious isn’t?”
I was dumbstruck.
“ Where did you learn
these?”
“ Learn? Like?”
she was 10th pass, I didn’t see books lying
around, I knew she didn’t have access to the internet, her community school
library did not house books having knowledge as deep as such. I had psychology
as my pass paper, I knew what was she talking about but I did not know how
could this come to someone my age who hadn’t read about it somewhere.
“ You know Swati you
could get through good colleges in Kolkata if you continued studying. You can
even use your disability quota. Naari can help you, I can talk to them for
you.”
I expected her to seem offended because I mentioned her
disability or sad because of her domestic condition, instead she blew a
raspberry.
“They don’t listen to kid interns, they will do what suits
their purpose and brings those donations” she rolled her lacklustre eyes.
I gaped open-mouthed.
I had to leave that
day because it was already evening. We had to take a 10 minute Toto ride back
to a more town-ish area where we were put up in a community wedding hall.
Piyali had completed her survey and was waiting outside for me. Swati held my
awkwardly draped dupatta and pulled back as I turned to go
“Ow, I will fall, its pinned”
“Come here tomorrow, I’ll help you fill your quota of survey,
I know every boudi’s life around here by
heart,” she smiled sadly this time, “ it won’t be wrong, it will be better than
real data trust me, then we can listen to your dreams, I’ll tell you more” she
pleaded almost pouting.
“ I can’t Swati, I
really can’t, and I need to finish my internship”
“ you will get that certificate,” she stressed on ‘will’ “
they really never will look through the sheets , trust me, they just need to
show they have spent on us to earn 30 times of what they spend on us” she faltered,
her speech interspersed with spitty laughter.
“ok! That’s not true,
they do try to help, and I’ve seen them donate books and stationary at your
school”
“ Ok I apologise, 3 times. Maybe, I overreacted, yes they
are trying, but things won’t change, mashis ,pishis,boudis are more to blame
than our men you know… Naari, Pink Caps, Swadhin, there are more who come here
trying to help us once or twice every year, you know why the Panchayat allows
them? So that when there’s a flood or cyclone or famine, they will come with
supplies if they let all these survey shit today”
“ Heyy Swati, I thought you know better, survey ‘shit’?”
“Look, it’s not your fault. Nor your NGO’s , people here
will pretend to listen, there will be no change as long as they don’t want to
change, how much ever you try”
“ Ok I really need to go”
“ I know you will come back tomorrow”, Swati smiled
mischievously “ who can ignore a girl in a wheelchair!” she faked seriousness
when she was absolutely joking.
I met Piyali outside and rode back to the community marriage
hall. Of all things I felt about Swati today, on day 3 of my field trip, one
thing that I absolutely didn’t, was the fact we were different.
She seemed to have known me in less than a day. we had a 5 o
clock, village square program on day 4 , post lunch we were supposed to
complete our individual home visit surveys and wrap up. Day after, the street
play and closing program was scheduled. The medical check-up continued each day
from the early morning till noon. I finished my lunch by 12 noon and informed
our internship coordinator that I was slow yesterday and needed to run early to
the village. She allowed. I took a Toto with Piyali and Doyita who volunteered
to be my shadows though they had already finished their quota of survey just to avoid a very frantic Anushka.
I slipped them some of my survey sheets in exchange of a promise for a treat at
Flame and Grill. They were drooling already.
I went to Swati’s house .
She teased me “ I can’t Swati” mocking my voice and bent
giggling.
I shared my 1st dream with anyone that day. And
then we lay down on hand-woven jute mats on a floor swept with cow dung on her
backyard, peeling and popping acidic sour local berries and talking about our
dreams. I only told her my nightmares. I have happy dreams too, pleasant ones
that make me feel good all day but why, why do I never remember them like I
remember my nightmares? Swati said I need to look inside, I picked up my kurta
around the neckline peeped in and smiled “ they look hot”. Swati giggled and
hit my arm “ow!”
“ now focus”, she said” we didn’t talk about our lives, our
crushes, her boyfriend , I didn’t yet have one, movies or food or aims in life,
we talked about the dreams that colour our sleeps, about the ones I see with
open eyes in a boring class lecture and gradually I opened up. For more than 4
hours I was in a reverie, listening to her dreams, so vivid, so detailed, and
so descriptive, as if a Hollywood 3d movie played in front of my eyes.
And I shared my dreams of falling down the stairs, of being
chased by a faceless man, of being lost in metro tunnels, of being murdered by
my sister, of being dead and helpless and looking at my parents mourning my
body, of being lost in a remote coal mine village in Jharkhand, I did not share
a single pleasant dream because I did not remember one, though I did remember
having plenty.
Swati told me about
her dreams of being in a water wonderland, a traveller in the mysterious
desert, one in which she sounded like she was Mary Poppins, one where she had
dug out a treasure chest full of gold coins from the marshes and more.
Her dreams could be made into fantasy movies and mine into
horror ones.
I felt jealous.
Lovingly jealous. I had a pink scooty and room full of dream catchers and
unicorns and fairy lights, my mother cooked me pasta, pizza or parathas at home
every day when I was back from college, I had high grades, my father was proud
of showing me off to his banker colleagues, what did Swati have? An abusive
violent sister in law, a drunk apathetic brother, stale rice and raw scallions
on her aluminium plate and her beautiful beautiful dreams.
I don’t know why
someone would want to analyse and interpret her dreams and put them into a book
or paper. Beautiful things are best enjoyed in their beauty, you don’t perform surgery on a perfectly healthy and
beautiful baby, and you don’t to her dreams.
I left her home
content. I hardly stayed attentive
through the village square session that followed. An overenthusiastic
Doyita and Piyali had got me more sheets filled than my quota. I have no
regrets confessing I cheated, 5 years later . I got my certificate, the NGO has
been shut down 2 years back and I’m well employed today without having to have
displayed that internship certificate at my interview.
I bought and sent her
a basic phone with a sim card and working internet pack the next month from my
pocket money. We kept sharing our dreams on phone and chat. Almost every day in
the beginning and then it slowed to the weekends. Swati was my therapy. My
calm. My happy. My self-discovery. Ever since I got my job last year the
frequency of our dream calls went down more.
But I would recharge her phone every month in hope one
weekend I’d be a little less tired to share my dreams. Over the years Swati
taught me to have and remember the good dreams, I had lesser nightmares and
more beautiful dreams now, maybe not as vibrant as hers but beautiful in my
way. I couldn’t wait to tell her and listen to hers. Over the years I don’t
know anything about her domestic life or about Aslam any more than if they
appeared in her dreams, Swati knows nothing about me topping masters or getting
my job or finally a boyfriend, but we know each other’s dreams more deeply than
our lovers ever would.
I lost Swati recently. I lost my dream sister.
Ever since Amphan hit West Bengal our electricity and phone
connection were off for 4 days and my Vodafone network is still not running smoothly, though, I
tried contacting her, obviously I couldn’t .
A team from my boyfriend’s neighbourhood headed to their
village earlier this week, to help the cyclone affected victims of the
Sundarbans with basic food, tarpaulin and soaps. I gave them all details.
Swati’s brother,
sister in law and their kids had taken refuge in the storm shelter, Swati
refused to leave the house. No one could get her to go, 2 days later they found
her body , I did not want to hear anything more.
Swati is alive. Alive with me. Alive in her dreams. Tucked safely
with me.
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