Chandu, the tout that Nandan used about a year back, occasionally drops by to say something crazy. Usually he says that he much some rich foreigner, and that they want to buy a lot of silk without asking questions. Sometimes he takes about opening a silk shop, which he says is the surest way to make money in Benares (there are already 10,000+ silk shops here and they have mostly identical stock, as the suppliers consider innovation in design to be contrary to the existing demand).
This time he had some Belgian girl with him. As near as I could determine, he had told her that he was taking her to some dancing school. Chand lies about everything, and because he can only speak English and not actually understand more than a word here and there, he tends respond in the affirmative to anything that is said. Incidentally, let me say that this is an effective sales technique, as it is entirely possible for a tout to sell something without understanding English simply by saying “yes” to everything the tourist asks. Some of best salespeople in one’s native country will do this also… watch for it…
Anyway, so Chand and this girl were in the family room and I came to probe as to what the heck the girl was doing with him. Chandu occassionally fondled the girl’s feet in a sexual way that was over her head, and because I wanted to see her response and because I thought it mostly harmless, I did not intervene. The girl was quite distracted and clearly not thinking straight. Foreigners get that way in Varanasi; I can recognize that strange look they get. I do not think she even noticed that her feet had been touched, much less molested, so best that she never knows, I supposed.
She sounded educated, albeit within the humanities, and I do not know what she wanted. I stepped out of the room after chatting with her a few minutes and during that time, Bunti saw something strange and Nandan questioned me about this later. More on this topic follows after I tell what I saw.
Chandu wanted to have the girl alone in my room to do her horoscope and I suppose to seduce her. He, as well as most uneducated and many educated Indians, have a bizarre understanding of sexuality and Western sexuality in particular. I took them up to my room for laughs and he proceeded to do a horoscope. He said things like, “You will get married at age 27” (she must have been 25) and “You will have two boys and a baby” and “Your mind will go to shanti shanti” and “Your father and husband will pay for everything and you will never have to work.” These are Indian goals, and do not quite represent what a girl like that wants, but it was Chandu’s idea of well-wishing within the context of doing a ridiculously fake palm reading.
Nandan came home at that time and started watching also. Shortly after taking a photo, I told the girl she should go home and be safe as it was getting dark. I told her no money for Chandu for anything, and she said okay. Sometimes people give into requests for $0.20 or whatever, but it just promotes craziness.
Later Nandan asked me if Chandu and the girl had sex in my room. I said no, why. Nandan said that Bunti told him that when I left Chandu and the girl alone in the family room for about three minutes, she (Bunti) went into the room to give them tea. At that time, Chandu had one hand up the girl’s shirt and one inside her panties. The girl was supposedly enjoying this.
I have repeatedly spoken on Indian concept of sexuality within this blog. It stands out a lot, because talk like this so often comes up. I, as a Westerner, talked with this girl, another Westerner, and I feel that I have some grasp of what her mores, interests, and thinking must be. Let me specifically state that in my opinion, this girl could not possibly have had any interest in sixty-year old Chandu’s crude ways, dirty body, or rotten bloody teeth. Also she was not drugged or in any kind of allure.
But the concept that Western girls will have sex with anyone, anywhere, anytime is a strong notion here. I have repeatedly heard this here, and if you are American and have not been to India or some other such Western-media influenced place then maybe you have heard this before, as I had before I came here, but let me say that I did not understand the depth of this conviction before seeing it over and over here.
Bunti was concerned on moral grounds that Chandu seduced the girl in the family room and, in her mind, he likely had sex with her in my room upstairs. I told Nandan to tell her that I was with them the whole time. Bunti must assume that I stayed with them to prevent sexual contact – of course this was not on my mind.
I told Krista this story and she laughed as I did, but it is not funny for Bunti, who does not want to run a love nest.