When Chalk and Cheese were planning their long vacation in America, one obvious talk was about the expenditures ahead and how much money to take along.

When we say ‘money’ it is an all encompassing concept, something like ‘humanity’; undivided by continents and social structures. The word money may be universal but the universality ends there alone. The minute we start thinking in terms of currency, the divide crops in. The Dollar, Pound, Yen, Yuan,Taka, Rupee, the currencies  line up together . And to see our dear Rupee standing way behind in this greased and slippery queue is not very enriching.

Since enough is never enough, Chalk and Cheese together settled for a certain sum which seemed reasonably ‘enough’ to them. We kept in mind our Rupees stamina and strength to run along with Dollar for a three month long race.

With a day or two left for our departure from India, I sat down one fine morning with a few Dollar notes spread on my bed, arranging them in my new wallet, and humming ” ye jo thore se hai paise..” when suddenly I heard a voice. I looked around in surprise and saw that the Rupee notes were peeping out from my old wallet and staring down at the new display of Dollars. I waited for Rupee to say something , for I firmly believed at this point  “paisa bolta hai” !

With a hesitant voice Rupee whispered,  ” Since you are about to visit America and now you are displaying all these fancy Dollars in front of me, let me tell you that though Dollar is my first cousin , I am not particularly fond of Dollar .”
I looked up with curiosity at Rupee and asked “But why so ? Isn’t Dollar the most accomplished, the most famous one amongst you cousins ?”

Rupee was quiet for a moment, then with a sad face it replied “That is the very problem with Dollar. Everyone thinks so highly of Dollar and success has gone to its head. In a brash and boastful manner it makes all other currencies, I mean cousins, feel very small and insignificant. “
Rupee took a deep breath and continued “And why will Dollar not get all the importance, when in my own country I am not treated with respect.”

Hurriedly I butt in “Of course I respect you dear Rupee, you were in my first pay check, you are in my life long pension, infact whatever luxury I could ever afford was because of you.”

Rupee was not listening to me, it continued in a papery voice, “Why blame others for being more powerful. Every big and small note, even the smallest coins in the mint are  constantly living with the fear of demonetisation. You humans will never understand, how painful it is to be told without any forewarning that this particular note is no more noteworthy, it feels almost like amputation “.

“Well, some of us do understand your pain ” I attempted to reply, “As humans we too felt the pinch of demonetisation, all our treasured notes losing their value overnight was quite shocking. And then the adjustment with those pink, blue and green coloured new notes, it created so much confusion and anxiety for us !” 

Rupee looked at me indignantly and continued ” Please don’t  talk of colours.  We did not chose to be pink or blue and not even black or white ! You humans have made us wear white and black as per your own convenience. “

The hurt was obvious in Rupees voice. I tried to calm it, and said somewhat reassuringly “I really value you dear Rupee, it is you who bought these Dollars for me, in a way it is you who will be going with me to America”.

Rupee was not calmed with my reinforcing chatter. With deep sadness laced tone it continued ” If you valued me so much, would you rush to exchange me in such a hurry with those proud-green Dollar notes? I feel so depreciated at this moment. You don’t  care for me much, you are taking me to a foreign country locked in a forex card where my value will keep falling everyday “. 

With that conversation with my dear poor Rupee etched in my heart I left India ; but I also made a promise to myself that while in America I would think in Rupees while spending in Dollars. No matter how loudly Mahendra Kapoor sang inside my head ‘ mere desh ki dharti sona ugle, ugle heerey moti, mere desh ki dharti ‘ , I knew the hard hitting truth that our economy was not doing the best, not when our next door neighbors could beat us in per capita income.

The day Chalk and Cheese had entered the United States a tired and somewhat rude immigration officer had asked Chalk “How much money are you carrying?” Quite an indignant question, I had thought.  Chalk’s reply had satisfied the officer enough to give us an eyebrow raise and a nod. I had smiled to myself and thought, as tourists we can only add to a countries economy, and our Rupee empowers us to do so.

In the initial days of spending I would constantly multiply Dollar with Rupee every time I had to pay for something .  Gradually the habit of doing mental math stopped  because the more zeroes I kept adding the fear of numbers became bigger and bigger . The easy escape route was to forget the math. I started thinking of one Dollar as one Rupee. Somehow the familiar thought of spending in Rupee started comforting my mind. I started buying tomatoes with 4 Rupees, potatoes with 3 Rupees , eat out with 70/100 Rupees, and finished a lot of other shopping with just 100 Rupees. I had stopped converting. I was treating the Dollar like Rupee. As the multiplication stopped in my brain, everyday life felt more affordable and easy.

In a few weeks time Chalk and Cheese would be winding up their spread sheet in America and head back home. A home, where a daughter, mother, sister, brother, friends and family awaits their return eagerly. A home where…there can be songs on ” panch rupaiya bara ana”. A few Two-thousand Rupee notes in my wallet  waiting to fly out for some hawa pani. Once home Cheese needs to call up dear Rupee friend to say that the Dollar sends its regards .

Someone new in the market called Bit Coin has started ringing the door bells of the currency cousins. For once Dollar is feeling it needs to say hello to everyone , after all family is family.