Nimita's Place

by Akshita Nanda

  Irving says: “Hong Kongers, we’re part of China but we want autonomy. One country, two systems. I have a lot of sympathy for Kashmir.”

  I do pranayama breathing and remind myself that he is from—that place in China. So what would he know about realities in India?

  Irving puts his sandwich down. “I seem to have pushed a button.”

  No seeming, mister, you pushed the button on ISRO’s Agni Missile Version 3. “Look. Some things, you can’t joke about. Some things you don’t know. You can’t comment on. Okay?”

  He looks at me. “Exactly. Okay?”

  My cheeks are hot again. “Sorry. I won’t call—your hometown—China.”

  He picks up his spoon. “I’m sorry too.”

  A sandwich each in silence. Then he asks: “So what brought you to Singapore?”

  “Haan?”

  “Why did you come here?” Irving refills his bowl of soup.

  “I got a job offer. Why not come to Singapore?”

  “Why Singapore specifically? Why not, oh, Hong Kong?”

  I twist my wrist while spooning more soup. I drop the spoon in the big bowl and massage my hand for a while.

  “I didn’t specifically choose Singapore.” Except I did. “I just heard about this job at a time when I was ready for a change.”

  “Hong Kong seems more your style. It’s a big city, lots of people, lots of energy.”

  “I had enough of energy in India, thank you. I like Singapore. It’s quiet. It’s neat and clean and nobody even spits on the street that much. Even if they do, cleaners clean it up. Is it like that in your hometown?”

  Irving shakes his head.

  “See? And then—” I realise it may sound bad so I don’t say that Irving’s hometown has gangs just like Mumbai does. Maybe even worse. But in Singapore, I can work late at the lab and take a bus or taxi home without worrying. Singapore is very safe.

  There are no morchas, no riots. So calm and quiet.

  I like calm and quiet. If the whole city were air-con, Singapore would be perfect.

  “Why did you join the National Cancer Centre?”

  I look at Irving. “So many questions.”

  “Sorry.” He rubs the back of his neck.

  I feel bad. This is the first time we’ve sat down and talked, I should also make an effort. “No, no, what I meant is, I should also ask you about yourself.”

  “I asked first. Why the National Cancer Centre?”

  “My master’s supervisor knows Dr Alagasamy.”

  Irving snorts.

  “What?”

  “I thought you were going to say something like: ‘I want to cure cancer.’”

  Everyone expects that answer when they find out I’m working at the National Cancer Centre. “Sorry. First of all, that would be a lie. I like the idea of curing cancer but I didn’t start this career to cure cancer. It’s more. Hmm.” How to explain this? “You know that game you made me play just now? I loved it.”

  His eyes crinkle. “I knew you would.”

  “You did? How? Anyway, I like solving puzzles. Science is all about solving puzzles. Like, okay, the first puzzle I worked on was this river near my university. The whole town got drinking water from it but also all the sewage and industrial pollution went inside so the water smelled. The river was always choked with algae and water plants.”

  “So what did you do?”

  I point my spoon at him. “I thought: those same water plants, what if you changed their DNA so that instead of just taking up water, they also took up some pollutants?”

  “That’s pretty cool.”

  “Na?” I spoon more soup. “It’s a very cool idea.”

  “Did it work?”

  “Kind of. Dr Savarkar—that’s my supervisor—says it will take another five, ten years before we know for certain. That’s the problem, see. All these puzzles are so big. There are so many pieces all over the place and it takes years to find a piece and more years to make it fit in.”

  “So cancer is a big puzzle.”

  “Very big puzzle. For each kind of cancer, we have to find the puzzle piece that explains why the cancer starts, how it progresses, then how the cells die. So many puzzle pieces and my lab is focusing on one or two at a time, trying to make it fit into the bigger picture. Why are you smiling?”

  “I like puzzles. Which piece of the puzzle are you on?”

  It feels so good to say this. “I’m planning a project to see if the haze pollution in Singapore can lead to throat cancer. Now tell me about your book. It’s a recipe book?”

  “No, it’s photos and stories about different foods I’ve eaten.”

  “Like a printed version of Instagram?”

  Irving laughs. “I think Instagram is an online version of—okay, yes, right now my book is a printed version of Instagram. But with a unique hashtag linking all the pages.”

  “What’s your hashtag?”

  “See, in places like Singapore or Hong Kong, you have so many different cultures interacting. Take a dish like mee goreng, or those curry noodles from Chutney Mary. Where did they come from? Who invented them? What were the original foods that were modified?”

  “So you’re writing a book about the history of noodles?”

  Irving’s glasses slip down his nose again. “I thought about it. I had a great title: Pasta and Future. You know pasta came from China, right?”

  “No!”

  “It did. Traders from China and Europe met, took each other’s foods and voila, pasta!” He pushes his glasses back up his nose. “I thought my book would start from China, move across the Silk Road, down into Southeast Asia. But today my editor showed me a book with the same premise. So now I need a new idea.”

  “Oh.” I want to pat his hand but I’m holding a sandwich. “I know how that feels. If my idea for throat cancers is not unique, I won’t get a grant to research it. Every day I scan the databases to check if anyone is replicating my ideas.”

  Irving raises his bowl. “To good ideas.”

  I clink my bowl against his.

  Afterwards, I carry some of the plates into the kitchen. Just like a man even if he’s a six. Dadi can make dal, sabji and rice with three utensils. Irving has used 12 or more for his cheese-tomato toast and soup.

  He rinses the plates and spoons and opens the front of the dishwasher.

  I don’t say anything but he says: “What?”

  “I didn’t say anything.”

  He closes the front of the dishwasher and starts scrubbing the plates by hand. “I suppose this is more environmentally friendly?”

  “Better for the rivers,” I tell him. “Come, I’ll wipe the table. Though technically, for what you did to my pressure cooker, you should be my kitchen slave.”

  When I come back to rinse out the table-wiping cloth, Irving is scrubbing the bottom of the cooker. The lid is clean. The space for the safety seal is no longer perfectly round.

  “We can’t use this any more.”

  “Sorry,” Irving says.

  “You over-filled the cooker.”

  “I’ll remember that next time.”

  “You owe me a new cooker.”

  “Okay.”

  “We’ll have to go to Mustafa.”

  He grins. Everyone likes Mustafa. Three buildings and twenty-odd floors full of every single thing you want, from food and drinks to electrical goods, clothes, shoes and bicycles. I even found Monginis slice cake in the snack area, the same orange cake I used to spend my pocket money on in school.

  I put the washed utensils to dry. “You missed a spot of cheese on that wooden spoon.”

  “I see it. Go play with the PlayStation.”

  I shake my head. “I need to do more research but playing video games has been linked to disturbed sleep and lack of focus. This sandwich plate is sticky.” I pass it back to him to redo.

  “Will you leave my kitchen?”

  “So rude when I’m only trying to help my kitchen slave.” I open the fridge. “Oh loo
k, chocolate. You want dessert?” I break two squares off the bar and pop one in my mouth. I hold the other out to Irving.

  He shows me his soapy hands, so I pop the square into his mouth myself. Just as if he were Chia Ying. “That’s a thank you because those sandwiches were amazing.”

  Irving squirts dish soap onto a foam pad. “The panini was amazing because amazing happens when you use actual cheddar and mozzarella with vine-ripened tomatoes instead of processed cheese slices and woolly mass-produced tomatoes. Why are you laughing?”

  I don’t tell him. He gets back to scrubbing the bottom of the pressure cooker.

  “Don’t bother,” I tell him. “Let it soak overnight.”

  He keeps scrubbing.

  “Look, anyway it’s useless as a cooker now.”

  “It’s a good thickness. I can use it for soup,” he says. “Go play in the living room.”

  The monster-woman has explained the location of the antidote for her condition and my detective is solving a new set of puzzles when Irving stands behind me.

  “Use the stick. Press the stick,” he says behind me.

  “Yah, okay.”

  “Don’t use that gun! Use the flamethrower!”

  “Okay, okay. Let me handle it.”

  “You missed a clue. That black bottle right there was a clue.” He goes to the TV cabinet, picks up something then comes and sits down on the sofa.

  The screen freezes. “What did you do?”

  “There’s a two-person mode.” He waves another controller at me. “Let me show you how we do it in China.”

  2.

  As soon as the lift doors open, I hear the crying. It is so loud I drop my shopping bags and bhindi rolls everywhere. Proper Indian bhindi too, from the vegetable seller on Buffalo Road. Santha gave me a hot tip and I went there after work.

  Tender, green ladies’ fingers roll everywhere in the corridor. No way I can cook bhindi tonight. I will have to soak it in salt water to clean it and let it dry overnight on newspaper.

  The child is still crying when I pass Hafeezah’s flat. I can’t help it. I look inside the grille.

  It is not the cry of a baby. My neighbour has her face in both hands and she is sobbing so hard her entire body shakes. She looks up and sees me and wipes her face. “Sorry, sorry. So embarrassing.” Her hands shake. She uses a corner of her tudung as a handkerchief.

  “No, I,” I need a good lie. “Oh!” I hold up the bag of bhindi. “I saw this at Tekka Market and it looked so good I bought extra for you. Bhindi. You know? Ladies’ fingers?”

  “Oh!” The corner of the tudung falls from her fingers. “Oh.”

  Tears stream from her eyes again. “Oh! You so nice! Thank you! So nice!”

  I stand like an idiot at her grille door while she looks around for the house key.

  “Come in. Come in!”

  What to do? I go in.

  I’ve never been inside this flat. It’s a little different from the one I rent. The central space is bigger and halved by two wooden doors into a separate living room and dining room. I see a baby crib against the far wall. The curtains are drawn. Altaf must be sleeping.

  Hafeezah takes the bag from me. “So much! Cannot, cannot. I take half, can?”

  “Sure.” I give her the bag like an idiot.

  “I make Sindhi curry with this. Very good. You come and have for dinner.”

  “No! I mean, no, you can’t cook this tonight. I dropped it on the floor, sorry, so you need to wash it and dry it properly.”

  She nods. “Okay. I make tomorrow. You come for dinner. We break fast around 7.30 I think. Let me check.” She feels around in her loose caftan for her cellphone and shows me an app. “All the timings here.”

  I have an app that shows auspicious days and times for the Hindu calendar. It must have a similar algorithm to Hafeezah’s religious app.

  “Sit, sit.” She heads to the kitchen. “You’ll have something?”

  “No, no.”

  “No, please have something.”

  “No, it’s okay, you haven’t broken fast yet, right?”

  She stops at the kitchen door and shakes her head. “So happy to see you I forgot.”

  I sit uncomfortably on her white sofa and look around the room. Some Islamic sayings in gold and green on the wall. Some fabric wall hangings. There is a carpet on the floor as well and another fenced-off corner with baby toys.

  Hafeezah comes out of the kitchen with a plastic bag much less full than the one I gave her. “Thanks very much,” she says.

  “No problem.” I take the bag. She sits down, so of course I can’t get up.

  “So nice of you to bring the bhindi. I know you are very busy. Since we move here, you never have time to talk. Even at the supermarket, rushing, rushing.”

  “Yes, sorry. Work, you know.”

  “I know.” She nods. “Last time I was the same. Before marriage, before baby, it was all work, work, work. You are in SGH, right? Same hospital as your Chinese friend? The girl?”

  “Yes, correct. I’m a researcher.”

  “Wow. You studied in Singapore?”

  “No, Pune.”

  “Is that in Pakistan? You’re from Pakistan right?”

  “Actually, I’m from India. But,” I always add this, “my grandmother, my father’s mother, she was from Lahore. Which is in Pakistan now.”

  Hafeezah claps her hands. “My grandparents were from Karachi! They came to Singapore in 1947.”

  “Right.” A lot of Sindhis left Sind province during Partition. Many ended up in Mumbai. Some came to Malaysia and Singapore.

  “I’ve never gone to Pakistan so I always wanted to talk to you and find out about it.”

  “I’m from India.”

  “Oh yes.”

  The silence is uncomfortable.

  “So you also used to work?”

  Hafeezah smiles. “Yes. And almost same line as you?”

  “Really? What, lab technician?”

  “No! I’m a beautician!”

  In what universe is a threading-haircutting-waxing-waali the same as a cancer researcher?

  “Come and see.” Hafeezah gets up.

  She has a five-room flat, which means three bedrooms. One of them has two leather recliners covered in plastic wrap, two ceramic washbasins on the floor and a huge mirror, framed with light bulbs. Film-star style.

  “Wow.” I can’t resist. I go stand in front of the mirror.

  Hafeezah says: “Nice, right? I saw in movie.”

  “It’s very professional.”

  “See reclining seats? So neck won’t ache.” She points at the basins. “I going to have hair wash, hair set, hair treatment, haircut, mani-pedi, threading, waxing, facial, everything. Last time I used to work in Rupini’s. You know Rupini’s?”

  Every Indian woman in Singapore knows Rupini’s chain of beauty parlours. It’s famous.

  “I took a break, after marriage, you know, but I’m thinking of starting work from home now.”

  The ceramic is good quality. So are the chairs. I see cases of beauty products in the corner. Hafeezah follows my eyes. “SK line of products. Skin cell therapy, just like your line. But also organics range because I believe in all-natural products. No ammonia, no parabens.”

  She comes to me and puts her face right next to mine. “You should do facial. Will help your dry skin. And we can pluck out your white hairs, only one or two.”

  “Er.”

  “You see dark spots? Oily nose. Dry cheeks. Got pimple also.” She lets my chin go and I turn to the side so she doesn’t see me rubbing it.

  “I ate lots of cheese recently. I always break out when that happens.” Why am I even explaining myself to her?

  Hafeezah clucks her tongue. “So heaty in this weather. Eat cool things better. Never mind. When I open my shop here, I give you discount facial. Your Chinese friend also.”

  Chia Ying never threads. Irving has very nice eyebrows. I wonder if Hafeezah is allowed to work on men.


  “Funny, right?” She has seen me smile. “Everyone thinks it’s so funny.”

  “No, no.” Why must I waste naatak-baazi on this? “Your salon looks very professional. When will you finish the, the remodelling?”

  “How to finish remodelling? I applied for loan. They never give. I showed them all the testimony from previous clients, so many years working, but today they tell me: ‘Cannot finance just like that.’ They want financial statements. Business plan. I tell them: ‘You give me money, I show you everything in one year. Six months. No problem!’” She folds her arms. “I know my skill. Sure got. But they don’t know.”

  The tears are starting again. Not even one box of tissues in front of her make-up mirror.

  “We just bought this flat, still repaying, I thought I can work to help. HDB say parlour home business okay, I think easy! But got so many problems. Cannot even hire one staff member, cannot advertise, cannot get loan.”

  There’s a packet of facial cotton pads on top of the SKII product case. I hand it to her and make windscreen-wiper motions. “Um. What if you set up your parlour outside?”

  “Cannot, lah.” She opens the packet, takes out a wad of cotton, wipes her eyes. “Cannot rent. Everything so expensive. Even I asked my brother to find for me, he cannot find.”

  “Your brother is a property agent?”

  “Part-time. He works at SembCorp but he does property part-time. Two daughters,” she says.

  “That’s nice. How old?”

  “Four and two. You got brother? Sister?”

  “One brother. In the US.”

  “Got kids?”

  My wrist throbs. Stupid air-con in this room.

  She’s asking if Romy-Bhaiya has children, idiot. “No kids. I have to go,” I tell Hafeezah. “Enjoy the bhindi.”

  3.

  Chia Ying sleeps in on Saturdays. That’s because her bedroom does not overlook the big open space between the HDB blocks, but mine does.

  Before 5.30am, the azaan comes floating into the darkness of my room from the nearby mosque. It is specially loud this month because of Ramadan.

  By 7am, the open space is full of aunties and children doing Zumba fitness workouts in the open air. The Latin pop and rock lasts until 9am, when some Chinese clan association starts shaking a huge lion puppet around. Seven or eight men wiggle the giant head and snakelike body and another seven or eight clash cymbals and beat drums.