Downtown Kot Laments: Coffee Shops, Asses, Classes and Fake Westernization in Kashmir

While I am neither a sociologist nor an anthropologist, but a curious people watcher with a passing (non -theoretical) interest in sociology, I must profess Kashmir presents a fascinating portrait of the intersection of cultural change(s), class(es) and their orientation and globalization and sameness. The picture that emerges is as complex as it is a crude caricature. It is complex because it suggests a Kashmir in the melee and vortex of a zig zagged, crass modernity (that is actually somewhat at odds with modernity itself); it is a caricature because its fundamental premise is mimicry. In terms of a simplified ‘reality’, we can call it the ‘instagram effect’ – persons of a certain age cohort take a cue from Instagram trends and then transform their ‘lived reality’ on the same pattern or form. 

But this aped and mimicked reality is at odds with their actual ‘lived reality’ that is determined and shaped by the contextual setting of Kashmir; it is still very much a traditional, religiously informed family-oriented society. So while Kashmiri yuppies (they are not very successful though by the metrics of money and purchasing power thereof) may get a wee thrill and kick in a simulated ‘reality’, he or she has to return to the actual reality of Kashmir. This is best reflected in a coffee shop scene and ambiance of Kashmir. A Kashmiri coffee shop will my starting point to delineate the theme of this essay.

A hypothetical may help illustrate the point here. 

Enter a snazzy café with a fancy sounding western name. Western music- either the soft or hard variety- will be playing in the background. Waiting staff (mostly from rural areas of Kashmir) will either greet you or they won’t. The greeting will be western. If there will be a smattering of customers in the given café, they will be either morose, asocial or passive aggressive. They will pretend not to notice you- as if youre invisible but they will start judging and checking you out in the crassest way. All will be very well dressed- mostly western attire. Some women’s hair will be streaked(blonde), others will be defined by latest and trendy haircuts. The guys will have a certain swagger to and about them suggesting confidence (but actually a poor sense of self inflated by a café ambiance).  The language spoken between couples and assorted customers will be either a mish mash of Urdu and English or badly spoken English (to me). Barring outliers, our own language Kashmiri will not be spoken in a café. If the waiting staff will not attend a person, he or she will say, ‘excuse me’, check out the menu or order her or his preference, say for a café latte, or a cappuccino, or a pizza- without actually being a connoisseur of any of these. They will then eat, perfunctorily, suggesting that they are not savoring the food but doing their best to maintain a front or façade of – whether they know it or not- a western experience. The fakeness of this ‘experience’ cannot be more eloquent than this. Some people will stare rudely; others will be hacking away at their laptops, while others will be people watching and sulking or gawking as the case may be.

Now the moment our Kashmiri coffee shop yuppie or assorted customers will leave the café, smug in his or her brief encounter with a fake western ambiance, he or she will encounter real Kashmir. This will be an urban setting defined by heavy, crazy and crazed traffic, hollering, traffic snarls, clogged roads and so on. He or she will either go to work again overlaid by a Kashmiri ingress and finally home where dad or mum will glower and growl: ‘Katio /katee aesekh. Yoot xeer chaa garre yivaan: where have you been? You can’t come home at this ungodly hour)- even though the time may be 6 pm.  

A word about the class characteristics and features of our café going yuppies is called for here: these mostly constitute the ‘upper’ educated classes of Kashmir. Their exposure to the world and understanding mostly comes from some education and some work experience in Delhi or Bangalore and above all from the internet- social media like Instagram, Facebook, chatrooms and twitter.  It is then a mediated experience; not an organic or a real one- an experience that is a mish mash of the rest and the west, is more image than substance, and one which crafts not a synthesis between the East and the East but a transmogrified corrupted self. It may, on the face of it, look or seem western but in real terms it is far from in. (I am NOT rooting or supporting a western defined and orientated self here. Far from it actually. Each and every culture in the world is unique and has something to offer. Each of us while not denigrating and demeaning other cultures and traditions must respect our own one too. This is where self-respect lies).  This is the story, self-narrative and self-concept- a mangled, distorted an inorganic one -of our elite educated ‘upper’ classes. It’s all in a Kashmiri coffee shop that it can be seen and observed.

What about the ‘others’?

 I can only speak with reasonable confidence about MY downtown Srinagar- where I am from. (I have since a while shifted to suburbia – unfortunately). Downtown Srinagar used to be a place characterized by deep social capital where everyone knew everyone and where everyone cared for everyone. To be sure, there were different economic and social classes in Kashmir but all in all it was a large family. This downtown, unfortunately, is dissipating and disappearing, owing to structural and social changes, trends like peri-urbanization, the dissipation of the joint family, the breakdown of the extended family, some degree of economic mobility and so on. But despite this downtown retains some of its character – spontaneous sociability, care for and of others, and overall empathy in varying degrees. Downtown Srinagar is perhaps the only urban space in the world that is safe and warm against a baseline comparison of downtowns across the world. Downtown Srinagar is a space where a woman can, bedecked with jewelry, walk alone at midnight without fear of assault, robbery or unsavory attacks. Downtown Srinagar is still a space where people know each other and care for each other, to a large extent. It is also a raw space where fake sensibility and fake culture does not exist. It, to some extent, retains its organic nature.  It is a space where after spending time in New York, London or Australia, I feel real, and authentic. It is a space where I connect, where I relate and where I am ME. The snaking alleys of Downtown, the cramped spaces of human habitation, the smells and sounds of downtown Srinagar, the rawness of its denizens, their love, their arguments overlaid by the architecture of the space – the Great Grand Mosque and the Khanqah a Mualla which are spiritual retreats are spaces where I am in my element.

But there is a peril that awaits downtown and that peril emanates from the fake Westernization of our elite educated classes. It is these classes that set the tone for society. Overlaid by the Instagram effect, the titillation and immediate fake and illusory gratification by the internet, aped by our elite classes, this fake westernization can percolate to OUR downtown, MY downtown. This sill not merely dilute its character but destroy its character and nature. If this happens it will be the saddest day of my life. How, the question is, can our downtown which emblematizes our essence be protected from depredations and assaults? 

Ultimately, it depends on us. We have to take stock of ourselves by becoming real and not indulging in crude and fake mimicry. This is not to suggest that aspects of western modernity be entirely rejected. No. Not at all. There are some noteworthy aspects of the west that are real and substantive, where our (Eastern) and their values mesh: truth telling, honesty and integrity. (These are, by and large, relative. No human society is perfect; values are reified practically in varying degrees of intensity).  But the west has its own culture and we (as Easterners) have our own. We cannot and must not become western clones. Plus the images of the west that are beamed into our living rooms and smart phones, these are just that: images and a mirage. By all means, we must go to the West, understand its wellsprings and nature if only to understand ourselves. This is the path to real and substantive dialogue between us and the West – a dialogue informed and defined by who we are, and by who they are informed by a respectful, dignified idiom, where difference and diversity are the operative dynamics.  It is then a Kashmiri man or woman, for example, can be home both in New York City’s Manhattan area and downtown Safaa Kadal or Maharaj Gunj. This is where real confidence and authenticity. By all means, wear Rayban sunglasses or Merrell shoes but be sure to wear the Kashmiri pheran and speak your language in a way that would make our greats like Soche Kraal sahib, Rasool Mir Sahib and Mahmud Gaemi sahib proud. It is here – not in fake settings of coffee shops with fake demeanours and fake accents -where respect, dignity and pride lies. The rest is hogwash!

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