Gayatri lay out the table on the floor. She was expecting a visitor who had been frequenting her studio apartment at Ganeshkhind Road, in the Deccan Gymkhana, Pune. But today, for the first time, he was coming for lunch. She had decided to do an original Bengali lunch, carefully choosing the vegetables and fruits from the Mandi the evening before.

“ Kidney beans, leun ghe ”, Shanta Maushi, the lady vegetable vendor had suggested. “Changla aahe!”

Kidney beans, fruits, green salad, grapes from Nasik, besanladdoos - she had already started to plan what she would make for lunch. But her guest made her promise she would have to wait till he came. They would cook the lunch together.

Cases of this nature are unknown to Bengali hospitality. A meal without fish is in itself unthinkable. Have you fed the guest at all, if there is no fish?

Times had changed for Gayatri. In the last two years she had become a complete vegetarian. That was one of the demands of her Guru, in order that along with yoga, she could cultivate a life that was moderate, disciplined with not too many moments of extreme happiness or sadness, too much excitement or lack of it. A life that was measured and smooth. These years had to be years of sadhana and not of just learning yoga. Yoga was a way of life, not just a practice of some back-breaking acrobatics.

For Gayatri this was an experience of sorts. M oderation, for her was for the bland, the apologetic, for the fence-sitters of the world afraid to take a stand. It was for those afraid to laugh or cry, for those afraid to live or die. She lacked the sustainable theories of using everything in a moderate way. In fact, it was her husband who encouraged her to come to Pune for three years to learn a way to do just that under a Guru. She would not only learn the theory but also the practice of a balanced life. No doubt, Gayatri had just begun to feel the difference.    

There was a gentle knock at the door. She opened the door to find a small bunch of mogra flowers carefully wrapped in the folds of green leaves greeting her.

“Come in Andre!” she smiled taking the flowers from his hands.

“I did not know what to get for you….”

“Thanks for the mogra and your presence. Both are very well appreciated,” Gayatri said placing the mogras in a bowl of water at the feet of a large picture of Krishna and Radha. She put her hands together in a namaste. Andre followed to do so too.

“Lunch ready? I am hungry”

“In a bit. You said it was going to be a joint venture…” Gayatri smiled. She went to the kitchen basin and turned the tap on over the kidney beans lying in a flat plate at the floor of the basin. The gentle fragrance of mogras filled the air as she began to peal the cover away from the beans. Andre came and stood behind her.

“May I help” he said placing his hands over hers on the wash basin.

Gayatri hailed from a small town called Aurangabad, just about four hours journey by bus from Pune. Andre had lived many years in Auroville, near Pondicherry. He had travelled to India for the first time in the 80s on holiday. In Pondy, quite by chance he was introduced to Shefali, a Bengali devotee of Aurobindo Ashram. They fell in love and married. Two years ago he came to Pune to learn yoga and here he met Gayatri. As it happens to many people, since both of them were from out of town, they grew close.

Andre had dreams of starting his own yoga school in Madagascar from where he hailed. And teach yoga in Auroville for six months of the year. Gayatri came on the behest of her husband, but was already desirous of including yoga in her medical practice in Aurangabad, after she returned. 

Andre and Gayatri were both aware that there was a thread of attraction between them. Gayatri was naturally surprised at herself for feeling this way. So was Andre. Tall, blonde and thin, with deep blue eyes, Andre was fond of her, especially because they shared a common Guru as well.   

After the yoga classes, they always broke one rule. They met at PhiloCafe and indulged their senses with a thick coffee with cream. Although their strict schedule and diet made coffee a no-no product, the Philoppuccino they shared together was their only excuse to keep meeting over a large cup of philosophy.

“What could be the reason, why a person born in another country, takes a trip to India and continues to live here forgetting his own country….”

“It is his search, his search for meaning in life”

Andre recalled the day he met his wife Shefali. She wore on her neck a necklace of tulsi beads. Her hair was long and black and she had a chandan tikka on her forehead. He found her reclusive and withdrawn. In fact that is why he was drawn to her. She had a dark complexion, a very dark shade of brown. She also had very steady black eyes. Lying on a background of white, carefully protected by long lashes, her eyes had looked at him without batting an eyelid. He was transfixed. They had looked on at each other for a long time without speaking. The communication was complete without saying a word. In a week they were married. It is Shefali who drew him to Sri Aurobindo. They walked together on the spiritual path, she half following Sri Aurobindo and half her own religion from rural Bengal. She sang Baul songs with such devotion, Andre, always saw a little Krishna sitting beside her when she gave voice to her longing to see Him. Andre thought perhaps he had married Radha incarnate. In Shefali his life’s search came to an end.

But there is a time for everything. Even his dedication to her, ripened and the fruit fell. A new thirst, bigger that ever started to gnaw at his soul. His feet found the road again. They carried him to Pune, this time to learn Yoga. Shefali did not accompany him. They spoke quite often to each other. But her world was Pondy. It was her Kasi too. She would never leave that little quintessential town to be anywhere else. Last year on Janmasthami day, she told him she was going to spend five days at the temple complex just outside the only Krishna temple in Pondicherry. This year, she went without telling him anything.

“She too has grown far away from me”, Andre had confided in Gayatri.

“How do you know?”

“Because, she thought I was her very own at one time, she always told me everything before she did it. But this time she has not told me anything. She has gone without even telling me she would be away for these many days. Clearly, she has grown apart from me. She does not feel I am a part of her life….” he concluded in a matter-of-fact manner.

The quest for meaning in life goes on. It is the same quest which had now brought him to the gates of Gayatri’s house.

“May I help” he said placing his hands over hers at the wash basin. Gayatri’s hand movement slowed down, as Andre’s increased. He rubbed the inside of her palm still holding her from behind. Gayatri had recently bought a brick red kurta with long sleeves from FabIndia. As the sleeves began to roll up, pushed up by Andre, she felt the gentle surge of warm blood filling her underbelly. Her mind prompted her to stop, but her body relaxed.

“All I want, he whispered “is your brick red kurta…”

Andre’s hand travelled up and just as she thought it was going to cup…..a quick, sudden movement from him and he had pulled her kurta off her body. She swirled around hastily covering her naked body with the front of his. The fragrance of his body mingled with the mogras filled her. His warm breath lay behind her ear….she could not help but let go.

Black and white. A photographer’s dream frame. Black and white, Gayatri’s dark brown body, naked from head to waist pressed against Andre’s white kurta. Black and white, like day and night, at once their exposed emotions and yet, the words that were never spoken. Black and white, like Krishna and Radha locked in their eternal flow of love song. Black and white, the conscious and the subconscious, the journey of life we are aware of and that we are not. Black and white, like his face pressed against hers, his pale blonde hair, wet at the side with the flowing sweat, juxtaposed against her jet black hair, flowing down to her back yet not covering it or hiding it from his eyes. There is indeed no shame to guard against, no guilt to dodge, just two flames of desire burning as one, their bodies pressed against each other, two colours, black and white, in a dance of ecstasy.

Normally this is not the diet for a first time guest at a Bengali home. There are other exotic recipes a Bengali woman can spread out on the table called sorse maach. In fact, the best sorse maach is made from Ilish maach. It leaves a strong taste both in your tongue and your nostrils. The aroma of the curry stays with you even after you have finished your lunch. It stays in your mind for an even longer time. The soft flesh, between your fingers, the tender bones you lick and put away, the mouthful of a flesh with an exquisite taste, so unique you can never ever forget it. You want to taste it again and again. Relish its refined taste. You will always return to shorshe ilish macch, as long as you live for even when you place your fingers at your nose, you will always smell the fragrance of that days delicious lunch, although today it is flat kidney beans mixed with the exquisite fragrance of the mogras….

In his mind, Andre imagined it was Shefali’s sorse ilish. It is the true Bengali flavour he could never forget – Ever!