It was almost eight months since Sunita had arrived in the capital on New Year's Eve. She had been staying with her cousin Ram and his wife Anu in their two bedrooms flat, having taken a while to get used to the luxury of her 'own' room. The city itself had been an amazing experience for her; the crowds, the traffic, the hustle and bustle of everyday living, the shops, the sights, the many acquaintances and friends that could be made, the beggars, the entrepreneurs, the vendors, the very life.
Delhi, in Sunita's mind, was a living thriving 5000 year old city whose origins could be tracked back to the ancient Indian text of The Mahabharata. She had soaked in this cultural, and almost religious, significance absorbing the history and culture at a scale so vast and so grand. She was always glad about having left the village to come out into the world. She spent the first few weeks travelling all over the city, taking public transport buses to the Red Fort in Old Delhi, the Qutab Minar at the southern end; she walked along the tree lined avenues of residential locations surrounding Lutyen's Delhi and down Raj Path where the Republic Day parade took place every January; she took the Metro to a station near one of the posh suburbs in South Delhi and walked along the service lanes; she visited markets in places like Connaught Circus and Karol Bagh, saw street vendors sitting outside air-conditioned shops in Lajpat Nagar and Sarojini Nagar; stared out of the window when the buses drove past grand Five Star luxury hotels like the Taj and the Maurya; walked down the chaotic Pahargunj labyrinths opposite the main railway station; she had lived through the winter and the summer and the monsoon already.
But very soon after Sunita's arrival, her sense of responsibility goaded her towards the need to find a job, however small, so she could contribute to the household expenses; Ram and Anu had been very hospitable and generous, never once mentioning the obvious financial burden that she must have added to. Initially she tried to help out at Ram's motorcycle repair shop just below their rooms but realised she wasn't being of much assistance beyond bringing glasses of tea for some of Ram's friends who visited or came to get their bikes fixed. She asked around some of the neighbouring shops if they needed an extra hand but none of them were willing to pay for help, least of all a woman who wouldn't be able to do any menial or physical work. She tried to take tuitions for school going children but their parents couldn't really afford to pay.
Ram and Anu had a fair number of friends and Sunita was beginning to get to know them; she requested all of them to keep their ears open and let her know if they heard of any opportunities. Sunita discovered that domestic help was much sought after by the middle class families in south Delhi but because Ram stayed at the western end, she wasn't sure how she could commute to those places of work. She did try however; Sunita met a few housewives, home-maker ladies that were introduced to her by friends and acquaintances of Anu but nobody wanted to hire someone who had no experience.
Sunita of course didn't give up her search. During her second month, after she had finished her sightseeing and somewhat satisfied her curiosity about the city, after she had discovered that her immediate neighbourhood was not rife with employment opportunities, she began to venture further afield. She started with visiting schools, hospitals and offices looking for and talking to the security guards or gardeners or anybody who looked like an employee of these institutions; always asking whether their employers were looking for additional help. She began to get temporary jobs, usually to fill a vacancy that occurred if someone was on vacation. For a couple of weeks here, another week there, she worked as a cleaner, a maid, a helper, a sweeper, whatever came her way. She wasn't happy with the kind of work that was coming her way but never complained; whatever money she got, she handed over to Anu.
Most of these jobs were at least a few stops away on the bus transport system and while she walked to these places initially, when the monsoon rains arrived she was forced to take the bus. On the bus Sunita discovered the sleazy behaviour of the Delhiite. The pushing and shoving she got used to, but the groping and pressing against her breasts, and the thrusting of masculine erections against her thigh appalled and sickened her. On occasion she would fight back by screaming at the person or abusing him, once she even slapped a young hoodlum that was massaging her saree clad arse. But it never stopped, at least not in the mornings when all the buses were crowded with the office going rush.
What Sunita didn't know was that public groping in city transport systems was a worldwide phenomenon, not that that would have made it any more tolerable. She shared these stories of lewd horrible men with Anu, as she did all her experiences, just to get it off her chest. Anu was sympathetic of course but could do little to help. When she told her husband what Sunita had to go through every morning he told her that there was no need for her to feel that she should contribute to the household income; they were doing fine financially and Sunita should wait till she found a more permanent and decent job. But she didn't listen, she felt a moral obligation to chip in, and chip in she would.
Her longest stint of temp work was with a small school quite some distance away. She started leaving home at 6:00 in the morning when most of the buses were relatively empty and she managed to get a seat for the hour long journey. She would walk the last half kilometre from the bus stop to the school and arrive there sometime around 7:15 on most mornings even though her duty hours didn't begin till 8:00 a.m. Her normal routine was to sweep the floors, dust the desks and chairs, clean the blackboards and ready the six classrooms by 9:30. Then, she helped out with the small children or doing whatever was required of her till all the kids left for home around 4:30. After that she usually had another two hours of chores to complete, and would try and board the 7:00 p.m. bus back to Ram's house, thus completing her 14 hour day.
In the evenings after Sunita returned home she loved to spend time with Anu, talking about all that happened during the day, sharing gossip and generally chatting the way girlfriends do. They would prepare the night meal together and wait for Ram to get back when they all sat at a small table in their kitchen and ate.
On Saturdays and Sundays there was no school and Sunita and Anu loved their time together; especially on Saturdays when Ram spent the day tending his motorcycle repair shop while the girls stayed and worked together at home. On one of these weekend days, Sunita told Anu of what happened on the bus ride back some days earlier; she had been too embarrassed and ashamed to share this earlier but now she wanted to.
