Mum's (the) word

So Mom was here for a visit, and on one of the days, Viv and I were supposed to call her when she was at home and tell her to take a bus and meet us at a place at a particular time. Now this was going to be a big event, because she had never really taken the bus by herself to a new place before. Viv had given her rough instructions, but had told her that we would call and tell her again.

When we called her, the phone was beeping (or like my niece Aishu says, "Mausi, your phone is crying. You need to charge it.") so Mom said she will change the batteries first in case we got cut off in the middle of our conversation. So she hung up and that's it -- we just couldn't get through to her after that. It looked like the phone was indeed out of charge, and though Viv had shown her where the charged batteries were, she was probably having a tough time opening the phone to change them. I don't blame her -- many a pretty and blameless fingernail of mine had perished in the attempts to change the batteries and so it was always Viv who changed them.

Viv and I stared at each other. Now what??

"Do you think she will panic?" He asked.

"No," I said, "I think she's already panicking!"

"Maybe she will just stay put at home?"

"But what if she leaves home based on your earlier instructions?? And then we can't find her??"

"Maybe we should go home now and pick her up?"

"What if she has already left home by the time we get there?"

"Maybe she will try to open the phone with a screwdriver or something?"

"Maybe she has already broken the phone?"

Ok. Ok. Stop panicking. Regroup. Regroup. Think. I told myself.

"Ah!" I said.

"What?" Viv asked.

"She will go to a neighbour."

"Are you sure??"

"Yep. She's an Indian Mom. They do that. I'm telling you. She will pakka go to a neighbour!"

I was confident, even though I had just had this conversation with her a few days ago.

Mom - So who lives here?
Me - Dunno.
Mom - And this side?
Me - Dunno.
Mom - And opposite?
Me - Dunno.
Mom - You don't know your neighbours??
Me - Um, no. It's different in Singapore. We don't really have the "Aunty, Mummy ne ek katori cheeni mangaayi hai." or "Bhabhiji, hum ek mahiney ke liye out of town ja rahe hain. Yeh rahi ghar ki chaabhiyan, zara nazar rakhiyega?"
Mom - So you have no interaction with your own neighbours??
Me - Yeeahh.. Not so much. If I went over and started talking to them about cheeni ki katori or chaabhiyan, I'd probably get dirty looks...

I don't know. Maybe it's me, maybe I've just become cynical, but the vibrant 'neighbour culture' in India, is truly found only in India. It's not like I have not made an effort, but things here are more formal and people don't 'haq se' impose themselves on their neighbours the way they do in India. And that's how I have adapted myself to live here.

Anyway, so back to my story and how it ended -- Mom called Viv about 15 minutes later. From some unknown number.

Not only had she found a willing-to-help neighbour, she had found a happy-to-help Indian neighbor.

Jai ho, Mom!