by Jenny Feldon
“Would you like to see the kitchen?” the housemother asked, shaking her head with weary amusement. “Some of the children are helping make a broth for their little brother, who is feeling unwell with fever today.”
“I’d love to.”
The broth was a fragrant, herb-flecked tomato soup that simmered in an aluminum pot on a makeshift stove. Jostling each other for a turn with the spoon, four of the siblings bickered over which ingredient to add next. “It has to be exactly right or Vishnu won’t get better,” cried a girl, waving a handful of spices.
I thought of Jay and the chicken soup, and how indescribably blessed we’d been to have mothers who made us better with recipes handed down from generation to generation. If we were lucky enough to have children of our own, I needed to make sure they understood what a miracle family was, biological or otherwise. In this small bungalow, people with no blood ties were bonded together forever. I watched the housemother settle their arguments, laugh at their antics, brush hair out of their eyes, and knew she would love these children as her own for the rest of her life.
Compared to the huddled camps of urchin gangs I’d grown accustomed to seeing alongside Hyderabad’s crowded streets, this was paradise. A house and a mother to call their very own, a close-knit “family” of other kids to play with. But a closer look revealed that these children bore the same haunted expressions, the same scars and marks that whispered of cruelties in a past too painful to fathom. A handful of them had grown up here at the Township, safe in the arms of their foster mother, protected from what would have been by the compound walls and the kindness of strangers. But others, older and wiser, remembered all too well an existence of pain, hardship, and sorrow. The Township orphans were the lucky ones. Gratitude was not a lesson to be taught here. It was a way of life.
“I’d like to come back,” I told Srinivas as Anjali and I started back to the gates. “To volunteer. I could help the kids with their lessons or do art projects or play games with them…or just be an extra pair of hands…” My voice trailed off. I wasn’t sure how to read his expression.
Kamala trailed a step behind me, her tiny fingers clinging to the hem of my skirt. She slipped something into my palm and closed my fingers around it. “I made you a gift, Jenny Ma’am.”
It was a pencil drawing, a woman in a skirt with long hair surrounded by a group of shorter people with clasped hands and open mouths. “It’s a picture of you and all of us singing.”
I knelt down and gave her a hug.
“I love it.”
Kamala beamed, hugging me back with a force that made my eyes sting.
“Please, Ma’am, will you come back? You could be coming with us to assembly next time, to hear the singing. It is making a lovely sound.”
I looked at Srinivas. “Can I come back? I’d really like to spend more time here.”
“We need to follow the proper protocol,” he said, handing me a handful of papers. “Fill these out and we will notify you.” His voice softened as he held his hand out for Kamala, gently pulling her from my side. “But it would be our pleasure to see you here again.”
As we pulled down the driveway, I looked back at the cluster of children still waving from the gates as the Scorpio disappeared down the dirt road. I was deeply moved by their trusting faces, their breathless excitement in sharing joys and secrets with someone who would listen. Those children saw me in a light more gracious than I’d ever seen myself. On the front porch of an orphanage bungalow, I’d seen strength and beauty reflected back to me in the caramel-colored eyes of a little girl.
Chapter 23
“Inhale and feel your chest rise. Exhale and let it fall. Surrender yourself to this moment. You are nothing more than your breath as it passes through your nostrils and into the air above you.”
I lay on my ancient blue yoga mat, eyes closed, palms open, trying to calm my mind and surrender to the universe. Or at the very least to the soothing alto of the teacher’s voice and the flickering leaves of the mango tree outside the window. I am not getting chikungunya, I told myself sternly. I am not annoyed at how slow this class is moving. I am not distracted by all that whispering coming from the back corner.
In New York, learning to let go and rise above my environment had always been my biggest challenge in yoga class. The tiniest distractions upset my balance: a buzzing fly, a too-hot room, the heavy breathing of the person next to me. But I’d made progress over the years. Finding peace by letting go of everything was the Zen state I’d been crawling toward since my very first class. Then India happened. I’d let the distractions and the discomforts become all that there was. Now, finally, I was finding my way back to the more enlightened path I’d set out to find in the first place.
Anjali woke me bright and early to attend a vinyasa class at Satya’s Global Yoga studio, a sunny space with shiny, faux-wood linoleum floors on the top floor of a house in Banjara Hills, about twenty-five minutes away from Madhapur. None of my Internet searches had turned up so much as a whisper about the studio; as usual, Anjali’s network of friends and family yielded far better results. Despite being the technology capital of India, Hyderabad still functioned better on word of mouth than computers. As a consolation prize for the ungodly hour, Anjali brought me a croissant from the Ofen bakery across the street.
“Only place in Hyderabad to get halfway decent European pastry,” she had said, daintily wiping croissant flakes from her fingers. “Sometimes they roast chickens. Those aren’t bad, either.”
Now I snuck a peek in Anjali’s direction. Not surprisingly, she was the picture of serenity: fully relaxed against her black Nike yoga mat, eyes closed, tips of her thumbs and index fingers pressed gently together, palms open in devoted meditation.
I had a terrible itch on my right big toe.
“Separate yourself from the natural world,” Satya intoned. “Separate yourself from the physical world. Leave your earthly concerns behind. Let your unconscious mind take over, emptying all unnecessary thoughts. Absolve yourself of all mental, emotional, and physical discomforts and challenges.”
I will separate myself from physical discomfort. I will ignore the fact that my right big toe is so itchy it might be gangrene or worse. I will lie here and let my unconscious take over. I will surrender to the universe.
Breathe in, breathe out, focus. My mat was worn thin at the top and still smelled like sweat and lavender from hundreds of Bikram classes in New York. The ceiling fans stirred the air ever so slightly, creating an illusion of coolness. I felt my body relax and my mind begin to let go.
Then the woman next to me, struggling to remove her burka, stumbled backward and tripped over my outstretched feet, falling on top of me in an awkward heap. I popped upright and stared at her, startled. Underneath the swathes of black fabric, she was wearing Mickey Mouse pajamas.
She followed my gaze and blushed. “I love Mickey Mouse.”
“So do I.”
We both laughed.
In the weeks that followed, I became a regular at Satya’s yoga studio. Anjali, who had a full-time job at a consulting company, came with me whenever her work schedule allowed her to get away, but mostly I went alone. The studio—worn but gleaming floors, dust particles swimming lazily in beams of sunlight that streamed in from the windows, the smell of sweat and dust and incense—was starting to feel more like home than I’d imagined anywhere in India ever could. Satya applauded my progress and encouraged me to take my practice deeper.
Despite Satya’s best efforts at maintaining, as she described, a “Western style” level of decorum, the yoga sessions were filled with conversation, complaints, and interjections, women coming and going or moving through different postures than the rest of the class.
“Yoga in the West is different than it is here,” Satya explained. “In the West, you choose yoga as a hobby, like a sport or a musical instrument. In India, yoga is ancient, part of t
he fabric of our daily life without needing to try. But for that, people are messy, undisciplined in their studies. We do not assign the same value or reverence as you do in the West.”
“So you’re saying in the West, yoga is actually better?”
“Not better. Different, yes. But even though India is the birthplace of yoga, there are things we can learn from those who have carried our disciplines into the modern world. Your respect for orderliness, for mindful attention, is a lesson all Indian people should learn to achieve, not just in the quiet of their own minds, but in a group, like this.” She gestured to a trio of women, swathed in black burkas, lounging and gossiping on their mats, ignoring the flow of sun salutations around them.
“We all have our struggles and our darker days, you know,” Satya said. “Forgiveness is the greatest gift one can give to the self. Healing starts there. Sometimes I see you fighting with yourself in asanas, trying too hard to make your body achieve what you believe is perfection within your mind.”
I stared into the leaves of the mango tree outside the window. “There’s a lot I’m trying to make up for. I used to be better at this. I used to be better at a lot of things.”
“Free your mind from the prison of ‘better,’” Satya said, gently pressing me to my knees and motioning for me to take child’s pose. She adjusted my body with practiced movements, pressing her fists between my shoulder blades, kneeling on my hips and forcing them to release into the ground. She crouched behind me and rested both palms on the small of my back. “Let go and receive. That is what they teach us at Mysore. You will come with us some day, and you will see.”
Yoga began to heal my body, to bring back the strength and flexibility that so many months of misery and moping had taken away. If the studio was beginning to feel like home, then my body—for so long a foreign vessel I’d felt trapped inside—began to feel like a familiar place too.
One weekend, Satya planned a retreat for her regular students. We piled into buses and drove through dusty back roads until we reached a secluded resort and spa tucked away in the hills. After a rigorous session of vinyasa in a jam-packed ballroom, we changed into bathing suits and headed to the pool.
I wore a bikini, the only bathing suit I owned. Most of the other women wore 1920s style bathing costumes, long-sleeved with pants that came down past their knees. Feeling conspicuous and indecent, I clutched my towel around me and dangled my legs in the hot tub, which was filled with freezing-cold water.
Fahmida came to sit beside me. She arrived at the yoga studio every day wrapped in a black burka edged with bright, elaborate embroidery. Only her stunning hazel eyes were visible among its folds. Her yoga clothes, like many of the other Muslim women’s, were loose-fitting nylon pajamas—a far cry from the curve-hugging Lululemon pants and sports bras I wore to class. Today, perhaps in honor of the vacation-like retreat, Fahmida’s burka was pale blue, stamped with violet flowers and embroidered in gold.
“Cold,” Fahmida said, sliding into the water beneath me. Her burka floated to the top of the water, swirling around my ankles with gentle caress. “Are you feeling chilled?”
“I don’t have another bathing suit,” I said, pulling the towel around me tighter still. “I guess I should have figured something else out.”
“I meant the temperature of the water. Your bathing costume doesn’t offend me,” Fahmida said with a laugh, leaning her head back against the tiles so her face was tilted toward the sun. “Just because you are not wearing habib doesn’t mean you and I cannot still be friends.”
“I didn’t mean…”
“I know,” she said, holding up a lined brown palm in defense. “You are Western, and Jewish also, no? You and I are enemies only in certain worlds. Here it is not so complicated. Just women and bathing and yoga. Friendship.”
“Much easier than real life, I guess.”
“We are the lucky ones. We get to choose whether it is easy or not. That’s what yoga has taught me. To choose ease over struggle. Not everyone is so fortunate to be making such a choice.”
Warm now in the sun, I shrugged out of my towel and slipped down into the cool water. I leaned my head back beside hers and closed my eyes against the bright light in the sky above me. Laughter and shouts and the sound of splashing water rained down around us. I closed my eyes and chose ease.
***
“Did you hear they’re building a new airport? With a Coffee Bean in it.” Diana raised her eyebrows and sighed. “I might need to fly somewhere every single day just to get a Vanilla Ice Blended.”
“There’s other stuff coming too,” Kyle said. “I heard a rumor they’re putting in a T.G.I. Friday’s.”
“No way,” I said. “With potato skins and everything?”
“Pretty soon we won’t recognize this place. We’re such pioneers. One day we’ll tell the new expats we used to ride buffalo to work. Uphill both ways,” Kyle said.
The waiter appeared.
“I’ll have a martini,” Diana said, placing her menu down on the table.
Jay looked at me. “Want to try a martini?”
“With vodka that freezes? No, thanks. With my luck, I’ll get sick again. Fake vodka parasites or something.”
We’d bought a bottle of Indian-manufactured Smirnoff from the liquor shack on the side of Road #1 last week. I’d been hoping to make a batch of vodka-infused lemonade to kick off what would have been Memorial Day weekend back in the States. Sundar had finally mastered the art of barbecued chicken, which he cooked for our small expat crowd. Three hours in the freezer and the contents of the vodka bottle had frozen solid. My science skills weren’t great, but even I knew that wasn’t a good sign.
“You have a weak American constitution,” Kyle said smugly, tossing a handful of anise seeds into his mouth from the bowl in the middle of the table.
“I do not! Look how much progress I’ve made. Sundar says my Indian palate is greatly improving.”
“Sundar just wants you to stop trying to teach him how to make macaroni and cheese.”
“All he has to do is open the box. I don’t know why he gets so bent out of shape about it. And look, I’m expanding my horizons,” I said, pointing to the menu open in front of me. “Tonight’s specialty menu is Malaysian food.”
“Sorry if she doesn’t expose herself to flesh-eating bacteria for fun,” Jay retorted, pointing accusingly at the bowl of seeds. “Do you know how many people have stuck their dirty hands in that bowl before you?”
“My stomach is primed to handle any situation,” Kyle said, unmoved. “It’s because I’m Chinese. We were born to eat street food and survive.”
“You were born in Memphis,” I pointed out.
“Hardly relevant. It’s in my blood. Like knowing how to make perfect wontons.”
“We’ve been married two years and you’ve never made me a wonton,” Diana said. Behind her, a loud splash signaled yet another unsuspecting patron’s descent into Laguna’s moat. “God, I can’t believe that’s still happening. Why don’t they do something about those moats already? Someone needs to talk to management about it.”
Kyle and I exchanged glances.
“Why do you think we come here? It’s not because of the food,” Kyle said.
“I can’t believe you guys. And Jenny, you get upset when Indian people are always staring at you.”
“This isn’t a racial thing. I think it’s funny no matter who it happens to. That huge German guy fell in ten minutes ago and it was the best one yet. He yelled at the waiter to go find him new pants. Besides, I’m learning to take joy in the small things. It’s all part of the yoga.”
“I’m pretty sure making fun of innocent victims doesn’t fall under the umbrella of ‘taking joy in the small things,’” Diana said. Her martini arrived, suspiciously murky-looking. She took a sip and made a face.
“It tastes sort of like apple.” Sh
e sipped again. “With some olive mixed in.”
Diana called the waiter over, grabbed his pad, and wrote down instructions in careful block letters. “Take this to your bartender,” she said with a sweet, do-as-I-say-and-you’ll-get-a-big-tip smile. “Vodka. A little bit of vermouth. One olive. Nothing else.”
The waiter bobbled his head and disappeared. A minute later, he returned to the table. “Your previous martini did have those ingredients, Ma’am,” he said, handing the glass back to her. “But we are of adding mix, Ma’am, because Ma’am shouldn’t be having drink too strong.”
Jay and Kyle smirked. I sipped my wine. Diana thanked the waiter for his consideration.
“That’s awfully nice of you. But I’d like a regular martini, just the same.”
He brought out another martini. This one was clear-ish. Diana, eternally the optimist, took a small, brave sip and smiled.
“At least this one doesn’t taste like apple.” Which meant, of course, that it must still be terrible.
The guy at the next table stared at me throughout an otherwise unremarkable meal. Strangely, I didn’t feel even the slightest urge to run over and strangle him. Maybe all the yoga really was translating into Zen inner peace that made me immune to the petty workings of my insecure American mind. Or else I was just getting used to the unwanted attention. Either way, it was progress.
After dinner, stepping carefully over the moats on our way out, Jay suggested we grab a drink at the nightclub that had just opened next door.
It was late. The old me would have demanded to go home.
“Sure,” I said.
Amid throbbing techno and a layer of cigarette smoke three inches thick, we made our way to the bar and settled ourselves on stools shaped like animal heads. Kyle and Diana ordered Kingfishers. Jay asked for vodka.
“We don’t have, sir.”
“Really?” Jay said. “It’s on the menu.”
“How about a mixed cocktail?” the bartender asked, holding up a carafe of something electric magenta and thick as tar.