Mala climbed up the stairs which led to the roof of the house, two steps at a time. The shaded roof crisscrossed with clothesline and clothes hanging from it, sun dried, fresh and crisp. As she pulled a sari, it swirled around her in one big loop and she was engulfed by the scent of citrus. Perfumed sari. Rich people’s scent, she thought. She took the laundry in and began to fold them neatly, but one of the saris was all wrinkled, she had forgotten to flap it before hanging it out, and now her employer would be furious . Didimoni liked doing things correctly and was pernickety about her laundry. But she put the thoughts aside, as she had to dash to her next job. It was five in the evening and she had been working since 8 in the morning. Many of her fellow maids thought she worked too hard, nobody worked in the evenings, but she loved the couple of hours she spent at Monoj Joshi’s house, cooking and cleaning. Joshi lived in a rented house all by himself. He worked in a coal depot and spent most of his day in the black haze and amidst whirring of truck engines which came and went. His family lived in Bihar which he visited once a year. A taciturn, he worked hard the whole day and all he wanted at the end of the day was return to a clean home and some good home cooked food. And Mala made sure he had nothing to complain. The evenings were only his and hers. Mala rolled out the rotis thin as paper the way Joshi liked, dabbed ghee on them, and put them on a hot case. The chicken was also ready, all she had to do was take a shower. She stood under the shower as water pounded on her. As the white foamy water left the outlet so did the dirt, sweat and exhaustion. Mala never had a shower, not until she started working for Joshi. At home she had to draw out water from the a well so deep that the water down looked like a tiny dot from where she stood, making her veins bulge. She had to carry the water laden bucket to bathroom , which was actually a square made of bamboo fences and consecrate slab to stand on. Bathing was never a luxury it was a a necessity. As she was pulling her hair into a tight bun, she heard the key turn in the lock. She knew who it was. Just like every other day Joshi had smudges of coal dust all over his clothes, sweat-soaked shirt clung to his body making it look like his second skin. He succumbed on the chair with exhaustion. Mala switched on the ceiling fan and disappeared into the kitchen. This was the daily ritual, Joshi resting for a few minutes before he took shower and came to dining table all clean and spruced up, wearing a lungi and a bleached white shirt, smelling of nycil powder. He was heavy built and tall, the combination made him look like Genie of Aldaddin, swarthy with furry caterpillar eyebrows, and rings of neck fat. But his eyes were soft and warm. He ate his dinner quietly, savouring every bit of it as the news anchor in the television gets animated after a verbal sparring with a politician. “Mala, lovely food, he said. I love the chicken, tasty yet not very hot and spicy. Why don’t you pull a chair and have dinner with me.” Class boundaries always became blur when it came to him and her. But Mala never had the audacity to sit at the same table with him, for her it was surreal. Joshi left everything to her. He never shopped. He only gave her money. She shopped-Rice, flour, vegetables, lentils, chicken, eggs, mutton. He never asked for the bill. “Tomorrow can we make some paneer”, he asked not commanded.

As Mala was rinsing off the dishes, she heard his snores, foghorn sound, and realised he had already slept. She ladled out some chicken curry in a box. Because of him her daughters ate good food.

She switched off the lights. Locked the door and dragged her feet home where her inebriated husband lay in wait like a hissing cobra. She wandered how Joshi was as a husband, did he wrap his hands around his wife every night before falling asleep. Her face on his hairy chest. Or did they only share bed space, a vast nothingness in between. How did he make love to her, was he gentle or wild? Her ears were hot, so were her cheeks, singed with jealousy. She knew he had wife and kids, but to her they lived in a parallel universe, as long as they did not collide, her cocoon was safe.

The house where she was returning was decent enough. Concrete with tin roof, two rooms, a kitchen. A toilet, not attached to the house but at a safe distance from the house, in the yard. The house was her husband’s. Actually it was her father in law’s whose foresight and austere ways made it possible. She lived here, spent the nights, waiting for dawn when she could escape and breathe.

The first thing she could see as she entered the house was the red veined eyes of Bhola, her husband. By now she realised, the deeper the red, the more sozzled, he is. There was a bob of spit on the corner of his twisted mouth as he pulled himself up to mouth invectives on her. In a derisively mocking tone he said, the queen is home. Come here, let’s see what you got here. He pulled her towards him, the skin on his arms were full of fish scales, the stench of alcohol on his breath made her sick in the pit of her stomach. Let me go, Bhola. I am too tired. Where are the girls? Are they asleep?

“Avoiding me, are you? I know you want to be in the arms of Mr Joshi, you whore, but that dreams of yours will never come true, you will always be the maid.” She could feel a lump of the size of gold ball on her throat at the mention of his name. She had recently realised that replying back always led to black eyes and a series of questions next days from her employers and strangers. It was only silence, a sign of kowtowing, helped Bhola to resign himself to bed. During the day he worked as a painter. During the night he drank. What he did with the money he earned, if any, she didn’t know. It was she who pumped all her earnings into the home and her children. Every other day she thought she would leave him, and his house. But where would she go with her young daughters. With her earnings, she couldn’t afford to rent a house. And the only saving grace, no matter how much he battered and bruised her, he never touched his daughters, and was always civil to them.

Mr Joshi loved white cotton shirts. Crisp and white like Santa’s beard. He had half a dozen of them. And Mala made sure she kept them clean and white as if they were just recently bought. Squatted on the bathroom floor, she was giving the collars of his shirt a hard scrub with all her elbow strength, when she heard a savage cry of pain. She left everything to find that Joshi was clutching the left side of his chest, his face all contorted in grimace, tossing and turning on his king-size bed. Her chest was beating furiously and her feet felt like jelly. She went outside and rang the landlord’s door bell who lived just above him on the first floor. “Can you take Joshi to the doctor, he is in pain. He needs to go to the hospital now.” The landlord rushed to his side, dialled for a taxi and soon they were on their way to the hospital. Before leaving, Joshi said, please call my family and let them know, the number is in my diary on the bed side table.”

Mala dithered. She never wanted to do anything with that part of the world. But she felt awfully selfish. She opened the small leather bound dairy. On the first page was written in neat swoop and swirls, Sarla Joshi. She felt a tight rope coiling around her chest, making it hard for her to breath. Her disobedient hand, punched the numbers. She could hear the ring at the other side. One ring, two ring, three ring, four ring. Well, that was enough, if no one was picking up the phone it was not her fault. She had called them, tried at least. She was about to dump the phone, when she heard the customary hello. A woman, her voice mellow and demure. “Sarla Joshi here. Hearing the voice made her realise she was real, she was not some alien in a distant planet living her life, and letting her live hers. Excuse me, who is this? Sarla asked politely. Her mouth was dry as paper, words were all in jumble in her throat and wouldn’t come out. Finally she mustered the courage, Joshi, Mr Joshi is very sick. He had chest pains and the landlord took him to the hospital.” There was a long silence at the other end, as if Sarla was having difficulty in registering it, or was Mala incoherent in panic, and her words did not make any sense. “I am coming right away. Till then please take care of him.” She was surprised by the ring of calmness in her voice. She was the one who knew how to keep the boat safe in the turbulent sea.

Joshi came back the next day. Doctors found a blockage in one of his arteries and had to put a stent to ensure that blood passed easily. He looked well, it didn’t seem he had just returned from the hospital but from another day at work. As soon as he was home he called his wife to say he was okay and she need not take the trouble of coming? but his brother told him that she had left. The train had set off. Mala’s safe haven was in trouble.

When Mala first saw Sarla Joshi she thought of the light pole just near her house which lit up the dark evenings and nights with its mellow yellow light. She was very tall. And flat- front and behind. No curves only angles. Since the day she put her luggage down, she took the leash in her hand. She marked her territory like a feline. She decided everyday what dishes to be cooked. The amount of spices to go in each dish. The way the vegetables should be cut. She went to the market herself to get fresh vegetables and groceries, and sometimes when she sent Mala to the market she never forgot to ask for the bill and the change. She was always there in house hovering around like a helicopter to keep track of things. Mala felt stifled.She often searched Mr Joshi’s face, for signals, a frown, a curl of the lip, but it seemed to her the change of situation had not affected him at all. SarLa Joshi was not an avid talker, she talked when needed, not a stray word, may be she believed maids were horrible gossipmongers, the less you share with them, the better. Unlike Joshi, for class division was necessary to command respect. So the sofa was for the employer, the stool for the maid. The power dynamics between employer and the maid was very much at work here. Though she was always polite to her, not a harsh word, she was cold as death towards her. She would say sentences like, Mala, please don’t forget to put chopped green coriander in the day. Or, can you put clean sheets on the bed today, and please don’t forget to tuck the corners properly, I don’t like any creases, it should be taut as young girl’s skin. But she would never ask her about her life, about her children, and Mala was pretty sure if she came to work with a black eye, she would never ask what had happened. The total surrender of autonomy was like sharp stabs, she missed her long showers, but it was far better than the tortured evenings, when had she had to watch her husband drink the vicious liquid that turned him into a black hearted Satan.

Then one day as she entered the house, Sarla Joshi said, Mala, come here I need to talk to you. Her heart started to beat faster in her chest, she could hear her heart thuds, clearly. Did she come to know her feelings for Joshi? Without a hint of emotion, she said, “I have found a live-in maid. I was looking for someone who could be at my beck and call always. You a very good at your job, but I know you have a family and won’t be able to stay here full time. I will give you your salary today. You don’t have to come from tomorrow. Now, can you make some kichdi. We will eat light today. “ Saying this she disappeared to the other room, leaving behind, two eyes welling with tears and one crushed heart. Joshi’s house was her sanctuary. And now in fell swoop it was slipping away. But she always thought it was unassailable. For the past ten years she was here every evening and whenever she felt like.. His wife never visited once in these years so it was not naive of her to believe that it would always be her space. She wondered what Joshi had to say about this. If he could only see her woeful eyes would he have pleaded his wife to change her decision. But she realised that for him, she didn’t matter at all. As long as there was good food on the table and a clean home where he could come and relax.

The next evening she took all the time to finish the end of the day chores at didimoni’s house. What was the rush. Then Didimoni had to tell her she had to hurry as she was visiting her daughter and was getting late. As Mala walked, giving even the snail a completion, she passed Mr Joshi house, she felt an urge to sneak in and hide. May be in one of the huge rice tins in the kitchen, or behind the curtain or best under the bed. But it was too creepy and dangerous. So returned to the house where four people lived, three alive, one dead.

With her head propped on her hands Shona was feeling dull and listless.She wanted to lock the door and go to her neighbour’s house to play some board games with their daughter who was a few years younger than her. But her mother had told her to  be at home and wait for an old lady who was coming to make a throw for the mellow winter months which were just about to set in. Winter rituals were common in most households eagerly waiting to bask in the winter sunshine after the merciless summer heat. Quilts which were stuffed at the bottom of the airless bed storage space were pulled out and put out in the sun for the whole day to get rid of the musty smell. Her mother told that sun was a natural disinfectant and just by being outside they would be spruced and fluffed up. It was considered the ultimate luxury to wrap yourself in sunbaked quilt. During this time, many artisans would do rounds of the houses to enquire if they wanted to make kaatha, a throw made of old saris. Shona’s mother favourite was an old lady. She would come every alternate year to make throws out of her mother’s used saris. In the morning when her mother left for work she told Shona, “the buri ( old woman) will come today. I have kept a few saris on the bed, ask her to make two throws one for you and one for your sister. Serve her tea and biscuits or mudi( puffed rice). By the time she finishes I will be home to pay her.”For Shona, the buri came from a parallel universe, poverty stamped all over face. It had been a couple of years since she saw her, she seemed to her the oldest woman in the world. She went to the terrace overlooking the road to look out for her. Then she saw her approaching her gate with a gunny bag on her shoulder. She was a thin as a reed, her skin brown as walnut, and Shona had not seen so many wrinkles on a face. When she smiled at her, she could see only two or three teeth in her mouth as a result her cheeks had caved inwards, her collar bones jutted out.  With her legs drawn up closely, she sat on the terrace floor as Shona laid out the saris for her. Blue, red, orange, pink, it was a mayhem of colours. She stroked the soft folds of the saris and Shona could see a longing in her eyes. Yes, she had touched and felt them against their skin in her work but she never owned such beautiful saris. With a heavy sigh, she fished out her box of threads and needles and started her work. Shona watched as the buri laid one sari on top of the other, keeping the best one for the top most layer and then with her deft callused fingers she needled her way across the saris. “No one wants to make kathas anymore, there are so many options available these days in the big stores. This year I only made kathas for four families. I don’t know how I am going to survive. I am looking forward to death, but it comes on its own time and till then I have to eat and live. Don’t you have anyone to look after you? Any children? Shona asked. “I had one son. He left home to find some work in some big city and never came back. “ Shona felt a lump as big as tennis ball on her throat, a pall of gloom descended on her, she left the buri to carry on with her task and went inside. She was restive. She knew couldn’t do anything to alleviate the condition of the buri, yet she just couldn’t brush it off, she knew eventually it would go away but now it bothered her like a pesky fly. She went to the kitchen, there was some farm fresh vegetables in basket, should she give this to her along with some rice and lentils, that would suffice for two or three days of meal. But then she decided to treat her. Her culinary skills were limited. Tea and omelette, that was all she could make, other than that she was fledging cook. She decided to make Kichidi. That shouldn’t be so much fuss. She took two handful of rice and two handful of lentils and soaked it in water. Then she cut some vegetables and lit up the fire. In hot mustard oil, the zing of which tickled her olfactory senses, she dropped the vegetables and gave it a good stir. Then she put in the mixed rice and lentils. 20 mins and the kichidi was ready. She took a spoonful and put it in her mouth, the hot kichidi singed her tongue, it was edible but she realised she had missed some spices.  But she had no clue. Next she cracked two eggs and made a fluffy soft omelette. The food was now ready. She took out a gleaming steel plate  and ladled generous amount of kichidi on the plate with the omelette on the side and covered it with another plate to keep it warm. It was noon, the buri raised herself up and gave her body a shake, and asked Shona if she could take a break. How about your lunch? Shona asked. I had mudi and tea, that is enough. Shona’s felt something twist inside, like a wrung dishcloth. You wait here, she said. And went into the kitchen and brought out the plate of kichidi. When the buri saw these her eyes were moist with tears. She was choking on her words. “Before you thank me , sit down and have your food. It is getting cold. This is the first time I cooked a meal so forgive me if if it tastes bland.” Shona watched as the buri sat on the floor and polished off the plate, scraping it with the edges of her hand so that nothing remains on the plate. It was after years I had such a good meal. I don’t have enough words to say thank you. May God fulfil all your wishes.” Shona felt a warm fuzzy feeling enveloping her, the feeling you get when you do a good deed. 

When her mother came home, before she could spill it out, the budi told her about the home cooked meal her daughter served. There was a twinge of pride in her mother’s eyes and she said, Shona, hope you were safe around the kitchen. 

In the following winters, the budi never came back. When she snuggled up on the bed with the comfy katha, her frayed and fragile image came to her mind. Where was she now? Had she passed on to another world where she was put out of her misery. The questions came fast and flying. The answers to which she never got.  

Circa 1980. The sun’s wrath had turned the whole city of Guwahati, the capital of Assam, a small state in India, into a humid, sticky chamber. My mother, my sister and I boarded a rickety bus to go to our cousin’s place. My sister perched herself on my mother’s lap and I sat next to her. Soon we (my sister and I) started to talk inanely in our mother tongue. My mother rolled her eyes at us, and tried to communicate in sign language to keep our mouths shut. But when we didn’t pay any heed to her, and continued with our chit chat, she pinched me so hard that I jerked my hand back. In a flash of a second my skin turned twilight blue. I didn’t utter a word during the rest of the journey.

Once we alighted, I could not hold myself back, I asked the reason behind her flare up. “In public, please do not speak in Bengali,” she said in a monotone.

Bengali was our mother tongue, even though we lived in Assam where the native language was Assamese. “Why, Ma? You always encourage us to speak in our mother tongue.”

“Yes, yes. But not in public, please. These are difficult times. You are too young to understand the situation.”

Yes, I was too young to grasp the true meaning of such strong words as hatred and hostility, but I could sense the tension in the atmosphere, it was close behind us, so close that I could feel its breadth on the nape of my neck.

The anti-Bengali movement was spreading across the state like ink in blotting paper. In the city, where we lived, everything seemed normal, but scratch the surface, and the undercurrent of hostility between the two communities was like a bubble waiting to burst. The Assamese people looked at the Bengalis with an eye of distrust and vice versa. One day I eavesdropped on my parents’ conversation. My father was explaining to my mother that the Assamese people were sick of the hegemony of the Bengalis over them, and the gnawing fear of losing their own identity and state had antagonized them against the Bengalis. There was a mass exodus of Bengalis from Assam, but our parents didn’t want to move, they wanted to become old and grey in this place. But I could see fear dancing like a madman in their eyes. My father came home early in the evenings, and late night outings were an absolute no. We stayed cooped in our house like prisoners. A vigilante party was formed in the neighborhood. The man of the family acted as sentinels and took turns in guarding the neighborhood at night.

I first thought I was in a dream. A man pounding on our door with his fists and telling us, “They are here. They are here. Run for your life.” My mother stuffing all her precious gold jewelry and hard cash in her bag, her face convulsed with fear. I realised it was not a dream but reality when I felt my father’s strong hands on me, trying to wake me up from deep slumber. I had never seen my father like this, cold beads of sweat were running down his face, his hands were shaking and he looked pale as a white paper. He lifted my sister from the bed, and threw her over his shoulder. Though her head was hanging upside down on his back, she didn’t move a bit. She looked innocent as an angel, oblivious to all the chaos. We had a small gate at the rear of our garden which linked our house to our neighbour’s. We slipped through the exit, the solid darkness all around us proving to be a perfect camouflage. Our neighbours were Nepalis, who sold milk for their living and had a stable full of dappled cows. My father knocked on their back door as we stood close to him as refugees. After some time a plump woman opened the door, we called her Nepali aunty. I couldn’t take my eyes off the colorful jewelry she was wearing. As she was talking to my father, I looked past her. The room was shorn of furniture. Men, women and children from other neighborhoods were sleeping on blankets, which were laid out on the floor, and the room looked like a crowded railway station.

“I am sorry. I don’t want to turn you back, but we don’t have any room for more people. But if you want you can take refuge in the stable.”

We sat huddled on a cushion of straw in the stable. The straw was prickling our skin and the smell of cows and cow dung were making me feel nauseous. It seemed to be the longest nigh ever. I became frigid with fear, couldn’t budge an inch. I thought someone would come and pounce on us from behind. After some time, my father said,” We can’t stay here. You people will fall sick. Let’s go to some other place.” My mother gripped his hand and tried to stop him, but he had already stepped out of the stable. We followed him to the next house, which belonged to a deranged old widow. She lived alone in a rambling house, which seemed to be lifted straight out of a spooky movie. Her house was an eyesore to the neighbourhood. I never saw her smile and she never talked at anyone. I thought she detested everything in the world. She also had anathema to children. One day when I walked into her unkempt garden accidentally, she came out running with a broom in her hand to shoo me away as if I was some stray cow. My father rapped on her door with his knuckles. I was pretty sure she wouldn’t respond but I was wrong. She opened the door after a while. Her moonlight colour hair framed her emaciated face, which looked like a crumpled paper ball.

“Please, can we stay at your place tonight. Our lives are in danger,” he said pleadingly. She gazed at us with a blank expression and indicated with her eyes to come in. We followed her as she climbed a staircase that led to the upper floor. When she opened the door to a small room a musty stench hit our nostrils and we all started to cough. She left us on the threshold and went down without saying a word. The room was sparsely furnished. It had a bed, a chair and a table. A thick film of dust covered the furniture, and cobwebs hung from every corner of the wall. But we didn’t pay any notice. For us the room was the best place on earth. Four of us lay on the same bed, staring at the ceiling. I didn’t realise when I fell asleep. But I know my parents didn’t sleep a wink that night. In the morning when we were leaving, my father went to thank her but she was nowhere to be found. When we came home, we realised it was a hoax call and no one had come to attack us.

After some years, the belligerence and hostility between the two communities died down, but I could never forget that terror-filled night. Nor could I forget the munificence of the old lady. Her behaviour towards us didn’t change, she remained cold as a slab of ice. But I always saw her with an eye of compassion.

( this is about a woman, who may not have ‘achieved” much in life..but helped me to make a bank of happy childhood memories which I still treasure)

I watched the rickshaw puller bobbing up and down on his seat, his soot black body swathed in sweat, his legs struggling to pedal the worn out vehicle as it made its way through the narrow streets of Nagoan, a small town in Assam. The seat of the rickshaw was too small for us—my father, my mother, my younger sister and me—to fit in, even the rickshaw puller had told so when we hired him at the bus station, but my father managed to convince him saying that he would pay him a little extra. My father held me tight as I was often sliding down from his lap. I wanted to stretch my legs but there was no room for it. I felt like being trapped in a magician’s box and was waiting for the journey to get over.

We were visiting our paternal uncles’ on our summer holidays. My father carried the luggage and we walked behind him holding our mother’s hands. As we walked down the ribbon-like lane, lined with cluster of houses on both sides, people stepped out to greet my father. My grandparents had migrated to this place at the time of Independence, leaving all their precious belongings in Bangladesh. My father was born here and he spent his entire childhood in this lower middle class locality. Later, he moved to the city where he got a job and bought a house but he still had fond memories of this place. I looked at the kids scampering around; their clothes the colour of dark monsoon clouds, their bodies plastered with dirt, their crude accent grating to the ears, they were unlike us. My sister and I were clean, smelled of talcum powder and looked like little angels in our mulberry-coloured lacy frocks. Yet, we loved this neighbourhood. This was because we enjoyed unbridled freedom here; we were like those domestic animals let loose for a few days. We played from dawn to dusk, walked into anybody’s house without any invitation for a treat and here we were feted as princess as we were Kanu’s daughters. But the foremost reason why we wanted to visit this place again and again was because our beloved Jethima lived in this neighbourhood. Jethima was the wife of my eldest paternal uncle. My father was born after her marriage to his brother and so she was more like his mother, though he called him boudi.

I saw her bent over a clay oven, blowing air through a pipe to make a big fire. When she saw us she dropped everything in her hands and ran towards us, and soon my sister and I found ourselves ensconced in her sturdy arms which smelled of ash and sweat. I dug my face deep into her bosom and I felt like I was sinking into a baby quilt, soft and comfy. Jethima was a mass of lard but solid as a rock. I looked up at her face. Her hair was now thin and silver grey, there were a few creases crisscrossing her round face but her other features were so very perfect– her nose chisel sharp, her eyes small but beady and her complexion like the blond dolls I had back at home. Unlike my mother who was very particular about the way she draped her sari—she would make pleats of the same width with her deft fingers before tucking it in neatly into the petticoat and let the long pallu fall becomingly over her shoulder–my jethima being a widow was custom-bound to wear only white saris which she would wrap it around her waist three or four times, bunch up the loose end and throw it over her shoulder haphazardly. Yet she looked ethereal, it seemed time couldn’t play much with her beauty.

“I missed you so much,” I said, meaning every word.

“I missed you more,” she said cupping my chin in her callused hands.

“So what did you cook for us today?”

“I made green jackfruit curry, bok phul bhaja, and mango chatni, all your favourites,” she said.

After she became a widow she prepared and ate only vegetarian food. But no matter what she cooked, the taste was always sublime. She was a master chef. The kitchen was her lab where she conducted fascinating experiments with vegetables, its peelings and an assortment of aromatic spices of different hues. I often saw her hunched over an upright blade (boti), meticulously cutting vegetables into cubes, long strips, and fine slices as per the dish she was preparing. She would then ground the spices herself on a rectangular stone slab, and play it up into a perfect concoction. I had an aversion to bottle gourd, but when she cooked it with yellow lentils garnished with fresh sprigs of coriander; I would eat half of my rice with it.

“Come with me. I have a few surprises in store for both of you.” My sister and I followed her to the backyard. There in one corner I saw a rusty cage. She unlatched the door and a few chicks came scurrying out. Being city-bred we had never seen live chicks from such close quarters and we hopped up and down like frogs seeing the yolk-coloured balls of fur, flapping their tiny wings.

“Let’s chase them,” I said to my sister.

“You can do that later. There is another thing I want to show you all. Come let’s go in.” She pulled out a box from underneath her bed and opened it.

“I made some clay dolls for both of you.” The last time I visited this place I saw many girls playing with clay dolls as their parents couldn’t afford to buy the plastic dolls that were sold in shops. I also wanted one desperately, but Jethima couldn’t make it for me for some reason or the other. We couldn’t take our eyes off the dolls. They were just like the clay idols which were made by the professional artisans during Durga Puja, though a lot smaller in size. Each doll’s dress was sewn by hand. I couldn’t believe she had taken so much pain for us, despite her failing eyesight.

“Now you two play. I will go and finish my cooking. Your father must be ravenous.” She disappeared into the kitchen leaving us to play with the dolls for hours.

All of my uncles lived in the same compound. It was a big joint family before but after my uncles got married they moved out to form their individual set ups. Now my uncles lived in pucca houses which had all the trappings of modern day life. But my Jethima and her two sons still lived in a house made of mud with straws on the roof. Every day Jethima had to light a kerosene lamp before day light faded and thick cloak of darkness shrouded the house. My uncles knew how used to we were living in comfort so they asked us to spend the nights at their houses, under the cool whirring fan, but we refused politely as we wanted to be with Jethima. At bed time as she lay down between my sister and me, we entwined our legs around her stomach as if she was a giant side pillow. Jethima was a treasure trove of fascinating stories. From the bed, I could see the silver moon peeping through the window, as if it too was straining its ears to listen to her tales. She told us one story after another, and soon I was transported into another realm, where I came up and close with magnificent kings, beautiful queens and princess in the razzmatazz of courts, malevolent magicians, evil witches, giant-sized demons and kind-hearted fairies. I didn’t know when I fell asleep.

I heard her calling out my name in soft whispers. “Do you want to go flower-hunting with me?” she asked. I sat up with a jerk, and rubbed sleep off my eyes with my knuckles. I had asked her to wake me up early in the morning so that I could go along with her. We walked out of the house on light feet as we didn’t want to disturb others. She carried a big bamboo pole and I walked by her side holding a flower basket. The sun was yet to fill the sky with its light so the street lights in the neighbourhood were still on. To my surprise, I found my senses heightened. I could feel the fresh and crisp morning air tickling my skin, I could smell the heady fragrance of flowers and I could also hear the dawn chorus of cocks, the strident cries of crows and melodious symphony of the nightingales. The whole atmosphere was so pristine; I never knew this part of the day was so beautiful.

“Jethima, why are you plucking flowers from your neighbour’s garden without their permission, isn’t it as good as stealing?” I asked her.

“No, of course not. We are not gate crashing into anybody’s garden. We are only plucking flowers from the bushes that are hanging over the wall, which is a common territory, right?” she said reaching over the wall and shaking vigorously a branch laden with jasmine flowers. A hailstorm of flowers fell on us and on the road, carpeting the whole area with white flowers. I was no one to judge her but I felt as if I was an adventure junkie, touring different localities and stealthily plucking flowers as the owners snored in their comfortable bedrooms. We came back with a basket full of hibiscuses, jasmine and yellow bell flowers, which she latter offered to an array of god and goddesses.

Jethima got married at the age of fourteen and never had the chance to go to school. Yet she was abreast of all that was that was happening around the world and managed to pull an intelligent conversation with anyone. I wondered how an unschooled woman could have such a vast wealth of knowledge. It was later my mother told me that she was a self taught woman. In the hot lazy afternoons when most people preferred to take a siesta, she would sit near the window and struggle to pronounce the sounds of the Bengali alphabets correctly and later try to write them on a slate—at first the letters were fragile and wobbly as if it was a horrendous task for her to make her hand obey her mind, but with time could master the neat straight lines and the solid curves. Now she was an avid reader. After she was done with the household chores, she read books that she borrowed from her neighbours.

Unlike other widows who confined themselves to the four walls of their houses, Jethima had a buzzing social life, which was frowned upon by my aunts but she was too free spirited to be tamed. Every evening she popped into someone’s house where they chatted and laughed over cups of tea and spicy puffed rice. In some evenings, she went to temples with her friends where they sang religious hymns. One evening she took me to her friend’s place. Jethima was proud of us and liked to brag about the fact that we studied in a convent school.

“They go to convent school where they have these nuns from Rome, wearing hoods,” she said.

“Really? So do they force you to go to Church?” her friend asked me innocently.

“No, never, but we go anyway, every morning before the assembly,” I said. As I spoke I could see that the women’s eyebrows were almost touching her hairline, and her lips were curling downwards in disgust.

“She can sing English songs too. You want to hear her sing?” my jethima asked.

I was shy by nature but I didn’t have the heart to disappoint her so I took center stage ready to display my talents. To my surprise, the woman called her granddaughters, who were quite older than me, and her neighbour’s kids to hear me sing. I felt awkward as so many eyes were on me, but I sang anyway. I sang “Brown Girl in the rain”, my voice rising and falling as I twirled and shook my body the way my teachers taught me in school. My eyes were transfixed on Jethima, her face all flushed with pride and happiness. I wondered what was going on in her mind. May be she was thinking if only she had been born now things would have been so very different for her, may be she was thinking of the changing times, how it was no big deal anymore for a Hindu Brahmin girl to go to a church or may be she was thinking of nothing, just enjoying the moment.

There was so much excitement around that I didn’t realize when the holidays were over and it was time for us to go home. She bid us adieu with a beaming smile and promised to come and visit us in the city very soon. Jethima did visit us quite often, at times twice or thrice in a year. She was quite fearless and had no qualms traveling alone, unlike the other women of her generation. We always had lot of fun when she was around. As we were too young to venture out alone, she accompanied us to our friends’ houses, zoo, parks, shopping, etc. She never felt out of place, she could fit in anywhere seamlessly and gel with anyone. At times she would walk with us all the way to school and back. She loved to see us dressed in our school uniforms—crisp spotless white shirt and pleated grey skirt that hit just above our knees. One day while we were walking to school she told me, “You are very lucky to go to such a good school. You must study hard and make your parents very proud.” Sometimes as she waited for us near the school gate, amid the chaos that generally followed once the school got over, I could see a wistful longing in her eyes, as if she wanted to go back in time and rewrite some episodes of her life.

Later as we grew up, our trips to Nagoan became less frequent. Our cousins were married by then and it was altogether a different environment with our sister-in-laws around. She too hardly visited our place, whenever she came she was in a hurry to go back home. We never found out why, but it was not like it was before.

One winter I was soaking up the mellow afternoon at our backyard when someone pressed the door bell so hard that the jarring sound almost knocked me off my feet. My mother went to answer the door. It was one of my Jethima’s neighbours. “Didi (Jethima) is very sick. Her sons are bringing her to the city. They have asked you to make arrangements at your hospital,” the man said. My mother worked as a supervisor nurse in the best government hospital in the city and had connections with good doctors. When she rushed in to take her purse, I asked her to take me along with her. At first she refused saying that it was not the right time, but I was obdurate. The strong smell of bleaching powder and disinfectant hit my nostrils as I walked through the hospital corridors. The sepulchral atmosphere, cries of patient, downcast faces of the people standing outside the hospital wards and the palpable tension hanging heavy in the air, made my legs heavy as lead, and I didn’t feel like moving an inch. I knew something bad was awaiting us.

I saw her lying in a white cot like a lifeless log. Her gray hair was splayed out over the pillow; her body looked like a shriveled yellow lemon, and her bones were jutting out from under her skin. Was she really my Jethima who as far as I remember was always big and rotund, or someone else? I thought. It seemed that somebody had sucked the fat out of her body and what remained was a skeleton covered with a thin layer of skin. She asked me to sit by her side. Her voice was frail and strained. She asked me how I fared in my exams and where my younger sister was. I saw she had great difficulty in speaking, she paused after a few words and her breathing was ragged. Tears were stinging in my eyes, but I didn’t want to cry in front of her. My cousins told my mother that she had been suffering from jaundice for the past few weeks, and though they took her to the doctor, there were no signs of improvement in her health. A few days later, I heard my mother telling my father that Jethima had been diagnosed with liver cancer, which had spread all over her body, and only a miracle could cure her. That night I cried. I balled up the corner of a bed sheet and thrust it into my mouth as I didn’t want my mother to find out that I was crying. It was also for the first time I experienced pain in my life. It seemed that something was gnawing away the edges of my heart. It was difficult for me to come to terms with the fact that in some months time Jethima would be no more and what would remain of her was an earthen pitcher of ash. According to her wish, she was taken back home where she breathed her last. My parents went to her funeral ceremony, but I stayed behind. For me Jethima was strong and stoic women with an amazing jest for life. I didn’t want to replace that image, no matter what.

I remember her all the time. I remembered her when I passed out of school, I remembered her when I got a job—she would have been so proud of me—I remembered her when I married the man I love— she would have been so happy with my choice, and I remembered her when my son was born. As the tiny pinkish bundle suckled at my breasts, I wished only if Jethima could be a part of his childhood just as she was mine.

( a nano fiction)

Rima took half a day off to visit her mother. As she stepped out in the heat encrusted afternoon, beads of sweat trickled down her face, and she could feel wet sticky patches on her underarm soaking her kurta. In such an unforgiving summer heat, she hated to let her hair flow. She wanted to bunch it all together and make a top knot, never mind she always hated it, to her it looked more like a bird nest, yet it she left it open. The bus was packed with people.The sits were all occupied and there were hardly any place to stand. People were standing so close to each other that she could smell their breath. Her open locks were disarranged in the heat and crowd, and she felt she couldn’t breathe. She fished out a rubber band out of her bag to tie it, then after second thought she slipped it into her hand. When the bus reached her stop she pushed her way out of the throng of people, once in the open she took huge gulps of fresh air, she felt a bit relieved. As she was walking to her mother’s house, she saw her mother standing in the terrace fanning herself with a sugar palm leaf bamboo hand fan. When she saw Rima, she drew her breadth in dismay, Rima dear again wrong choice of colour, today you should have worn a light colour kurta, a glance at you and I feel hotter. A patina of hardness descended on Rima, in one swift movement, she took the rubber band out of her hand, pulled all her hair back into a tight bun. The tattoo she had done a few weeks ago, a butterfly, was now completely visible.

When neighbours are god send

When I think of my childhood and my mother, I realise that she was always on the move, always on her feet. Walking the tightrope, balancing home and a very hectic professional life, she was huffing and puffing to make ends meet. At the end of the day she would just plop down on the bed and fall asleep in a fraction of a second. Like most working mothers, child care was always a gnawing problem, more during the school holidays, and it didn’t help that my father was often posted out of station. I spent a major chunk of my childhood in a rented house with the owners living in the same compound, along with few other renters. A series of houses, each having two to three rooms, stood in the shape of a square with a courtyard in the middle and at the rear was a huge back garden with abundance of flower and fruit plants. I still remember the blood red hibiscus shrouding every bit of green on the plant, the flowers so red that if you squash it with your fingers it looked you had blood in your hand. The houses were a hand’s length from each other, giving credential to the adage walls have ears. If there was any bickering between husband and wife, or the employer and the helper, lest be assured you would know each and every word they hurled at each other.

Ma left us on our own since we were very young. She had no other way out, the helpers often took advantage of her being away most of the time and we had no family in the city. But ma didn’t have to worry much about our well being because our neighbours pitched in, they would keep an eye on us always. Most of the doors were always wide open and we would drift in and out of them, there was no propriety. With no cushion of relatives to fall back on, they were like our extended family. Before we became fairly independent, ma would leave a pan of milk in one of the neighbours’ house to be given to us mid morning with some biscuits if we were hungry. Or some fruits. We had late lunch because we had to wait for ma to come and serve as food. Sometimes if she was late, had to work extra hours, our neighbours would call us to their house and share lunch with us, we would eat whatever their children ate. In the warm, sticky summer nights, when even the whirr of fan couldn’t provide any respite, after dinner we played in the courtyard till late hours with our neighbours’ children who became our very close friends, their cousins our cousins, there aunts our aunts, their uncles our uncles. In the evenings after our homework was over, we ran off to our neighbours’ houses to watch television with them even though we had a television at ours and they did the same. We had the hardest times when dad build our own house and we had to move there, it was like tearing us away from something which had become a part of us. My sister was heart broken so much so that she refused to come home from school but stealthily went to theirs making Ma anxious. When she didn’t come home for long, I could see lines of worry on ma’s face, her body tensing up, the ends of her mouth drooping down. She knew where she was and she had to coax her and drag her to our house. Now when I think of it, it is because we had such great support from our neighbours, Maa’s life became a tad less difficult. With time, the contours of society has changed, neighbours guard their private life fiercely, whether it is good or bad I am no one to judge but they were a major part of my childhood and memories of them are etched on my mind and fill me with toasty warmth.

At times you look back in joy at some past moments of your life and then try to recreate it again just to sway in the similar feeling. Puffed rice or mudi is a staple of every Bengali middle class household.. those crunchy puffed rice is served as an unostentatious breakfast as well as a delectable evening snack. Mudi was rarely brought from shops. My parents would patiently wait for the mudi ali ( a woman who sold mudi ) to call in once in a fortnight. A wiry, solid woman wearing a tattered white sari, frayed sandals, a face stamped with lines of age and hardships , she sold mudi house to house even in the blistering summer heat when most people preferred to stay cool under the shades, but she had hunger in her belly, she couldn’t afford that luxury. With huge sack of mudi perched on her head she would come knocking to our doors with beads of sweat trickling down her face. Other than money for her mudi, she would also expect a cup of tea and some snack which most households willingly obliged as she was a familiar face. My father mostly had a bowl of mudi and a cup of tea after he came back from work. But me and my sister loved our mudi like potpourri-mudi with crackling peanuts, julienned coconuts, wicked chillis, garnished with flavoursome coriander leaves and the zing of mustard oil. Mudi was snack which was never served individually in our house, we would all dig in from a one big bowl, and more the number of people, the merrier.. it was around which we exchanged day’s stories and sometimes juicy gossip. Few days back hubby brought a huge bag of mudi from an Indian grocery shop and said let’s create some evening magic. So I make mudi makha and team it up with some store-bought masala chai.. we eat, we laugh, we talk and try to live in the present and not past.

Rinka opened her red lunch box with lily white cover, one glimpse and a mass of dark clouds gathered on her face. It was the same dry chappati and potato fry. She pushed it back and snorted derisively. She looked at her friend’s lunch box, well not friend but with whom she had to share a table according to her teacher’s instruction, spiralled noodles slathered with dollops of ketchup and shreds of fried egg. She wanted to reach out and stuff her mouth with those delicious looking noodles, but she knew what would happen next so she tamed the little monster rising in her. Rinka was always thankful that she alone was privy to her satanic thoughts. She closed her lunch box and put it in the bag.

At home she knew that in the evening her mother would ask her for the lunch box. She had to wash it clean for the next school day. If her mother found she had brought back the lunch box just the way she packed it she would have her ears pulled till it went beetroot red. After all, everyday her mother woke up when the sun was still stretching its hands languorously after a peaceful slumber. With lights on, she would the knead the dough and prepare freshly made chappatis and something to go with it before she had to rush out to do an eight hour gruelling shift. But Rinka was never a thoughtful child. She took the chappatis out of the box and put it in the deep secretive folds of her text books. She couldn’t put it in the garbage bin as it was taken out daily and she would get caught. It was just not this one instance, always a terrible eater she had the habit of hiding, disposing of food she didn’t like. Her parents everyday ten minute harangue before dinner, how they should consider themselves lucky never to go hungry a single day, while there are others who struggle to get a decent meal, fell on deaf ears. Sometimes her mother would serve her rice and move on to do other chores. It was just the moment she would wait for. Naked feet, she would take soft padded steps just like their neighbour’s cat, and empty the plate in the drain. She would then run the water in full force so that the food flows out to the main drain. Once or twice her mother had cast doubt over her polished plate but she was too washed out to play the sleuth.

Then one day she was siting at the table dressed in her creaseless skirt and lemon scented white shirt, her mother had used some lemon soap and she couldn’t stop sinking her nose in it, when her mother served her a mound of rice with piping hot yellow lentils and fried aubergine. Food was always simple but fresh before she left for school. She took a few mouthful, and decided it was enough. Her ears tried to trace her mother’s whereabouts. She was in the bedroom getting dressed up, she had to leave for work soon. She would not be out of her room for another ten minutes, that was enough time for Rinka to put her plan into action. There was an enormous cavern in the center of the backyard, the best place to dump the food without a chance of getting caught. After all, who would go and peek into that cavity. She gingerly and stealthily walked towards the hole and was ready to throw the food into it, when her legs slipped on the loose earth and she fell into the dump with a thud. Her clean dress was now smeared with filth, her hair disarranged and she smelled of garbage. Worst, it was so deep she couldn’t climb out of it without any assistance. Her mendacity and deception caught up with her. Her cries of help pierced the mellow morning hair and reached her mother. She ran out of the house, her body shaking like a leaf in wind. She tried to figure out from where the desperate cries were coming. Ma, I am here in the damp, Rinka cried her voice trembling with fear. When her mother came to the edge of the hole, and saw her with the big round stainless plate in her hand, she knew what was it all about. Terror mixed with hot molten anger run through her body. She could see her mother’s rage engorged face, and thought would it better for her to stay in the hole forever than face the heat of her wrath. Of course, her mother pulled her out with all her strength. Her mother didn’t hit her, nor did she gave her an earful but she her trust in her was broken into tiny fragments like glass. The trust which Rinka could never win back.

Fatigued. Yes, that is how I feel even though I slept for 8 hours straight. I feel a weight like lead dragging me down to a bottomless depth. I know I need to shake myself up, wake up the children and get them ready for school but all I want to do is crawl under the covers and go to sleep again. But that is luxury for another day, may be the weekend. I haul myself downstairs. A cup of hot tea, yes, that is what I need, I say it to myself to pull myself out of this gripping somnolence. I switch on my gleaming black kettle sitting pretty on my equally glossy black kitchen countertop which I always remember to polish before retiring for the day. The all encompassing silence of my open plan kitchen is slightly disturbed by the rumbling sound of the water boiling in the kitchen. I pour the water in the cup, add some milk, sugar, and then take out my fragrant earl grey tea bags. I dip them in the boiling water, 2 minutes and my tea is ready. Half way through and I already feel relaxed, not invigorated to the fullest but , yes, ready to kickstart the day. Few hours later as I snug up in my comfy chair finishing the last few pages of my book, the morning blues now gone, I realise few years back I would never have kettle tea. No, thank you, I would say. I want mine nicely brewed, the thicker, creamier and if it is spiced up even better. It is one of the myriad changes of displacement, the electric kettle replacing the hindalium pan. When did that change happen I try to think hard, but I fail to remember, it must be seamless or else I would definitely remember. I think of parents, they would roll their eyes, grit their teeth if they are ever served kettle tea. What is this, hot water or tea? they would ask, their mouths all twisted and puckered in show of disgust. Same with new arrivals from India. Some frank ones can be very blunt and vocal, without mincing words, they would say, can you make tea the way we do in a India? Or have you forgotten it?Can’t drink this tea. I better not have tea if I to drink this. Never set in my ways, I have always embraced change and flowed with it with little or no complain. I don’t mind drinking kettle tea, though I would definitely prefer the Indian way. It is easier to make and hassle free. Later, in the evening when it is tea time, I decide to go back to my roots and brew it as I always did in India and here too for many years. I prise open the box of cut tea leaves which I keep for guests. I peel some cardamoms, crush some cloves and when the water comes to a boil, I put them all in. I use the milk laden with fat, which I give to the kids, and generous amount of sugar, and let it simmer. I can see a thick sheet of fat on the surface, rippling under the bright spotlights. With quick flicker of my hand I take it out and throw in the sink. Was never fond of that. The tea now looks strong, thick, and creamy. I stand near the stove and drink in the fragrance. The aroma of my childhood, of my growing up years that permeated the kitchen every morning and evening drives me to the solid hands of nostalgia. I promise to myself not to let this culinary tradition fade away, but to keep it alive by making tea the Indian way now and then.

Open the spice cabinet of any Bengali household and sitting their pompously is the mustard jar right at the front among other spices like cumin, coriander and nigella seeds. Bengalis love their mustard or sorse and are also punctilious about its preparation with elders keeping a vigil over how the mustard paste is made. As my mother in law says, if the paste is not made to perfection, the dish will lose its taste. Back when I was in India I never made the paste myself, it was either my mother or some helpers who would prepare it for me. I only had to cook. So when I came to UK and used my grinder to make mustard paste, it always turned bitter. Of course, back in India, even now in most households, the shil and nora, a kind of motor and pestle, still has a pride of place in the kitchen, and is a kind of family heirloom. The shil or the flat stone and grinding stone or nora was always pockmarked. In some parts of the flat stone beautiful intricate designs were craved, the penmanship of the artist holding me in awe. Once a year a skeletal man came in his rickety cycle,carrying a rag satchel, knocking at our doors to bang with ferocity on the sheel and nora with his hammer and wedge. As the clanging noise filed the air, we would cover our ears, at times with pillow, to shut out the headache-inducing noise. But once it was done, as promised by the man, the grinding process was easier. Making a mustard paste is an elaborate process and a tiresome one, no wonder helpers are hired by many households just to make different types of paste. I remember my mother in law standing tall supervising the preparation, specially when she had guests coming. Our maid after vigorously washing the sheel, squats on the floor all set to bulldoze the yellow seeds who lie pitifully on the stone, their fate about to be sealed. With all her strength she pushes the nora up and down, her jaws clenched, face taut. I can see beads of glistening sweat coming down her face which she wipes with a rag cloth. After several of turns, the mustard seeds are crushed beyond recognition. They capitulate. Is this okay?, the helper asks my mother in law meekly. No, she would say with a hint of authority in her voice, it is still grainy, it needs to be creamy. You let go, I will give it a good grind, how many times have I taught you how to make mustard paste, she admonished her. And she squats down herself and with bull prowess drags the nora up and down until she is satisfied herself. This is how it should be, she tells the maid. Even now when she has a electric grinder she can’t part with the sheel and Nora. If we try to harangue her on how easy it would be to use the electric one, she shuts up saying, it would be, of course, but it tastes better when ground on stone. Technology has fallen flat on its face on this count. Coming to my story, I found out my mustard tasted bitter because it was essential to add a few green chillis in it when you make mustard paste. I never knew that. With that dose of valuable advice from my mother in law, I prepare the mustard paste again, this time with some plum green chillis, and to my delight it tastes just like home. Not perfect as my mother in law, but then I succumbed to technology, she did not.