I tried to bring a little distraction in Chitra's life.
But my wife's homesickness was getting greater and greater and grew into a monster.
I stood firm and refused her wish to fly on a holiday to her homeland after such a short time. The result was that she began to drink secretly.
Sometimes it was quite difficult when I was looking for her all over the house and did not find her but then a guest came and told me that the hostess lay drunk under a urinal in the men's room. That was too much. I had to do something. There were days when she crept into our bedroom, sat on our bed and did not move for hours from the location.
She then remained motionless like a life-size doll and was unresponsive, as if she were in a trance or someone had hypnotized her.
Our family doctor advised me to do something, otherwise she would harm herself psychologically. It was even possible that she would try to take her life. He made me really scared and I asked him for some advice.
He also could not think of anything - except for the suggestion of letting her travel home. But how, without money for such a trip?
As if there was not enough disquiet at home - a telegram arrived with the news that Chitra's mother lay dying and had expressed her desire to see her daughter again.
The issue of homesickness was forgotten, I borrowed four thousand marks from my uncle, who had fled from the east zone and now had a bakery here in the West.
I bought a ticket to Frankfurt-Colombo-Frankfurt with an open date for the return flight. I couldn't do anything more.
It was a very dark November day, a sad gray-in-gray-day that I brought Chitra to Frankfurt Airport.
She was like a different person and very happy that she was going to a warm place, to her sick mother.
The only thing was - is a person so happy when she knows that her mother lay dying? But Asians are just different compared to us Europeans - I had already learned that.
The joy of flying home was probably greater than the concerns about her mother.
I now had to see how I got on for a few weeks without Chitra.
My parents were there and would certainly still support me. Feeling very sad, I drove back to Netphen, to my restaurant. My mother came and stayed for a full week, during which she did a general house cleaning.
Father wanted to come only over the weekend in order to save commuting daily to work because it was too far from here to his gas station. The guest rooms were already all in a top condition. Now our bedroom was next in line to be cleaned.
The outcry came when our cleaning lady together with Mother moved the cabinet from the wall. They found Five German Mark notes twisted into rolls.
There were always twenty five mark bills in rolls and held together with a rubber band. I found three such rolls. There were three hundred marks, not a lot but it was probably only the rolls, which my dear wife had forgotten - that was our assessment.
I was shocked; my mother was horrified and the maid grinned somewhat sardonically. I think she was gloating. The host's own wife robbed him and he did not notice it. That was not funny! There were many questions raised.
How much had she taken with her? How long was this going on? Would she come back? For now, I had had my fill and did not want any more discussions, not even with my father during the weekend. It was clear to me what the tax consultant wanted to tell me: You are being robbed, be careful. He wanted to tell me that.
I had not understood him with my blue-eyed faith - everything is nice and all people are good. Now I woke up. Why did she do this? How could I continue to defend her in front of my parents?
It had happened now and I would have to live with it. The show had to go on. So I did my work.
But the next hammer came down promptly.
My neighbor was a butcher, from whom I got my Schnitzel and sausages as well as assorted cold cuts and fresh meat.
It was the butcher's wife who opened my eyes, when I complained about the bill.
I had said the amount was too high for such small quantity of goods. In reply she said that I should monitor my cleaning woman more closely, who always came in the mornings and made breakfast.
So I kept my alarm a little earlier and appeared in my kitchen.
Already halfway I got the wonderful smell of fried, Schnitzel perhaps, coming my way. I was right, they were fried Schnitzel, which were packed just then as school- break time snacks for the four offspring of the cleaning lady.
Now I had to look for a new cleaning woman, which was not so difficult but I would be able to find out if I had the right one only after some time.
First, his own wife, who had stolen some Deutsch Mark from him and now it was the cleaning woman, who had thought that I had joined a charity association.
Why is it that these people simply thought that I had too much of money, which was easily earned and wanted to share it with me? My father reminded me of the saying that trust is good but control is better. He also was of the opinion that my wife would not come back.
Some of my guests started teasing that Chitra ran away because I was beating her.
Yet another said that I could not satisfy such an Asian and should have left her to him.
After that I had one guest less because he took the view that I was a kind of thug - in the process I missed giving him only a few slaps.
The world around me became more honest because I did not take people at face value anymore; I was in the position to look into them and realized how hypocritical some of them were.
Meanwhile almost six months had passed. My letters to Chitra went unanswered and I was also worried initially.
But gradually I got angry. Mother was certain that something had happened in the meanwhile and suggested writing to the German embassy and ask them to find out what had happened there. It wasn’t possible that any funeral could take place for a duration from November to June in Asia.
I got a letter from the embassy. They were pleased to inform me that my wife and her mother were seen by an embassy staff a few days ago in perfect health while shopping in a large departmental store.
However, the young woman had returned to work as a dancer at the Tropicana. They also were spreading the rumor that she had returned because her German husband had married another woman in Germany. This really blew me out of my mind. But father said that I should leave everything as it was now. But I was not satisfied and sent a telegram to Chitra in which I invited her to present herself within two weeks in Germany. Otherwise, she need never return. How she would do it was her problem, not mine since she had a return flight ticket of course.
The answer that I got from her was that she needed a lot of money to pay a medical bill. She said she had an intense pain in the lower abdomen and the doctor had to remove her uterus That had cost so much that she had to encash the return ticket in order to get money.
Now she needed a new ticket, which I should send her. I only answered that the time of two weeks would be up by then - and lo and behold, not even a week had passed, I went to Frankfurt to pick up my wife.
I was thrilled and very pleased that she was with me again.
But in the seven months of her absence some things had happened with me and the business. At some point it was also time that I enjoyed it being a grass widower, so to say, and amused myself with the waitress in bed.
It was in the days of doubt whether Chitra would come back or not. Very quickly the others realized what was going on between me and the waitress.
We made no bones about it and she did not leave for home at all evenings but stayed with me in the marital bedroom. She was quite sure that she would become the future boss because of my behavior.
But now Chitra was back and the waitress had to make room, which she did not like. The relationship of boss-employee did not exist anymore for a long time. And she showed that she knew the boss very well, to my displeasure.
This matter had to be discussed. She also threatened me that she was pregnant and I, the "perpetrator" had
to pay. A few days went by and I got a call from one of my guests, who had been together with the waitress for some time right after me.
He said that she had given him the marching orders and he wanted to tell me something confidential now. We met in a different restaurant and he told me that my waitress was stealing.
He gave me a few examples.
It must have been the truth, because how else would he know about the in-house facts of my billing?
After a targeted monitoring, I caught her, which in turn, meant that I had to look for a new waitress and the woman went to my wife and told her about our relationship after she got fired. That brought my wife up the wall.
But somehow she realized that I had the upper hand and that she did not have a good set of cards in her hands. Chitra remained vague and did not make such a great scene with me. Also, I was glad that she was there because I adored her still - or I was newly in love with her?
Yes I felt that everything had changed a bit; us being together was not like before.
Mother was also very reserved towards Chitra and father thought I should send her back to where she came from - namely, back to where the pepper grows, to Ceylon But I didn't think much about Father's opinion, he had been always a little different.
Mother had received mail from Colombo but she did not give me the letter to read but instead passed on to me just greetings from the radio operator of the ex- "Arsterturm", who was on another ship that was in Colombo
But I did not pay attention to such trifles because I was in love with my wife again. And that was what counted - at least for me. Mother had a confidential conversation to with me advising me to go with my wife to a doctor. She said that she should get herself examined because she had put on so much of weight.
My mother told me that I just had to only take a closer look – that my wife had become very corpulent around the abdominal area.
Of course she had eaten too much of curry and other food items in Ceylon and had put on some weight - that was my explanation.
Mother just shook her head.
Mother however did not leave me in peace and I quite literally dragged Chitra to the doctor.
This doctor referred us to a gynecologist who then ascertained and confirmed that my wife was pregnant in the fifth month.
The unsuspecting doctor also congratulated us.
At home there was a real fight and I flipped out when Chitra assured me and swore that she never had sex with another man. She said I should read the Bible again, then I would understand, because there was also a woman in the Bible, who became pregnant without the help of a man and gave birth to a son I suppose, she meant the Virgin Mary.
Next she explained that it was the swimming pool and then about the toilet seat. I had enough of it. What kind of garbage did she try to convince me of?
Did she think that we Germans were so stupid to believe this shit?
The toilets - story might be true, I admitted. But only if you've been screwed by a guy there - I had to add.
My patience with her was pretty much exhausted.
It would have been easy if she could had have just said that it had been an adventure and it just happened - simply, bluntly.
But trying to fob off such a pack of lies to me and my parents was just too much.
I promised her - and it was not just an empty threat - that I would buy her a ticket to Ceylon with the next money I got.
But how? From which money? My uncle was still waiting for the repayment of borrowed four thousand.
The brewery provided only against cash.
The butcher, the wholesale trade, all wanted to provide goods against immediate payment.
With the knowledge that I was heavily in debt, I could just survive, but I could not deal with the fact that my wife had messed up so royally.
Mother and Father had withdrawn themselves and thought that I should come to terms with myself.
When I became reasonable, they would come and help me again. The condition was that I should leave my wife.
It was the first time in my life that I stood before shattered illusions and I realized that I was trapped in a bitter reality. A big mountain of problems piled up there in front of me. Only this could help: Clenching my teeth together and going through it and yet I was stuck in the middle of it and did not know what to do.
The pub was in debt. I was not in good terms with my parents. My uncle was upset. I did not have health insurance because I had not paid the premium amount.
I had also not paid the voluntary social insurance amount for the same reason. The woman was in the hospital was giving birth to her daughter.
Not mine.
To date, the daughter is still owned by the hospital - until full payment. So they say.
In mid-October they notified me that I had a daughter. She was a hundred percent Ceylonese girl.
Even against the reasoning of my parents, she was officially my daughter - perhaps some would think that I am stupid.
Firstly: I still loved my wife.
Secondly: What was the child that her mother was a bitch?
Why didn't all this make much difference to me? As much as it mattered to the others that the child was not mine?
Was it because of my seafaring, where everything is evaluated very differently, where a whore is considered as a sister to a seafarer? Or did I subconsciously know that something like that had to happen to me?
In the very violent discussion that I had with Chitra, she promised me to be a good wife and not to cheat on me in any way or expose me to ridicule.
I forgave her again and did not want to talk about the issue of cheating any more. Now we wanted to take care of the big pile of rubble around us and clean it up.
The capitulation
The restaurant was beyond saving and we gave it back to the brewery. Somehow I was relieved but not hugely happy about it. The view that we were actually going to move to another area however was reassuring, because no one would know us there and we could start over.
Frankfurt was a good choice in our eyes because we would have some rest from any demands to make payments there first of all. Such a big city always has some anonymity. Since I had not paid any bills in the last few weeks - water, taxes, electricity and others - I had stashed away some money.
That should be enough for a deposit, the rent and for one month for living for the three of us. I could have even saved the little Ford Taunus 12M Combi.
But it was only a matter of time that they would take it away from me. Our new home was a one-bedroom apartment in the Stiftstraße in Frankfurt opposite to the newspaper building. Because of the car, I was mobile and could look for a job. I found a job in a restaurant as a cook in the evening shift.
But after some time, came the inevitable: payment summons!
So much money was deducted from me, that the rest of the money was barely enough for rent and maintenance for the family. Now I began to be "sick". I did not care much for the job and so I was on the way to losing it. I was always just so credibly ill that the doctor wrote a sick note. And that was because I had a few tricks up my sleeve that I could pretend to be so. After a while, my employer had enough of me and sent me a notice.
Meanwhile, I had already looked around for something new.
The little car was sold; I didn't need one for my new job because I was supplied with one. It was written "Courier Services and Pick-up" in large letters on both sides of the utility wagon.
It was long working hours, if I wanted to have anything remaining for me. At the beginning, my lack of knowledge of the city caused difficulties.
I knew just the Eschersheimer Turm, the Stiftstrasse - where we lived and the Kaiserstraße - which was the place, where I had my drinking binges many years back with my friends. I knew a few more streets as well but what use was that when you are supposed to be on the road almost like a taxi driver. But it worked out very well because my boss did not want to register me.
This suited me very well i
n its overall concept; every day I had hard cash in my hands. What I did not like was our neighbor. An elderly gentleman living alone, who often came over to us and borrowed something.
Mostly he was there when I came unannounced home by accident.
Then he and my wife sat and had a cup of coffee together. Or I had to pick up Chitra from the neighbor’s place.
What was that again: Trust is good but control is better? I could not shake the feeling that the old man wanted to fuck my wife. So I banned Chitra from visiting the neighbor and threatened the 'horny bag' next door with a beating if he didn't leave us in peace.
There was one more issue to worry about: my new employer probably did not have a few things quite in balance. One day I wanted to leave the car with him and have my weekly billing.
There his wife waved to me from the backyard and told me that I should go immediately to the car and wait at the restaurant round the corner. I did that.
My boss came, brought me the settlement of accounts and told me that he had problems and the authorities wanted to take away his car. He had to hide it or report it as stolen.
So I had to give him the vehicle in order not to get into any trouble. Quite willingly I took the tram home.
Chitra was not pleased but I was sure that I had to look for a new job again. Again it was a job as a rental car driver. But this time, with registration and insurance. Things took their course and the summons for payments also continued to come – till it landed on the desk of my new boss. The game began all over again. This time it took a little longer to get work and I was getting frustrated.
Almost a year had passed and our situation did not improve.
I suggested to Chitra that I wanted to go to sea again or rather, that I should. After much hesitation, she agreed. A buddy who also wanted to go to the sea, took me along in his car to Hamburg.
A fortnight later I had certificate of hire to start work as cook on a "Hapag" ship, which was to sail next day to Japan. But exactly on the day the ship sailed, just a few hours earlier, the CIDs came and picked me up from the ship. Supposedly my wife had made a complaint against me that I was going to leave her and her child willfully and had taken all the money.
My Dream to Be Free Page 13