Questioning the “normal”: Life as a transman in the pandemic

I had eloped with my partner from a small town in the interiors of Gujarat in 2018. We were barely two years into settling down in a new city, when COVID-19 struck the world and our lives in April 2020. As a trans man, navigating spaces was already a challenge. Now, COVID wore away all that we had lined our new nests with – a bit of security, a rented accommodation, jobs for ourselves, finding our feet and putting them squarely on the ground. From counting pennies, to living a dream of open skies was no easy task in the face of meeting formalities of identification, opening a bank account, or even using the earlier account that we operated in our town. We constantly ran the risk of revealing our whereabouts to our families from whom we had run away. We had to succumb to presenting ourselves to neighbors within the locality, to our landlady and our colleagues at work as ‘friends only’ who lived together for no reason other than the fact that we were two ‘women’ who had come into the city looking for jobs.

We had barely adjusted to the rough edges lurking around our lives, and a semblance of ‘normalcy’ was established for us. The sudden announcement of the lockdown left us shocked and confused. We did not anticipate the closure to last that long nor did we visualize the consequences it would have for us. But the thing about those of us, who live on an edge, is that only hope keeps us from falling. And we were high on hope having come out safe from families. We thought they loved us, but discovering how conditional it was had brought home a painful realization which we had to reconcile with. Being together healed us. But COVID-19 seemed to make a dent there too. I learnt that scarcity, insecurity and indefiniteness do not always birth bonds that grow strong in tough times. Or at least not when you have started on a rough road, and around the bend you are not anticipating a bigger tear. It tired us out and we had to be watchful; watchful about the distance between us and watchful of what was out there.

The space shrunk between us, for more than one reason. Since we were home-bound, our landlady would make her way into our space every now and then – as if it wasn’t bad enough we were dealing with our own issues. She commented on the time we got up, what we wore, how and what we cooked and even wondered aloud if sharing a small bed was quite alright for two?

Another time she sailed in and sat cross legged on our floor rug, sipping from the cup of tea we offered. She wondered, “I want to ask you if you do not mind…” I sensed it was going to be a slippery road. So I asked, “Is the sugar right?”

But she did not answer. Instead she continued, “You have been here for some months, but both your parents have not come yet. Why is that so?”

This was perhaps the one time when COVID worked in our favour. I said, “Yes, Aunty they were planning on coming, but COVID has come instead.” My partner looked at me and we exchanged looks as the landlady nodded.

Sometime later, she had another bizarre demand. She wanted us to pay an increased amount for the electricity, much more than what we had agreed upon earlier. Her justification? “Now you stay home twenty-four hours. The electricity use is more – the fan, the lights…” No amount of silence and turned backs deterred her from walking into our side of the living space.

The last straw was when she insisted on us paying the house rent. None of our employers were paying us our wages. The money that we had got from our respective homes was not enough. We offered to pay in installments. But she did not want to hear of it. “The whole amount” she said. “I depend on the rent.”

The Government had given me a paltry amount of Rs. 1500 when the lockdown happened. Just once, and no more. That barely helped us meet our living expenses since we are two. At a time when people were stocking up on household necessities, scared of a deficit, we had no choice but to compromise severely on our daily needs.

Eventually the landlady took our deposit amount and asked to leave. We were able to pay rent only because of support from the community. We found ourselves in a bind, relieved to be free of her and sad at the loss we could not afford. We ran up debts that we are still paying back.

Now things are relatively better. I go to work. For quite some time I was on less than half of my regular salary. In the meantime my partner also found work in a call center. The experience during the pandemic, however, has done much to intensify our existing fears and insecurities. Being mindful of the new protocols of social distancing and constant sanitizing had to co-exist with our already deep-seated concerns of staying hidden from family and relatives. People say that we will have to adjust to the “new normal”, but that is for those who were used to a secure and stable past. For people like us who have always been on the down low, evading and constantly changing, the pandemic is simply another stage which we learn to negotiate.