Seventh Day
I have never met a person who can bargain like my mother. There are two qualities that make a person an effective bargainer: 1) You have to have no shame, and 2) you have to have no sense of Arithmetic. My mother possesses both qualities.
On the seventh midmorning, a door-to-door produce trader came to sell tomatoes in our neighborhood. My mother approached him: “How much per kilo?â€
“Maalkin I’ll give it to you for 32 Rupees,†the peddler tried to sweet talk the most fastidious woman I have ever known.
Neither his Terai accent nor his slick tone fazed my mother. She calmly offered: “I’ll give you 15 Rupees per kilo.â€
I was so embarrassed to hear my mother’s bid I dashed to my room and closed my ears with my fingers. When that did not work I started singing Black Eyed Peas’ “My humps†loudly. My mother had asked that guy to reduce the price by 53.125 percent. Even by my mother’s standard, it was unheard of. It looks like she has only gotten better at this game. I did not know there was a room to improve to begin with.
Eight minutes later my mother walked into the house with two kilos of tomatoes. “Moro le thagnu thagyo,†she sighed.
“How much you paid?†my curiosity was choking me.
“Eighteen Rupees per kilo,†she said without a hint of pride or any sense of accomplishment. She has mastered the haggling art so brilliantly she hardly takes any credit for such triumphs these days.
And right at that moment (10:52 AM), my mother became my hero… a devilish sort of hero. But a hero, nevertheless.
I couldn’t wait to pull a stunt like that myself.
Inspired by my mother, the next I stumbled upon a handsome shopkeeper who said, “Your call is not important to us, don’t stay on the line. Shut up and hang up NOW!â€
My experience at the Bhatbateni store was an exception. In many of the small stores in Kathmandu, the owners don’t care much about the term by and large known as ‘customer service’.
“Excuse me, how much are you asking for that broom with long sticks?†I asked a smart looking shopkeeper in a store that seemed to have every household item.
“Two hundred twenty-five rupees,†he replied without making an eye contact with me, or my nephew who was accompanying me.
“But I saw the same thing for 190 just across the street,†adhering to my mother’s bargaining tips I thoroughly lied to him.
My negotiation tactic made the man so angry that he stared at me as if he was George Bush and I was an essay on Global Warming. And just like Bush, he snappishly gave up on me: “Then Go buy it there.â€
My bargain campaign was intercepted. Being a son of a hall of fame bargainer, however, I did not give up that easily. I pointed to a bathroom mat hanging on the wall and asked, “How much is that?â€
The shopkeeper dismissed me: “I’m not selling you anything. Just go across the street and buy everything there. You told me it’s cheaper there.â€
I was bowled. Red-flagged and defeated, I went to the store across the street and got myself two scoops of French Vanilla. I should have at least checked the store across the street before bluffing. It turned out to be an Ice Cream Parlor.
It was only three o’clock in the afternoon. After our disastrous broom-buying escapade, my nephew and I decided to head back home. I am yet to drive in Kathmandu, and in all likelihood, I will not undertake that project during this trip. From what I have seen so far, to drive in Kathmandu you have to have Mother Teresa’s patience and Roger Federer’s accuracy. I have neither.
We had to hail a cab to get back home. The first three cabs ignored us completely. The fourth one stopped three inches away from my tow.
“Where to?†the driver pre-screened us.
(A reminder here… If you are planning a trip to Kathamadu after a hiatus like mine, just remember, cabs still don’t always go where you want to go. They only go where the driver wants to go.)
“Baluwatar,†volunteered my nephew who gets quite animated by the concept of riding a cab.
“I need dedhi,†the driver tendered.
More than the driver’s demand, the Nepali language’s inclusion of the word ‘dedhi’ offended me. The language that does not have words for orgasm, keyboard, libertarian, or Thesaurus has a word that calculates a number by 1.5 times. It had been such a long time since I heard that word, my nephew had to remind me what the driver was talking about.
If you live in the suburbs, these cab drivers charge you ‘dedhi’ in the night time. That is reasonable because they don’t usually find passengers to get back to the city. But it was three O’clock in the afternoon. So I told the driver, “Forget about it.â€
He changed his mind as soon as he heard the defiance in my voice. “Hop in,†he murmured.
Thus, for the first time in my life, I rode a rollercoaster.
I don’t know whether this cab driver needed to pee, or he was a failed stuntman, but he was on to proving something to us. His driving was so hazardous, so fast, and so out of control that at one point my nephew and I held each other’s hand like Thelma and Louise.
During every turn he made, the ‘Sekuwa’ I had for lunch in Putalisadak would climb up my throat and threaten to come out all the way. If Alka-Seltzer was not already invented, this driver would have forced the invention of something similar.
He would drive through the puddles splashing pedestrians. He would honk at other drivers as if his team just won the championship. He would swerve like a toddler who just learned to walk. And he smoked as if Kathmandu pollution was not good enough for his lungs. It was a ride to remember.
“Aiyaa, I popped a boil on my butt.†screamed my nephew after the driver hit one more puddle.
To be continued…
PS
Since I am getting married tomorrow, followed by receptions, ‘dhog bhet’, a trip outside Ktm, and what not, it will be a while before I will write again. But I have jotted down everything I have experienced. I cannot thank you guys enough for your interest in my writings. Though I have not replied to most of the postings on my thread, as self-obsessed as I am, believe me I have been following all the postings. I found it quite refreshing that more than 90 percent of the people who responded are decent, encouraging, and appreciating. For being so supportive, I wish you all a wining lottery number in the next five years. For those of you who read but did not respond, make that seven years. See you all in about four weeks…
