The tales of Jeroo: Of tea and trouble

Jeroo Dalal leaned on the railing of her little balcony, and took a exploratory sip of her tea. Satisfied at its milky sweetness, she took another, and then looked around.

None of her neighbours were out yet. No matter, there was bound to be something interesting happening on the road below.

Aha. Like that little fellow sneaking up on those two girls...and was he holding something in his hand? Yes.  A balloon? No, too small. A stone perhaps? But what was he going to do with....

oh! The silly goose! He gave her such a start, bursting that nasty little cracker so unexpectedly. No wonder the girls were chasing him; she would too if she could. Not that they stood a chance of catching him - he was always too quick. No wonder they called him Jaldiram Haldiram.

Although she really did think that was such a silly name. Always made her picture one of those snack packets running about everywhere, prancing about in shops, hiding from the grasping hands of a baniya desperate to get some money from the fat man at the counter who was drooling over the thought of gorging on what was inside them. Poor little packets. Plucked, torn apart, their innards devoured, with fingers poking into all the little crevices looking for the last morsel, and then being discarded dismissively, their shiny skins soon to be grimed over by all the effluents of the world.

Besides, it wasn't as if it was a proper nickname. And he had such a nice name too - Vikram...Vikrama...Vikramaditya. Such a solid name. You could hear the echo of centuries each time you said it. Vikramaditya. Yes, such a good, old name.

And so rare. You didn't hear too many of them anymore - names her generation had been proud to carry, because they meant something, had some history to them. Kaikhusroo, Jalaluddin, Banoo, Meherbanoo, Gerson, Marilyn, Amreesh, Pradipto. Names that had a personal history for her, all old friends and family. All gone, of course. And what was she left with? These newfangled foreign words, with as few syllables as possible. Kaia. Gaia. Laia. Miel. All Greek and Hebrew and Latin and whoknowswhich other languages. No wonder she just kept calling them baby. They probably thought she was senile. Let them - she still knew what was what.

Ah, there was that nice upstairs Mr. Narayanan (with his cup of coffee, of course). What was he pointing at though, and why was he gesturing and grinning so much? Aha! That boy was right below her window, and the girls were headed in the other direction. Well. He might have a nice name, but he had startled her.

She leaned out a little, and carefully poured half her cup of tea over him.

And as he yelped and jumped up, only to be spotted and chased again by the girls, she settled back, acknowledging Mr. Narayanan's exaggerated claps with a modest smile.

It looked like it would be a pleasant evening after all.