By Prateebha Tuladhar

The announcement of the CA election in 2006, after the formation of an alliance by the eight major parties, ushered in new hope for the likes of me. It felt like a chance was finally coming along to participate in the country’s policy making through the ballot. But with the postponement of election twice, a feeling of bitterness has begun to creep in due to the continuing political limbo and the deferral of the whole process.

Casting the ballot seems like an interesting process to me. To stamp the crisp ballot paper in favor of whom you support, and folding it neatly (I am imagining it!) before dropping it into the ballot box, with a soft thud. I think with nostalgia about the indigo mark the elders carried on their thumbs when they returned home after voting in the elections after the post people’s movement – 1990. The sense of pride they flaunted in casting the ballot was almost enviable.

I haven’t forgotten how prior to the elections, houses in the neighborhood warmed up in colorful flags, carrying all kinds of symbols, which were Greek to me at that time. What faith they had in the parties and their candidates! The walls untidily covered with pamphlets, boasting of candidates and parties seemed to condense the size of the city, only with a promise of heralding something new. The sense of excitement I felt as a school-kid staring at the posters from my school-bus as it raced me through the streets of Kathmandu is just reminiscence. But even that memory is tinged with the brightest hope for change, which the nation seemed thick with then.

The announcement of the CA poll had filled us Nepalis with renewed hope, which dispelled the frustration experienced during the period of insurgency. It offered us something like a comic interlude in a tragedy. But with the continued deferral of polls, the frustration is beginning to return. The anxiety of waiting for a new election is more or less like waiting for a friend who never comes. It is like waiting for Godot.

Posted on: 2008-02-11 20:53:17 (Server Time)

Maa,

On wintry nights,

When fog curls up

against trees,

you hold me close

and

warm lullabies

into my hair

in soft whispers.

YOU 

I shatter myself with you.

I bend to pick up the pieces.

RAIN

Your parting gift to me

1.
Loneliness has no
bounds.
It leaps
over the crowds
and transforms you
to nowhere.
Solitude-
your parting gift.
 
2.
Evening
craws in,
bringing back
with it,
what I’ve always
feared.
Even in the dark,
won’t you be there
to hold
my hand?
 
3.
Give me words.
Give me back words
that I left behnd
when I met you.
You sealed
my absence of words
with your syllables.
Now,
at your departure,
give me words
so
I may be
whole
again.
 
4.
It isn’t working-
You and me,
you say.
 
Perhaps
you are right.
 
I never thought
You and me,
could be
about
working
and
not working.

5.
Choke me down
with your words.
 
Not this silence.
 

My thumb on the left hand looks ugly. It has a streak of dark line (close to black) encircling my nail, as though marking a boundary. I try to think hard to see if this is how my mother’s or father’s thumb looked like when they had voted in the 1999 election. It seems to my feeble memory, as though they came home carrying indigo marks on their thumbs. But the mark on my finger seems different. What does it matter?

Every time I look at my finger, I’m reminded of the fact that today, I gave myself, the first ever opportunity to cast a ballot. It’s taken me almost 3 decades to come to this point  (I turn 30 next month), just like it took the nation almost two years to come to this juncture. Between predictions and speculations, the D-day has happened to the Nepalis!

Walking down to the polling booth at Chundevi with my parents was a nice feeling. On the way we ran into several people from the locality who had already had their thumbs painted. When we arrived at the centre, the environment was fairly normal (it made me feel quite proud of my neighbours!). The residents of Kathmandu constituency number 5, were gladly queuing up to vote. 

My entire family had turned up to cast their ballot. It felt like some great carnival, where people were getting together to express solidarity, albiet in different ways. But it took a while for my voting turn to come ( I had to stand in the sun for over an hour – and I spent that time happily chatting For, I ran into some of my neighbours, whom I hadn’t seen for years (who says you have to be in America to be busy ?!!). It was fun!

I learnt from chatting with my neighbours that the house right next to the polling center (which was huge!), had been captured by the YCL for almost  year now. The YCL in fact, were pretty active at the station. They were the ones giving out water to the thirsty. But the stronger contenders from the area were Narhari Acharya, Ishwor Pokharel and Kamal Thapa.

I could see Bhima from my neighbourhood arguing at a distance with some people, about an elderly lady not getting to vote. I found out later that the lady was trying to cast a proxy ballot and the officiers had found out and sent her off. And yet, it was her who was making so much hue and cry about not getting to vote, and saying- tinuharu ko, mero lal purja magne?

When it was my turn to go in, I felt my heart skip a beat. I’m extremly silly about such things! I cry sometimes when I hear Rastirya Geets. Yes, so I handed my mother her identification slip and nagarikta, and followed her into the main booth. There was a woman, about my age or younger, at the booth. She wore stylish jeans jacket and denim, had highlights on her hair and work a stunning pair of glaze. When the officers started to ask her for identification, she started to fumble and say “Maile ta purse nai bokeko chaina. Paisai leyera aako chaina. Kati paisa lagcha?

The polling officer said “Paisa chaindaina. Khoi, nagarikta liyera aunu bha cha?”

“Chaina, maile ta kehi liyera ako chaina. Huncha, ma ghaar gayera liyera aunchu ni ta.”

I couldn’t help wondering about the larger illiterate and remote area population, after seeing an urbanite so low on voter’s education. What I did find interesting was how the women’s line seemed to stretch on.

I continued with what I was meant to do. Today, I was going to be just a voter! I had already abandoned my choices to be a reporter or an observer during the election. I have felt that without even having exercised my own voting right first, I could hardly play a good role as either.

 So, I had my thumb marked, signed, collected my ballot paper, stamped it in secret, folded it and dropped it in the ballot box, which I has so far only seen on poster. What an accomplishment! It definitely gave a sense of accomplishment and I was thrilled.

The day is almost getting over. Of course, there have been incidents of violence at several places in the nation. But if we look at the larger picture, it has been quite peaceful. But most importantly, to think that an entire nation went at the same time to do something important today, completely overwhelms me.  

April 10, 2008 (When else?)

 
Vinay caught Prachinta unawares. She was completely engrossed in reading the article on her PC, when he walked in unannounced. She had been expecting him to show up. Yet when he walked in, it surprised her and it made her adrenalin gush a little. Inside her, she wondered how it might be possible to behave like a colleague with him. Would it be possible to discuss work with this man, before whom she had bared her innermost truths?
Vinay seemed unfettered. He sank into the nearest chair to the door with a grace, reducing the size of the already small room. The room seemed to fill with him, while she receded into its fringe. It felt to Prachinta as though all professionalism and intelligence had just been trampled under Vinay’s tallness.
“So, let’s discuss the time division and divide the working hours so that you and I can step in for each other and avoid confusion.” Vinay spoke as though they had been talking about work for a very long time. Those should have been my words- thought Prachinta.
” Yes.” Prachinta felt as though she had forgotten the agenda of their meeting. She had been planning what needed to be shared during the meeting the whole morning, and yet she suddenly felt blank. She hated it. There was nothing between Vinay and her. She could be sure that Vinay felt nothing for her. And yet she felt a mild congestion in her chest.
Her life recently, had been focused on work and nothing else. With work pressing her down, she had even turned unattractive and she felt old. Now, in Vinay’s presence, she started to feel so ugly and foolish, she wished the meeting was over and Vinay would leave. She hated the feeling that he brew, transforming her into a desperate, hopeless creature.
“What are the updates? What else are we planning to work on now?” Vinay asked
Prachinta turned back to her PC and started to open different files. Trying to explain to Vinay the progress of work, was gradually turning into an ordeal. The computer had turned into a monster! Vinay dragged himself in the chair, next to Prachinta, to get a better view of the PC. It was the first time she had been alone with Vinay in a room and it stifled her. As though sensing it, Vinay drew his chair away. She felt uglier.
Dinesh walked into the room, “Sorry I was caught up with something.”
The rest of the meething, was a dialogue between Dinesh and Vinay, while Prachi faded into a wallpaper.  When Vinay said, “Right, so I will see you guys again next week.” she felt relieved.
When he walked out of the room, she felt a little sore within her.

Posted on April 7, 2008

 Tuesdays were the loneliest days of Roop Shova’s life. She stole peevish glances from the window every once in a while. She was well aware that her doing so would not change the fact that a Tuesday was a Tuesday, and yet she did it, more out of habit than logic.

 The window sill was beginning to gather dust. She had no interest in cleaning it. The ledge boasted of thick grey accumulations. She sat at the base of the window seat sometimes, looking through the iron rods that stood between her and the world. The iron had rusted to black.

 Across the street, shopkeeper Dabaldai, waited patiently for customers. He flapped the newspaper now and then, as though it had arrived at his shop to serve the purpose of a fan, rather than the news it carried. Huge glasses sitting atop an aquiline nose moved up and down as the newspaper jerked in air. She recognized the nose as that of the Prime Minister.

 The house was quiet. Cousin Amrit had just got a visa to America and her mother had gone over to visit him with the sagaan and the good wishes of the family. Roop Shova had heard of so many people applying for something called DV lotteries to go to the US. They said Nepal was no more fit to live in. She wondered what it would be like if she had got the visa instead of her cousin Amrit. What would she do in the land of the hippies? Would she be able to speak English just as well as Amrit did? Amrit had gone to St.Xavier, the school run by Christians. Some of her cousins were even educated in India, in Darjeeling. But Roop Shova’s parents had not had so much money so she and her siblings had been educated at Raktakali High School, a government run school. The only English Roop Shova could remember was what she had read in the books. It had been a long time since she had spoken to anyone in English or written in the language.

 College was a long time ago…almost a decade. They had been brief morning hours, running off to the huge building crammed with women in brown saris and then a sprint back home to avoid men who so readily made passes at anybody in that uniform. When college got over, the fear of men taunting her on the streets and the nervousness in answering the teacher’s questions in the classroom had also vanished. And so had marriage proposals. Life was simple at home; the window room and the baigaa, where she helped her mother cook during the monthly festivities, were her world now.

 The day she noticed Ram Babu look up at her window, she had found herself a new occupation. She noticed he had sharp features and curly dark hair. She knew he came from the west- the districts she’d heard of and never been to. She had heard people from the districts were very smart and were not to be trusted. She had also heard they were the ones, who had brewed the rebellion against the King. Most of the men from the districts were Maoists or they were in some party. She knew things were changing fast in the country. The King was no more like a king. The ministers seemed richer than the King when they appeared on TV. They all came from the districts, the men who made loud speeches on TV. Ram Babu was one of them. But she was always eager to listen when she heard him chat in the streets- party leaders, government policies, the market price, his children. His voice was crisp like the morning air. Ram Babu was a clever man, different from the men she had seen around her a lifetime- men who were ever willing to organize feasts or drink themselves silly. She often thought life must have more to it.

 Ram Babu would disappear on Tuesdays. Not that he was present in her world in any significant way on the other days of the week, but on Tuesdays, he would just disappear.

 Roop Shova sighed. She picked the karuwa, lifted it so that its nozzle was right above her mouth and tilted it, drinking continuously with a chuckling sound. She got up to look at herself in the mirror. She looked like a child in her plaits, her complexion fair and frail. But there was something about her eyes that deepened like that of an old woman’s. She turned to look at the clock when the cuckoo bird came out to say another hour had gone by.

Roop Shova thought the day was taking too long to pass. Every day offered the same activities for her (unlike the things in the country that were ever changing). But Tuesdays were different. She felt less at ease on Tuesdays, as though someone was blowing and blowing a huge balloon inside her and she would burst choking. There was nothing she could do about it. So, Roop Shova just returned to her window seat and waited for it to be Wednesday.

Luncheon (TKP)

The very first meeting was somewhat comical. Annu was new to the neighbourhood. Her husband had a job with the disestablishmentarianism, which kept him on the move all the time. And which was no fault of his, really. So the wife and the daughter just moved along with him, wherever it was that the job placed him.Once, when Annu was hitchhiking, the woman behind the wheel had asked her how long she had been in the town.

“Two months. My husband’s just got a transfer.”

“So do you get to move around a lot then?” The woman puffed away at her cigarette, blowing little circles in the air.

“Six times now, in eight years. That’s how long we’ve been married, too.”

“Well… you should go right ahead and divorce your husband. I’d never stay with a man who makes me move places that often.”

The woman combed out short strands of her blonde hair with fingers that still held the cigarette. She did it with great deftness. Annu looked at her in fascination and smiled. When she got off, she thanked her for the lift and the piece of unsolicited advice, which she knew she would never act upon at any rate. She had met all kinds of interesting characters during her stay in foreign lands.

But her meeting with Ling Ling was by far the most interesting.

Annu’s daughter Aashtha was five. And after a harrowing time that always comes tagged with moving, she had finally managed to enrol Aastha in a decent school, in the correct grade. But the environment to Aastha was new and therefore strange. So every morning, when Annu walked Aastha to school, her tears would begin to flow like they were rain in monsoon and would expand by leaps and bounds to seas by the time they arrived at the school.

That morning, Aastha had devised colic pain, desperately hoping a day away from school would be the treatment to her ailment. But her adamant mother, who knew all the tricks for an Icchya Diwas, just dragged the little hypochondriac to school. When Aastha started wailing, the class teacher advised that Annu leave. As she was walking out of the school, a woman, Asian in appearance, caught up with her.

“That crying girl,” she pointed toward Aastha’s class, “your daughter?”

“Yes,” Annu sounded embarrassed.

“Then why you leave her crying like that? You’re no good a mother!”

“The teacher told me to leave.” Annu felt the need to explain herself.

“You can’t say you want to stay? Why not you stay?” She sounded annoyed, almost as if she was reprimanding a child. The woman just walked away in a hurry, having made a disapproving face at Annu.

Following that day, Annu noticed the woman at school more often. But they never even exchanged hellos. Then one morning, as Annu was walking out of the school, the woman caught up with her again.

“Are you free in the evening?” She questioned in a tone that said she wanted to hear ‘yes’ for an answer. And she did.

“I don’t go to work today, so you’ll come to my house for lunch.” Evening? Lunch? “The teacher said to mix the children. I’ll take you with me from school. You’ll meet me here,” she commanded.

“I will.” Annu said at her usual polite self.

So in the afternoon, when she collected Aastha from school, she found the woman waiting for her. Aastha followed her mother quietly, who was in turn following a stranger. She drove them in an ocean blue Mazda to a huge house. As the main entrance was being unlocked, the lady of the house finally introduced herself.

“Oh!” she tapped her chin with the index finger. “I forget to tell you. My name is Ling Ling. From China.” Annu entered the house with some apprehension. She removed her frost bitten boots and slipped her feet into the first cosy slippers her feet found in the hall.

“No! No!” Ling Ling shouted, “My husband’s shoes! He’s French. He no likes to share his shoes.”

And Annu was rendered barefoot on a cold winter noon.

The luncheon was well set. Annu forgot all about the Tuesday bartas she observed as she sat on the settee, half watching “Neighbours” and half talking to her new acquaintance while the whole of her relished the thickness of the sausage piled on thick strands of cheese-dripping noodles. Forgive me Lord, she said inwardly when she remembered it was her Tuesday fast she was violating.

Ling Ling was talkative. She told Annu all kinds of things about the Chinese people that she has never been asked, meanwhile managing to pile on Annu questions after questions about Nepal that she didn’t want to answer. Why were the people so poor? Why was the monarch treated like God? How often did he appear in public? Do you think he’s a nice man?

The conversation gradually shifted to their daughters and their school. And then,

“Oh, I forget to ask your name”

“Annu.”

“Oh, and your daughter’s name – very, very difficult. I have problem to remember. Is it Abbie-gale?”

“No, no. Her name is Aastha.”

“Oh!” Her index finger raced up to her chin where it lingered, tapping. “She’s not Abbie-gale?” she pointed at Aastha in horror.

“No. Abigail is the English girl. You mean Abigail Jones from their class, don’t you?” Annu said, somewhat bewildered.

“Oh! The teacher says to me to bring Abbie-gale home for lunch.” She threw her hands in the air in a slight indication that looked like despair. Annu was so taken aback she couldn’t speak a word.

“Ohhho! Never mind.” Ling Ling laughed as she walked the mother and daughter out of the bungalow.

Annu walked home, feeling nauseated for eating all kinds of things on a sacred day and for having a lunch that had been cooked with someone else in mind.

Ling Ling, she thought. What an apt name for a strange woman. What she didn’t know at that moment was that the strange name was going to be her best friend in the years to come.

Posted on: 2005-07-09 18:51:40 (Server Time)

She presently works, walks and lives in Kathmandu.