Movement 99

He was a Western student who went to Lahore and taught for a yean Ten years on, Jonathan
ldle returns to Pakistan and India and reflects on the changes that have taken place both there
and inside himself.
Taken Fo?
Granted
n Nagpur Station at 5.OOam
Rosie wondered if anyone
would remember her ten years
on, and would they care that
she'd come back to see them? We
needn't have worried; by lunchtime the
Bishop had interrupted a staff meeting
just to give us tea, and his secretary
was organising our timetable. After
that our main concern was being so
warmly welcomed that we had no time
for ourselves, attending a 'welcome
dance' and hastily-arranged visits to
development projects as if we were
some kind of celebrity.
I had had similar concerns arriving in
Pakistan-who would still be around,
and would it feel awkward to turn up
ten years after losing touch? lt was in
fact exhilarating to meet my closest
friends there. the school servants. They
were equally delighted, and not only
invited us to their homes to eat, but
gave us presents because l'd got
married since l'd last seen them.
We were both returning after ten
years-l had come to show Rosie
Pakistan and she wanted to show me
lndia. We both wanted to see people
and places we had memories
of
-memories all the more intense as
she had ended our relationship when we
came back, but seven years later we'd
got married. We also wanted to see how
our own reactions would be different
this time. As time went on it was those
reactions that most fascinated us. lt
was exciting to note how much I had
changed, by noting such intense and
different reactions to what we were
experiencing.
We didn't simply enjoy the
overwhelming welcome from friends; we
went back to our guest-house and
discussed the limits of cross-cultural
friendship and the nature of intimacy.
We discussed the dynamics of power
and the intrusion of wealth and poverty
into relationships. We found, most days,
a quick link between our experiences
that day and the big questions of life.
Take poverty and our reaction
to it. Mark Tully's answer when
asked how he copes with
poverty is "l don't have to. The
poor do". An equally striking
answer might be "The same as
we cope with the poverty in
Britain". Even the word
'poverty' is too abstract and
sanitised for the destitution
which we find unimaginable
but which is normality for
millions; Tully's answer hints
at the thoughtless and
abstract ease of the
question. My answer
implies that if we don't
notice poverty till we reach
lndia we have closed our
Eating cake in a posh hotel
and then walking past a
beggar feels uncomfortable,
but it is logically no worse
than eating cake when we
can't see the beggar.
whether in Britain or lndia.
We all do this every day,
but it feels worse when the
beggars are more
numerous or their situation
more extreme.
But who is poor?
Poverty is relative, and
closely related to power
So whilst in some ways
we are richer-more
advantaged
-than most
of those we met, in
other ways there are
people whose monthly
wage I could drop out of
fnovcmsnt 15
my pocket and not notice, but who are
no poorer than me in terms of their
status and access to what their
society offers. I got tired of
being asked