Nowadays when the trend for readymade garments is on the rise, our interaction with tailors is less frequent. Some of the old tailoring shops in the town have been closed while others have been converted into readymade garments stores. Of course, a large number of tailors are still around.
A tailor who will give you your clothes, ready and ironed, on the date which he has assured you is definitely not true to his profession! In our town which is fast growing into a big city there have been certain tailors whose idiosyncrasies and amusing habits have been often discussed by their customers. In fact the customers often compare notes about the behaviour of these tailors and find consolation by learning that they were not the only ones who were being victimised by the eccentricities of these persons.
There was one (he is still around but has finally stopped stitching, much to the relief of many people who were being tortured by his whims) who could hardly ever be found in his shop. One would have to wait for almost an hour before he would suddenly appear from the back door. His mouth full of paan, he often made everyone wait as he made an hour-long trip alongwith his baker friend. The two friends gossiped with others on the way and then had a long conversation with the paan wallah (also an old friend). This was a ritual they indulged in thrice a day.
Whatever remained of their working hours was divided between work, lunch at their homes (which were on the first floor) an afternoon siesta and many cups of oversweet tea ordered from the neighbouring chai wallah.
Once you gave him anything to stitch, he could take weeks — sometimes even months — to finally get down to do the “cutting”. The lessons in patience he gave his customers were quite valuable. But when patience finally gave way, there would be scenes at the shop which I can never forget. Sometimes I too lost patience and brought back my bag of suit material which had been lying, getting dustier by the day, for months on his crowded shelves.
There was a lady, who had brought her daughter along to identify the cloth they had given to the tailor two months ago. The lady had forgotten what it had looked like and the daughter had come to help her retrieve it. They showered him with the choicest abuses as they walked away with the cloth. He actually smiled through the entire episode. Probably he had been planning to step out for the paan as soon as they would leave. He believed in the philosophy that work was a very small part of life and one need not take it too seriously. Not as seriously as the paan trips, at least!
He now sits comfortably with his two sons at a readymade garments shop they have started and can escape with the baker as many times as he wants to without any fear of intimidating customers coming in for their clothes!
In the small market of our colony, there is a tailor who seems to have become a popular folk tale like figure. Women meeting each other at the market in the evening exchange stories about his craziness. life would not be so interesting without his little corner shop where there is a congregation of women and girls threatening him with dire consequences if he did not return their cloth right away. I think he is a little deaf because he never replies to their loud clamouring. Perhaps this is his defence mechanism or he stuffs cotton wool in his ears and carries on operating the sewing machine. He never goes out of the shop and yet he never completes his work in time! One of my neighbours who had to go for a wedding to another town was told by him to make use of the clothes she already had. Why did she need new ones for every weddingIJ
There is yet another one, in this same market, who parks his motorbike behind the shop. As soon as his assistant spots any lady coming to the shop to check on the progress of the clothes given by her, this tailor master jumps on the bike and drives away at great speed from the back lane. Truly amazing! Nobody can ever unravel the mysteries behind the strange behaviour of these “Master jis.”