Beautiful Thing: Inside the Secret World of Bombay's Dance Bars (27 page)

Aunty said, ‘Ai hensum.’ She leaned on her toes to kiss Tinkoo on the cheek like she was welcoming him to a tea party. Lowering her voice, she said, ‘So, who is this one you’ve brought and what she wants?’

Tinkoo kissed her back, ‘Hello Aunty,’ he replied. ‘She’s a doctorni.’

Aunty pecked Tinkoo’s other cheek, ‘But does she know?’

‘Of course! She knows everything.’

Aunty grabbed my hand in a claw-like grip, ‘My dear girl,’ she said, still speaking English in an accent I couldn’t place. ‘Business is so bad I have nothing to offer you—not a cup of tea, not coconut water. If only you had come a few months earlier you would have seen how I really live—in what style! I had a driver! A cook! A peon! One person just to cut my
bhaji
! But now they’ve all gone and do you know where?’

Clearly no further introduction was required of me.

‘When I first hired those fucks,’ Aunty went on, directing me towards one of the cottages, ‘all they knew was to stand under a coconut tree and wait for coconuts to fall into their hands. Then one fuck asked, “Aunty, how much do you charge?” and another fuck said, “Aunty tell no, what’s the best way to increase revenue?” and so I taught them everything I knew, thinking it would be useful for me to have people who understood the business. But how did they thank me? One fuck opened a brothel on my right, the other on my left. One fuck offers free beers with his fucks, the other says, “I don’t care how many women you bring in as long as the door shuts behind you.” So now Aksa is full of brothels and no one comes to Aunty.’

We seated ourselves cross-legged on the porch. Aunty’s shorts hiked all the way up her bony hips. She had forgotten underwear.

Tinkoo was fascinated.

When could I ask of Leela?

Aunty had her own plans. She plucked a joint out of her bra and foraging in her back pockets retrieved a lighter. Lighting the joint, she took a puff. She exhaled. And she started to cry. ‘I fucked myself,’ she sobbed. ‘How I fucked myself.’

I was startled. I looked over at Tinkoo, wanting to follow his cue.

He was unperturbed. ‘Tell everything Aunty,’ he encouraged. ‘Soniaji is my sister.’

Aunty handed the joint to Tinkoo, who grabbed it eagerly. ‘What you’ve missed, dear girl,’ she said. Tears continued to roll down her face. I held out my hand to comfort her. Aunty grabbed it and started massaging my fingers with hard circular movements.

‘This place,’ she said, wiping her face on her t-shirt, kneading away, ‘was exact like Kamatipura. Exact! So many people fucking, forty girls I had at one time and they weren’t darky and ugly as they all seem to be these days, but beautiful, like in the movies, the black and white movies mind you, not the masala nonsense of today. Each one of them earned at least ten thousand rupees a night. Now all the girls are the same. Dark darky ducklings. What is their purpose? Does a man want to eat
rajma
rice outside his home, when at home all he gets is rajma rice, rajma rice and some more rajma rice?’

I shook my head.

‘But the moment a beautiful girl wants to work for me one darky randi
log
or another, getting scare of the competition, invades my property and chases her away. “The police will arrest you! If they catch you with a condom, they will put you in jail!” What condom? Most of these girls have never seen a condom! Give them a condom, they will fill it with water and play balloon-balloon. A man wants a beautiful woman. Not someone who reminds him of his wife! Right or wrong? These randis will get two rupees if they get paid at all!’

I’m looking for a friend of mine, I said, withdrawing my hand. I was wondering if she was here. Her name is Leela.

‘Leela?’ Aunty said thoughtfully. ‘Darky? Pretty?’

Pretty, I said.

I was suddenly flooded with sadness.

Aunty’s face softened. ‘Poor pretty. Must be somewhere, getting fucked up the backside.’

She’s my height, I said. She has long hair, till here. I indicated.

Her eyes are black, but she often wears contact lenses.

‘I wonder sometimes if it isn’t best to be darky,’ said Aunty. ‘The pretty ones? No peace. Now, dear, look at me, looking at me now, would you say I was once pretty?’

Yes, I sighed.

‘Exact!’ agreed Aunty with enthusiasm. Her tears had dried quickly. ‘I get it from my father’s side. Anglo-Indians, you know. So fair-fair and light-eyed too. High-class! But it isn’t enough to have looks, my dear; head sense means something too. I made a mistake. I married a man beneath my station. He owned a bar near Marine Drive. A bar and well, let’s be frank, he had a side business with women. Mind you, he loved me to death. I had no work in the house other than picking up the phone. “Aunty dear,” he would say, “I don’t want you to darky your hands, let the servants do everything.” But then he died and his business partner, fuck him twice, he stole all of his money, and I was left with nothing but this house.’

‘Then what, Aunty?’ Tinkoo hustled, unwilling to relinquish the joint.

‘Then what means what? I had no choice but to stand at the door waiting for someone to approach me. That first time I waited for days. Then finally people understood—this is what she does. A man came, he finished, he rolled to one side and he asked, “How much?” I didn’t know the answer! I said, “Whatever makes you happy.” Another time a man lived with me for fifteen days. He ate, drank and fed me too. When he left he gave me nine rupees.’

‘One day Aunty thought, “Why should I do this when I can make money off other women doing it?”’

‘Exact,’ said Aunty.

‘Soon Aunty became famous.’

‘I don’t know why kustomers liked me,’ she preened. ‘But they did! They would say, “Madam, I like how you speak, what you say, even how you say it.” I would reply, “Fine, my dear boy, but what of my girls? What of my rooms? Do you like them?” And they would blush like little children, “We like you, that’s all we know!” Remember, my dear, kustomers don’t belong to you or to me. They are free to do what they want with their money and with their cocks. And if, despite that freedom, they come back to you and say, “I like you!” it’s an achievement. It’s like winning a prize! Ah prizes . . . That reminds me, my dear, did you know that when I was in school I won first prize in a singing-song competition? Can you believe it? Me!’

How nice, I said. What about Leela? You know, the bar dancer?

‘Now, of course, my dear, there are more polis than kustomers who come to dip their cocks into my girls. Those that don’t come for sex, come for cash. Mind you,’ Aunty shrugged, ‘I don’t mind paying hafta. After all, the polis have to eat too. Some fuckers pay the polis to protect them from kustomers but I have my methods, I don’t need no polis-wolis. If a man has sex with one of my girls and then refuses to pay, I say, “As you wish!” But the next time he comes by I’m standing at the gate with a mutton knife in my hand. I tell him, “This time, mister, you
will
leave something behind. So for your sake, make sure it’s money.”’

Tinkoo giggled, ‘Aunty will cut them also, they know it!’

I was beginning to lose patience.

Tinkoo, I said, isn’t there something you want to ask Aunty?

He was thoughtful. ‘No,’ he said frankly. ‘Nothing.’

I glared at him.

‘Oh yes! Leela! Aunty, do you know this girl, Leela? Has she been here?’

‘You do go on, don’t you,’ Aunty said. ‘Why do you ask?’

She leaned forward eagerly. ‘A kustomer wants her, is it? You are the go-between, is it?’

No, she’s a friend.

‘A friend called Leela,’ Aunty mused. ‘Hmmm. Okay, come with me.’

Aunty grabbed the joint from Tinkoo’s hand and started walking towards one of the other cottages. She flung open the door and we heard a yelp and saw a man dive under the bed. The very young, very naked girl he had left behind sighed. ‘
Kya,
Aunty,’ she said, languidly. She motioned at the joint between Aunty’s fingers and Aunty leaned forward and stuck it into the girl’s mouth. From under the bed came a small voice. ‘Hello, Auntiji, can you please pass pant-shirt?’

Aunty dug through the bed sheets and obliged.

‘Thank you.’

‘How are you, my son?’ Aunty said, peering under the bed.

‘Bahut badiya.’ Very good.

Aunty straightened up and turned to me, ‘I noticed you have a camera. Would you like to take some photos?’

No! I said, stepping away, pulling at Tinkoo’s arm.

And this isn’t Leela.

‘Of course, this isn’t Leela. Her name is Poonam. Am I right, dear? Your name is Poonam?’

The girl nodded and looked away.

Then why are we here?

‘This is not Leela,’ said Aunty. ‘I know that! I was being polite, my dear. I just wanted to show you around. Have you been to Aksa before? Really? Who would have thought? . . . Now what is your friend’s name? Leela? Oh yes, now I remember. She was a lovely. So young. She was here for a couple of days and then she had a fight with one of her kustomers and left. I don’t get involved, my dear. That is how I keep my sanity and my life. She said to me, “I’m going now,” and I said, “Okay. But if anything happens, run like Sita should have run from Ravan!”’

Do you know where she went? I asked.

Aunty shook her head. ‘A randi without options, where will she run?’

Thanking Aunty, I prodded Tinkoo out of the door.

{ 4 }

‘They showed me. They showed me all night’

T
he weeks passed and I continued to receive rambling calls from Apsara. Sometimes she demanded to know where I had hidden Leela, at other times she begged me to find her and bring her home. Tinkoo called as well, mostly to discuss his latest business plan.

Then one sunny afternoon, about three weeks after my visit to Aunty, I got a call from Baby.

‘I met Leela!’ she screamed excitedly.

Is she okay?

‘Fine—on the outside! But come quickly. She’s in Cheetah Camp and keeps threatening to leave. Sajida
apa
worries that if she does leave we’ll lose her forever. She’ll get picked up by a pimp or be funnelled into a brothel.’

Cheetah Camp? I thought. Where was that? And Sajida apa? Who was she?

I asked Baby for the address. ‘What address?’ she said. ‘Just come to Cheetah Camp and ask for Sajida apa.’

I phoned Paanwala Shyam and left a message for Apsara and Priya. Then I went online to find out more. Cheetah Camp was a predominantly Muslim slum settlement of approximately 100,000 daily wage earners. It had a tumultuous history. The previous year, in 2004, an altercation between local Muslims and Hindus carrying out a temple procession had left twenty-three people injured.

‘Every few days they catch a “terrorist” here,’ a resident
complained in a newspaper report. ‘This has given Cheetah Camp a bad name as a dangerous locality.’

As I got out of the auto-rickshaw and viewed the vast sprawl ahead of me, I realized why Baby had been unable to provide me with an address. Cheetah Camp was a settlement of small, even rooms separated by what seemed no more than a finger-width of space. Outside these rooms life was lived openly: daughters combed their mothers’ hair, mothers bathed babies, and little children, their eyes wet with colds, their feet sloppy with mud, played in the sewer that zigzagged through the camp. The sewer was thick with flies that buzzed drill-like over hillocks of faeces.

Spinning wheels of dust raced through the air, and the air was as hot and smoky as a firecracker.

Although it was past conventional work hours, everyone was invested in a task—in domestic chores, prepping and cooking food in open-air stalls, manning shops that sold shanks of raw meat and eggs and fruit and sacks of lentils. These activities gave the camp a sharp, invigorating liveliness.

I had to ask several people the way to Sajida apa’s, but she was well known and I was able to navigate the narrow lanes with steady ease.

Sajida apa’s door was wide open and in the darkness, lit only by the blue light of an aquarium of shimmering, brightly coloured fish, sat Baby on a carpet, with a small, plump woman I guessed was Sajida apa. She appeared to be in her early sixties. Her white hair was pulled back in a bun, her light-brown eyes were lined with kohl and her squat, pink face was creased into deep lines. She was stroking a sewage-coloured kitten mewling with pleasure.

Baby jumped up and introduced me. Sajida apa nodded distractedly. ‘I hope you like biryani,’ she said. ‘I would like you to stay for dinner.’

Baby lowered her voice. ‘She has come for . . .’ she inclined her head towards the adjoining room, which was demarcated
by a thick pink curtain. ‘We have some things we would like to discuss with her. Is there a hotil close by we can go to?’

Sajida apa raised an eyebrow. She looked Baby up and down. Baby was wearing a salwar kameez. She did the same to me. I was in my standard-issue reporter’s outfit—a kurta and a comfortable pair of jeans.

‘But the hotils here are full of men,’ Sajida apa said. ‘There is no separate ladies’ section in this area. Do you want to sit open-faced, among men, in a hotil?’

‘Of course not!’ cried Baby. She offered an abashed smile. ‘I’m mad. I should have come in a burkha.’

She turned to me. ‘Fine then, the two of you chat. I will keep Sajida apa company.’

Sajida apa looked at me. ‘I work in the local Mahila Mandal,’ she said, referring to a social empowerment group. ‘There are a lot of young Muslim girls in the bar line. I follow up on them. I try to stop them from destroying their future by offering them small jobs in beauty parlours, doing henna design. One of my girls came across your girl and told me about her.’

‘Sajida apa and I are old friends,’ explained Baby. ‘That’s why she called me.’

Sajida apa angled her face as though she was talking to the fish. ‘Tell your girl,’ she said, ‘Tell her life is hard. There is no point making it harder on oneself. Even good girls, they get into trouble. A girl will spend her life preparing for marriage, learning how to please a man. She will do no wrong, and how will her husband repay her? With
talaq
. The number of talaqs in this locality, by God! What are our men up to? They marry, they have a child, two childs. If nothing changes then neither do they. But if they make money and move upwards in life, they just have to show the world, make a show for the world. And what better way than with a new wife? So they say talaq, talaq, talaq.
Zubaani
talaq! On the phone. SMS talaq! And they remarry. But do they have the decency to find a woman elsewhere? No! They marry in the same mohalla, again and again. They give
us a bad name. As if we don’t have enough problems! And this is with the good girls, mind you. The ones who don’t deserve what comes to them.’