Nimita's Place

  Any thoughts of telling Mummy about the scene in the kitchen are swept away in the chaos that follows. Dilip-Praji has an asthma attack in his excitement, Tony-Baba vomits all over his smart grey knickerbocker suit and Shanti-Bhabhi is trying to quiet a suddenly screaming Urmila-Baby. A corner of the shamiana tent is flapping loose and Karan can’t find any workers to fix it.

  Nimita takes Urmila-Baby and dumps her on Meena-Maasiji’s lap. “Why do you want to stop her? Crying is good for babies,” Maasiji informs her while rocking the baby into laughter.

  Nimita gets Najma to search for the labourers who must be hiding to smoke their cheroots. She has her family organised by the time the Bhargava procession turns up at the gate.

  Anand Bhargava’s face is hidden by a curtain of flowers and Nimita feels a happy pang of memory as he alights from his white horse.

  Roshna is a dead weight on Nimita’s shoulder as they descend the staircase to the waiting groom and sacred fire. She sinks onto the wooden seat before the fire.

  “Be happy, be happy,” Nimita murmurs the blessing until it becomes a chant lost in the greater rustling and chatter of the crowd.

  To her pleased surprise, she can see almost as many people as came for her wedding. Those missing include the Tiwanas who are in Delhi. Also absent is Mrs Dalhousie, newly moved to Bombay to take up the principalship of a private girls’ institution. Kinnaird’s trustees probably thought her rescue of the Heera Mandi women would affect enrolment.

  Nimita has estimated the crowd correctly. No food will be wasted and nobody dare say the wedding was not as fine as Roshna’s own mother would have wanted.

  Urmila-Baby is a sleepy, sticky weight in Nimita’s lap. She thinks of 18 years from now when she might be doing all this for her own daughter’s wedding. It terrifies her, the idea of finding a suitable match, talking to his parents, arranging the ceremonies, just Karan and her. Not the scope of the tasks but their inevitability, for to have a daughter is to one day lose her, to send her away from her own home. “Don’t marry, Baby,” she finds herself whispering in her daughter’s ear. “Don’t leave your mother.”

  “What are you telling the child?” Karan whispers in her ear. Nimita shivers deliciously as her husband moves to stand behind her, one hand on her shoulder, face grave but eyes smiling as he looks at his sister.

  “I told Baby she must not leave us,” she says. He looks at her.

  “What will she do, stay with us her whole life?”

  “Yes,” Nimita says, hugging Urmila-Baby tight. “She can be an engineer. A doctor. Anything. We will find a boy to marry into our house.”

  Karan laughs and turns back to watching his sister.

  This is the second time they are together in a marriage pandal. It is different from this angle. Was I as sad and pale as Roshna? Yes, Nimita thinks, yes, before Karan looked at me and smiled.

  In that same instant of remembrance, Nimita sees Anand look towards his bride, boldly parting the flowers with his fingers so he can gaze into her eyes and smile. Only for a moment before his scandalised mother hits him on the shoulder, but in that moment Roshna relaxes. Nimita’s eyes water from the smoke.

  The newlyweds touch the feet of their elders—me too, Nimita realises, startled—and sit down to eat with them. Nimita’s stomach grumbles, empty since breakfast, but hers and Karan’s duty is to ensure the guests are fed. This being the Punjab, guests have to be gently but forcibly brought to the food over protests that they are not hungry, let others eat first.

  The white butter runs out. Nimita looks for a servant to get some. Ramu is near the kitchen but so too is Najma, the woman’s proximity to the door freezing Nimita’s blood. Not again.

  Hurrying over to scold the servant, Nimita stops at the sight of Ramu reaching out and gently touching the chunni on Najma’s head. When his fingers fall back, there is a white star on Najma’s ear. A flower, Nimita realises. Maybe a jasmine or tuberose plucked from one of the many decorations. Even more baffling is the fact that Najma does not step back or slap his hand or run away. Any of those reactions would be far better than the expression on the woman’s face.

  I wonder whether Shukla-Bibi knows, Nimita thinks and realises that yes, of course she does. That is probably the reason for all the fights.

  Ramu? He is only a child, look at how he plays with Najma’s Shabbo and Kabir. How old would he be? He has shot up in the past year and a half. Fifteen or 16 maybe? Nimita was engaged and wed at 17 and there are those who say her parents waited a long time to marry her off.

  Nimita half turns, not wanting to see. She calls Ramu’s name to give the couple time to separate. When she finally faces them, she sees Najma putting together the dirty plates as instructed, Ramu waiting, hands twisting. “Butter,” she says and he darts towards her to take the container and then back into the kitchen.

  Ramu might have been fooled but Najma is a different matter. Nimita looks at the servant woman, half-hunched over the heap of plates, head slightly turned over her shoulder. You have seen. Now what? The position is that of a dog waiting to be beaten, a beggar on the street waiting to be kicked.

  Nimita remembers the last time she saw Najma in this position. Today of all days, she has no wish to turn the girl away.

  Part Five

  2014–2015

  1.

  “Passport?” The Malay lady in the brown tudung holds out her hand. I give her my passport.

  “Photocopy of front and back is on the top of the papers I gave you.”

  “Birth certificate?”

  “This is the original. The photocopy is in the papers I gave you.”

  She flips through the papers, missing it.

  “That one.” I make a fist so I won’t take the papers from her. “You just turned it over.”

  She finally finds the original, puts it next to the photocopy and looks at them through her glasses.

  The Immigration and Checkpoints Authority website for permanent residency is very systematic. There are application forms to download and a list of supporting documents to gather. You have to make an online appointment to submit your application in person. I put the documents together in the proper order, like it said on the list I downloaded from the website. But when I gave the file to the officer, she took out all the sheets of paper and spread them around so nothing is in order now. Very unsystematic.

  “Educational certs?”

  “You put them there on the side. Those. And that one. And that one on the right. No, that’s a character reference and my testimonials from past employers.” Chia Ying and Santha and even Siddiqui wrote me character references, so nice. SGH human resources gave me a salary confirmation letter and in addition, Dr Alagasamy wrote me a very nice testimonial. Also there is a letter from Dr Savarkar. I have the one she sent me in 2010 when I interviewed for the job but she very nicely sent me another one for this.

  Does the immigration officer know what these letters mean? One testimonial from a top cancer researcher and one from India’s number one plant-protein expert. These prove that I am a hybrid specialist. These prove I am a multitalented molecular biologist. If this was a submission for a research position, even Cornell University or University of London would hire me in a heartbeat.

  “Marriage cert?”

  “I’m not married. I wrote in the application there.”

  “Oh yes.” She smiles and looks at me through her spectacles. “So pretty, so young. Still got chance.” She laughs.

  I relax my clenched fists. The officer is my buas’ age. There is no arguing with buas. When Pritty-Bua downloaded Facebook on her smartphone, she posted a family picture and I tried to tell her that whatever she shared would be seen by the whole world if she didn’t change her privacy settings.

  “But, beta, see, the app is so smart, it says: ‘Friends, family, acquaintances’. It knows already who is who.”

  “No, Bua, you have to tell the app who is your family, friend and acquaintance. Every time. For every person.”

&nb
sp; “No, beta, I don’t think so. See? This photo of family has only been liked by members of our family. Means only they can see it, no? Otherwise the whole world would be liking it, no? So cute you look.”

  When Itty-Bua decided to learn how to use WhatsApp calling to talk to our chachis in Delhi, she kept disconnecting incoming calls no matter how much I said: “Green, green, slide the green arrow.” Finally she did it and said: “Haan, beta, it was the green bar. That’s too fat to be an arrow. It’s a bar. Green bar. Come, I’ll show you.”

  When Itty-Bua or Pritty-Bua want to do something, there is no point telling them the shortest and fastest way. They will find their way only and do it that way. You can go mad trying to hurry them up, Mummy says, or you can relax and let them be.

  I relax and do pranayama breathing.

  It sounds very loud in the room, so I stop. The white couple sitting in front of the officer next to mine turn towards me and I pretend to cough. They look back at their officer.

  My immigration officer begins putting together all the photocopied documents, hopefully in the same order as the instructions on her website.

  “Ma’am, that copy there.”

  “Ah, salah!” She laughs. “Good eye, very good. Contacts? No? Very lucky. You take care, yah, always on the smartphone, you young people. My age got to wear glasses.”

  She finishes bundling everything together. “Okay. You go back now. We will let you know the outcome by post.”

  Who else to ask if not her? “Ma’am, will I get PR?”

  “We will let you know the outcome, yah?”

  Did she just shake her head? I lean forward.

  “Ma’am?” Time for naatak-baazi. Time to speak Singlish. “Really, you think I got chance or not?”

  She puts the paper down and looks at me. “Got, lah. You young. You single. Good also, not so good also because you single.”

  “Why?”

  “Good because maybe you marry Singaporean, yah? Not so good because,” she flips through the pages until the salary slip comes out, “because two high-income better than one.”

  I have a high income? I can’t even afford a flat here without a bank loan.

  “You sound like my bua. My aunty. Always matchmaking me.”

  She smiles. “Yah? She found you nice boy or not?”

  I nod. Naatak-baazi relies on truthfulness. It is true that Itty-Bua has found a boy. No need for this lady to know I don’t plan to marry him.

  “Indian boy?”

  “Yes.”

  The officer nods. She isn’t smiling as much. She flaps her hand at me: come closer. So I do.

  “People like us, got quota.”

  People like us? “Got quota for women?”

  “For women? No, lah! Us, you know, minority.” She points to herself and to me. Malay, Indian. Us.

  Not Chinese.

  “Chinese got more chance. Minority quota very easy to fill, gahmen make it smaller last year because so many people complain got too many foreigners. Chinese quota bigger, not so easy to fill,” she says. “Gahmen don’t like Mina so they bring in Cheenah. Yah! Those ching-cheong can’t-talk-properly one.”

  “Oh.” I think about this for a while. “But I actually want to reside permanently here. I want to buy property here. Settle here.”

  “Then better you marry fast fast, yah?” she laughs. “Better marry Singaporean. I got nephew, very nice. Maybe I introduce him to you, okay?”

  On the way back to SGH, I notice the Chinese people on the train for the first time in a long while. When I first came here, it was very shocking to see all those white faces, short legs, flat eyes and straight hair. It was very difficult to understand the way they spoke, such fah-nee ways of saying things and throwing in words like lah, ma, can, last time, next time. So funny the way the Chinese speak. Not at all like Indians, na?

  Chia Ying is Chinese but I stopped seeing her Chinese-ness after Dadi’s stroke, when she was so nice about the rent. She needed someone to split the rent, that’s why she took me as a flatmate, but she didn’t throw me out even though I had to default on rent within three months because of Dadi’s medical expenses.

  Chia Ying is Chinese. No wonder she got her PR here easily.

  Irving is Chinese. I bet he’ll get PR here easily.

  I message the lab WhatsApp chat group on my way in, saying I’m going to have brunch and can I bring in anything for anyone.

  Santha wants coffee.

  When I go to the drinks stall, the woman looks at me weirdly when I say in perfect Singlish: “Kopi C kosong”, which means coffee with evaporated milk and no sugar.

  “Ni yao shenme?”

  “Kopi C kosong.”

  She begins making my drink and adds a teaspoon of sugar. “No, no, kosong, kosong, kosong!”

  She looks at me again and speaks to her colleague. The man comes and asks me: “Yes, miss, what you want?”

  “Uncle, I want kopi C kosong.”

  He tells her something in Chinese and then I get the right coffee for Santha.

  “Must be from Beijing,” Santha says later. “These Cheenah don’t understand plain English. Last time my order also salah.”

  I drop a couple of earbuds tipped with bacteria into flasks of sterile nutrient solution and put them in the warm water bath. Tomorrow the clear solution will be cloudy with bacteria. The bacteria can grow for 16 hours without supervision so I have time to go to the library. I should work on my experimental design for the throat tumour project. Dr Alagasamy had a few questions last week that I have to be able to answer at our next meeting.

  Instead I go home early. Since no one is home, I chop potatoes and cauliflower for gobi aloo and make it in the pressure cooker. Stir-fried in the kadai is best, but today I am impatient.

  After the gobi aloo is done, time for dal.

  While the pressure is coming off the cooked dal, I set my smartphone timer for 45 minutes and turn on Irving’s PlayStation. I feel like playing the World War II fighter pilot game, but must limit my exposure for the sake of good eyesight and mental health. Irving’s pilot game can be played on autopilot. You can shoot and shoot and shoot at enemy planes while your mind thinks about other things.

  Or maybe not. That’s the fourth time a Messerschmitt has clipped my plane before I killed even three in the enemy squadron.

  “Argh!”

  Irving walks in front of me. “Only I am allowed to throw my PS controllers, N. Control yourself or playing privileges are revoked.”

  “Sorry, sorry. When did you come home?”

  “The last time you died.”

  “Urgh.” I pause the timer. Twenty-five minutes to go. Maybe the two-person game will go better. “Want to team up and hunt German fighter planes? For twenty-five minutes.”

  “You can’t play a game for only twenty-five minutes.”

  “Please?”

  Irving taps his chin. “What’s in it for me?”

  “Um. Urad dal and gobi aloo?” No one can resist Punjabi gobi aloo. Even made in the pressure cooker, the aroma is too tempting. Chia Ying says it smells of home. I don’t know who cooked it for her before me.

  “I’ll be squadron leader.”

  We restart gameplay in two-person mode.

  Five enemy planes and three lives later, Irving turns his plane and starts shooting at me.

  “Hey!”

  “Oh good, you’re paying attention!” He stops shooting at me. “Pay attention, idiot, how many times do you want to die out here?”

  “I’m paying attention!”

  “You’re a danger to this squadron. I’m grounding you.”

  “You can’t ground me!” I fire back at him. He ducks and flies away.

  A Messerschmitt fires on us both. The screen explodes in flames just as my cellphone timer goes off.

  “Great.” I drop my controller onto the sofa and catch Irving’s when he throws it at me.

  “What is wrong with you today? That was the worst game you’ve ever played and I watched y
ou learn to play this game.”

  “Nothing.” I get up but he leans over and pulls my sleeve so I sit back down. “Nothing! Argh! I’m just frustrated!”

  He switches the TV off. “How was the PR application?”

  “I submitted it. But I won’t be successful.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m not Chinese.” I turn my head and look at him. “The government of Singapore wants more Chinese here than any other race.”

  “Ah.” He doesn’t look at me. What can he say? He’s Chinese.

  Actually, he should say something. Chia Ying would have said something like “sorry” at least. Lots of sympathy he has for other people but none for me, haan?

  “Did you hear me?”

  “I heard you.”

  I throw a cushion at him. “You don’t think it’s unfair?”

  “It’s unfair.”

  “Yah! I can speak perfect English and good Singlish and am a very good molecular biologist, but that doesn’t matter. A drinks stall lady with no education and no English will get PR and I won’t!”

  “You’re shouting.”

  “Sorry.” I lean my head back on the sofa. “I’m frustrated.”

  “I can see that.”

  “No, really. You and I,” I point to him, “ninety-nine percent of our DNA match, the exact same. One loop here, one unexpressed gene there and you are a man who is Chinese. And I am Indian.”

  “And a woman.”

  “No, women express genes in two X chromosomes. Men have only one X chromosome and a poor, stunted Y. So unexpressed gene means you are a man.”

  Irving throws a controller at me again. I catch it again.

  “We have the exact same DNA. I am probably more intelligent,” I hold both the controllers above my head so he can’t grab them, “but that doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what job I have, whether I’m a good person, whether I really want to settle in this country. It doesn’t matter how much I want to buy a flat here. They only care about what I look like. They care only about phenotype, not genotype.”

  He manages to grab a controller and turns the TV on.