As Sweet as Honey

48




I thought how easy it had been for Rasi, Sanjay, and me, on the island. In hindsight, we were rarely bored, and if we were, we had each other to complain to. I wondered if Meterling was right, what I had overheard the other night. She wanted to return to Pi, for Oscar’s education. Nalani and Ajay were adamant: no one returns to the island for schooling; one only returns armed with degrees.

“All he will get here is learning by rote, and get involved in college-age politics. All these boys rioting and overturning buses, it’s too much.”

“There are all sorts of race riots in the UK, and anyway, you did well.”

“Yes, but surely readying for Cambridge and Oxford—the seats of learning in England—”

“Seats of learning, Nalani? You once thought the English bastards and bullies.”

“Oxford and Cambridge open doors. Oscar deserves better than schools here.”

“I wonder how is it in America?” asked Ajay.

“Oh, Pa always says American education is a joke. Our children are by their nature brighter,” said Meterling.

I had always thought my family’s social views slightly outlandish but not dangerous, yet listening to them, I wondered if I had been too tolerant. They were middle-class, used to a very good life on Pi, and had gone without land or family to the States and become a different kind of middle-class. I still remembered one of my father’s friends telling us the story of how people in a town north of ours had stared when his wife appeared at the A&P in a sari. Little children had made faces and pointed; but out in the Midwest, in St. Louis, because it was a university town, people were so enchanted with his older sister’s sari, they invited her to model it at the local TV station. In the U.S., South Asian housewives carefully created their own upholstered American living rooms with fabric from Jo-Ann’s and patterns from Butterick. My mother didn’t, but that was because she was one of the rare women who worked. Aunt Pa had got to hand-stitched matching tea cozies and toaster covers before she said, Enough, and looked for a computer course to take.

As usual, my thoughts had wandered away from me. Hemamalani’s chin rested lovingly on my knee. Absently, I petted her. I didn’t want to evaluate my family, judge them without knowing everything, although of course I did. Who knew what was hidden in their past that they wouldn’t talk about, ancient hurts and injustices that had shaped them? “Ancient” was the right word, because hadn’t we been shaped from millennia of custom and decorum? All those laws to prevent the boat from being rocked. A woman’s talents lay in how well she could roll a betel leaf, how many sons she produced.

Thinking I’d lay claim to my own talents, I thought I would go into Madhupur proper to get some sketch pads and pencils. I liked the Aspara-brand charcoals here, as well as the thick paper hand-sewn into notebooks. I wanted to sketch Grandmother watering the plants, as I had once done long ago, but this time, I wanted to catch her spirit in the arc of water splashing from her hand. I would never get married. I would break the chain of ordered life.

Still, I needed a guide for the practical things. Nalani took me on the bus, and we took Oscar along. I thought I’d get him a small set of watercolors, since I’d noticed the one in the house had all but vanished from frequent use. On the bus, I avoided eye contact with the men who leered in our direction; three years ago, I’d made the mistake of looking into a man’s eyes, only to be “accidentally” brushed against, a hand snaking across my breasts minutes after my bottom had been pinched, hard.

Looking over Oscar’s shoulder through the bus window, I saw the thatch-roofed stores giving way to brick and stone ones with Plexiglas windows advertising saris, electronics, and furniture. Stainless-steel ware was sold on the streets; tumblers and saucers and thalis lined up on rough blankets. Small and large chimes were sold on the street as well, and you could purchase songbird cages complete with songbirds. Small, colorful temples punctuated every few blocks, dedicated to both large and small deities, and vendors displayed coconuts, fruit, and flowers for purchase for special prayers. A priest was blessing a scooter with coconuts and lemons. Three years ago, if we were on foot, I’d insist we stop in at all the temples, pray and receive prasad. Now, outside one temple, I saw a holy man, with dark, long, curly hair and mustache, ash stripes covering his arms and chest, taking a break with a cigarette.

A thin, unsmiling proprietor looked up as we entered the art-supply shop, and a thinner and saried woman followed us as we browsed the aisles. I can always rely on art-supply stores and stationers to get my senses engaged and, weirdly, my senses calm. This store was tightly organized, with pyramids of candy-scented rubber erasers and boxes of unsharpened pencils. Paintbrushes were neatly arranged in open cups, one reason the woman in the sari was probably following us. Pads of foolscap, tracing paper, and heavier drawing paper enticed, as I ran my finger dreamily along their spines. Oscar was much intrigued by a paper tiger mask, but in the end, decided he really didn’t want it. The proprietor still didn’t smile as Nalani insisted on paying for my purchases. Well, there was no need for him to smile. He wrapped up the sketch pads, brushes, pencils, and watercolor set individually in brown paper and twine. Because it was so hot, after getting coconut water, we headed for home. I wanted to ask Nalani more about this Laksman, but instead we chatted about her pregnancy and the adoption while Oscar stared out the window.


I told Rasi about the holy man smoking in front of the temple.

“Do you think he just goes up to the counter and says, ‘A pack of Camels, Hari Om’?”

“With a special discount, yaar, and I’ll pray for you?”

Somehow this struck us as hilarious.

“I’m sorry I was angry before,” said Rasi.

“That’s okay.” I hesitated. “I just don’t understand why you agreed to an arranged marriage after your whole life has been about, you know, nonmarriage.”

“ ‘Nonmarriage.’ I like that. Anyway, I agreed only to an introduction. Look, the whole charade will be over. Nalani will be happy, my parents will be happy. I’ll have seen one boy, that’s all, and I can say no to all the rest. I told you, I can say, ‘I’ve tried it your way, but now please leave me alone.’ ”

“But won’t everyone think if you agreed to one meeting, you’ll agree to more?”

“I don’t think so. It will get everyone off my back.”

“Or you could wind up with someone on yours.”

“Ha-ha.”