USHA

Knowing Usha was like knowing a tornado in female form. She stormed into my life one afternoon around 23 years ago,  shrieking a warm greeting in her inimitable voice to my mother in law - "Hiiii maaamiii!!!" and enveloping her in a warm hug. She had just landed from Stockholm on a short visit to India. I was struck by this woman of whom I had heard a lot over the years, but had never met.

Usha was tall, with long legs and a perfect figure that any woman would go under the scalpel to acquire.   Big expressive eyes that she rolled ever so often as she spoke, which she did a lot!  She was chirpy, loquacious and full of beans. If you ask me what was her core character- the one quality that defined her life- it would be 'independent'.  She was an emancipated soul, brave in the true sense of the word, never hesitating to put thoughts into action.  And yes, she had energy - loads of it. She was also brutally frank and candid to a fault - easily misunderstood  if you didn't know her well.

Usha and I took to each other almost instantly, although I found her too overwhelming and she, as she would later reveal, found me too naive. She had a peculiar voice - shrill and  a tad loud with an unmistakable European accent that comes with years of living in those parts.  She always struck me as masculine ...her rather aggressive gait,  her no- nonsense brusque tone when she chose to get her point across and her practical approach to everything. Usha was as far as a woman can get from being  coy, shy or coquettish!

I cannot think of having too much in common with Usha but who said friends have to be similar to genuinely like and care for each other? I marvelled at the free spirit that she was, occasionally cringing at her irreverence and scant regard for norms that we embrace unconsciously. Behind that tough exterior was an extremely loving and caring person who reached out to family and friends at all times and stood by anyone who needed her.

 She did not visit India too often but when she did, she always called me soon upon arrival. Hearing her shrill voice greeting me with a big hello was the beginning of fun times with her. We shopped, visited restaurants and had long serious conversations. Usha was rather unique. She never believed in niceties and formalities - no ' come home when you can' or 'let's meet up when we can' with her. She dropped in happily whenever she could, ate whatever was at home and made plans for us to take her to the club, at times with her gang of Swedish friends!  She bonded with my mother in law equally well, giving her all the family news and promising to holiday with her.

So, what is surprising? Don't we come across many successful women like Usha who settle abroad and make an alien land their home ? Maybe. Except that Usha never went to  college.  This strong, super confident woman came from a modest, simple and conservative middle class family. Born and raised in Madurai  and married off when she was all of 15 into an orthodox joint family,  she walked out of an unhappy marriage with her daughter who was a toddler then. With no educational qualification to fetch her a job and no support from her parents, Usha lived with friends and found a job that took her to Stockholm.  Usha being who she was, learnt the language, worked hard at her career, fitted in and embraced Swedish culture effortlessly. She had a son through her Swedish partner both of whom she flaunted when she visited family in India.   

She called me occasionally and we chatted on facebook and skype often. Each time we connected Usha kept imploring me to visit her in Stockholm. She wanted to give me a great holiday, get me to meet all her friends, take me around a few more countries where she had friends' apartments to stay....it all sounded exciting.  I would always assure her that it was going to be 'this summer'. We planned my visit with her for 7 years. For some reason, it never happened. She was almost indignant every time I called off my visit, accusing me of not trying hard enough. She did not give up asking me, nevertheless. 

Last year, I decided to finally visit Stockholm. Usha was overjoyed, although she sounded a bit drained and exhausted when we spoke a few times of my travel plans on the phone. I was planning to go in June. Usha called  in the second week of May to inform me that she had cancer of the liver and was in hospital for treatment. She joked  'you cannot put off your visit for next year.... I may not be around to invite you!'  I was devastated. Hearing me sob on the phone,  Usha said  'come on Dharma! I am a brave woman. I can fight this. Don't change your plans..we can still have fun!' That sort of sums up the person she was.  

When I saw her at the Stockholm airport, I couldn't recognise her for a moment. She looked frail and weak and had aged around ten years in a few months. The ten days I spent with her in her serene home, far from the city in the middle of a forest, with birds chirping and a picturesque lake as its backyard will remain etched in my memory forever. We spoke of life and death, of karma and rebirth, of cancer and pain, her life experiences and mine. It was not the 'fun trip' that we imagined it to be in all those years. But it was much more than a holiday.

Through the day we received friends dropping by to see Usha and I was astonished by her warmth, courage and pragmatism in sharing details of her cancer with them. We spent evenings cooking some Indian food and chatting, with the pitter patter of the rain on her spacious deck giving us strange solace. Usha swung between hope and despair. She planned to visit India, work here for a year, build a new home and spend time with her mother and brother as if she had not a care in the world. Occasionally she broke down when reality of her impending death hit her -and to me, that was the hardest and saddest part. I could not see Usha helpless. She was a woman who was always on top of every situation,  got what she wanted, did as she pleased, planned her life to suit her dreams and had her future all mapped out. As she told me a few times, cancer beat her at it. She hired a lawyer to ensure that her children do not keep her on life support should it come to that and asked for all her organs to be donated for cancer research. She refused to move in with her daughter and stayed alone till the end.

After my return, I spoke to her a few times. In her last conversation ten days before her death, Usha asked me to buy her temple jewellery that she had seen on the internet and send it with a friend. She was talking of starting a venture in India the next month,  helping her ex mother- in- law find decent accommodation in an old age home and enquiring about my family. Not a word of death.

 Usha passed away in the early hours of August 14th, 2013.  Even now I cannot believe that she is gone. I expect to see her online in skype and  hear her 'Hi sweetie' pop up on facebook chat. Miss you Usha. More than you will ever know.