During Ramzan, while I am fasting I am inescapably reminded of the times I chose to be poor. I use the word “choose” cautiously. Fasting is a choice, as, in a way, was my poverty. For people like me, who have both land and houses in their name, claiming poverty is, at best, farcical. Nevertheless it was a situation that I inhabited for a little while as I worked on my first couple of books.

I guess it is clichéd to be out of money when you are writing, the truth was a little more complex. I had studied international politics, a discipline that has few direct job opportunities in India. After I finished my MA, one of my professors surprised me by stating, “I have always wondered what the students of this course do after they graduate.” This information should have come at the beginning of the course.

Like most other disciplines, in India we judge the value of the degree by the star performers rather than the majority pursuing a course. In acting we think of Shah Rukh Khan or Deepika Padukone rather than the huge number of small-part actors whose names nobody really recalls, and who earn a pittance, and never advertise toothpaste. In our discipline we saw foreign secretaries, ambassadors and public intellectuals using high-minded words for arguing on TV channels or in the newspapers. Little did we think that they were the very few and far between. We had half-a-dozen heroes to look up to, and just our class alone had more than 60 students. Those half-a-dozen are still in our newspapers and on TV screens, and more than 15 full classes have graduated after mine.

But I wanted a job in my field, and I did not understand the cliques and circles in Delhi that helped you find a job based on who your kin is rather than what you have accomplished. While I searched for a break, I worked on a novel, because it was something to do, a dream, a desire to keep me afloat. I had no contract, I did not know anyone in publishing, I just had a desire. And this is the first lesson I learned in my poverty, that when you have nothing, when the doors you knock at do not open, when your applications disappear without an acknowledgement, you need something to help you along — even if that something is impractical.

The second thing I learned was to swallow my pride. When you don’t earn, you beg. There is no other word for it. It is humiliating and hurtful, and reduces you in your own eyes, but when you have nothing, your pride is not worth much. I begged for time from my parents, I begged for loans from my sister and cousin. I ate from money I had not earned, and made my appeals on hopes that I could not honestly say were true. I spoke of a job prospect here, an idea there, but what I was really selling was my own pride, my self-worth, and begging my family to give me a chance, even if I did not make the best decisions.

And this is the third thing I learned: you do not make good decisions when you do not know how much money you will have, and how long that will last you. I sat and figured out how ₹10 would feed me for three days. I put off dealing with the pain in one tooth — eating only from the other side of my mouth — until the pain became unbearable and I had to beg again for money for a root canal. The few times I had some money — borrowed money — I would spend on friends because I did not want to “feel” poor.

They did not judge me, and this is the fourth thing I learned: you may have little, and even fewer prospects, but a person is never truly alone.The company you keep sustains you, helps you walk, and, in your eyes, is the ultimate judge of your character.

Poverty and poor prospects shake your self-confidence, and your belief that you can judge things. It is then that the company of your peers allows you to try and maintain your balance. And just a hint of praise from somebody you respect can sustain you for months.

After those months I got a job, my self-imposed poverty ended, but I have not forgotten what it was like, or the support I received, the friends without whose company I would have lost my way.

Omair Ahmad is the South Asia Editor for The Third Pole, reporting on water issues in the Himalayas; @OmairTAhmad

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