Why I’m ordering potions and lotions from Delhi while I’m sitting in a foreign country

My friend was coming from Delhi to visit me and, as always, she had to bring me a huge list of toiletries that I pre-ordered on the phone from my Delhi kirana shop Sardarji. He doesn’t get why I’m ordering potions and lotions from Delhi while I’m sitting in a foreign country that, he truly believes, makes the best of everything — from cars to creams. It’s embarrassing. How do I explain to Chatwalji that in Japan they do what they do, and they do it better than anyone can — but they don’t, and won’t do anything out of the ordinary?

I cannot go to my convenience store (combini) here and show them a bottle, only available in select chemists in London, and expect the shop guy to say, “Ok Madam, I’ll get it for you in a few days”. The mere impossibility of even uttering such a demand at the local combini is what marks the main difference of my existence here.

If you are going to survive here, you very quickly fall in line and, more often than not, I mean that literally. Having grown up in the much-is-never-enough lanes of Delhi, I pride myself in being the queen of jugaad (crudely translated as an enterprising bending of rules). So, when a Japanese bows his head politely, but sternly crosses his wrists in the definitive “NO! Not going to happen. Don’t bother to argue” sign, then I’m conditioned to think, “Oh please, I’m sure I’ll find a way, a back alley that even he doesn’t know exists.”

Fourteen months, and one too any raised, crossed wrists, later (that is one uniquely Japanese gesture not lost in translation), I resign to the fact that there just isn’t another way. Not for that coveted counter seat that needs booking months in advance at the Teppanyaki you really want to go to tonight. Not for the “I have a major emergency and I have to take this call” in the no phone zone. And certainly, not for the cream that’s not already on the shelf.

And if there is, then it’s so dammed covert and inaccessible that unless perhaps you are Mr Sumitomo himself or the hottest member of the ever-changing Jpop band, you will spend endless frustrating hours trying to find the other way, only to end up being pushed ever so politely further away from what you want.

Survival has ensured that the queen of jugaad has metamorphosed into the queen of rules. To get what I want now, I first understand the process (and there is one for everything), I pay close attention; I master the rules and follow them to the tee.  My aim is to beat the Japanese at their game by being more acquiescent. Impossible. They are infallible when it comes to obeying of rules. They will queue that much more precisely. You see, standing in line patiently is not enough. There are painted footprints on the floor of where you are expected to stand, and lo and behold! That is exactly where they stand — still.

Even when they are queuing they look like they are meditating. Yes, I’ve become more zen about the whole standing in line thing but I can’t fully banish the thoughts and plans of how can I jump it. Queuing is a national pastime here. At a hotel reception, I was once told, very politely of course, with many an apologetic bow involved, to stand on the blessed footprints and wait till I was called forward. I looked around baffled — for Pete’s sake there was no one else in the entire lobby but me!

So, for now, Sardarji it is for that special blackcurrant Lemsip flu powder and the Q10 extra dry lotion. I pretend I don’t hear the bemused smirk in his voice as he takes my order. My new hometown has taught me well how to not see or hear what is not necessary. Though this bowing before the system is great in many obvious ways of equality and predictability — the lack of enterprise is a more serious problem of entrepreneurship here. Everyone obeys without question. Thinking differently is frowned upon. It’s hard for us Indians to understand a society where risk taking is not rewarded.

I digress, back to my toiletries. There’s another minor detail as to why I order a bulk of the basics from Delhi. Half the times I don’t know if I’m brushing my teeth with foot cream or worse — tingling lubricant. It’s a cliché, but I am so lost in translation.

I have enough Japanese to order off the menu, understand the numbers, make a booking, give the taxi directions, ask for the toilet but I still cannot tell the shampoo bottle from the "paint fake hair i"’ powder. Firstly, there are some strange products on those shelves and secondly, for all you smart-alecs shouting “Google translate” at me, here is the last translation for a bottle I’m sure was hand soap but could be cellulite reduction oil or going by transcript a rare yummy delicacy — “A heart, a plum, one grain of Umeboshi plum Meat one minute’s mind One grain zero per cent. Everything gets smeared.”

To avoid being poisoned by detergent that I mistook for gourmet, I stick to getting anyone who is even vaguely a friend’s friend coming to Tokyo to carry my precious package. If you think that’s me finding the back alley, what about Mr. Chatwal?  He gives all the friends, and friends of friends who go collect the package, Yen at the best possible exchange rate under his 4 by 4 counter. Chatwalji — that’s initiative! But I must not think of such things and focus on standing still by igniting my inner samurai.

(Courtesy: Mail Today)

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