The Gurkha's Daughter Read online

  Be careful of the money, he reminded her every time they spoke. Don’t let anyone know you have money with you. The bus fare from Birtamod to the border should be no more than ten rupees. In fact, you may even be able to ride for free because you have the kind of pleasant disposition that inspires kindness in the most hard-hearted strangers.

  “You’re taking her to attend your mother’s funeral?” Parvati asked, not making an effort to hide her horror while she ferreted for two thousand-rupee notes in her purse. “Your mother dies, and you already have a new mother. That’s a convenient life you lead.”

  “Arrey, you never know with these Australians. Once they like you, they could even sponsor you. In two years, you become an Australian citizen. And she’s already grateful to me for taking her to my mother’s—my birth mother’s—funeral.”

  “Would it bother you if Sunny found himself another mother too?” Parvati asked, pointing at Sarita’s son, who sat sulking by the window.

  “Why not? If it benefits him, why not? He can even have one when I am alive.”

  “And when is your husband coming to the funeral?” Parvati asked.

  “He may not be able to make it. He has to go to China for work tomorrow. But he’ll be there for the thirteen-day kaam. The representatives from our family are my son, me, and Aamaa.”

  “Yes, your family’s representatives for your dead mother’s funeral are you, your son, and your new mother,” Parvati said, aware the sarcasm was lost on Sarita.

  They had now left the main city and the heavy traffic behind and were traversing serpentine roads. Erin clicked pictures when a particularly scenic mountain view greeted them. Sarita, ever the dutiful daughter, asked her if she wanted to get out and take photos.

  “That’s fine,” Erin muttered.

  “No, Aamaa, that’s no trouble, please, please,” she said and then asked the driver to stop, following which Erin got out, stared at the mountains, sighed, shot pictures, said a prayer, and got back in.

  “Her camera is the size of a TV,” Parvati said.

  “When you use English words that way, she knows we are talking about her.”

  “People would think we are on a sightseeing trip and not mourning Aamaa’s death,” Parvati added. “And why does she keep praying? Is she calling her Yeshu to bless her?”

  “She’s a Hindu.”

  “Like these white people are ever Hindu.”

  Sarita switched to English: “Hey, Erin, my sister-in-law doesn’t believe me when I tell her you’re Hindu.”

  “Maybe I should recite the shlokas for her,” Erin said.

  “You should,” Sarita replied with recently formed filial indulgence.

  “So, she knows the shlokas too?” Parvati asked Sarita, impressed with herself for having gathered some information from a conversation in a language she barely understood.

  “Yes, she does. You know, they wouldn’t allow her entry into the Pashupatinath Temple; they said only Hindus allowed. She then recited the Hanuman Chalisa in front of the priests. You should have seen the look on those priests’ faces.”

  Erin chuckled in the front seat. She turned pinker when she laughed. Kaali let out a giggle.

  “Does she understand our language?” Parvati whispered.

  “No, but she knows what story I am narrating because I tell it to everyone. I think it makes her proud.”

  “I can’t believe you call her Aamaa. She doesn’t even speak Nepali. I could never do it.”

  “But doesn’t the servant girl—this one in the back—call you Aamaa?”

  “No, she doesn’t.”

  “I thought she did. Maybe you should ask her to call you Aamaa. It could make things easier for you. Does this one still steal?”

  “No, Kaali doesn’t steal. She’s been with us five years. She’s good.” Parvati looked at Kaali from the corner of her eye; her servant was listening intently. “If she continues behaving, we can maybe get her lip operated on. It will cost us a lot of money, but I don’t have anyone else to spend it on.”

  My mistress promised to get someone to teach me how to drive when I turned fifteen, he had said. I turned sixteen, and she said I wasn’t tall enough. I turned seventeen, and she said it was better to wait until the legal age. I turned eighteen, and she said I hadn’t been satisfactory all of last year and didn’t deserve to learn it. I didn’t learn how to drive until I ran away. These people love making false promises. Tell me, does your mistress tell you she will one day get your lip fixed?

  “Yes, at least Daai built the house before he passed away. You’re lucky you don’t need to save for your children’s education. Nowadays even the most stupid of them wants to go to America. I wonder where we’ll get the money from.”

  “We’ve had three deaths in six years,” Parvati observed, cautious of any money talk. “Does that say something to you? Maybe we are cursed.”

  “I don’t know. Baba died because he was sick and because it was time.”

  “Yes, that was expected. Do you think Aamaa will go to heaven?”

  “I don’t think so. She has always made a lot of people suffer. She doesn’t deserve to go to heaven. I know she’s my mother—my biological mother—but a fact is a fact. Thankfully, God gave me another mother.”

  Sarita squeezed Erin’s right shoulder and lightly massaged it.

  “Don’t think she only treated me badly. She was sometimes nice. Maybe if I tried to understand what she was going through—a son’s accident, a husband’s passing—I’d have been able to tolerate her better. She could have stayed with me in Kathmandu instead of Birtamod. I could have offered.”

  “She’d have burned you alive if you women lived together. She’d have sucked out your blood, minced you into pieces, roasted you, and eaten you like a khasi. Honestly, Bhauju, how did you feel when you heard the news?”

  “I was sad. Ask Kaali. I couldn’t help crying. I am better now—more in control—but then the tears just wouldn’t stop flowing. They went on and on and on like the Simara rains. I didn’t know I’d be so affected by all this.”

  “You’re definitely a better person than I’ll ever be. I need to feel sad, I know I need to cry, but I just can’t. It’s my mother we’re talking about, you know, my biological mother.”

  “Your only mother, Sarita. All this talk about another mother is nonsense.”

  “No, I knew you’d find the concept ridiculous. I would be grateful if you didn’t. This woman is nice. You would discover how nice she is if you could talk to her.”

  “Oh, what will I talk to her about in my tutey-futey English?”

  Kaali said she had to pee, which immediately flustered Sarita.

  “We’ve only been on the road five hours, and you already have to pee?” Sarita said. “I told you to take care of your business before coming.”

  After they passed a resort village, from which Sarita asked the driver to stop a good distance away, because it was crowded with rafters and tourists, they all got out to stretch their legs. Sarita and Erin disappeared behind the bushes. Kaali squatted by the van, and the rivulet springing from between her legs irrigated, among other things, a colony of red ants, spurring them to zigzag their way to dryness.

  “Why don’t you pee standing up like a man, Kaali?” Sunny shouted from the other side of the road. “You look like a boy, and you should pee like a boy.” The comment provoked a guffaw from the quiet driver.

  Parvati crouched down to relieve herself where Kaali had and, spotting an ant struggle for life, asked no one in particular, “The dead, do they know when they’re dying?”

  “No, they don’t,” Kaali said with seriousness. “No, they don’t know when they’re dying. It just happens.”

  “Shut up, Kaali,” Parvati said, getting in. “Talk only when you’re asked something. Have you even experienced the death of a loved one to know what it feels like?”

  The driver claimed the van wouldn’t start because of overloading, so they all got out almost as soon as they’d got
back in.

  “Sunny, can you push the van?” The driver revved the engine up once again.

  “Yes, Kaali should, too—she’s a boy after all,” Sunny yelled as he pushed the van with an exaggerated display of histrionics.

  Erin joined Sunny. When the driver signaled to them that they could get in, Sarita looked proudly at Erin.

  “Look, Aamaa doesn’t think any job is beneath her,” she said.

  Within half an hour, the mauve in the sky would turn pitch black. It would be warmer as they descended into the plains, but it was getting colder now. Parvati asked Sunny to close the window on his side, but he was adamant about its remaining open. When she disagreed, they compromised that the window would be left partially open. When a truck roared past them, Parvati nudged Sarita to talk to Sunny. Sarita remained silent, forcing Parvati to take the matter up again.

  “All right, Bhaanjaa, time to close the window now,” she said. “We have to be well rested for the funeral, and your mother will freeze to death if you keep the window open all night.”

  Sunny scowled but said nothing. Sarita was quiet.

  “Close the window, Bhaanjaa,” Parvati said, her voice hardening slightly.

  “Half an hour more, Maaiju,” came the impudent reply.

  “In half an hour, we’ll turn into ice.”

  Sunny mumbled something under his breath and shut the window.

  “Do you shout at him at all?” Parvati asked Sarita.

  “No, not since Aamaa has lived with us. She has taught us several things about disciplining children. We allow him to do everything. She says that will make him a confident adult. She even told me not to scold him when he broke a windowpane with a cricket ball. They go on all these trips to Changunarayan and Nagarkot, and he comes back so much happier and more knowledgeable about plants and animals. I could also say he has learned more about Nepal from Aamaa than he has from us or from his exorbitant school.”

  “But we’re different, Sarita. She’s white. She’s a foreigner. We bring up our children differently. We need to beat them. They need to listen to their elders. Sunny is thirteen. He’ll soon be more difficult for you to manage. Thirteen to nineteen—these are crucial years.”

  “I don’t know, Bhauju, I was beaten as a child. Aamaa —the one who died—hit me all the time. It was something I could have done without.”

  “But who from our generation wasn’t beaten growing up? I don’t know what nonsense this gori is feeding you, but you need to raise your children the way other Nepalis do.”

  At the mention of the word gori, Sarita quickly stole a glance at Erin, who was fast asleep. Parvati looked to see what Kaali was up to. She was spread across three big luggage bags, with a shawl covering her body from neck to toe. She gave Parvati a cheeky smile, looking more comfortable than anyone else in the van.

  “I think what Aamaa says makes sense,” Sarita said. “If I had been encouraged to stitch paper clothes when I was a child instead of Aamaa, the one who gave birth to me, telling me I’d end up as a low-caste tailor, I’d perhaps have been a fashion designer, making clothes for film stars. But when I said I wanted to study fashion designing, Aamaa actually had Daai give me a thrashing.”

  Yes, you can even become an actress once people see your real beauty after the surgery, he had said. Bombay is a different world. I was the one who first encouraged Manisha Koirala to go to Bombay, and now look at what a big actress she has become. Of course, I can’t take all the credit for it, because she was already very beautiful. You will be a film star with the nicest clothes. Now, now, I must warn you not to wear those revealing clothes all these actresses wear. That will not make me happy.

  “Daai, as in Sir?” Parvati asked, surprised that her docile husband would be asked to carry out so brutal a task.

  “Yes, your Sir,” Sarita said. “He beat me with nettle leaves. He dipped them in cold water first and then brought the sishnu down on me—my hands, legs, everywhere—while Aamaa shouted encouragement. ‘No one in this family becomes a darji,’ she screamed. The memory is still alive. I was married six months later.”

  “And it turned out well. You have a healthy son. Your husband makes good money. You’re about to move into your own house. I don’t see how the beating did any harm.”

  “How do you think it looked? A grown eighteen-year-old daughter being beaten in full view of everyone? I was so ashamed that I refused to even walk down the street. Everyone in the tole talked about it. I’ve never been able to forgive Daai for it.”

  “You and he were never really close.”

  “We were, actually. It was after this episode that we drifted apart.”

  “He never mentioned it to me.”

  “Well, you and he weren’t all that close either.”

  “But we were married.”

  “That doesn’t mean you share everything with each other. I like what Aamaa says. She thinks marriages aren’t so important. The expectations are much lower when you remain unmarried.”

  “Your Aamaa seems like a home wrecker to me. Soon you’ll be telling me that you think divorces are acceptable.”

  “They should be,” Sarita said. “Did I tell you I’ve begun going to college?”

  “Harey, college? At your age?”

  “Yes, I joined classes at Padma Kanya three months ago. It’s strange going to class with students who are so much younger. They are so surprised when I tell them I have a teenage son.”

  “They must think you’re a pagli, Sarita. I think you are mad. You have a husband and a growing son to take care of. You need to look after them. College? At your age? Please don’t tell me this was another of your Aamaa’s ideas. She will soon convert you to Christianity.”

  “I told you she’s Hindu.”

  “Let her be whatever she wants, but she’s definitely bent on wrecking your family life. What did jwaai have to say?”

  “He thought I was being inconsiderate, but he doesn’t like to say that in front of Aamaa. When she’s around, he talks about things he doesn’t believe in, like women’s liberation, but once she’s out of the picture, he keeps telling me I am being unreasonable. He has even suggested driving her out, but because she pays so well, he can’t bring himself to do it.”

  Suddenly their driver jerked the wheel to avoid collision as a truck from the opposite direction veered close to the van.

  “Bajiyaa,” he screamed.

  The swerving and his swearing woke everyone up but Kaali.

  “Drunk drivers in the night,” Parvati growled.

  “Is everyone okay?” Erin asked. She counted the heads and discovered the number fewer than what they had set off with. “Where’s her helper?”

  “She’s sleeping, Aamaa,” Sarita reassured her, reaching out to pat her on her shoulder. “She’s fine.”

  “Oh, all right,” Erin said, and closed her drooping eyes again.

  The driver, shaken by this sudden encounter with death, asked if now might be the right time to stop for dinner. Parvati met his suggestion with happiness. She was hungry. Then, realizing that her mother-in-law’s death required that she abstain from proper meals and meat for at least another thirteen days, she retreated into her shell.

  “It’s okay if you eat, Bhauju,” Sarita said. “I couldn’t eat in good conscience.”

  “But I was married into this family, so it’s my family, Sarita. It’s acceptable if you eat because you were married outside the family. Just don’t eat any meat.”

  “She is—was—my mother. You can’t possibly expect me to eat.”

  “But you’re hungry. Maybe you could start the fasting and sacrificing tomorrow.”

  “Yes, why don’t you, Bhauju? Tonight we eat, and tomorrow we start.”

  But when the driver finally pulled up to a brightly lit restaurant in a town that bustled with night buses and diners, both announced they wouldn’t be able to forgive themselves if they ate. Kaali, Erin, Sunny, and the driver walked to the restaurant while Sarita and Parvati shopped for
fruit and milk. They couldn’t get milk thick enough for their taste anywhere this late, so they made do with tea and bananas. By the time the others had returned, Parvati and her sister-in-law had finished a dozen bananas between them. Parvati discarded her plan of surprising Kaali with a banana early in the morning as she snapped the last fruit in half.

  “Six bananas each—we must have been hungry,” Parvati said, hoping Sarita couldn’t sleep either.

  “What did you eat, Dinesh?” Sarita asked the driver.

  “The food was good,” Dinesh said, with an appreciative burp. “They had chicken and fish and mutton.”

  “Did you eat like a pig, Kaali?” Parvati asked.

  “Yes, she ate quite a bit,” the driver, unexpectedly talkative, answered. “But Madam ate the most. I’ve never seen a woman eat that way. I never knew a kuiree could eat so much Nepali food. Will the spices not destroy her stomach?”

  Do you get to eat meat here? he had asked. How often do you eat meat? At my mistress’s place, they seldom ate meat. When they did, they usually left a smidgen of gravy and a small piece of chicken for me. I would put my plate to my face and lick it clean. Your new life will be different. You’ll get to eat as much as you want, but we don’t want you to be too fat. Have you seen a fat actress?

  “She’s used to it. She loves Nepali food.”

  “Oh, she eats everything you cook?” Parvati asked, surprised.

  “Yes, everything. Earlier she had a problem with the bones, but now she’s used to them. She’s too old to cook. Otherwise, I am sure she’d make an excellent Nepali cook.”

  “Maybe you could teach her. I’ve heard you make delicious chicken, Sarita.”

  “I am learning other recipes. I am taking a home science class at PK. We get to experiment a lot.”

  “So, you’re actually going to college to do a course you could study at home?” Parvati asked.

  “No, this is just one of the classes. I’ve many others. I like this one best. Maybe I could do a bachelor’s in home science, then a master’s.”

  “Who’s heard of a mother of a teenage son with such ambitions? I think you’re throwing a lot of time and money down the drain.”