The Human Comedy Inside an Elevator

What Happens When Elevator Doors Close?

                                                                                 - Anupama S Mani

Nizam, the house help, came in grumbling loudly, practically seething, as he brought the milk in the morning and shut the door. “Kya hua (What happened)”, I asked him.

“Aaj lift mein nth floor wali madam phir mili theen, phir wahi sab sawaal pooch rahi theen. Yeh log hamein lift mein akele milte hain to yeh sab kyon poochhte hain? Aise to nahin baat karte! (Today I again met the ‘madam’ living on nth floor in the elevator and she was asking all those questions. Why do these people ask me questions when alone in the lift? They do not talk to me otherwise.)

For the benefit of the readers, the repeated questions, are - Where do you live? What do you do? What are you carrying? Why aren’t you going to your own floor? Why isn’t your ‘madam’ seen much outside?

This lady is not the only one, he has told me of a few others too.

Nizam is generally polite and well-mannered, so my sympathy lies with him, for he has to face this volley of questions during the short ride between the ground floor and our level one.

There is no prize for guessing why these ladies question Nizam. Are they merely passing time, are curious about the life of this unknown Indian woman, or, for the very unlikely reason- genuinely concerned about my well-being?

No wonder he prefers to take the stairs.

A friend’s son told me how, soon after they had moved house, a complete stranger, presumably a resident of the building, asked him how much they had paid for the apartment, in the elevator!

That set me thinking. Why is it that as soon as the sliding doors of these tiny 6’x4’ cubicles close, shutting us off from the outside world, people seem to assume different social entities?

Different people respond differently in an elevator. Some try to avoid eye contact, staring at the floor indicator as if their lives depended on it. Others remain aggressively silent, even as they can feel somebody’s eyes scanning their body and storing the details in their brain RAM. Some read the advertisements on the walls as if planning to take the elevator there, while others search the ceiling for creeping creatures.

Some acknowledge fellow passengers with a nod or even a smile.

I myself have occasionally exchanged a sentence or two with familiar faces about weather as if they created it and I were a farmer worried about my growing crop.

Then there are those who eavesdrop on random conversations, hoping to update their knowledge of gossip, add to their storehouse of reusable, recyclable information, or collect baseless theories on any political, economic or social issue.

I have met women in residential buildings conducting interviews for position of maid in their homes. Sometimes, you encounter people who could well serve as the building’s time-keepers, so disciplined are they in their timings of going to work, school or their morning walk.

Some people in our building have prayed to the so-far-unheard-of elevator god not to stop at a particular floor because the six or seven-year-old spoiled brat, so lovingly raised by the parents, might get in, start kicking the door, yodel loudly and generally be a nuisance.

In these confined spaces, all of us have encountered children who, in their innocence ask sweet or strange questions. Worse, some have a meltdown because their mother or maid will not let them lick the door or put a finger into the slit between the closed doors.

What do others do in such situations? They either look sympathetically at the accompanying adult, as if saying I know, I too crossed that bridge in 1985, or, if they have been lucky enough to have normal children themselves, give them fiery looks. The unspoken message is if you paid as much attention to your child as you do to your make-up, nail art, clothes or accent, perhaps your child would know how to behave normally.

Some passengers exchange pleasantries or blame the zamana (times), sarkar (government) or RWA for paan stains and other defacement of the elevator walls, or for the lift having stopped on some previous occasion.

You may also witness the theatrical micro-performance of incompetence when someone presses the wrong button.

“Oh, wrong floor daba diya (Oh, I pressed the wrong floor)”. After a few seconds, “Kitni tension hai, dimaag kaam hee nahin kar raha, kadak chai peeni padegi. (I have so much tension, my brain is not working, will have to drink strong tea). As if after Modiji they are the only one who has to carry the country on their shoulders. Most passengers ignore the comment. A couple of them might offer a slight smile, while another may start recounting how he too did the same thing once, or even several times.

Then there are those who burst into a crowded elevator looking as if they have just run a marathon. They cannot stand quietly. They shift from foot to foot, click their tongue every time the elevator stops and the door opens because someone had pressed the button and vanished into the other elevator. They must broadcast to the world how inefficient this machinery is. The production involves a lot of audible sighing, aggressive wrist-watch checking (even if they are wearing a smartwatch that isn't lit up), and muttering to themselves.

“Come on, chalo, chalo bhi”, they whisper fiercely to the closed doors, as if the cables will pull harder if they sense human panic. Their vibe is unmistakable: I am an incredibly important, busy person, and this mechanical box is sabotaging my empire. The other passengers subtly shift away, terrified that this person's stress might be contagious.

There are also people who talk on their phones, cooking excuses, “Abhi to main ek meeting mein hoon (I am in a meeting right now). Every head in the steel box suddenly shoots up as if switched on, while the person blithely continues to manufacture sentences about their busyness.

Or you might be privy to someone discussing their evening or holiday plans, leaving you wondering who these 80 crore people are after all, whom the government gives free rations, supposedly out of your tax money?

Sometimes you stand gingerly, avoiding the dozen pieces of luggage scattered carelessly over the now-dull floor, as if their owners had hired the elevator for a private ride to their penthouse. Other people may be calculating what more-than-humanly precious possessions those bags and boxes contain.

Sometimes your stomach begins to growl at the aroma of food wafting from someone’s bag. More often however, you find yourself covertly or shamelessly covering your nose when the smell of stale alcohol on someone’s breath, overpowering perfume or sweat becomes unbearable, or you are bombarded with the gaseous contents of someone’s innards suddenly let out in this microcosmic world. Immediately a few passengers begin darting accusatory glances at faces playing the detective in this whodunnit game.

Occasionally, your quadruped co-passenger arrives on a leash, sniffing every nook and corner before zeroing in on somebody’s crotch or posterior. The human on the other end of the leash offers a reassuring Dariye nahin, yeh kaatta nahin hai. (Don’t be scared, it doesn’t bite). This is followed by an admonition to the dog. The dog’s look seems to say, “Why isn’t this vehicle air-conditioned?”

And I worry whether the animal is vaccinated, wonder how much flesh its mouth can grip and hope someone knows the ambulance number! 

And then, of course, there is a miniscule category of people who meet in an elevator, fall for each other and romance blossoms. I have seen this in a couple of films, but needless to say, real world is far less exciting than the reel world and I have yet to meet someone who lost their heart in this mechanical hoist.

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