The Hindu : The other side of Laurie Baker

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Feb 15, 2004

Kerala

Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

The other side of Laurie Baker

By C. Maya

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, FEB. 14. The bedroom windows in `Hamlet', Laurie Baker's retreat atop a hill at Nalanchira, overlook the garden where bulbuls, magpies and robins keep up a chirpy orchestra throughout the day.

Sitting by the window, on that `very special armchair' that Laurie had designed and made for her years ago, watching the rays of the morning sun create geometric patterns on the floor through the `jalis', Elizabeth Baker talked to The Hindu about her forthcoming memoirs, which has been tentatively titled, `The Other Side of Laurie Baker'. The book is in the last stages of going to the press.

It was on another day, again sitting on her special chair that she went back in time to one morning at a rustic railway station en route to Faizabad, where a young man, "thin as a rake in khaki shorts and a T-shirt" stood waiting for her on the platform. He was to accompany her to Faizabad, where her brother was a doctor.

Travelling together in a `jatka', the young man spoke to her as though he had known her all her life. "It has been some 56 years since we began our journey together. As I was reliving those old memories and thought about the unique and extraordinary life we have had together, I felt that I should put it down on paper for our children," says Dr. Elizabeth Baker.

"We got married in 1948. On our 50th wedding anniversary, I had presented to him a small booklet, in which I had penned my thoughts and some moments we have shared in our 50 years of togetherness. It has now become a sort of a family heirloom and that was the beginning of this book," she says.

The book, she says, is essentially about Laurie Baker and various phases in his life - his life in England, the years he spent in China doing wartime service, their life in the Himalayas - something few people know about. There are also several personal accounts, anecdotes that give one a glimpse into the other side of Baker (his quirky sense of humour, how despite his Indian-ness, he never learnt to manage a `dhoti) and also brings out the rare intimacy that they share. Her account of her first meeting with Laurie is something that sets one on a romantic trip.

There are four sections in the book, which include her life with Laurie, letters written by Laurie to his mother while he was in China, letters of friends and his writings. Neither of them had kept a diary but the memories are so vivid that recollecting them was a pleasure.

Laurie detested anything mechanical and a bicycle was about the only vehicle that he could handle. However, as a member of the Friends Ambulance Unit, during World War I, he had to drive huge lorries through mountains and wild rivers in China. There is a hilarious account in the book, in his own words about his first lesson in driving a lorry.

"I got in and hung on to the big steering wheel...manhandled and foot-handled some of the devices in front and below... and shot off like a bullet to crash straight into an architectural gem of a gatepost..."

They went to the village of Chandag, 13,000 ft up in Himachal Pradesh, near the Tibetan border, for their honeymoon..., which lasted for 15 years. There were no roads and in the hilly terrain, one had to walk miles to get anywhere. "There was no doctor in the area and we stayed back to help people. Laurie was my nurse-assistant and for years we trudged together all over the place to give medical care," Dr. Elizabeth remembers.

Their life at Wagamon, their coming to Thiruvananthapuram where at Vellanad he built her their first home for Rs. 2,000 and his architectural concepts appear in later chapters. "People still marvel at the tough life we have led. But I do not think about it that way, for I've enjoyed every bit of it," she says.

She says in the book: "When I think about Laurie's life and the contributions he has made, I'm reminded of some verses in Chuang Tsu's `Man of Tao'.

"The Man of Tao...Harms no other being/By his actions...He goes his way without relying on others/And does not pride himself on walking alone/ While he does not follow the crowd/He won't complain of those who do..."

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