Move over corona count; the breaking news on the 15th floor of a Rosedale apartment in New Town is that their washing machine has broken down. In a lockdown where most township residents are tirelessly trying to complete chores without domestic helps, almost everyone can empathise with this family of five.
But there are also some homes where after chores are done and dusted members are relaxing to watch Netflix, paint, read, catch up on sleep and still have some time left to get bored. The lockdown has created a divide among residents where one is either bored or overworked.
But there are also some homes where after chores are done and dusted members are relaxing to watch Netflix, paint, read, catch up on sleep and still have some time left to get bored Illustration: Onkarnath Bhattacharya
Buried under work
Zomawii Chongthu is the homemaker of the Rosedale apartment mentioned above which comprises her husband and three school-going sons. “Yes, they are doing dishes and sweeping but frankly I’d rather they not try to help. Men are clumsy and make a bigger mess than what they started with,” says the lady. “Plus, what I take half an hour to do they manage to drag for three hours!”
Zomawii has a spacious four-bedroom apartment that two domestic helps maintained till the lockdown. “Now I’m working 10 to 11 hours a day,” she says. Does she have any time for hobbies? “I watch TV while chopping vegetables, if that’s what you mean,” she speaks from the heart.
Tuli Basu of BL Block sounds like she’s waging a war. She’s cooking (for her family and stray dogs outside), cleaning, washing…. “And my chores are intercepted by calls from neighbours,” says the secretary of the block association. “Someone needs a mask, someone who lives in a garage needs food, someone needs blood, someone has a dead dog lying in front of his house…. My me-time starts at 11pm,” says the lady who doesn’t remember the last time she logged into Facebook.
For respite, Tuli blasts music while working and sings and dances along. “While cooking I pretend I’m on a cookery show and speak out instructions like: ‘Now I shall add a pinch of salt’. It’s all to amuse myself, so I can carry on this mundane work day after day. We don’t know how long the lockdown will last so cannot burn out so easily.”
Forced back in the kitchen in the absence of cooks, many senior citizens are struggling, not because they cannot cook but simply because they are out of practice. “I cooked for the entire family, including my in-laws, for years after I got married. But over the past decade or so, I have had little to do in the kitchen. So for the first few days after the lockdown, I was struggling to remember what phoron goes into which dish,” says Shila Mukherjee of HB Block.
Her domestic help stays in Kestopur. “She stopped coming as the three other houses she works in forbade her to come. She used to get lunch at one of those houses. I too feel bad asking her to walk all the way to Salt Lake to work just in my apartment.”
“Bason maja, ghor jhar dewa, ghor mochha, washing machine theke kapor mela...” Biplab Basu of Greenwood Park, New Town, lists his daily chores. “These are my nine-to five jobs now. I am thinking of applying to other houses if they want my services,” he chuckles. His wife is doing the cooking, he adds.
Lockdown memes: A selection of the ones doing the rounds on social media Sourced by the Telegraph
Work from home
Even if some residents are spared chores, they are falling over backwards “working from home”. “For me the lockdown means even more work than before,” says a resident of Sourav Abasan, next to Karunamoyee. “My office thinks that since I’m home I’m free and is piling me up with 12 to 13 hours of work a day.”
Since the bed and couch weren’t designed for the office, this man has developed shoulder pain from sitting on them and staring at the screen. He has now resorted to placing his laptop on the shoe rack and working on it standing upright! “Far from spending quality time with my family I’m always in a foul mood because of the work load. I end up shouting at them even if they come to call me to eat repeatedly.”
Arundhati Sarkar, also of Sourav Abasan, says she envies friends who are posting pictures of themselves cooking and baking exotic dishes on their lockdown leave. “Unlike them, I have no free time. I’m barely getting time to write my journal,” says the lady serving clients in the Netherlands and the US. “On a good day, it’s eight hours, else it’s 12.”
Joie Bose of CD Block says in the initial days of the lockdown she was slogging till 2am. “I was trying to do office and house work and ending up doing neither satisfactorily. So now at 9.30am, come rain from shine, I change out of my nightclothes, comb my hair - put on lipstick if I’m feeling perky - and enter a corner of the house that I’ve designated as the work zone. Till my lunch break I will not get be disturbed by anything domestic.”
It’s no joke maintaining a house that is usually serviced by four domestic helps but somehow Joie finds this system to be working. “Now I’m being able to watch Netflix, Amazon Prime and the like with my son once in a while too,” says the lady who finished watching the film The Zoya Factor and the series Just Add Magic during the lockdown.
Lockdown memes: A selection of the ones doing the rounds on social media Sourced by the Telegraph
Extra time
Chiradeep Majumdar clicked a video of rangan shrubs and rose at the entrance of his parents’ CJ Block house and posted it in a WhatsApp group of friends. One has to look closely to notice the leaves stir ever so slightly in the clip. “That’s how bored I am. It was a Monday morning, peak office time in normal circumstances. And this all I am doing for close to a month now - staring at the flowers from the ground floor verandah,” lamented the garments exporter.
He does not have to bother about domestic chores. “Our help stays in our garage with her husband. So we are not short of hands,” he says.
In fact, this is one of the reasons why he has shifted back with his parents in Salt Lake. At Uniworld City, where he stays, entry is banned for domestic helps unless they stay back at night too. “I hardly ever bothered to check messages in most WhatsApp groups I am part of. Now I am even commenting in them. Reading 100-150 messages helps pass time,” he sighs. He is doing free hand exercises twice a day, more to kill time than to stay fit. Koto ar TV dekhbo!”
Before the lockdown people poked fun at Isha Dasgupta when she told them she did not have a domestic help but she’s having the last laugh now. “It’s no extra work for my family now. My husband, daughter and I are continuing to share the work. The only difference is that we are together all the time now,” smiles the resident of Sraboni Abason.
So Isha now has time to revisit old books, TV serials and even to attend online classes with her high-school going daughter Swechcha. Everyone in the family is a great cook and so they are also sharing recipes on social media. “More than fancy dishes people are liking easy-to-cook ones like different kinds of phyana bhat,” says Dasgupta, even as her husband and daughter debate in the background about whether to make jilipi next or ice cream.
Call her Ivy Mondal or Superwoman, but this New Town CE Block lady is working from home, completing chores, managing her nine-month-old baby, rustling up delicacies and also managing to upload them social media. “This is nothing; I wish I had the time to start a YouTube food channel,” she says, taking a break from preparing khejurer gurer ice cream. “My husband and mother are helping but cooking is a stress-buster for me. I never had a cook even before.”
Sangita Saha of CJ Block says she has gained time from the lockdown. “Our helps don’t hang around the whole day, do they? At most they work for an hour and a half. Yes, I’m doing their share of work but thereafter I’m free. I don’t have to fetch my kids to and from school, tuition, music, dance and swimming classes. My own elocution classes with Urmimala Basu have gone online. I’m saving three to four hours a day by simply not commuting. I can now rehearse for dramas on WhatsAap and perform at online programmes. It’s a win-win,” she says.
Aloka Bhattacharya, a senior citizen of BE Block, is getting bored after chores and is spending time watching television and on WhatsAap. Deepta Chakravartty of BL Block is getting 15 hours of sleep even after helping his wife with chores.
“My staff has told me that I better return after the lockdown with my dark circles gone so I’m getting lots of beauty sleep,” laughs Indrani Saha, a resident of IA Block who runs the AD Block salon The Princess Diary. Even after chores with her parents, she is also able to work out and says her clothes already feel loose. “I also have time to pamper my hair with home treatments and by staying away from pollution for so long the skin will glow.”
Lockdown memes: A selection of the ones doing the rounds on social media Sourced by the Telegraph
Bottom line
Ask her if she’s enjoying the lockdown and Ivy says she’s enjoying her life! “The world was passing by too fast and we needed this break to sit back and observe things around us. The secret to not getting stressed out now is in not wanting too much,” she says.
Zomawii reflects upon the same thing. “The lockdown is not about complaining. It’s a chance for us to introspect. We Indians are quite spoilt, aren’t we? We are so used to others doing our work for us that we are at sea without them. “How complicated we’ve made out lives! Our spices need to be grinded and grated and we cannot do without daal, vegetable, chicken every day… Why can’t we simplify life and have a single nutritious fried rice?” she wonders.
Sangita of CJ Block says many of my friends have come to enjoy cooking so much in the lockdown that they want to fire their cooks after this. “Even their homes have become much cleaner now that they we are scrubbing it themselves. Everyday now is a working day or holiday depending on how we use it. It’s up to us to make the most of the lockdown,” she says.
Additional reporting by Sudeshna Banerjee
