“THAT PLATE IS NOT FOR YOU .. RASCAL!! THAT’S FOR KAAALI – GET AWAY FROM IT .. KAALI, KAALI .. COME HERE WILL YOU? BANKEY IS ABOUT TO FINISH UP WITH YOUR FOOD! KAALI? WHERE DID THIS GIRL GO TODAY?? KAAAAALIIIII?”
These words infiltrate my dreams; there, I am the sole owner of the Kanyam Tea Gardens and it’s early morning up in Kanyam and I gaze out towards Shree Antu Hill from my cottage’s porch waiting for the sun to come up. The sky is at its best: showing off with hues. My girlfriend, who also happens to be a model, is still inside making hot chocolate. My cottage, you see, is perched right on the 4 mile stretch in Kanyam – amidst the lush tea-gardens, just before you enter Phikkal. I think my girlfriend is from Brazil. Yes – that’s about right. She’s in Nepal just to visit me. She’s flying back next week. I’m sending with her to Brazil some tea samples from Nepal. I want to conquer that South American market. Yes.
Some say, you can literally see the sun rise up above the Bay of Bengal from atop Shree Antu Hill. I haven’t been so lucky when faced with a real world to amble on over and look over the vast Indian expanse from atop Shree Antu which of course, is in Ilam jilla.
My best sunrise is still from 4000 meters up in Pathibhara – Kanchendzonga’s magnificent massif being savored by the sun’s first rays brings sort of like an enlightenment or maybe it is fulfillment – okay just super satisfaction, somewhere within my being every time I reminisce. After KDZ, it’s Kumbhakarna Himal, and then Makalu, and then Manasulu, and then Sagarmatha getting successive kisses from the sun.. you can actually do a 180 degrees swivel with your head gazing at these Himals standing at one spot. It’s like you’re in front of a map except the Himals are right in front of you smacking you with honest-to-goodness truth. Find me there again this and every October while I’m here, getting high on nature.
Sun .. the source of all energy. Sun .. god to some. Sun .. gives us all the time we need to get out and do something. Sun .. performing magic everyday. Sun .. the primary reason why I’m sweating?
“BANKEY!!! I SAID GET THE HELL AWAYYYYY FROM THAT FOOD!! GET OUT!! GET OUT YOU RASCAL!!!!”
This penultimate holler makes me wipe the sweat off my brow and the imaginary model girlfriend from Brazil and the imaginary riches instantly thaw into the deep abyss of another midsummer morning’s lucid dream. By this time, even the late risers in Kathmandu should be able to hear my mother yell at Bankey from this town – Birtamode, Jhapa.
I peek at the wall-clock from under my elbow .. it’s 7:45 am and I see that mother’s day started about 3 hours ago. By this time, she has finished up with her trying to please all kinds of gods, she’s done making tea twice already, she’s done preparing the kitchen for her maid who comes to help her out, she’s had her medicines, and soon she’ll yell at the 10 year old Rekha not to do anything in the house (Rekha’s the maid’s daughter) else ‘Dada will kill me!’.
Dada, of course, is yours truly. Like many, I’m Dada in my parents’ house and a coward everywhere else.
I can imagine mother fixing to strike Bankey with a broom and Bankey flat-out ignoring her and thinking of a trick he can conjure up so that he can get to Kaali’s plate before she arrives. Rekha comes trotting in the living room (where I mostly sleep because I can watch the TV until late into the night and browse the web) and smiles brilliantly at me – “Dada, TV herum?”
I lazily smile back at Rekha and manage a nod, eyes barely open. Suddenly I remember something and pry my eyes open to glance at her feet. Her feet and the accompanying toes are crocodile dry. I am not amused .. didn’t Gulshan didi buy her flip-flops with the money I’d given her the last time I was here?
“Rekha, where are your flip-flops?”
“Hasina’s worn them.” [Hasina is Rekha's older sister.]
“And what happened to Hasina’s flip-flops?”
“Bankey ate them dada.”
I reluctantly get up and adjust the pillow so that it’s set up vertically against the wall behind me. I don’t leave the bed just yet. Backrest in Birtamode. Father .. a struggling writer in his retirement, is scribbling away on his trusted diary given to him by his buddy who works at some insurance company in Kathmandu. He’s plonked himself on the sofa just a few feet away. My bed and his couch are separated cleanly by a carpet that my parents bought in Ilam Bazaar – up the hills .. about 2 hours drive, give-or-take a few 5 minute chunks, from here. He takes a gander at my early-morning-thus-half-deranged self and acknowledges my presence before signaling towards the tea on the TV stand that I can easily reach to from my present circumstance.
Home. Mother’s tea ,, I can smell the ginger in it already. One sip of Ilam’s organic, and I come alive. Father’s back knitting his brows like the hems of my pillow cover and pouring his heart out – ink first, on his dear diary. A heavy Nepali Dictionary rests trustily beside him.
Although my father can type in Unicode fluently, he insists that he has to use the pen and paper every morning to rekindle his creativity. Rekha sits herself on the carpet near my father. She turns back to stare at him. He looks at her quizzically from behind his rimless specs. She then waves the remote control at him trying to buy an early morning tube-feed with her flawless smile. Father lets out a faint sigh, takes off his specs, and puts them on the diary which he now closes but not before bookmarking it with his pen.
“What time are you going to school Rekha?”
“I’m sick today.”
“What happened to you now?”
“My stomach’s hurting.”
“Shouldn’t you then be resting at your house?”
“I want to rest here.”
Father shifts his gaze towards me. Slurping my tea on my bed, I shrug. He then gives up and goes back to putting his pen to the paper in Devnagiri. Rekha turns on the TV and immediately changes channels to some Indian reality show that features kids dancing against one another to win some title. The TV is located adjacent to my bed so I cannot actually see the screen. Rekha pulls both her legs towards her and wraps her hands around them and places her chin between the two knees; remote’s at the ready on her left hand, just in case. She keeps glancing at me from time to time.
“Dada .. when did you arrive?”
“Late yesterday, Rekha.”
“Did you fly in an airplane?”
“Yes.”
“I want to fly in an airplane also but didi says it’s scary.”
Rekha’s eldest sister is in Dubai. She’s 18. Kamala went there with her friend some six months ago. She’s been sending money.
“How often does your didi call you?”
“She called yesterday. She says it’s very hot there right now. Hotter than it is here. She always tells me how smart I am and that I should study hard.”
“Do you study hard?”
Rekha giggles and sticks out her tongue and shakes her head.
“Well, your didi is right. Study hard and you can fly anywhere you like.”
Rekha stares at me when I say that. She has that calm and a streak of confidence about her. I have a feeling she’ll kick some serious butt when she grows up to be a woman. “I’ll buy my own plane and fly it too ..” she seems to be saying to herself. I can’t, of course, tell. For now she’s just a kid who switches channels as if she has to go to school if she doesn’t.
Gulshan didi walks in, glowing as always. She has a sylph like figure that holds a big and bony face with sleek cheek bones that stretch. Her eyes are also big and a shimmering black. She has her hair tied up into a bun, like a Japanese Sumo Wrestler’s. She’s given to Rekha the radiance of her smile which has the faculty to light up an already sun-lit room even more. She flashes that unmistakable smile at me thus making my morning. In a voice that resembles a quitting cigarette smoking 41 year old dowager, she says:
“How are you bhai?”
“I’m good didi.”
“You know .. I’ve been meaning to call you about this. But since you’re here, let me just say it to you: I’ve got just the girl for you. She’s a teacher in my in-laws’ village. She can speak fluent English. You’ll like her. I already talked to your mother about her and didi already likes her …”
“Hahaha .. not again Gulshan didi. Remember the debacle last time?”
“She was a fool bhai. How long are you here for? Do you want me to call her? She’s buying a scooty. She’s real smart!”
“Hahaha ..”
“Are you still hung up on that crazy girlfriend of yours? She’s already left you, hasn’t she? She’s not going to come back bhai. You should find a good woman and settle down. Your mother’s worried sick. Can’t you tell?”
“Oh thank god you’re here Kaali!! Yes .. chase this rascal away!! Bankey!!!! GET OUT!!!” I hear my mother in the front-yard trying to secure Kaali’s food from the enemy. I can’t tell if she’s worried.
“Hahaha … doesn’t sound to me like she is all that worried didi. I know she used to like Pratima .. she’ll get over it.”
“Oh god! I don’t know what you guys these days are thinking. Do you have another girlfriend already? God save us and YOU!”
Aashiqa, Manisha, and Nisha – dance bar dancers all, dance in front of my eyes. They block my line of sight to Gulshan didi. I remember Nisha’s scooty. Pratima’s bidding me good-bye at the same time. Bad morning ..bad morning! I close my eyes, slurp the last slurp of the fabulous tea, and think about the sunrise in Pathibhara.
“And look at this girl. Oi Rekha!! Watching the TV all the time isn’t going to get you anywhere. Why don’t you come help me in the kitchen or go to school?”
“Gulshan didi .. Rekha’s sick. And of course, she’s not going to help you.”
“Bhai .. but look at her. Does she look sick to you?”
I’m taking Rekha’s side here.
“Ama .. my stomach’s hurting that’s why I don’t look that sick. Dada knows, right dada?”
“Of course, Rekha; let me get out of this bed and I’ll get some dygiene for you from the paan pasal.” Shaking her head, Gulshan didi walks out to the porch to help my mother salvage the scene Bankey’s been creating.
My dear mother talks to her dogs like she’s talking to humans. There’s one big difference from most households anywhere in how my parents treat their dogs. They never tie them up in a leash so these dogs are free to come and go as they please. My parents throw a party for all the dogs in the ‘hood (street or domestic pets) once every 6 months or so. My cousin who lives with my parents was telling me that on the last one, he had counted a total of 22 dogs from all walks of life crashing the to-be-crashed party in my parents’ house. I sorely missed that event but mother was there to explain every detail over the phone to me.
My father also talks to the dogs. The manner in which he converses with them is a bit different than mother’s. He’s mostly joking with them. Mother mostly yells at them. Despite that, whenever she leaves the house, there’s a caravan of stray dogs trailing her as if she’s the queen of some stray dog country and is going to another one to sign a treaty. Heads turn.
I’ve never seen my father feed the dogs or bathe them. Mother’s always running after them with food and trying to disburse the food accordingly; my sister, whenever she’s visiting, always makes it a point to bathe the dogs. Else Rekha and my cousin bathe them; apparently it’s easier counting the stars at night than bathing Bankey .. or Bankoo, as my sister calls the menace.
Bankey always messes up my mother’s carefully laid plans for breakfast for him and Kaali; and sometimes also for some of Kaali’s friends when they hang out together. Bankey doesn’t seem to have many friends.
My mother’s war with Bankey is always ongoing. Once Bankey disappeared for 3 weeks and she would wait for him to come to the front-yard every morning like he used to (if he wasn’t spending the night at his shed in the house). When he wouldn’t show up, mother would swear she wouldn’t give him a drop of water if he came back. Sure enough, he did hobble back one morning with scratches and bruises and she rushed him to the vet’s with tears in her eyes. Mother. Always there to care for her children.
Bankey’s gone missing many times since. Parents have lost all their hopes and expectations they had pinned on him. It’s like having a son who’s a drug addict live with you. No matter how many times he gets out of rehab, he still manages to sneak out to shoot up heroin with his buddies.
Kaali is all black. Bankey is fawn-ish. When Kaali got pregnant and procreated, all three pups came out fawn-ish. Bankey, of course, acted like nothing happened and that he had nothing to do with Kaali getting pregnant. He would still eat Kaali’s food. He would still anger my mother every morning. He would still not give a damn about his well-being. And on top of that, it’s not like the dude’s getting any younger. The older he is getting, the more self-destructing he’s becoming.
During the course of last month, Kaali’s pups were taken away from her one by one. One got killed in an accident. A motorcycle ran over it. A relative from Phikkal took another one. The last one remaining was found lifeless one morning out on the porch by Kaali herself.
After that day, Bankey never touched Kaali’s food. He did whatever mother told him to do. And mother didn’t say much. She didn’t know the pain of losing her own children and I’m sure she wasn’t about to even begin to imagine the prospect. Those days filled with hurt, she used to glance at Bankey and turn away after placing his plate in front of him. With her eyes quickly collecting fluid, she would have nothing to say to him.
Not anymore, that melancholy, thanks to the born-again rock star – Bankey. As it turns out, Kaali’s pregnant again. And apparently Bankey’s been acting like his old self the past couple of weeks including his indifferent behavior when Kaali’s around – acting as if he has nothing, again, to do with her getting pregnant. Since mother has her old Bankey back, it’s W A R all over again. Things are getting back to normal once again down in Birtamode.