House ATTACK!!!

Last month, I was researching about architecture, art and places to visit in Vienna for my upcoming trip to Austria -- a favourite part of travel planning.

I stumbled upon an art installation at the museums quarter, Vienna, which has a little house entangled into a neat modern exposed concrete building of modern art. It looked like some aliens had thrown houses at the earth, one of which got stuck in this building! ”House Attack” – it was aptly named by the artist or the journalist that had a quirky sense of humour. That image lingered in my mind and when we reached Vienna, I ran to search for that wedged house in the building. But it was gone! I asked the woman in charge, “where’s that house, trapped onto this building?” she thought I was insane, until I showed her the picture from my neatly printed self-made travel guide …”It was a temporary installation” she laughed! “The aliens took it back!”

But this reminded me of the two bitter- sweet “house attacks” that my husband and I had experienced in Abu Dhabi--- of the very few struggles in my otherwise fairy tale life ;)

Back in 2006, when I came to Abu Dhabi, it was very difficult to find homes to stay. After sweaty house hunts, so that wife dear can get the comforts instantly, Mr Mallu got tempted into a sub lease house contract from one Mr.Afghan, who worked out of Abu Dhabi and whose family was back in Afghanistan. I am sure it was the corner glass windows that allured him into doing so!

We lived there happily for two years , enjoying the panoramic wonders of the corner glass windows, until one fine evening, sub land lord returned with his pot figured wife and three tiny little pathans in sizes L, M and S, saying that they want to stay in that apartment ! We were aghast! Horror struck! Knowing not what to do next…

And moments later,Mrs Pathan started unpacking huge aluminium urns to cook biriyani right inside the living room that was once mine!...and the three little pigs…oops kids, scampered around in their respective L, M and S sized pathan suits…and I later found a fourth sweatiest XXL sized pathan suit hanging to be dried on a string right in the middle of the living room!

I thanked god for our bedroom with an attached toilet that saved me…

We survived the “house attack” for the night, but next day, we firmly asked them to give us a week to move out till we found another house. And after endless arguing in Hindi versus bits of Urdu and Pashtun, they went to stay with their relatives for that week.

Followed by tireless house chases and consoling an upset morale, we found a cozy cute apartment in a villa by the fragrant Albizzia! It had a “lover’s balcony” overlooking a nice mosaic dome of the mosque. Despite nightmares of three little pathan suits, I managed to decorate our new home with a lot of love, colour and a newfound fighter spirit!

We cherished this place for two years until another “house attack “disturbed our routine life. This time we reached home after work to find the balcony knocked down!!! The owner of the villa, an uneducated old hag, as expertly advised by his manager, decided to extend his villa on our balcony side in order to have more apartments and in short, earn more rent!

This was a harsh reality of Abu Dhabi, until the Baladiya and the Urban Planning Council acquired some power.

My warrior spirit was back, this time in a more professional manner! With a fake phone call and some kind help from our Arabic speaking friend, we managed to extract extra money in addition to reduced rent in return of the destroyed balcony! The opening was neatly “gypsum boarded” as per ‘architects instructions’ and later made into a nice “art wall”. I realized the perks of having creativity by my side through all these occurrences, to make good the “unaesthetics” of life.

We continued to love this home because of the next “nine months” that started with a sudden sweet realization. No balcony to look beyond, but a tiny bump that made me forget everything else!

Since the past two years, we are living in yet another home to accommodate three different flavors in place of two. This one is the best till date--- our abode of Love. Let me not say much about it, as who knows where the “house attackers” are hiding!

I still have some images of the three tiny pathans with a round fat mother(I wondered if another XS sized pathan was shaping up inside:), their huge aluminium trunck and their funniest master bed full of mirrors(the baby maker), that I got to see later when we were moving out and they were moving in! I also have photos of the unbroken balcony….Maybe I knew, someday, in a quiet moment, I would write about all this…looking back at it with a smile.

For someone like me, who lived in Pune in a rock solid ancestral stone house for twenty four years and never moved from there till I got married, such “house attacks” were quite overwhelming! I remember crying a lot for missing the first apartment where my new life started…But after my rebirth from pregnancy, no attack feels more challenging than a panic attack!

~ Inspiring "House Attack" --- Art Installation ,Vienna
 Image courtesy : Pinterest