Delhi Press Club

　　The Delhi Press Club, Vijay's favored drinking joint, attracts a rather less exclusive crowd: Indian journalists, almost all of them male and as hard-drinking, chain-smoking, and cuss-mouthed as American newspapermen of the 1950s. They throng the bar in crumpled button-downs, tossing back whiskeys and handfuls of spicy fried Bombay mix, and trying to best one another with tales of political scandal. The place is windowless, run-down, and raucous, with TV sets blaring Hindi news channels. When I walked in, a half-beat of silence fell across the smoky room as a number of the men paused to take note of the unlikely sight of a feringhee girl in their midst. I was worth just that——a glance——before they returned to their stories.

　　I wandered outside to the patio and Vijay in the falling dusk. He was with the only other woman in the bar, whom I took to be Parvati. She was wearing a white salwar kameez, a wool shawl pulled around her shoulders against the late October chill. Her makeup was the traditional kind that Geeta disdained for Western-style colored eye shadow and lip gloss. For centuries, Indian women have lined their eyes with dramatic black kohl and painted a black or red bindi dot on their foreheads——women from upper-caste maharanis to 1930s Bollywood heroines. Parvati was dressed like a pious virgin, and yet, lined up on the table in front of her were a pack of Gold Flakes cigarettes, a bottle of soda water, and a shot of amber-colored whiskey.

　　Vijay introduced her with a grand sweep of his hand. She was one of Delhi's best political reporters and one of the few women who's been asked to join the press club, he boasted, then added, "She also really cares about issues, which is unusual among most of the journalist choots you see in here." Vijay's words slurred together boozily, and his English was peppered with Hindi profanities that he must have restrained himself from using during our interview; I soon learned that Hindi curses are an essential accessory among the Delhi Press Club set.

　　……

Sideways on A Scooter, Life and Love in India, P75~76
Miranda Kennedy
ISBN 978-1-4000-6786-2