Roadside Reboot

HE8217;S quick on the uptake. Quick to assess the podiatric requirements of the trooping public. At his spot outside a cinema hall in south...

HE8217;S quick on the uptake. Quick to assess the podiatric requirements of the trooping public.

At his spot outside a cinema hall in south Delhi, on a late afternoon, I ask him if I could borrow his shoeshine box for a few hours. 8216;8216;I8217;ll polish, you teach. It8217;ll be in the newspaper,8217;8217; I tell him. The 11-year-old takes the box, hanging on a strap, off his neck and hands it over without a word.

The shoeshine box: A wooden receptacle8212;the kind they pack mangoes into8212;with an attached leash. Every day, tiny hands fish out four essentials from the box to boot up your life: A small brush, a big brush, a muslin rag and a case of wax polish. Without them, there8217;d be no shine on any sole, ever.

The roving eye of my guru is always on the lookout for a catch. 8220;Ask the man with the baby,8221; he instructs. It totally works. Wham! The box is before him. I take the rag and begin to dust the man8217;s shoes8230; oops. Wrong move, the rag comes at the end. But my guru is lenient. He hands me the small brush with a smile. I quickly take it with a nervous grin. 8216;8216;Don8217;t use both your hands,8217;8217; comes another admonition. Rs 5 for the effort.

We are on our third customer. 8216;8216;You are using too much polish,8217;8217; says the little man. 8216;8216;Sorry boss,8217;8217; I reply. He doesn8217;t smile this time. 8216;8216;Theek hai, thoda kam kam lagao,8217;8217; he whispers.

In four hours we8217;ve only spiffed up five people, including a Caucasian and a Japanese. Another hour8217;s passed. I hurt my index finger with the buckle of our sixth patron8217;s shoe. On the eighth one, I bruised my nose twice with the big brush used very very swiftly to get the shine, there are needles in my toes, and my eyes are watering thanks to the vapours of the polish.

The little guru8217;s friends have come. They also want to be a part of our game. 8216;8216;Khel nahin ho raha hai, akhbaar mein chapega,8217;8217; he tells them.

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We have a chuckle over our ninth man. The chap8217;s hurried off with one trouser leg still rolled up. It8217;s the third time that8217;s happened. My Lilliputian guru gets a real kick out of watching them walk away, one up one down.

Another client arrives with two female friends in tow. The master simply can8217;t stop asking the younger girl, in black open-toed stilettos, if she wants a clean-up. I can see why. Her toe-ringed feet look fresh out of a warm pedicure. He pesters me to ask her in English, and then whispers, 8216;8216;Shirt se saaf kar doon sandal8217;8217;. We are obviously snubbed.

The sun is unrelenting now. The flagstones at Priya Cinema are baking. But while I8217;ve almost reached the end of the line, the little one8217;s only coming to life.

He8217;s vanished behind some lanes chasing after a spiky-haired, buck-toothed colleague. There are a bunch of them, all killing time. After all, in six hours, we found only nine willing to give into the grace of shining shoes.

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The teacher swoops back in. I ask him about the 8216;P8217; tattooed on his right arm. 8216;8216;Parvin, my name is Parvinder.8217;8217; He runs away again. I drag myself out of the crowded facade of the cinema complex. I want to crash in my shoes. Parvin appears again. 8216;8216;Where will I find you next,8217;8217; I ask him. Always at Priya, he says. He doesn8217;t ask for a copy of the article. Does he even remember?

Sunday film goers are pouring out. Too many floaters and too much sportswear. Barely Rs 20 in hand, there are no more offerings for my barefoot shoe master.