Bearers and Houseboys
Simple Tomato Chutney
Sunday mornings were fun at boarding school. We were only allowed weekends out of school on alternate weeks, which meant I usually had two weekends at school. On Sunday mornings, the Christian girls were woken up early and bussed to church. Not Chapel. We had Chapel service every night after dinner in the chapel right by the dorms. On Sundays, the Christian girls were taken to a church, which, I think, was in the compound of the Bishop Cotton Boys’ School. So yes, it was also a chance for the girls to do some er… fraternizing, tales about which we heard upon their return. But that is not what this post is about.
Us non-Christian girls were allowed to sleep in a bit. And then we went down to our breakfast of tomato chutney and slices of white bread slathered with butter. Not exactly a balanced breakfast, but one we waited for all week. Because it was delicious. Now while every other morning, there’d be two slices of bread and butter by each place setting (in addition, of course, to other things brekkie foods), on Sundays, there’d be plates with stacks of buttered bread at each table, and bowls of tomato chutney. And this was the one day of the week when we were allowed extras. Of both. And oh goodness, did we ever have extras!
It was also the only day we’d be allowed to walk to the kitchen door, past the Matron, Mrs. Marchand, an old woman of British heritage. Very old school Marm British, with an accent, however, that spoke of an Indian upbringing. Always impeccably dressed, from her floral frock, down to the large pearl necklace around her neck, and either red or pink lipstick on her very thin lips. And every single time we passed her, we’d have to make eye contact, smile, and give her a very polite excuse me, ma’am. Walk past her to the the kitchen door, with our table’s empty bread plate and chutney bowl, to ask for more. We’d walk back to the table, and the bearer would bring us some.
Bearer. One of my early Sunday mornings at boarding school was the first time I heard that word. A word that possibly came from the people who carried palanquins – the palanquin bearers who predated the days of the Brits; but the word bearer came to be used for domestic help, and commonly, servers, during the British days.
Now this was 1985. And we still called the men who brought out food for us bearers. Men who brought us our food, and cleaned up after us. We didn’t ordinarily see much of them – they remained in the kitchens. On other days, we didn’t have reason to see them because they would set the food out at the tables before we entered the dining hall. Since on Sundays we were allowed extras, we had cause to see them. Bearer, please can we have more chutney? And more bread? Bearer, please bring it to our table.
Didn’t strike me then that in a culture that so greatly emphasizes respecting older people to the extent that any older person is an auntie or an uncle, these men were still bearers. Even to the littles in boarding school – the kids who were 5 and 6 years old.
Because auntie or uncle is a title accorded to someone – er – equal? Not for someone of a lower class? Or caste?
But that was almost 40 years ago, one might argue. And I do wonder if things at the Bishop Cotton’s boarding house dining room have changed. Mrs. Marchand, for one, isn’t there anymore, hasn’t been in at least a couple of decades, I am told. But lest you think this is another example of the lingering colonial mindset I wrote about many weeks ago, let me relieve you of that idea (and don’t get me wrong, I’m certainly not condoning the colonizers for anything). Because domestic help in Indian households far predated the British, and has continued far beyond their time – it is the norm in most middle-class households. And our attitudes towards domestic help speaks volumes about how we, all by ourselves, have done plenty to maintain a certain status-quo, to perpetuate certain specific objectives – of keeping certain people - most often based on occupation, below.
Let me provide one example.
I live on a university campus in the Middle East with a very large expat Indian population. And most of the Indian families on campus have full time help, often men. Their house boys. Another term leftover from the days of the Brits. A repugnant title for a multitude of reasons, not the least of which is the fact that many of these “boys” are my age. Or close to.
And I know that this is, by no means, exclusive to India and Indians. But I don’t need to speak of another culture.
Now to their faces, we might very well add an amma (mother) or akka (older sister) to precede the name of a woman helper of a certain age; or a bhaiyya or bhai (older brother) for a man. Sure. But when we talk of them, they are servants, house boys, servant girls, servant boys. People who are allowed in our homes to take care of our many, many needs (but not before we have “trained” them, of course, to meet our needs; we have to teach them our ways, the correct ways; so we train them to clean the way we want the house cleaned, to watch our children how we want them watched. And trust them with our children. Oh, but not with money. And ours are houses in which they often don’t even feel comfortable enough to use a glass to drink water out of. Wouldn’t be respectful, I have been told. And it is the very rare household in which they eat with the family.
Equals, they most certainly aren’t.
Bearers and house boys they remain. Perhaps the Brits supplied the terms. But we already had the attitudes. And we have done little to change them.
And I have often wondered whether lexical changes might actually influence attitudinal change – I mean, language does influence thought, right? Domestic helper instead of houseboy or ayah? But the cynic that I am (with regard to this issue), I don’t think so. Our thoughts regarding class and caste are so deeply, deeply ingrained. And, of course, duly validated by choice interpretations of various religious texts. It is the aspect of Indian culture that I detest the most.
From a crappy segue into food last week to a very direct one here. This week, I give you the tomato chutney the men who saw to it that I had enough to eat for three years at Bishop Cotton’s brought us, plateful after plateful, on Sunday mornings. A simple tomato chutney with not many ingredients. I cooked it down for longer than it must have been cooked at boarding school, because I make it to last a few weeks in the refrigerator. So while the version I ate as a 13-year old was a bit more watery, this version I give you today tastes the same. And I am grateful for all those bearers who introduced me to it.
And while I absolutely love eating it with bread (and I must confess, I have a penchant for plain, fluffy white bread that has absolutely no nutritional value) and butter, there is a lot else you could do with it. It could be used as a marinade, could be used as the start to a good curry, or, and this is a fun one: you’d never think cheese plate when you think Indian food, would you? But why not? So the chutney, some crackers, maybe some cut up veg, and some cheese. We ate it, this week, with some good crackers, three kinds of cheese including an Arab garlic labneh, some finely sliced raw onion for crunch, and some cilantro – because I love cilantro. And of course, I did have bread and butter as well – although it wasn’t my favorite boring white bread.
Simple Tomato Chutney
Ingredients (makes about 2 cups of chutney; vegetarian; vegan; gluten-free)
1. About 1kg (about 2½ lbs.) ripe tomatoes, chopped. If you don’t like the texture of tomato skin, you could puree the tomatoes or chop them up fine. I don’t mind the texture, so I rough-chop them.
2. 2 Tbsp finely chopped garlic
3. 2-3 finely chopped green chillies of your choice – or more or less to taste
4. 4 Tbsp vegetable oil
5. 1 tsp turmeric
6. 1 Tbsp mustard seeds
7. 3 sprigs of curry leaves (if you don’t have any and have the rest of the ingredients, do try this recipe!)
8. 2 tsp salt
9. 1½ tsp sugar
Method
1. Heat the oil in a heavy-bottomed skillet.
2. When the oil is hot, add the mustard seeds and wait for them to pop. When they start popping, turn the heat down to low.
3. When the mustard is about done popping (you’ll know by the intensity of the popping), add the chillies and garlic and curry leaves. Sauté for about 30 seconds.
4. Now add the chopped tomatoes and the salt. Cook, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking, on medium-high heat for about 20 minutes. Tomatoes splutter like mad, so be careful.
5. After 20 minutes, turn the heat down to low-medium. Continue stirring occasionally, and cook till the oil separates. This took me about 40 minutes in total. Now add the sugar, stir, and take off the heat.
Cool it down, and eat it with bread or crackers. You can store this in a clean, dry container – should stay good for 3-4 weeks (if it lasts that long), providing you don’t put a wet spoon in the container. Enjoy!
Good with bread, good with crackers, good straight off the spoon ❤️
Evocative discussion of the moment when racist and/or hierarchical thinking is instilled in children.
I vividly remember my first introduction to the idea of slavery. It was in the first few days at high-school when we began to learn Latin. The school book introduced us to the life of a family in Ancient Rome. The vocabulary to be learnt included "servus" (the slave) and "vapulare" (be beaten) which led to a predictable combination of the two words. I remember that one of my classmates asked: why do we have to learn about the brutal habits of the Ancient Romans? The answer included a lot of wishy-washy comments about the origins of western civilization etc. It was the moment when the school, with the help of a standard school book, normalized the idea of slavery.