She almost giggled but knew that would be inappropriate. She
curbed her smile and felt the gust of the overpowering emotion. It rose in one
section and abated in another, this wave of open grief. The women sat on their
haunches draped in nine yard saris, beating their chest moaning and groaning
loudly. She had never witnessed such an open show of emotion before. They duck-walked
to each other and wept on each other’s shoulders. This expression was so loud
that it seemed insincere. Even she did not cry that loudly not even when her
favorite toy fell into the valley and disappeared forever.
She sneaked a glance at her mother. Could her mother do this
open wailing show? No, her mother was sitting on the ground (not squatting) and
she was weeping, but no loud sounds came from her. The little girl was
relieved. There was a measure of sanity in her world. She continued to watch
the exaggerated display of emotion utterly bemused.
It had taken them a long time to get to this place. She
remembered the flight, the first in her yet short life. They were over the
clouds or alongside of them. She had pointed to the clouds in the window with
such joyful wonder that her mother had laughed joining in her delight. And the
lovely airhostess had offered her candy, which she had refused out of
politeness of course as trained, but was glad when the lady insisted and her
mother encouraged her to take some: even then carefully picking a few not to
seem too greedy.
A few years later travelling alone to an African country to
meet her parents there, she had been taken to the cockpit by the co-pilot and had
gazed in wonder at all the little blinking lights and the switches and the
knobs. What a ride that had been.
And then there had been a bullock-cart ride, another first,
on the third and final leg of their journey to the village of her father’s
father. It had been extremely novel in the beginning. She had been rather wary
of the large animals with their long horns and angry swishing tails and she
kept well out of their reach holding on to her mother’s hand for additional
safety. There was a romance to the motion of the cart, the slow rhythmic sway,
the clatter of the wheels, the gentle breeze. But it died soon enough as the
road got bumpier, the air dustier and the sun became scorching hot. The thirst
in their throats was mildly mitigated by the rationed water. They were tired
and desirous of reaching their destination.
In between was the train ride, which she hardly recollected.
Probably because she was used to train rides. Every summer vacation they took
the train to visit her mother’s mother’s homestead in Bombay. She would sing
the ditty in time with the clackety-clack of the train wheels.
“jhuk jhuk jhuk jhuk
agin gaadi,
dhuranchya resha havet
kadhi
palti jhade pahuya
mamachya gavala jaooya
mamachya gavala
jaooya”
{jhuk jhuk jhuk
jhuk fire engine train
drawing smoke lines through the air
let’s watch the trees run
as we make our way to uncle’s town }
she did not get the irony of the stanza that went
“mami mothi sugran,
roj roj poli shikran”
{Aunty is a great cook as she makes banana-pudding every
single day} as that was her favorite dish anyways.
There was none of her favorite food at the meal they had
upon reaching their destination at her father’s father’s village. It was good
to be on firm ground at last, on a surface that was not in some kind of motion.
They were fed bhakri (rough bread) and something very spicy. She wanted to ask
for some jam something sweet to make the food palatable, but her mother shushed
her and she vaguely realized she was a child of the cities, familiar with urban
ways. This village in the back of beyond was alien in more ways than one.
At the mourning she grew bored with the tides of public lamentations.
It went on and on crescendoing in one place and then in another, her chest
fluttered occasionally with the reverberations of the emotion. The drama was
not theatrical enough to sustain her attention. She was tired she wanted to
sleep. She asked her mother to pat her back as she lay down to help her fall
asleep. Her mother stiffened, already too aware of being different, dressed in
a five yard sari, not a nine yard one, unable to join in the loud wailing; she
ignored her little girl. The child was not deterred. She closed her eyes and
patted herself to sleep, self soothing in that strange if not bizarre situation.
Occasionally she opened her eyes as the loud noises got to her and she observed
a few of the women sniggering as they pointed to her surreptitiously. She could
sense her mother’s embarrassment but by now she was angry, angry at being
dragged so far away from her regular ways, not being able to comfortably eat or
sleep. She ignored the women and her mother and kept on patting herself till at
some point she fell asleep amidst the din.
They must have come back late from the cremation; the two
brothers, her father and her uncle, along with other males of the village. It
was probably strange and bizarre for them too, to have the entire village mourn
for their father. A man in a powerful position, who was respected and feared
for his authority. A man who had belittled them and put them down countless
times. They could not hold the emotional dissonance it created to grieve for
one who inwardly they rejoiced was dead simply because it set them free. They
were also drunk, drunk with the power of their father’s might. The loud
lamentation created such a discord between their internal state and the public
persona that they had to find an outlet, to vent their conflicting emotions and
the suppressed memories.
And they came upon her laying there innocently in the dark.
They entered the room stealthily. She slept unaware until she realized that she
was not safe. Then she escaped, she fled her body. A thin long subtle yet
strong chord kept her connected to her physical form but she was gone. Out
through the ceiling on to the roof and up into the stars. The rain had subsided, the clouds had cleared
the stars were shining bright. She looked at them and she knew she belonged
there that she was made of the substance of the stars. Whatever they did with
her physical form she was far gone. No wonder she did not remember what
happened, because she was not there. She floated in her true home and returned
only when others were awake and about, probably the next morning.
And whenever it happened that is where she went. It could
not have been too frequently, simply because of the logistics. India is so
densely populated that you cannot be alone for very long anywhere. She was
saved by the multitudes in a sense. And the stars, the millions and millions of
stars that glittered and twinkled and held her in their embrace.
