Housework

A domestic situation bubbled to the surface this week that presents a unique opportunity for considering certain Indian social conventions, issues related to class and religion, and where we as foreigners of relative means fit into the equation. When Kyle and I moved into our third floor flat in Hauz Khas almost two months ago, our landlord, Anil, introduced us to Reshma, who he said would be available to clean our apartment as often as we wanted. Being American graduate students, and therefore quite unaccustomed to hiring domestic workers, we told him once a week should suffice. He looked horrified. Following minimal deliberation, he convinced us Reshma should come a minimum of twice per week. In no mood to protest, and given the relatively paltry expense, we agreed. After all, most middle- and upper-class Indian families have someone--likely a low-caste worker--wash dishes and clean the house five days a week. Twice weekly seemed reasonable enough, though the thought of staying home Monday and Thursday afternoons to sit around watching someone clean my living space on hands and knees rubbed me the wrong way. I accepted that this feeling was one that as a foreigner living in India I would probably just have to get over. Regardless of my own imported sense of social justice, Reshma needed employment. As official cultural ambassadors, we could at least pay her to clean our flat twice a week.

It didn't take long to get into a rhythm with Reshma. She reliably arrived around 12:30 pm, except when she didn't, and we slowly warmed to one another, particularly once Kyle departed for three weeks in Rajasthan. I'd move my drums and practice rug up onto the bed, allowing her to clean the floor in my bedroom, and she'd spend 45 minutes to an hour sweeping, dusting, and mopping all the floors in the apartment with a wet rag. I'll admit, with all the dust in the Delhi air, twice a week turned out to be a solid arrangement. Each time she returned, surfaces inevitably needed dusting and floors needed cleaning.

The first stirrings of an issue emerged one day when Anil-ji stopped by the apartment and ran his finger over a shelf only to find a displeasing amount of dust upon it. I defended Reshma's work and told him she'd be coming by that same afternoon. The dust on the shelf was no fault of hers, merely a consequence of passing time. A couple days later, he called me and tried to convince me to fire Reshma and hire someone he knew and liked to cook and clean for us, someone he insisted was trustworthy and would certainly do a better job. I resisted, explaining that I really didn't need a cook and that I was perfectly happy with Reshma's work. It wasn't what he wanted to hear, but he relented.

Reshma continued to come like clockwork every Monday and Thursday. At the end of March, I handed her a stack of 500-rupee notes for her efforts. Judging by her response, it was more than she expected to receive from us, as it was close to the monthly rate she would charge for coming every day. She thanked me and explained that her daughter would be getting married in December and that she needed the extra help. I told her per my calculations the sum should get us more than a month of cleaning, and asked her to just tell me when she expected to be paid again. We left it at that.

This Monday evening, Anil, who has been living elsewhere in Delhi while working on a building project, stopped by his second-floor apartment and called me on the phone to let me know he was downstairs. I invited him up and offered him a glass of cold water once he sat down in the living room. We chatted about the AC units (all running fine), various plumbing issues (mostly resolved), and the quality of our TV and internet connections (I asked him to please add more Hindi movie channels and a Hindi cricket channel to our existing package). Then, right on cue, he ran his forefinger over another surface--this time the wooden stand holding the glass table in the living room--and showed me the dust. He again brought up the cook, who he now referred to as "a good Hindu girl."

And there it was. In plain sight. It wasn't about the dust at all. Reshma, he explained, is a Muslim, and his wife is not too fond of her. I sensed they had been looking for a reason to dismiss her and bring Pushpa, the good Hindu girl, into our lives. I agreed to meet Pushpa, who conveniently was downstairs at that moment, and Anil called her up. He had her list all the types of food she could make, including shopping for ingredients, and I couldn't deny that having home-cooked meals a few times a week sounded like an upgrade from eating street food when it's 107 degrees outside. We arranged for her to come by the following morning to whip up a batch of paratha, which she did. Filled with potato, onion, green chili, and cilantro and served with the mango pickle I had purchased in the market that morning. They were delicious.

But what of Reshma? Anil assured me they would keep her on to do general cleaning on the property, which had been her role prior to our arrival. That made me feel incrementally better, and I agreed to the new arrangement on the condition that I wouldn't have to tell Reshma to stop coming. If that was what Anil wanted, he could handle it himself.

And so this morning, Thursday, I woke up with the vision of Pushpa and Reshma arriving here at the same time to do the same task. Pushpa planned to come around noon to clean and cook dal tadka, bhindi masala, and rice as requested. Reshma, as I mentioned, usually arrives by around 12:30. Had Anil delivered the news or would she continue to come per usual? Pushpa, it seems, has a habit of arriving earlier than expected. Today she rang the bell around 11:15 and left shortly after 12 with pots of food steaming on the table. Again, they were delicious. But having watched Reshma clean for weeks now, nothing about Pushpa's cleaning struck me as more thorough and meticulous. Reshma, running later than usual and thus sparing me from my nightmare scenario, arrived around 1:20 pm and has been working for most of the past hour. She clearly didn't receive the news.

So what to do now? I may have just written myself into a solution. While I feel strongly that it is not my place to actively defy the will of my landlords or upend indigenous social norms by playing "white savior," I do have some agency in this matter. Perhaps the answer is to keep Pushpa on to cook several meals a week, relieving her of any non-kitchen cleaning duties (which it doesn't appear she wants to do anyway), and continue the current housekeeping arrangement with Reshma. Maybe all it will take is doing nothing beyond continuing to pay them both and asking Anil-ji not to dismiss Reshma. Sure it's more domestic service than I need, or ever expected to have, but then again I didn't really choose any of this to begin with. Maybe my role in this seemingly sticky situation is merely to sit back, enjoy the home-cooked meals and sparkling clean apartment, and provide both of these women with reasonable income given my current means. Perhaps this is the way of the cultural ambassador. Who the hell knows.