Swap case

Tere mere sapne khile yaaro ke dil mile

The acid test for our approach to Amal’s screen time has been transatlantic flights. Starting with our first winter in Canada, our travel to India has become an annual darshan in February. Each time it has been harder to keep her from using the in flight entertainment.

The first year was easy because she slept through it. The second year, I was able to convince her that everything was in French because we flew Air France. This year was a challenge. I had already whetted her appetite with 20 minutes a day the week of our flight. She was sick and at home and it seemed like the most painless way of avoiding my calls interrupted by a loud “AAAAPPPPPAAAAAAA”

She perked up as soon as we left for the airport. She had packed her own bag- a pink Barbie strolley and negotiated how much she would like to watch on the train to the airport.

“I want the flight one and 2 Peppa pigs and 2 Paw Patrols”

This despite an Icelandic cartoon featuring a wolf and 2 elves being the last “flight one” she had seen.

The flights we were on had slim pickings but she watched anyway. 2 songs with Baby Shark on the first flight and then 1 episode of Peppa Pig. She fell asleep so she missed watching an episode of Paw patrol on the second one.

When we landed at 2 am, she had forgotten about all of that. Entering Indian air space had flipped a switch in her head. As soon as we hit the tarmac, she snapped the seat belt off and had waded into the sea of people in the aisle, while we waited for the doors to open.

“LETS GO APPA. WHAT ARE WE WAITING FOR”

If you haven’t been to the new T2 airport in Bangalore, you would have missed how it is efficient enough to even cater to an impatient child like this. So efficient that when we saw immigration within 4 minutes of getting off the plane a panicked aunty turned to me and asked “duty free yellidhe?”

8 minutes later we were waiting for our baggage. Our first bag arrived. And then the second shortly after. Half an hour in we began to worry about the third bag. By this point Amal had begun to look as exasperated as my father in a restaurant without alcohol.

There was just one person at the lost luggage counter. Kiran, who informed me that our bag had arrived in Bangalore. Based on this information I dutifully went back to the carousel. Of the few remaining bags there was one that looked exactly like ours except for the fact that it had a ‘Sunita’ emblazoned on it.

By the time I went back to Kiran, there was now a queue in front of me. I had to wait fifteen minutes for the mutual decryption of a German and South Indian accent. The missing bag was either to be sent to the Taj or on a Haj. The next person before me was an indignant American who claimed that this never happened in the US and he had never been separated from his bag.

“Try it when brown” I scoffed only to swiftly look up to the ceiling when he whipped around.

When I finally got to the front of the queue I explained to Kiran that we hadn’t gotten our bag but just one that looked like it. He looked to me and then to my bag and then said to me ominously

“Swap case saar”

As he proceeded to talk into a walkie talkie about our swap case, I waved for Mali to take Amal out to meet my parents as I suspected it would be a while. It was already more than an hour after we landed. Amal had started putting one foot past customs to goad Mali into following her outside.

“Anything to declare?”

“Just this brat!”

Just as Kiran had sleuthed his way to an assessment of where my bag was I had gathered that the night shift at the airport was a rare occurrence of meeting a workforce that was entirely Kannadiga in Bangalore. I switched to Kannada as well to get things moving.

“Kiran you have to help me guru, where’s my bag”

“Sir I will get it back for you sir don’t worry”

“What is the protocol. Can I send someone to pick it up from here later?”

“No Sir, that person will come and then you will swap the bags again. In front of me”

Entha protocol thoo

He claimed to have made contact and had asked me to wait for half an hour. By this time I gave up and called my folks outside and told them to leave with Mali and Amal.

With no coffee shop or anything else to kill the time while I waited for Sunita, my mind began to think of ‘swap cases’ I had seen on screen.

Like Tere Mere Sapne about Chandrachur Singh, who is an orphan tycoon, exchanging places with a taxi driver played by Arshad Warsi. The only thing more ridiculous than the plot was the fact that Arshad Warsi is supposed to be Tamilian.

And then of course there’s all the twin ones. I was too young to watch Seeta and Geeta. I remember my dad watching it on TV and asking him about the plot.

“She goes from being an Idli to an Idli with pigtails”

A twin one I did like was Kaminey. It had Shahid Kapoor playing twins in a gangster movie. It was chaotic and the music was banging. Raat ki dhai baje

Fuck it’s 3.45 now!

“KIRAN? What’s happening guru”

“Sir she just told she is leaving her house sir”

I wondered if it would be unbecoming to buy a quart and a Bisleri at duty free. A lot of the swap case movies focus on moments like this to show the difference between the rich and the poor protagonists.

Like the movie Ala Vaikuntapuramaloo in Telugu featuring Allu Arjun. The movie starts with the secretary of a business tycoon swapping his baby with the tycoon’s so he can torture his son and so his own son can grow up rich. It was also remade in Hindi as Shehzaada, with Karthik Aaryan, who had honed his acting skills earlier by looking like every 3rd person in the Delhi metro.

The plot only gets more ridiculous from there. There’s a board room scene where-

“Sir?”

“Ya Kiran?”

“Sunita is here sir”

“LET’S GO! WHAT ARE WE WAITING FOR GURU”

I followed Kiran out as we met Sunita. A sheepish Mallu aunty who apologized with “sorey pa-new soot case”. She had gone to and returned from her house in Jakkur. I shook hands with her and Kiran and continued on my way.

That stretch of time was probably the longest bout of staying in one place in the weeks that followed. Like every other trip to Bangalore, our schedules were packed almost as much as my belly. A blur of travel stretching from Konankunte to Cooke town to Coorg, while Maliha and I were working through our trip. We spent large parts of the day driving trying to squeeze in as much as possible.

None of this bothered Amal. She had a beatific smile as we would weave through traffic. She would wear a new dress every 4 hours and she negotiated a trip for herself to Mysore with both sets of grandparent and 0 parents.

Maybe she should do the Canada, U.S tariffs next.

The trip was much too short for her of course and she was a bit down on our way back. I felt more than once like we were kidnapping her.

Was this because of her being aware of the Allu Arjun gap between her life in Canada and India? Public transport vs air conditioned car? An army of people at her beck and call vs one of us answering her while cleaning/cooking/cleaning after cooking?

Or it may have just been the weather. She perked up after we left Canada again for a week long trip to the Dominican Republic. A long overdue holiday, when I was fully off for the first time after last June.

We had booked a trip to celebrate Amal turning 4 and our 10 year dating anniversary. Unlike our previous holiday to such a resort, Amal had much more of a say in how our day was spent. The whole day was in the pool. Nights were spent at the entertainment provided by the resorts. No matter what the programming.

“I want to go to the body building show”

She had also made friends with some of the other kids at the resort. One from Chile, another from the UK and one from Mexico.

We were the only Indians in the resort. “De La India” as I would say when asked. I was even roped into represent it in some pool side beer chugging competition where I took on a tiny skin head from Italy. I did so badly that if time travel ever becomes a thing, I am sure my past self would have come all the way to just thupp on me. Besides the weather, the food and the rum, there were other things that reminded me of India.

Like a Spanish song I heard playing in the buffet. It sounded a lot like a song by KK. With the main chorus going ‘Yaaron’. Not the one that makes grown men cry at reunions. But Hai Junoon by Pritam. In the movie New York, one of a hundred movies in the early 2000s that said the best place to be Indian is outside India.

I don’t know if I am there yet but I do feel it makes sense for Amal. Not just because with 3 first names, she is the Neil Nitin Mukesh of Canada.

Because I think that her relocation is a part of the reason she is so confident.

Yaaron, jo khud pe ho yaqeen

To zindagi haseen, tuje kal bulaaegaa

She’s more independent with only us to rely on for most of the year. She has the attitude in school of someone who has been there the longest, which is true. She’s confident riding on public transport. She’s mastered commuting to school on a scooter. And with her little Spanish, now knows how to say thank you in 5 languages.

I remember what followed one of my Spanish lessons as I failed to negotiate an exit from the swimming pool after 4 straight hours.

“You liking it Amlu?”

“Ya the weather is hot. Like Bangalore”

“Should we go back soon”

“Ya ya do that, Bangalore again”

“Longer than 3 weeks?”

“Ya ya. 5 years”

“5 years?!”

Swap case saar!