My first ever visit to India after evolving into 'Ushasi Sinha Vasu Mallik'! The day also isn't far behind when I can see my near and dear ones more satisfactorily, breaking the barrier of a virtual window. This is after a full circle of three hundred and ninety three days and the experience can't be more exquisite while I take on my first flight with Emirates airline. The world looks more beautiful but less enticing without the man of the house next to me, gazing at a sublime and overcast sky that guides our aero pathway to Milan, Italy! An hour's halt at Milan, a quick tete-a-tete with a Hispanic co passenger in a broken amalgamation of English and some derivative of Espanola, everything goes smooth leading to a comfortable five hour's travel to Dubai. Now that I'm finally onboard for my flight to the city of joy Kolkata, it gives a strange sense of ecstasy and content within my dignity and uncompromising femininity, to pen down few candid words from the innermost corner of my heart - with the iPad open on my lap, every sip of that freshly brewing green tea tastes richer, leaving me feel wiser and blessed as ever.
This shall definitely be my first as well as last transit via Dubai. And the factors contributing to this deliberate decision are so very quintessentially Ushasi - the maiden then, the child wife now. One thing remains stable, unchanged, resolute, perhaps slightly more palpable than before - an unflinching faith in myself, and the unwavering zeal to take charge, voice for what feels principally right to me, regardless of how much pain and effort it takes to establish the right and vanquish the wrong.
The security staff sends me back thrice to take off three different items at the security check gate - my boots, my scarf, and my wedding bangle respectively - all of which he could have asked me to remove at one go and assemble in the tray for scanning. The United States, a country that fundamentally believes in ripping even a celebrity off his belt and shoes for security and safety purposes, normally doesn't adhere by rules such as asking passengers to remove their wedding rings and other religious ornaments unless they are indicative of some illegal trading or might turn out to be suspiciously and potentially threatening. This gentleman (if I should be gentle enough to address him so) has an inadmissibly churlish and aggressive body language from the very beginning and I don't know what pleasure he is relishing by making me go through the unnecessary trouble of returning continually and managing to grab the tray interminably, while almost choking in a wild stampede of a heavily crowded queue that seems to have the guests in more hurry than anyone else across the globe! They were probably like a herd of impatient sheep, each of them bleating in a nugatory effort to head quicker than the other for a magical flight to another destination. In addition, the rush makes them forget the basic generosity and courtesy of bearing with what is going on with another passenger before their eyes - a single girl, traveling alone with two hand baggage - one of the two considerably hefty, consisting of two single malt whisky bottles, a laptop, a plush puppy and few more goodies for her loved ones which she can't afford to carry in the check-in luggage owing to their fragile nature. Interestingly, there are other women too, whose jingling bangles and many more adornments camouflaged under the floor-length veiled garment is cleared to pass at the same point of safety check without a hint of hassle, but I am asked point blank to be free of my 'loha' ( wedding bangle on my left wrist) possibly due to some precisely unspecified and assumable reason. The security personnel, a dusky and lanky guy in his late thirties - hatched-faced, dark eyed, bearded, who considers himself to be the 'police' and the sole keeper of all the safety rules and regulations of the entire Saudi Arabia, unhesitatingly rolls his eyes at me in quite a nasty fashion and yells - 'Go!! go back! Take this off! (The bangle)
In a frenzied disbelief, my astuteness revolts through the veins instantly. According to the limited knowledge of the safety procedures that I am gifted with, there isn't any least convincing element in what he is trying to drive me at. There's supposed to be a beeping noise at the entry of any metallic device or object that in case is attached to your body, you are immediately told to put the same down for scanning, which in my case, makes no noise or doesn't flash any clearly visible blink in the machine either. Sometimes these personal belongings might very well be your anklets or even belts. I remember a couple of times the same was stringently followed at the Delhi airport several years back. Those days I used to be wearing a silver studded waist chain which habitually and subtly peeped out of my low rise denims on and off and it was extra special as was gifted to me by my mom during my early teens. I never took it off as it looked irresistibly sexy and also helped me ensure my waist was within its 26" width limit. Voila!
Every time I crossed the security check point, it beeped and I was blatantly asked by a female staff to pull my top up so that she could check me way too thoroughly, all the way down my navel where she could actually reach the metal chain and rotate her X-Ray wand all over. All this is more than acceptable. In an era of undue atrocity and religious fanaticism, the remorseless masterminds more often than not resort to the most devious ways in pursuit of sating their thirst for innocent blood. The 9/11 terrorist attack is the ultimate instance of concealed weapons that had helped the nihilists strategically hijack the carrier at the height of 50,000 feet above the ground level and where, survival stands hardly a chance. The emergency escape route is far from the gateway to your sweetest nest, nevertheless, the heaven's door might be wide open to greet you royally. Yikes!
This janabe-ali welcomes all international passengers who touch down upon his home ground with few minimal expectation that they'll be treated with adequate respect, if not exceptional warmth and striking gestures, and he most certainly nurtures several dyed-in-the-wool discriminative tendencies, and so doesn't mind allowing the ladies in black to proceed but this lady in her khaki tee and faded blue skinny jeans is held in custody for not yielding to his precariously male chauvinistic command and idiosyncratic demands which refuses any explanation! Since this unfortunate lone traveler takes pride in her marital signs and perceives that the withdrawal of any of these must come with some reasoning and justification, she is considered as arrogant, not remotely 'intolerant' and of course a rebel in all forms for protecting her customs and religious sentiment that are a part and parcel of her existence.
"I'm afraid, I wouldn't be able to take of my wedding bangle. It holds a religious significance for me." - I declare.
"You can't take off your wedding bangle? No problem. Just go back. You are not allowed to travel." - And he gives me that vulture's stare with total disapproval of the clarification I ask him for.
"You can't speak to a guest like that! Your X-Ray machine hasn't even beeped. Why are you troubling me for something which is no way going to make your task difficult of double checking on the safety measures? Is any lady officer there??" - I retort.
"Listen lady, if you do not do what I'm asking you to do, I'll take away your passport and you can not fly!" - He screams at his bestial best and snatches the passport away from my hand.
"Now you know what I can do to you right?" - He chuckles in his merciless vengeance mocking at my helpless, volatile state which only makes me shudder at the thought of what else is in store. What if I miss my flight to Kolkata? What if I am not able to reach the husband and the family?
Losing hope is not the solution and standing up against every wrong that attempts to bog one down can be ruled out itself by the virtue of one's conviction, judgmental prowess, unruffled composure and unabashed actions. There might be other girls too, just like me, who take up such risks and fight such a battle everyday travelling from one corner of the world to another and there is nobody to the rescue of these over protected and cherished daughters, sisters, wives and mothers of the family. Unlike many other times in the past, I feel I am going weak in my knees, jostle inside and out to regroup myself, and I mutter within - ''I'll sail through. Silently, singlehandedly but srongly. I know, courage and confidence is all that I have to bank upon and it's not easy. However, I can not let perseverance abandon me in this crisis while the faces of my affectionate family members keep coming into my sight.
I turn back, walk a couple of steps behind, as loud as a prying fox he is, I contrarily maintain my calm and my pitch substantially low, though loud enough to pierce through the ears of my targeted listener - "The next time you speak to a lady, utter words of respect in a tone that is professional and acceptable. I need my passport back! Do not try to harass me. It's not about the security check, but your behavioral manners." - I insist.
I am made to sit for approximately forty five minutes after claiming the passport and in the meantime not a single service personnel belonging to the same team and ethnicity assists me with the password of the wifi which can help me connect to the worried consort. Furthermore, I am not permitted to step out to the cafe area to refresh myself. In my understanding, I am being tested, tried and watched over until I reach my breaking point, which, for the dauchebag is like waiting for godot and in succession, is thwarting his plans. I, being a strong devotee of Bajrangi bhai jaan, (not the one who swoons us over his screen presence, but the one that is omnipresent, sturdy and divinely) - smile within myself as I see another gentleman who happens to be our janabe-ali's supervisor, approaches me with the passport in his hands. He apologizes for the misbehavior, harassment as well as the delay, and in return receives few words of advice suggesting an in depth training in people skills and passenger handling for his subordinates and seniors. I thank him and walk down to gate number C18 and in a blink my international roaming is resumed connecting me to the love of my life.
The truth is, that we talk about political dogmatism, we
argue over the news of award return, there is a tempest in the teapot almost
every morning over beef eating, or the prosecution of a criminal who has
damaged millions of lives almost a decade ago. But no one talks about how the temperament
of the society at large has not yet changed over the years in view of the
attitude towards women across the globe. At least thirty five to fifty percent
female air travelers report of being groped and fondled during random body
search at the airports every day. And if deprived of the least scope of sexual harassment,
one may even have to undergo an unexpected lashing of verbal abuse. And Dubai
airport is no exception. Not to forget, there was not even one female security
officer to check me physically, but janabe-ali standing tall and upright. The darkest images of such malevolent
realities prevail across the whole of middle east. There are countries that
still has its 'Muttawah' (religious police) roaming around the streets to make
a record of maximum arrests for witnessing an unmarried man and woman having a
conversation - be it a casual and pleasant chit chat, or some hint of euphemism.
It was not too long back when one such country made news of an employer
chopping off the arm of an Indian domestic help for simply resisting sexual harassment.
If one may put up a debate - How do we, as a civilization, as the citizens of a
first world country, reconcile with a culture that continues to openly perceive
women with contempt and brutally pound them with condescension? How do we, pervasively sit still for all those times when a female body and her emotions are
mauled in an orgy of zealotry? How do we as a self-proclaimed educated specie,
the moderately enlightened mankind make peace with our ill-fated brothers dying
in suicide bombings who have spent more than half of their lives looking down
upon their women for desiring to create their own identity beyond those black
flowing nondescript robes? How do we help them outgrow such malignant
dispositions that swears by the perseverance of their female counterpart's
'abru' (honor) at the cost of mutilating them, dispossessing them of their
individual rights and fredom of expression? Change is quite possible to
show up when we learn to redefine Feminism as a universal phenomena, and not
just as a cliché blowing too many grains of sand in the eye.
