Kingdoms in Newness
G. Haritharan
Copyright © 2011 G. Haritharan and s4mT
First Published by s4mT in 2007 ISBN 978-0-9552958-1-2
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
Thank you for downloading this free ebook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.
Other books by G. Haritharan:
The Depression of Surya (and Stories from this Era) https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/42621
Followers of the Dead Man
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/85323
Dedicated to the individuals and groups who have fallen in the pursuit for the freedom of Eelam. Your efforts will never be forgotten and She will praise you once emancipated.
Public Mental Health Warning:
Do not attempt to figure timelines or draw maps using this novel (especially with Murali’s second chapter). You’ll see/feel frustrations that could be avoided by merely relaxing and reading.
“The imagination is a wonderful thing.”
(Anyone who has ever said that, the year/s that they have said it)
Nahani (1)
(She took two steps across Rama’s Bridge and looked back at Tamil Eelam and Sri Lanka/Ceylon. Was she going home? She turned and looked towards India…feel home, even when one is not there…)
Entry One (of new copy book) – 9th March, Madras
Today I woke and thought of the rest of my life. At seventeen (albeit very plus!) there are to the ladies of my culture the options that fall beneath our feet. However, we do not choose but merely play wait to the notions of both the males and other females within our circle. I sit to a tight and wait upon my bull as supposed long before teardrops in oceans, the Southern kingdoms of India, castes of separation and blonde haired travellers of a previous ‘Pure’- stan. With puffed cheek and quick step heart rhythm I am to enjoy my situations – like petals at my toes. Let me ask; who actually likes the feeling of petals at ones feet? Is it to be ranked top number in example of feeling? I can think of many that would overjoy these episodes and that is the same for the thought/feeling/notion of ocean that is female movement.
Am I to follow the footsteps of my brave mother and wed? I have this option. The easy option. No need for curtailing thoughts of jamboree run away my precious and rest not until your lungs cannot fashion further alveoli osmoses (or was it…? anyway, an issue with a semi-permeable membrane). Oh the ragged Annie life would not suit me, I have an education! At the stinch of a pinch, I choose the wedlock.
But seventeen?
A young one like me should not be given up in such flight of fancy circumstance. I am at a prime – already, I know. The thought of my ageing is beyond that of many; just last week a foolish child of fifteen went away with another off the banana. (Once more I say, I know what you must think of my 200 month old/young/wise/idiotic frame, but I am almost seventeen – to you all I say ‘So there.’) Anyway – so to the fifteen year old. Banana boat and lover. Fresh I tell you. Back they went to the motherland like hoodwinked lemmings. She, a doctor in training born of a wealthy family, many brothers and sisters all doctors themselves. She even had a delightful singing voice; so I’m told. He, a rough scallion of the dark and dingy kind; his brother worked the bar of a watering hole… if such things legally existed.
Their official word was of love and the impossible living circumstance of India – that is here: the Hindustani great cape. The two’s parents and family were much too overbearing to compete with the same playing level…
So what do the star crossed do? – move back. Back across the sea leaving India, their/mine/our new home gone.
If a love is worth a fight then so-be-it. But to travel back? ‘Let us flee persecution of our familiar towards the arms of tyranny’. If you pick a lover then away with you! Not to this land or your previous; the resplendent land? Never. Only to the Buddhist. The brainwashed Sinhala. A Tamil couple should not go back they should move forth… and they are not even good at cricket! (I hear great things from father (Appa) on the subject of the Indian national team. The name sounds so meagre when compared to the might that is England, yet they have a chance, he says. Either that or the West Indians will ride once more: ‘the team to lift the world cup will be Indian. I’m just not sure which Indian.’)
I digress…
If it is a love for me – then I will move on. I mean, let it be assured that I know no real love – I have thought of nobody else but my Siva. The man who I am to wed at my father’s (no, sorry - my ‘Appa’s’) request is a boy I have known in and out for a while. Of course, it is not the romance of love but it is our way and like my brave mother would tell me ‘You will fall in love, eventually’.
I am scared. What the English call ‘Cold Feet’. Still, it was like this for my mother and probably to a degree, her mother – my grandmother. We are venturing the pre-historic Tamil age here, where emotions are none more than either excitement or anger. These two; the bread and work of Tamilian nature. All others are to be suppressed under a carpet of skin, blood and other organs.
I am not special as I will do this also. My ambition will be ‘corned’ i.e. discarded for the sake of peace within my family. My father (sorry, Appa) would not have his stubborn ways changed for all the rupees you could throw at him. If he wants for my marriage then it is so… and it is increasingly like this will be the case.
If you detect the air of defeat within my words (or even a growing contradiction) then reader, close your eyes. I will have opportunity within my sole option (not quite the ‘option’). Ok I will be, at first, a baby making/breeding/raising machine but that is expected and that will be my vocation. My husband’s will be to lay the foundation of monetary base. It’s that easy. My option, herein, is to lay my own foundation. My children will grow not knowing this. They will grow not knowing of the stupidity by which my family are here in this Indian continent of filth. The plush setting that would have been their upbringing has been replaced by the smell of mortar and evility. My child(ren) will not know of this in real experience. They will be Indian and brought up to believe that they can stand up and be accounted for as a being that need not the oppression of others – including mine!
Yes, oppression will not be living with my family. Siva best know this. Best for his sake.
A Poem – 13th March
I do not much feel for writing today. I’m much too sad. I have told Appa that I would like to see England before my marriage (again as always) yet he disagrees with my sentiment. He agrees I am mature enough for such the venture but, alas, I am promised to Siva like the moon to his Namesake’s hair.
Adieu England, adieu your sweet land
For if I could show you a hand
Or a foot
To step amongst the soil, the clay, the soot
For time will keep us apart no longer
Place me in your heart and hold me stronger
I will be with you
Entry Two – 15th March
I have written diary since the earliest of ages. Copy books I use come and pass (the last was first page written upon ‘over there’. Shh, I will not speak her land’s name). I have, with previous entry started the new, reader as you know. With each start I must explain at least something I have quite honestly written before. On gone pages. The order of these speeches (or entries) will not be geared. Sequential. Merely as and when. To chart my life. To keep me in check for I will not give up the fight to out breed alienation. I will not embark the trip to England but my child(ren) will. Oh England.
It is my dream to live my literary heaven in the country that my bones were supposed to born. They will; with my endeavour and hope, die there. The language is what I am blessed (though maybe cursed). Read is all I am and do while my family play and engage in conversation between my sibling, aunties, uncles, mother and father (Appa).
Indeed I am Tamil; from teardrop. Born and raised for a long while; transported via ocean/bay/heavenly water of newness like Narayana It/Her/His self. If it were my decision (and my family have been privy to the fancy of my choice) then I, well would condone such behaviour. India is my home now. Tamil Nadu is a swap for the atrocious past. However, the decision was removed from my hands and placed into that of Appa’s, who to be but only fair, has made some of the best judgements to his Tamil people that only the future will prove me correct. (Though with the separate beings that are his Tamil people and his only daughter, the curiousness of certain choices are brought up. But I am his daughter, so herein my bias! What am I to expect but normality bred from traditional Hindu way? Father’s (Appa’s) ways are only modern for his people; backward for his famile).
Even the mithuna that is Double J will follow the path. We have not spoke of such events and futures for the long while. Exam pressure has got to the three of us which tinkers slowly and successfully with regular other life. Today I even let go the usual motor route. I told Dosh to release me from autocab constraint a full three streets down from high school. I walked on kicking dust; alone as a woman should not be, I am told. I caught the stares, no doubt wondering why such a dark skinned woman should be so brave. Fellows in white shirts literally turned to notice me, I know I am not a looker, so they turned just to make a note or two. I passed street vendors selling nothing but fruit on this hot day; I would have sweated out all my melancholy but the sun is not hot enough to do such. I stopped, looked a mango. I was tempted, but what of my mood? Does it necessitate I remove a curse with a gift? No. I walked on passed the bronze statue of Vellupillai then next on the three pairs of tall, swaying trees. The benches beneath them cause stirs at my remembrance: I imagined my self back in Colombo, a little girl getting lost in the maze map of the lower neighbourhoods. No road markings, just memory as guide. Go with someone you know for the first time, then as a true Tamil way, you’re on your own after that.
I always knew my way home; ‘smell the tea leaves, thanga’ I told myself. ‘When you get home you’ll write a poem in your diary and no one will see it. Then you’ll post it in your imaginary post box and it will end up on the desk of a duke in Cambridge.’ I walk with my head down, firmly engaging the blasted earth, except I was smiling. Why? I walked passed a post office, only this one was real.
‘Britain’ I said under my breath.
Entry Three – 20th March
I know reader, I know. Never the day to day making. To be honest, revision and homework is time consuming rage with the 16th being taking with task. It was not so in the beginning/start, then I wrote you diary everyday. But here lay difference in my motivation; I will write to the consistency that once sat upon this land I promised to write my verses. Thus far, my words have been scribble this/that/the other. As a valuable reference point in history (less of the his missy!) I will document my situation.
But this, after a story I wrote in English class.
The Flower of Ten Petals
One day a beautiful handsome prince named BV was strolling around his palace in a town next to Madras, conveniently called Manipura. Everyday he would do this. He would wake, brush his teeth. Bathe. Eat breakfast with the queen and then stroll. The daily activity of walking around the gardens pleased the young man who had all to live for. At a small pace he walked around the confined walls of the estate looking deeply at the various different flowers dotted. Chrysanthemums, roses, tulips and then the really exotic; grey lilies, pink jasmine and a flower that he did not know the name for. It had ten very distinct petals upon the perimeter of her face and a deep, engraved red triangle amidst the circular centre. Though he spent hours in front of this particular one, for he was proud it had grown in his view, he did so out of several emotions and not just so of pride. In fact, there were contrasting, conflicting feelings of embarrassment; why should this flower grow here in the kingdom enclosed, why not further a field for all the towns folk to see?
Still, that was most days. Today was the one day of speciality; for after years of absence, his father Arjuna the Great was returning to see his son and wife, so like a son would, BV busily prepared the grounds. Chief gardener pruned; maids swept, cleaned and dusted. Cooks prepared a feast. Butlers moved furniture. Everything was to perfection, yet BV wanted more. He wanted to show his extra love for the father that would no doubt do the same… he pondered and walked in the similar fashion he’d always do; feet straight as arrows from a bow, in line with each step and his hands interlocked behind his strong, lower back. He passed the gardner and enquired of his flower scissors; ‘Why use scissors when you can use a knife?’ BV spoke directly. The gardener bent down on one knee and spoke to the prince’s feet; ‘Scissors are easier for my arthritic ridden hands, though if the master wishes I will use a knife and the finest one in Manipura at that to cut these beautiful flowers.’ It was then that BV had the idea that would change his life.
He snatched the scissors and ran across the green field; passing the smaller servant huts, passed mini hill adventures and finally passed orange roses to find the flower of ten petals. The idea was to cut the pretty head off and place it upon the breast of his father. He went to cut the stem when he stopped. Could he do it? He stared long and hard at the flower head and grew ashamed. How could he kill the beauty of it? To destroy beauty is another’s way – an evil way. BV put down the scissors and smiled. Suddenly, he received a tap on the shoulder. He turned and stared into the eyes of his father. Would one think of joy, of rapture of happiness? No, BV could only feel guilt and shame. Fear even. His mouth dried instantly and he was tormented on the very spot. He fell to his knees and looked at his hands; who was he? Who was this man ahead of him? Arjuna the Great bent to offer peace to his child yet the prince could only see war. From behind him he picked up the garden scissor and thrust the sharp object into his father’s side. With wide eyes of surprise, Arjuna the Fallen repeated his sons early drop… then further to the earth, dead.
BV with desperation in his sight pulled from abdomen the blade, opened it and snapped the head of the ten petal flower. Instantly it too died, perishing in a flame and ash. BV went to turn the sharp edge upon himself…
Well I was sad. I am always sad. Until my dreams are truthed, so I shall stay this way. The occasional vent of a story or poem (though never to publish such, only privately… until England). Well so so. The romance of the English language is not only the blast that is imagination. What of structure? Such fame can be accounted for individuals other than the world’s best Shakespeare. What of Carew… or Bacon? The Byron? Even the lesser know trinkets as in David Lodge or namesake – David Spirral. A grandiose grasp of the language that has spread over this wide earth like it were hallucinating in fever yet shivering in damp, moist sweaty shakes!
Like in their manner, perhaps my writing (though rather mostly unfictional, as opposed to their workings/writtens/stories/charms) will show face to real emotion. Maybe my happy, even dancing words cover the gloom that sits chamber in my second heart. The heart that yearns (like these and other writer’s hearts) for it’s fulfilments. Britain awaits me; I know it does.
Entry Four – 29th March
By the wooden house annex we sat. where I once saw a boy I thought I dreamt. He ate under the old tree on his own. Lentil curry, rice and another I could not smell. I wanted to ask him if he was indeed the same boy. His hair was the same; slick and parted at the side. His eyes were the same; hazel brown and piercing…
He left no sooner he arrived in my life. He left me alone and bewildered. I could love, I told myself. I was not desperate for love, but I could love. Not just Siva or family love… but real, unmatched love.
By the wooden house annex we sat. Double J and I. Janany, Jhoyti and Nahani. Two that have been by my side almost since I scratched my first page with Indian diary ink. As three females in this Indian society, at lunch, we sat and discussed our role in the greatest play since the times of the aforementioned playwright; that is, “The Future.” We sat by the wooden house annex, our spot. Marriage, children and possible happiness. Well, yes happiness will lay in the eyes of my first born. Maybe even in those of Siva; the suited candidate of my procreation. But is there not a time before this event that will send my heart into overdriven excitement! Is existence not more than the simple/ordinary? Tell the opposite to our Marxist Tamil brothers south of the bay. With death staring mothers, fathers, siblings and other everyday in the face and without a non-native sole/soul outside of the fated island honestly knowing the true worth of beings that fall for the spite of others. Purity is a common word, yet so versatile, for beauty or evil extreme will come from it.
And in sombre. Though both Js have not the ambition/(almost antonym) tale of land/s other than their own. Or lives other than that set for them by best laid plan. – Line of best fit. We sat. Those three; Tiffin carriers and eyes; nervousness but burnt. Anxiety; but in good form. Me, a look in my mind’s eye that this great trauma is beset by the damning of will: like a train track pulley. Destination was fulfilment… change! and now new ending: normality. The three had a content about them, this whereas I could only see one path to which I am being dragged away. Yet there is silence, for my screams/shouts/calls are not heard. England! England!
(I remember Janany giggling for I, to mine and fellow student’s surprise actually did chant the country out loud. Luckily, no Ghandi in sight.)
A Poem – 1st April
The fool I am
To think that the British will love me
Married I will be
The fool I am
To believe that dreams will come to me
Married I will be
The fool I am
To even write my desire out for me
Married I will be
The fool I am
To pray to Muraghan about what will become of me
Married I will be
Entry Five – 10th April
Pa Pa Pa!!
Rah rah rah!
Wow Wow wow!
My joy is ridden to a highest height! Yes, reader, you are not mistaken it IS still I, Nahani your melancholy ridden, teenager. However it has all changed at least for the moments in the day of… – Today!
I overheard father (sorry, Appa, he is ever the stickler) and for you I will translate what I heard: ‘How dare he!’ He started whilst I stopped to listen upon landing outside ajar door master bedroom. ‘Does the son of a fortune believe he can become any man? Does he hold no regard for his wife? How is he to support the lady; through his daddy’s money? Don’t be a rascal.’ Mother then said her quick, interposed piece, which was ignored as custom, something about stress and my Appa’s level of diabetes, then; ‘A director! How could my son…’ that is, my husband-to-be, ‘…be a director of talkies? This clown believes he will be a famous man at his young age. It takes years to crack Indian talkie market… look at that loser Pradesh; he made one hit and he was a drunk forever after. If he was an established director now then fine… but how will he support his wife and children…’ children! Appa, please! ‘…Through the money of his estate? How [I’m guessing who] does he think he is; Dr Ramachandran? At least he is a doctor. Nahani is seventeen, you know?’ Yes, my mother knew, ‘do you think she has many more years to bare little ones?’ I should think so. ‘No, she is not to marry that rascal.’
Joy! More than I could have ever thought that would have lifted my spirit! I say more due to facts ill explained in Appa’s rant. After cooling period, the one half of my parent team realised he would have to accept a pride defeat in that his good friend Logan has a son who does not want his very own and quite dearest (I should hope so!) daughter’s hand in marriage. To counter such demeaning/self esteem rocking my father (my Appa) turned up at Logan’s abode and told him of his relief at the ‘delay’ in the marriage of appropriated offspring due to his decision to send daughter packing half away across planet to… ENGLAND! I had begun to give up hope upon this excursion but a turn of film talkie related events has thrown my dream oh so alive again.
I should not get so excited. Appa is such the whimsical man with the ability to change his mind at the drop of a hat; the simplest perversion of truth. Not half a day when Siva was the apple of a middle age Tamil man’s eyes, yet now only the rotten core. However, due to this dissonance I am free… in just five months to fulfil ambition – a student of the English system… literature in the place of birth! Rapture!
I should not get so excited. That last paragraph shows example of how it so impossible to remain calm. It is either yes or no, yet I will not know until all is set. For once, his proud Tamil soul has come to my use; perhaps even to dissipate worries of me leaving with tales of my desire to study the books and words of the English. Well the family of Siva needn’t worry about the corruption, taint and finally safety as to their future-daughter-in-law… for I would have gone along with such a proposal; what is a girl of my situation to do than suppress years of desire for the production of a marriage as arranged by family tie?
Still, I am seventeen and for most those years I have lived my life through the works of others; books. All I have done is read the literature of the English. This is the language of my second faith. Together with my Hindu nature there is the fusion of love, life and spirituality. All of these. I begged myself to believe and dharma has collected the plea for today I have beginning to achieve.
Entry six – 12th April
I woke excited. Spoke a silent prayer, wishing Muraghan well on His movements through planes other than ours. In my tradition I lit a candle and broadcast thoughts out to my uncles, aunties, brothers and sisters being plagued by terror past Rama’s Bridge. As I looked at the flame I thought of Agni, without whom there would be no natural heat, yet the irony in mortal man’s fear of Him.
With the weekend I had there was no being (God or otherwise) to worry this young woman! To school I went; smile blazed across my façade! What joy to tell Double J.
Jhoyti and Janany: my sisters. Technically, not. But the schooling I have shared with the pair links me closer to them then I am with my obnoxious younger sibling, Suthyan: air to the internal to internal ChiefLeaf Corp and the full external to internal ImporTea Corporation. (Appa’s businesses since travelling to the dusty earth of Hindustan; five years and stronger than ever though not quite as threshold reached as with Portokorilli, which is a place past Indian border, south past sea.) Whilst in writing it is always too difficult to grant priority to either of my two chums so I represent the two with the tag Double J.
And since love is all I have for them then share is all I can with them. I would tell them my news… except, in reciprocal authority, the two shared equal with I. That is, my super news was pushed to the minor order. Main course was something entirely different…
A new (and rather quiet) pupil, Ashok, hailing the outer extremity of Gouripur, Bangladesh, pushed into the slight palm of Janany: a letter. A letter of love? Well according to the boy’s limited use of either Tamil or English the letter was from a cousin (for that matter, he could not use any Indian mainstream language… what he was doing in the region of Madras – heart of Tamil land only one or two Gods will know). This cousin was back in the northern state of the country of his origin. Reasoning? – Not of love but of intrigue. Love could have been understandable given the nature of the disease in this town, but intrigue? We may well have done worse than to sniff trouble. According to the young man (but a month or two my elder!) the Bangla boy’s cousin, ‘Dietmar’ wrote it.
Hello there,
My cousin has held you in the most highest and deepest regard as the drei frauen – the three women of Madras. The three of Chennai District High; Mixed Final Year.
I must admit, the description that my cousin gave me of your delicate natures is that you all remain within your circle of trust. It is refreshing to hear of the female togetherness – since it is in your very essence to cat, rather than to coup.
Do not be alarmed by my forwardness, my name is Dietmar: cousin of Ashok. He is fairly the shy, quite boy but believe that is more the language problem than anything else. He’s a lovely boy really.
Listen, please write back (via Ashok) and I will reveal more about myself as hopefully you will too.
Dietmar
x
Interesting/exciting/weird! Though I purred at his direct and forward boldness. Still, Double J were inclined to agree with ‘weird’, and were the apprehensive except there was no doubt that we were to reply. After querying the hapless Bangla Ashok, that is.
He is timid, as described by Dietmar. Rather coarse, stiff and oh so greasy hair. Thin/slim body, a peculiar (though not entirely dislikeable) odour and also an expression upon his U-shaped face that would neither change for sun nor moon. Gormless and serious; with an orange tint to skin that was fairly pimpled. He is ill-received by fellow students due to his sweaty/unclean ways (he has several shirts; worn on rotation, that we are sure he does not wash as regular as he would wear them). That and the fact he is foreign.
The combination of a set of students about almost all of whom were Tamil made up our honorary Junior High – High school. A near toxic mix and blend of the studious types amongst a good amount of sport orientated persons (largely boys). Achievers were limited to the such sports: Kabaddi and cricket. However, there is one outstanding face of difference (I add in wonderment, due to such the individuality); the energetic role of the one boy; Kevin Sundaar. The Principal’s sole hope of mapping real fame to our only infamous school (on account of the mixed gender final year). You see, master Sundaar was good enough for professional tennis leaders to take note. National tournaments he had been collecting at the youth standard when at even young ages. However, turning eighteen, it was decided to thirst his developing body on an adult circuit; and even further a field than national: a minor Asian trophy. Yes his build was dwarf but his sheer drive and determination moved him beyond his station; a post-mature semi-final exit.
And from here the fame started; he grew – physique, stature. The lot. But do you know what grew the most? You maybe allowed for guessing incorrectly; a forearm, back muscles, leg muscles and all you need for successful tennis did rise (and is in transition), however, the most undeniable feature of Kevin Sundaar, as he caught that flight back from Thailand. The inexplicable component of his body which enlarged the greatest having finished the tournament… was his head. In fact, it ballooned to a distortion between it and his body. It enabled more students to make him out in the hall rooms, outside class. And on the clay courts of Malhavany… there goes the new star! So sexy, yaar… new balls please! And back to the humble school of his reading, an innocent walk to the WC causes whispers… I hear he is going to America… I hear he is going to Wimbledon to be India’s glory! With all this speculation, how does he study?
I digress…
– we quizzed him. Rewind, rewind… Ashok! We quizzed Ashok about this mysterious letter; who is your cousin? Where does he live? Why did he send this to us? What did you tell him of us? (these all answered in the letter, though still we pursued ignorantly). How old is he? What school does he go to?
No luck in these jaunts. The boy’s linguistic skills are none too smart. Included with inability was a shyness that once under pressure there does indulge the common stutter.
Who is your cousin? Dee-dee-ea-ea-eat-maar
How old is he? Ai-noo (‘I don’t know’, perhaps?)
The way he looks at our Janany leads arousal of suspicion he is under the spell of infatuation; even pre-letter. The secret fancy of a lady the boy holds and she is indeed pretty, sweet, so inclined with many virtues a madam could bare. This consists of a quiet way that I too share and sets us apart to the underscore of the robust Jhoyti. Lovely and loud is the latter’s theory of life. They say that the opposite will attract but dear Ashok has eyes for silent, still Janany.
The trio (incorporating myself, yet I still use description afar) decided, owing to the reception of letter so close to the ending of school day, to write response tomorrow. This has rather overshadowed my news on becoming elite with Chennai High’s escapist club. Second fiddle is a place I am thoroughly used. Spirit dampened? A touch. But only a touch, dear England – do not worry!
Entry Seven – 14th April
It is agreed that though Jhoyti is the spirit of the reply; I will take position as writer (it’s only natural!)
To the man labelled Dietmar
That is an unusual name for a Bangla boy… Are you sure you hail from this area? You are an interesting motivation and what we are ensue of is why you would send letters of provocation to three innocent girls?
We have questions:
1) Who are you? Please explain yourself fully detailing age, schooling/family background, father’s name, home and current city/town information.
2) (the obvious) Why did you write to us (in your own words and an expansion on ‘female togetherness’?
3) If possible, please send a photo (not a question but a request! Via Ashok we will send it right back)
We fully suspect your plain motive in your written moves and are only dedicated to the appeasement and resolution in an end to this writing charades. We are not the types to be continually conversing using, what if know, forbidden communication.
Regards,
J, J, N
The mere fact that we responded showed the man an opportunity regardless of my effort to threaten. The Double J both displayed no sign of leaving ends open; the trio are not so the success rate at Chennai High. We walk the sultry/hot/steaming sun’s glare alone and but for the odd interruption, we talk alone. This is not to our exclusive domain, or even inferred such, this is mainly to the perception of a lower state to our trilogy. The exception of this rule is Jhoyti’s firm standings and ability to interact without self-consciousness to those that mingle in the tiny instance. However, we are still outcast: touched by the foot, rather than the mouth, though with form as if spoken to by ear. The High school class system. We lay near bottom; within ourselves yet almost entertained. Then along comes a Bangla letter and we realise the space that a non-uniform caste has left us with. Come mystery with, come hither and play with the trio! Unravel as you would! (Let us hope to unwrap in the presence of a photo; we have no real ambition for this since Bangladesh is the most backward of countries.)
So in the time passing for when quiet Ashok takes our note back with him to his temporary station (the daily commute from Bangladesh is very implausible!) I once more iterate the little-to-my-peers fact that I am to travel the world to a darling land. This time I received the furore I so expected the first. I was able to explain the decisions of Appa, the movement of talkie scandal; director sons and learned daughters split apart by fates that one has forged, the other none-manipulated.
Of course the gasps! The hugs! And with so we walked to lesson after recess. Here it hit me like a love impulse maybe. My dreamed aspiration to move on to the island I so always wanted to be apart of. From my young days sitting upon earth across the Gulf of Mannār learning hard and engulfing myself in the English language. Admittedly, maybe first motivation came from my reluctance to take on board the Singhalese scripting/speaking as so pushed upon me by my education and curriculum.
I will share with you sore/sour/difficult/repressible (but not taken) information about my past that I knew one day I would write about. Did I envision such a change in circumstance? My first confessions of life lost in diary ink in a land away from where I bled without the real flow of red plasma…
My days at East Colombo Junior and High school involved burial of mind within the grammatical structure of the Queen of England’s system of communication. Not just so; the words and subsequent expansion of my then meagre vocabulary. As other children played; I played. Played with knowledge - with grasp. More I wanted: words, forms, interpretations, descriptions; it all vained me. By Junior High school it was poetry and stories that involved my creations. Though this was not mine yet. After only a month of creative writing plague I stopped, promising myself to continue once (and only when) experienced in my chosen language of English. Until then; all non academic fiction will be confined to the pages of my journal. To honour this, I would have to embark on excursion to land that natively harboured the linguistic.
So I returned to literature. To read at least would give me the vital stepping stones to a future filled. The outsource teaching; I pressured myself into spending spare time reading and self-coaching; Dickens, Steven Charles, Virginia Woolf and even Evelyn Bridges (she was not strictly British). All (and more) gave me what I hungered for but without satiation. Maliciously, I was attacked politically grounded – to drive me to edge/end/border. I had to move off. Impossible in the physical, actual sense, so I did in thought. In retrospect, I would have needed the challenge of propulsion from my peers or even an enthused teacher. I did not receive such and was confined to a few grey, clay walls that held me, tutor and ten blue jumpered, white shirted, grey skirted Singhalese girls.
Yes. The sole difference between myself and the other eleven members of class A6, East Colombo Junior High was that whereas I was Tamil, they were Singalum.
Not that theses two sets of people needed encouragement; government propaganda did so, to push the majority Singhalese brunt upon Tamil. And as crisis worsened each day, my repressed Junior High; likewise. The regime of eleven-on-one. With pupil there were no accomplice and even through our tutor: no saviour, for I. Teased and harassed as would little girls of an evil mind could do, whilst in another corner, a much older bully exacted her storm of abuse through alienation and disassociation. Through showing up a girl in example, as if she had done all things wrong. Delivering beating when I can only think of my teacher’s frustration at events exclusive to myself and even her class. What I would say/do helped in no end to what I received at the hands of a brainwashed teacher aiming anger at her only Tamil student. What could I say of my fellow ten pupils also? The same frustrations, annoyances, angers, fuelled by repetitive images (newspaper/poster/radio/messenger for the poor, add television for the rich enough) and those beliefs passed down from parents in the same tree. I wish not to go deeply into the horrors that the children beset upon me, so I will not. All lay with me and shall stay, barring miracle, to the grave.
I will say, that ever the cliché – the fallen, seeks courage through vice. In this case, the avenue of literature. In order to get away; I travelled further than a car, train, plane or ship could take a soul. I read.
(The midnight hour is approaching and so I must move forth with the next entry. I am on a role so I will continue where I leave…)
Entry Eight – 15th April
(As father like daughter – a true stick we both are for traditions. He to his own and I to the entry per day as divided by midnight. A little word of my surrounding – I sit here, quiet as a mouse so as not to disturb sleeping giants, using only candlelight to guide me like a real British author (Dickens perhaps?).)
But my continuation beyond reasonable end is an explanation of another British man who stole my heart at an age where if it were left as is, the bruising may have continued onto till early demise.
So I left the reality of my life for the works of one David Spirral. I could honestly say (though blushing!): my first love. A modest author who spent his energy written about the events of a Roman Catholic Boys’ School in Blackheath, England. The joys of escaping to and within his world held me hopeful and the degree captive. A ‘Secondary school’ (middle school, ages 11-16) full of children in charcoal trousers, plain white shirt, a v-neck grey sweater (for use in winter) and compulsory little, lime and loving green jackets… so cute, I imagined! In addition (I recall from memory, though the volume lay next to my desk) black socks, black shoes and a green and white tie, striped at intersections.
The tales (for it was one fairly continuous book of short stories), still now, bring sweet thoughts. As his stories flood gates opened in my head, I could do my journal no harm than to regurgitate. One such, told of the Jewish and Polish boys. At the time, I read this tale over twenty times; sometimes for the pure pleasure, others caused by run ins with narrow-minded Singhalese girls or ethically/ethnically intolerant Singhalese teachers. The story centred the conflict of two boys (with each other) and their bids to rid stigma of being the most hated pupil of the year/grade/class. Due to their lesser in Roman Catholicism, others bullied each, both separately and as a pair. The latter, a persecution with purpose, for in the usual/the most/the unoriginal, this shared evil would bring the boys immediately together; however, Spirral is not the most/usual/unoriginal. After bearing witness to a particular onslaught that both of the two boys received, a group of three (the leaders of the year) thought precedence in reversing any solidarity the duo may well have formed; turning both against one and other. Spirral labelled the ‘Fight of the Barrel’, for both were very much at the bottom.
The weeks went by and each trained their small frames with fighting spirit (more so than technique). The date had been pre-arranged; one month, the venue; under the chapel staircase; an enclosure. This was the space used for many transactions of little law.
And with four weeks of grind, new found attention and even fake respect, the two came together; space limited, to an elite few who had lunch money saved to pay for a ticket; others stood just outside. Spirral described the intensity of each’s eyes – on destruction: ‘I would not be the lowest ebb’. Elevation may even hold the opportunity to move further up invisible ladder.
The description gave birth to five pages of detailed fighting scene; even creeping analysis. Not a blow omitted. The author lost himself in his pen as I did (and the others who have read) will have done. The culmination and peak set at two green blazers being ripped to shreds. At this point the roars of the audience were in the high decibels and with noise marry curiosity. A Scottish teacher and priest by the name Father Walter McEwen hauled the two boys to their feet, dragging, separating and then detaining them. Not interested in any of the others who had scampered, steadfast.
This became the case for a two week period: after school detentions (corporal punishment not used, as would be the case in Tamil, Singhalese or even an earlier time in England). Then, when came a third week Father McEwen changed the rules. It was obvious fighting was wrong and this lesson had been learnt but the relationship between souls was weak. So the rule was this: once the boy’s conversed, they were free from punishment.
Easy for the cheaters! However, they did not; and it was not til the end of this trio of their worst weeks did the talk start to flow. The Polish boy, Nicolas, looked at the Jewish Boy’s, Joseph’s, ‘Record Book’ and coveted the front cover wrapping. Each boy who attended the school was given a three month planning diary, or Record Book, at the start of each academic semester (one small enough that it would fit within the inside pocket of their green jacket). The task at the beginning of each term was to cover it using imagination (or for those without; a simple transparent ‘sticky-back plastic coating’). This in a building of extra solidity for the piece and subsequent respect for their own effort. Joseph had an eclectic mix and match of different squares of wrapping paper. Something that must have taken true patience and dedication.
So after the initial awkwardness and fears of rejection Nicolas expressed his admiration for the work of Joseph. Joseph paused and in equal reluctance appreciated the respect shown… From those moments acceptance rang in and, of course, Father McEwen released the boys of their debt. For the rest of their time at the school in Blackheath, England, the duo were inseparable.
Blow – for out goes my candle light…
Entry nine – 27th April
Days have moved on and to you reader, I apologise. For a brief moment the Siva escapade had moved back into timeline so I have been a little off of the weather with angst. He (and other) is working on a talkie project with the Madras Film Company to which, by the sound of Appa’s rants, is not moving all the success story. Still, what keeps my hopes alive is the motivation (that I perceive through third eye) he has.
‘What a stupid boy!’ My Appa cries! ‘Does he not know that there is a beautiful girl waiting for him… if he is only sensible?’ (thank you, daddy dearest.) ‘He has the offers of working for his father in a very traditional, good way. Why blow all chance of a family with foolish ideas of making bloody pictures? It’s not even working for him and he is getting no respect from Madras… and why would they? Taking a risk on a boy with no credentials, did you even hear of this film malarkey before dear?’ to which Amma mumbled some tepid response. ‘Yes, yes, woman, but he has nothing but ideas… does he have a script? You need a script for a film you know. I know dear, I have plenty of experience in the trade of media, my dear, you know that. At least I have made investments into the future of fact… bloody not the movies. All love and singing; what about real issues and bastard killing..?’ Amma sighed, for the warning sign of if we were still had just arrived. ‘…If we were still in Ceylon then we could be thinking of a marriage involving a nice proper Tamil boy…’ (a proper Tamil boy was a male Tamil born across the water, i.e. not the Indian side; however, Amma did note that Siva was in fact born across Rama’s bridge.) ‘…yes, but he is diluted to the customs of over here. Talkie movies and what not. You see Nahani, she is a very traditional girl with a strong root for her island. At least, if he wanted some media experience with my company then he could have at anytime. But he rejected this idea for being too ‘journalist’. The boy sees nothing for his very own people.’
Amma reassured her husband and my father that Siva was kind at heart and that he was to help people, in a way, by making feature films. She also pulled sense into the equation that if he did try to gain some way with Appa’s small media interest Siva would in fact have to move back across bay to the original side – that is, away from me. May not have been a bad happening.
Forgive my negativity; I have only been thinking of the worst and with exams approaching I can only study (to make university grade) or wile hours away believing that all could be in vain. There has not been any update on our side plot of Ashok and the mystery cousin to take my mind away. He has confessed to not having seen his estranged family for the while…
It made us discuss briefly the bond between cousins, brothers friends. This even brought about how close Double J and I are. I even thought, with smile, of Joseph and Nicolas, particularly as I had my personal reminisce so close gone. I always looked for the kind of bond I share with my current trilogy in my younger, junior high school days. None found, so I took to the tales of others. If I could not bond with happiness; I had to bond with something relentless… how about adversity? None more so than the evil government control of my former time – how was a young Tamil mind to understand the propaganda, almost hypodermically infiltrated, into the minds of my Singhalese peers? Indeed, not just to the child these lies lay, for all around me. My school – though my class had only one teacher, all tutors for the range of grades were anti-Tamil. Were they not educated fellows? I may accept the fisherman or farmer with poisonous views but a teacher? Against the minority they were; and, in East Colombo I was that; minority – being the young one, I still to this day do not know or have heard word of other Tamil girls who may have attended East Colombo junior/high. I do maintain, which makes this harder than ever to understand the brainwashed: hatred was not personal to my persona, but to my creed. Why teach the Tamil children when there are Singalum girls to educate? To educate, in fact, as to how Tamils are not the future of their vision of the land. In all being, we are the Singhalese anti-future; reversing the process of majority. The paranoid still exist from times of past where the major players set many to sword through aggressive acts. To kill or be killed. Tell me, will a patriotic warrior not fight for his country, that for the moment unguarded was invaded by colonialist Portuguese, or Dutch and finally British? Cankili, leader amongst Tamil men of past, fought the brave battle in which he hauled limited success. For what? The future of Tamils or gelled ‘Resplendent Land’? We could have seen the battle of two that had raged since earth in Eelam and Ceylon was a virtual free land, converged as one to expel beast (yes, sadly even the British includes this description). However, like all before him, Cankili’s stake in Jaffna bellowed the pride of man; be you Christian, Portuguese, Portuguese-Christian or Singhalese: away with you!
Whilst the Portuguese ravaged the rest of the island only a few Tamil hot points remained and eventually went. Colonial master not interested in the history of the nation they had crudely interrupted, placed flag over a whole nation – NOT the many kingdoms as is the truth. Yes, Ceylon is Singhalese owned, that I do not dispute but Eelam is to Tamil as Mannar to Karaiyar and on... A certainty! Read it in the Gazette, the Post or the Times! At the least (and more so now), the island known as the teardrop in the Indian ocean is two distinct nations, where one Ying halts Yang via the greatest piece of luck in Asian history – the February 4th 1948 independence!
British hands are washed of a volatile nation and the party with a beautifully fixed ballot wins score and prize – two for the price of one! Inherit one, get one free! Two nations for the brand new government to believe is one. And from this point – the evolution (for where Darwin is executed by the Tamil idea of the old kingdoms, then Marxism and eventually separatism). It is not an accurate history as preached by that old school of mine with all the others; did the minority+ (strictly as a term for the idiot wholistic view of Ceylon) that are Tamils really invade Ceylon for the gold of land that a majority+ (strictly as a term for the idiot wholistic view of Ceylon) race held? What sense does this make; take a lesser legion to conquer? If this is history, then exactly who’s story? If intelligence prevails then the tale of my fore fathers should run back to settlement of Tamils on land for the taking; as Singhalese did the same. Each race survived through the years of diminishing person (AKA Empirical Time) simply, and what is the making of total sense – to regain what is ours and what is theirs; Ceylon/Sri Lanka for the Sinhala; Eelam for the Tamil.
Not even this nominal ground. And from the technicality and grandiose of history; filter movements to the times of now and the small scale. For even a high school was a collected hateful/scorned issue. A no scale compared to the difficulty my Appa faced upon his level. To be rich on another’s plane. With no respite, Appa kept one eye on bank account and the other (with hand) on our passports. He had the feelings that time would grow short but with cheery face, still played mule. Everyday he prayed folly belief in chance, yet stayed wise to the option to flee.
My Nuwa home-home – on a hill, deep forest/jungle to our left and of course Appa’s tea plantation near by. Appa would drop me off at Canal Tree Point where the school miniature bus/van would pick me to take to shame. He would then travel back to oversee the overseers. It was his owned hot drink making site. Leaves manned and pruned by native: Tamil, Singhalese; Portuguese, Dutch – whomever. My father, my Appa was owner. Here lay the problem, for what would a Dutchman know? If he exchanged leaf for a few rupees then another of his un-understanding countrymen could also be as poor.
I know. Does a rant ever begin with sense? Never! My writing will tell all of my emotions for my Tamil people for I have felt first hand the cold, bitter twist of the Sinhala knife that threw my family and I out of a country they hardly owned. If I seem incoherent it is due to the pain of insolence and thoughtlessness of those powerful enough to put pressure upon my Appa and our family to slip out before real, physical force would have occurred.
Appa had secured the rights to create liquid enhancing netted bags from leaves after a purchase from the Dutchman; Hayden of Turremgoor. Lock and stock. The deed switched and in the decade of the 1960s; Tamil production.
Business boomed with global transport breakthrough. Overseas movement of cargo was trebling. Account books did not have the paper to cope! Whilst my tiny eyes (and Suthyan’s even tinier) saw only a mother’s gaze with the occasion father’s smile, the evil government noticed more. It looked beyond crayons and making Appa gleam, it studied further than I being baby-like jealous of the family’s first son. The British rule had records and targets for the several ‘Bolts’ of the Ceylon they knew; these largely ignored by new office since the biggest ventures had already grown clearly ahead of their immature siblings. Tea; and in particular my Appa’s investment grew to the level sight that only big dog’s lustful eyes could capture a glimpse and even, through nasal; a sniff. Was only the matter of time that lay between a bite and a carry to the garden; buried under soil.
By my tenth birthday, my father… my Appa’s tea movement was the third biggest in the land. Some talked weather: un-failed monsoons; others, the earth – rich and almost edible to the hungry. Maybe even the ghosts of the Dutch were to be thanked for the good fortune – hungry sons of landowners voyaging to land in order to earn their father’s wager amongst the indigenous coolie.
So whatever the reason, the point was this: in the land of the Singhalese, what is more dangerous than a spirit of Netherlands? A Tamil with money.
Entry Ten – 28th April
(Gosh! Now I should not get used to burning midnight oil for the sake of all else but duty; my exams are on their way, so in a last bid of freedom before my chaining to a study desk I will continue my journal of almost slavery... at precisely one minute past twelve and on!)
So. The government’s policy of ridding the now Singhalese owned land of all Tamil culture was firmly in operation (on fairness; where my family and I lived, Singhalese land it was before British, Dutch or Portuguese). Except, the rules heinously applied also to the Tamil owned land (that is in fairness; before the British, Dutch or Portuguese, now and forever onwards). First language systems were abolished: the new national language of Ceylon and Eelam: Singhalese, then second, English. In accordance, the majority+ populations of Provinces in East and North of the island… i.e. Tamils, were to take up the language of the minority+ Singhalese in order to comply with the law of the other land, now forced upon by adjacent land. (+Yes! Yes! Just search Hindustan library available censuses birthed by those rather numerically literate Englishmen! Tamils are majority in Eelam, Singhalese are majority in Ceylon/Sri Lanka… I will reiterate; two separate nations that are merely only not-politically-recognised.) The Tamil people unlucky enough to believe that the Southern state of Ceylon was a utopia existence (mine family inclusive) were to be tested upon their use of the spoken communication, for without it, even a job would not sit for him.
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