'hamara bajaj'...

i used to love that ad.
the father starts the scooter...with the kid in front.
mommie waving them off...or sometimes sitting behind the father.
that advertisement at the time summed up aspirations of millions of indians.

not for us though.
since dad passed away, money had always been tight.
for many...car was a luxury.
for us, it was a dream. a very distant dream.

faridabad was a small town then.
we took cycle rickshaws everywhere.
and the haryana roadways bus to come to delhi.
(some of the experiences on that bus deserve a separate post!)
id seen saroj take a cycle rickshaw to work everyday for twenty years.
sometimes in burning june...sweating.
in pouring rain.

so when i first started working, i had only one goal.
to be able to buy a car.
thankfully emi's were a wonderfully celebrated concept by then.
i just needed enough saved up for a downpayment.

finally that day came....but rome wasnt built in a day.
for many weeks we had huge fights.
saroj wanted me to buy a maruti 800...cheaper smaller and does the job.
after all she only knew two types of cars...the 800 and the bigger ones!
But I knew that after waiting for SO SO SO many years we just couldnt get a small car! (i always had these delusions of grandeur..even then!)

Dec 23, 2003...was a very big day in our lives.
Thats the day, we were to get home our very first ever vehicle.
But Saroj manages to stump me without trying.
As i proudly led her and my sister to the shining silver gray ikon...i realised that S had been distracted by something else.
I turned to see what had caught her interest.
She was standing in front of a BIG SHINING BLACK mondeo!!
And i swear to you...like a kid in a candy store she asked me..."OMG is this the car we are buying?"
Like i said she only knew two types of cars...the 800 and the bigger ones.
The ikon suddenly seemed so much smaller.

Then came the next step.
A shiny new car and NONE of us knew how to drive!
So a driver had been hired.
Our first drive in our own car...we will ever forget it.
For those 20 kms...we beamed at everyone.
From the vegetable vendors to the cars right next to us..at the red light.

Except the ones that tried to swerve too close.
It was the only time we were openly swearing in front of our mother and she was ok with it.
now gunther(sister) and i always frown upon these "indian" traditions!
the coconut breaking...the red scarf(mata ki chunni) thats tied to the rearview mirror...or the black paranda(i dont know if this can even be translated!) flowing on the back wheel.

but i assure you that these "customs" seem wierd only when you see others doing it.
the force with which i broke that coconut almost bruised my arm.
couldnt take chances with it not breaking and leading to any 'apshakun'(bad omen).
in all the years that we;ve had the car....she has been like a member of our family.
ul say...get over it..its just a car!
but we know that for us....it marked the shift from being small kids living with our mother wanting to become something in life..to now adults who can take on the responsibility of the family as well as any boy/son.

6 years, 60,000 kms and several accidents later...the other day somebody suggested that it may be time to change the car.
but even the promise of a Mondeo or an equivalent big car doesnt budge my mother.
bajaj will stop manufacturing scooters in march...one of the victims of the new economic prosperity of the middle class post liberalisation.
but we are not ready to retire "hamara bajaj" just yet...




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