First Person

To be quite honest, when I came to India for the first time on a holiday in 1989, I was more than ready to go back home. I came down with...

To be quite honest, when I came to India for the first time on a holiday in 1989, I was more than ready to go back home. I came down with malaria and my wife had her share of problems. We went on to continue our holiday in South East Asia, and it was there that I began say, Jeez, I miss India.’ I missed the spontaneity and the warmth. My posting to Islamabad was a combination of my desire to be in the sub-continent, as well as the BBC’s decision to send me there. I was there for three years, and I had a great but hectic tenure. In my first year and this is one of my favourite lines there were five changes of government, four Prime Ministers, three Presidents, two army chiefs of staff and one BBC correspondent.

Coming to India next was like coming to Paris. I had a lot of friends in Islamabad, but Delhi had many more restaurants and places to eat out. People often ask me Did you choose to come to India,’ and I tell them No, I fought to come here.’ There were seven people vying for the same posting and it was literally a dog-fight. I like the ebb, the flow of the country. I am also lucky to have the job I do: the BBC allows me the freedom to do the type of stories I want to do, feature stories that will let me find out how a country ticks, which may, in fact, interest people more than politics. Most other channels still continue to have pre-conceived notions of India: they see it as a land of Mother Teresa and beggars. It is, but there are a hundred million other things as well. I am particularly happy with my stories on the pop music scene in Mumbai and the Tamil film industry.

I find that when one digs into the culture, one can get to much deeper issues like corruption and the underworld. I like Hindi films, the social themes that run through movies such as that of Raj Kapoor. I don’t like the new films much, I just like the songs.

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On the whole, though, I find that India has a lot going for it. I find, though, that Indians are too harsh on themselves. They are always criticising themselves. I find the same in Pakistan as well, and actually, in Canada too: so it could be a human tendency. The only people who don’t do it are Americans, but that’s because they hero-worship themselves.

I don’t know what I will do next, but the pattern is that I don’t stay in one place for too long. I was in Pakistan for three years, in London for about two and I have completed three years in India. Staying on is not really an option, I’m not going to be a Mark Tully and settle here, but this place will always be a part of me. I prefer it to my home-country, Canada. For one, because I think Canada is too materialist. And also because I am vegetarian and cannot find anything to eat that is without meat! I always have an Indian lunch, though I don’t really follow a recipe when I cook. My cooking is a kind of Mediterranean masala: a mix of Indian techniques and western ingredients. So you can say I create my own type of cuisine.

I speak enough Hindi to get me by, but I am very embarrassed to speak to my colleagues in the language. I don’t have a problem with others, though. Like, the man who accompanies me on my treks in Garhwal doesn’t speak any English. We converse quite well in Hindi, or at least, that is what I think it is, maybe it’s Pahari. The point is that we understand each other and are friends. I think one of the best things about India is that everyone is bilingual at the least. It would be nice to have a BBC television news service in all the Indian languages — maybe we will, one day.