SUIT UP!

I may be underestimating my friend’s serious tone when she sighs as I announce that I am going shopping to the mall. But she has a good reason for doing so. I will come to that in a while.

My trip to the mall is never just a cursory one. When I am at the mall I don’t simply frolick around or window shop, sighing with bated breath as I pass by one of those sexy outfits ; the price tag on the said piece of clothing equating it to a heavy gold relic from El Dorado but weighing over the anorexic ‘plaster of paris’ mannequins.

Leading a grad student life with limited funds and time, I rarely visit the mall. But the few times I do, I have an agenda. And that is to shop till I drop. But only because I REALLY need to shop.

My recent trip was catalysed by a panic-stricken epiphany that I did not have the right formal attire to attend a conference in New York. Of course if you’ve appeared for interviews which I have back in India, one would have basic black suit and trousers to go. And I did. Except that it was cut in 2006, at a time when I neither had a very keen eye for corporate attire nor the funds to possess an immaculate set.

Which reminds me of where the suit was made and I must distract myself for a while to tell this story; at the Raymond’s showroom in New Empire market in Kolkata. Raymond’s did I say? Fancy you would think. Na-ah! I forgot to mention. It was exclusively for men! Given my family’s love for good tailoring and the old craftsmanship of this skill (which can only be found these days in the small-town neighbouhood ‘dorji’s dokan’) my family has always had an obsession to get trousers, shirts and even denim tailor made. So when my sister joined the corporate ranks after her fancy MBA, international brands and SGP’s fashion houses didn’t do it for her. Instead she got her suits and even buttoned down shirts made in this hallowed sanctuary for middle class corporate professionals. ‘Masterji’ as everyone fondly referred to the head tailor at that showroom would have basked in glory had he seen Arthur D Little’s executives stop by didi’s desk to ask her where she’d bought her perfect fitting pearl grey shirt.

Now getting back to my friend’s ominous sigh. I am a dread to go shopping along with when I have an agenda. Sure enough this specific friend promptly informed me that she had ‘homework to do’. On such visits to the urban mecca of consumer crap, I almost always know exactly what I want and will go to and fro from one store to another comparing prices, trying things on until I know for a fact, that my dollar is being well spent. It’s not the Indian desi mentality, no –oh! For those who knew me in my early earning days back in Mumbai, they would have sworn that Sophie Kinsella’s lead in ‘Shopaholic’ must have been based on me. In comparison now, I may take longer to arrive at a decision comparing clothes but that way I have been able to hold back from impulsive shopping decisions.

But this particular mall excursion will go down in the annals of history…..my unique history, of the countless shopping trips that resulted in things being bought but never used or never needed. This time I needed a suit and I was prepared for the trauma that would come with looking for one. I am either a wreck trying to find the right fit or providing entertainment to the sales girls giggling as a cackle of geese as they watch me float around, arms and legs akimbo in clothes that merit a person of more Goliath-like proportions. But little did I know what I was in for on this fateful day.

I didn’t waste any time going to a Macy’s or Lord and Tylor’s instead boldly stepping into Banana Republic. My wallet was shrinking in horror as I inched towards the slick black suits lined up in front. They yielded like silk and butter (imagine a combo of that!) in my hands and elicited deeper and more heartfelt sighs than my friend’s. I think ‘grad student’ must have struck her instantly because she led me to a depressing ‘grey’ section that was on sale. Note. Greys are perhaps the only thing always on sale! I must have looked real forlorn or God had decided that this was to be the day my faith in good salesmanship must be restored. The salesgirl asked me to hold on and promptly disappeared to a storage section which didn’t strike me to be good because all rejected or bad fits land up there. A few minutes later she emerged cheerfully asking “Is this okay?”

Okay! Hell it was more than okay. It was the super duper okay of O Ks! I hurried into the trial room and low behold. This slate blue suit with a subtle blue trimming and a matching skirt just the perfect length and perrrrrrrrrfect fit (needless to say moi’s derriere looked nice in it ) was on me…NO , it was made just for me. A double zero (beat that Kareen aKapoor!!) she said. I was a double zero and so was the suit!!!! HALLEJUAH!

I left the mall a happier and more optimistic person that day. There’s been a spring in my step and a whistle on my lips. I don my fancy suit and skirt and tread the streets of New York tomorrow…a person whose faith in wardrobe miracles has been restored.