Don’t have umbrella.
Stuck in Kolkata monsoon.
We’re drenched. Dripping. Wet.

Walking through the city of Rabindranath Tagore, it’s hard not to feel poetically inspired. But when you’re walking in a torrential downpour, it’s hard to feel any other way than wet.

The heaviest monsoon rains are supposed to pass Kolkata by the end of September. But due to low pressure hovering over the Bay of Bengal, the City of Joy has been hammered by thunderstorms threatening to dampen Durga Puja festivities.

We made two rookie mistakes resulting in the complete soaking of our clothes and belongings. First, we failed to realize that Calcuttans are quite sympathetic to the fact that it no one really gets anywhere in the rain. Ignorant and rushing make an appointment on time, we descended the steps of the Victoria Memorial, where we had spent the afternoon, into the deluge. Second, we did not bring an umbrella.

Sometimes you feel a sense of calm caught in the rain. You’re soaked, but so is everyone and there’s nothing you can do about it, so you look up, enjoy the shower and smile. But today we were missing that peaceful resignation. We were wet, surprisingly cold, and tired.

It’s times like these chai wallahs were made for. And it’s times like these you appreciate how you can hardly go half a block in Kolkata without running into a chai wallah.

We scurried from the cover of the Kalighat Metro station looking for the first chai wallah in sight where we could retreat, like mice scampering across a kitchen floor blindly searching for a hole in the wall. We didn’t have to go far – about 20 steps – to reach Shibu’s tea stall where we huddled under tarps promoting political candidates and advertising “Spoken English” tutoring.

Shibu promptly poured us strong milk tea into a two-inch tall clay cup. The cup – kulhar in Hindi, bhandh in Bengali – lent an earthy taste to the tea, an extra something plastic can never match.

As the storm grew stronger, we packed in tighter under the tarp with other customers taking refuge. Prasul, waiting out the rain before boarding a bus to his home in Darjeeling told us he took his tea with “liquor only.” He encouraged us to try some. We were indeed in need of a stiff drink but surely he couldn’t mean alcoholic tea. We ordered one, unsure what we were getting ourselves into.

“Liquor only” in fact meant something much more innocent – simply the “liquor” of black tea. The bitter drink provided a welcome respite from the rich milkiness and sugary sweetness of masala chai.

While we sipped, we admired how Shibu and his wife Purnima worked together, one seamlessly taking up the other’s task where he or she had left off. With 20 years of running this business together under their belt, they knew each other’s rhythms. When Shibu left a pot of boiling tea to fill another vessel with water, Purnima stepped in and stirred the pot before it could boil over. “Husband and wife make a good team,” Shibu smiled. Their son Devashish helps out in the evenings after finishing his sales job at Park Avenue Cosmetics.

The rain kept coming down as we watched cars and buses lurch through the soaked streets. A few unfortunate souls without umbrellas waded through knee-deep pools of water, but foot traffic was sparse.

“This rain is very bad for business,” Shibu said. “It’s Puja time so everyone should be out shopping. This is always the busiest time of year for all businesses in Kalighat.” But in the hour we stood at the tea stall only four customers came by.

“We are sad it is raining, but we are happy at least you have come.” We had been sad too. Until their chai brightened our day.

The post Monsoon Chai: A Respite from the Rain appeared first on Chai Wallahs of India.

My inspiration for writing about chai wallahs is a 5-foot tall Nepali woman who brightened every day for me during the year I taught English at Nav Yug School Peshwa Road on a Fulbright Fellowship.

The students made me laugh. The teachers made me fat. But it was Jhumka Auntie who made me feel at home and kept me going each day with her warm smile and warm adrak chai.

I returned to Nav Yug School to relearn the words to Jana Gana Mana and Vande Mataram, and to brush up on my Nepali while Jhumka prepared chai.

As she boiled water, she recounted her personal story. Jhumka was born in a village near Pokhara, a peaceful town on a lake at the base of three of the world’s ten highest mountains. Twenty-nine years ago she came to Delhi with her husband who had found a job at the Parliament House. She worked as a domestic in the home of S.B. Chavan, who served as Home Minister in the governments of Rajiv Gandhi and Narasimha Rao. When Chavan died, his son Ashok, who was Maharashtra’s Chief Minister until removed amid a corruption scam, found Jhumka a job at Nav Yug.

Hired as an aide to help supervise small children, her responsibilities quickly expanded to include making and delivering chai to teachers. They pool money for Jhumka to buy ingredients and give her tips to supplement her salary. “Teachers are addicted to tea,” she explained.

She splits duties as school chai walli with Anandi, who came to this school with the principal when she transferred from another Nav Yug branch. “We use different recipes for different people. Madam ko chini kam pasand hai.” The principal takes less sugar.

As Jhumka tosses tea into her pot, students pile at her door to place orders for their teachers, listing the classrooms where Jhumka’s services are needed.

Some teachers can’t wait for her to make her rounds. Lured by the sounds and smells of smashed ginger, Negi Ma’am, who teaches high school English, enters Jhumka’s kitchen. “This is my break period and I have a lot to do, but I can’t do any of it until I have tea,” Negi says. “If I’m tired I have tea. If I’m hungry I have tea. For every problem, our solution is tea. And for this solution we need Jhumka. We handle the students’ problems. Jhumka handles our problems.”

Jhumka pours a cup and hands it to Negi. She takes a sip. “Jhumka is the lifeline of our school.”

Jhumka Auntie’s Adrak ki Chai (Ginger Tea)

Serves ~8 small cups from Jhumka’s thermos

Ingredients:

3 cups water

1.5 cups milk

4 teaspoons black tea

6 teaspoons sugar

1 inch piece of ginger

Instructions:

Bring water to rolling boil. Add tea and ginger. Cover and steep for 10 minutes. Add sugar and milk. Put mixture on highest heat. Just as it is about to boil over, stir. Repeat three times. Reduce heat and let sit for a minute. Pour through strainer and serve in cups to teachers in kitchen or bring thermos around to classrooms and provide a welcome interruption to lessons.

The post Back to School: Returning to My Favorite Chai Walli appeared first on Chai Wallahs of India.