by Esther David
Nothing disastrous had happened so far; there was no need to worry. On that particular day, somehow I was nervous, but started preparations for dinner. During August the weather usually cools down in Ahmedabad, but that year there was a heat wave.
On Friday afternoon, two goats were slaughtered for the Saturday night party. I packed the meat in plastic ziplock bags and froze it in the synagogue refrigerator in the storeroom.
It was not the first time that I was cooking meat on a Saturday night. It was a challenge, as I had to start preparations from Friday night by making the masala. I planned in advance and never failed.
But on Friday morning I had half a mind to call Nurith and tell her that it was advisable to postpone the Saturday dinner to Sunday, so that we could have fresh mutton curry for the party.
I regret that I did not listen to my instinct. Even when my husband slaughtered the animals on Friday according to kosher law, I was distracted and worried. All through Saturday as I organized breakfast and lunch after the bar mitzvah, Reuben strutted around like a rooster in his brand-new prayer shawl. I had checked on the meat in the fridge and wondered why it did not look fresh; it looked pale and dead. I felt there was a stale smell in the room. But I convinced myself that the storeroom always had a musty smell and there was nothing to worry about. It was stacked with old furniture and objects we had received from families when they left for Israel. The fridge was a donation to the synagogue from the Samson family. It was a big double-door frost-free parrot-green fridge, embellished with magnetic stickers. It was already old when it arrived and I had often suggested to the synagogue committee that it be exchanged during the festive season for a new one. But Simon had checked it and given his verdict that it worked very well. Since then, we used it to freeze chicken, mutton or vegetables. So far it had never let us down. It was also not for the first time that we had frozen meat for almost two days. I closed the fridge, went downstairs to the kitchen and busied myself in preparing the mutton curry. I browned the finely chopped onions as my daily help washed the meat and then I sautéed it in the red masala till it had a nice red colour.
An hour later, I forked the meat to see if it was cooked, then added a large quantity of coconut milk, simmered it for fifteen minutes more and garnished it with finely chopped coriander leaves. But somewhere in the back of my mind, I was wondering why it did not exude the aromatic fragrances it normally did. To distract myself, I made a cauldron of rice and tossed a salad of cubed cucumber, tomatoes and onions with lemon juice.
My fears proved true when the food was served. There was chaos in the synagogue pavilion. Lebana was the first to fill her plate. She had a morsel, made a face and whispered to her sister that the meat was stale. Like lightning, the message passed from one to the other and reached Nurith and Gideon. They noticed that nobody was eating. Then Nurith filled her plate to reassure the guests that all was well and ate a spoonful. Her face contorted with disgust as she called out to me, ‘Elisheba, the meat is stale…’ I froze. The otherwise mild-mannered Nurith was telling me that I had ruined her son’s bar mitzvah dinner.
I stood with bent shoulders as the truth sunk in. Not one to panic, I called out to my eldest son and asked him to buy paneer masala and dal fry, available at the corner restaurant near the synagogue. I made sure that he raced on his motorbike. At that moment, I saw Nurith making preparations to leave the venue but begged her to stay, telling her that I had made other arrangements. I stood in the doorway and announced that I would not allow anybody to leave the synagogue on an empty stomach. In the meantime, I opened packets of potato chips and served cold drinks.
Meanwhile, my husband went to the storeroom to check the fridge. His heart sank when he saw that it was not working. Shamefacedly, he came down, stood beside me and whispered, ‘It is nobody’s fault. The fridge is not working.’
Making sure that I was heard, I said, ‘When we prepared the meat on Friday evening, the fridge was working. Then, because it was the Sabbath, I did not go into the storeroom. This evening when I took out the meat from the fridge to cook it, I did not notice that the fridge was not working. I apologize. It is my fault.’
The congregation sat still as I carried the vessels back into the kitchen. My son arrived with packets of food and I laid it on the table. By then, Nurith had calmed down and offered to pay for the food. I refused.
Our home is next to the synagogue, so I rushed home and packed a gift for Reuben. After everybody had eaten well, I called Reuben and gave him the gift for his bar mitzvah.
The next day, when Nurith and Gideon opened the gifts, I am sure they must have been thunderstruck. I had given Reuben two silver coins, my life’s savings.
Soon, the matter of the stale meat was forgotten, but the memory of the silver coins would remain with me forever. I had given the coins to Reuben as I did not want to tarnish my reputation.
This is how Reuben received two silver coins on his bar mitzvah, because, after all, it was just a matter of two zuzim.
10
Malkha
As told to Elisheba
TRY AS I might, I cannot eat fish. Imagine a woman from Alibaug, who comes from the land of the fish-eating Bene Israel Jewish community, getting put off by the mere smell of fish. I call it ‘smell’, although it is the best fragrance on earth. However, as a child, I enjoyed going to the Alibaug fish market with Mother, where fish was brought fresh from the sea, and identifying the different types. Pomfret is as dear to a Jewish woman’s heart as Bombil or Bombay Duck, which I liked, because when it arrived from the sea, it had a rose-pink colour with a touch of white and looked like a flower. It is delicious when rubbed with rice flour and deep fried till golden-brown, but now I cannot bear to look at it. I wonder why?
From a very young age, I was taught that we were only allowed to eat fish with scales yet, at the fish market, I was often attracted to shrimps, prawns, lobsters and crabs, with their soft flesh encased in hard armour. I would have a great desire to open the shells and feel the sweetness inside, which my friends and neighbours had told me about. But I never ate fish without scales, because it was taboo in our religion.
All was well, as long as I was unmarried. A month after my wedding to Samson, I was alone one afternoon and marinating fish in salt and lemon juice, when I suddenly felt nauseated. I cooked it anyway and quickly made some spinach for myself, which I had bought for the evening dinner. When Samson saw me eating spinach and not touching the fish, he asked me why. I avoided telling him the truth. I told him that I sometimes preferred leafy vegetables to chicken, meat and fish. He gave me a quizzical look, but did not say anything.
After Samson’s demise, I moved to Ahmedabad to live with my son Ezel, daughter-in-law Tamar and their children Amy and Benny in his apartment A-109 at Shalom India Housing Society. But when Ezel and Tamar decided to emigrate to Israel, I returned to my house in Alibaug. When Tamar separated from Ezel, I helped my son, looking after the house and children. But when she returned to India, I went back to Alibaug. I will always value the memory of having spent time with Ezel, Benny and Amy. Maybe I have got used to living without Ezel, but not Amy. I miss her sweet chatter, as she liked to snuggle into the folds of my sari and tell me about her school friends and any children’s story she had read at the school library.
Once Tamar returned to Ezel’s life, he did not discuss their plan of leaving for Israel, but I heard him telling his friends that he had booked four air tickets. Rather hurt, I asked him to book my train ticket to Alibaug. I was sad, but happy that Ezel and Tamar were together again. I returned to Alibaug with a heavy heart.
When I reached, I opened the front-door lock of my home, dreading the endless lonely hours I would have to spend there. I had informed my old caretaker Sonbai about my arrival, and she was waiting for me at the door. I opened the windows, aired the house, dusted and cleaned it, washed the kitchen shelves, ordered a fresh stock of groceries from the shop down the road, washed the vessels, wiped them clean, polished the brass vess
els, asked Sonbai to clean the floor, beat the dust out of the mattresses, changed the bed sheets, called the dhobi and gave him a huge mound of washing, rearranged the furniture, carried my favourite deck-chair to the veranda and made a cup of hot tea for myself. My heart warmed when the mongrel Brownie, whom I had brought up when he was a pup, returned, wagging his tail. Sitting there, I watched the coconut trees in the front yard and made notes of the things I had to do, such as ask a farmer to look after the trees and help with the marketing of the coconut harvest, subscribe to a newspaper and ask the local veterinary doctor to give shots to Brownie. As he licked my feet, I felt I had returned home. It was then that my aversion towards fish reemerged and I did not know how to handle it. So I tried to jog my memory and remember my family history, which I had heard from my mother, aunts, ageing cousins and grandmother. I could not put my finger on the root of the matter. I vaguely remembered that this feeling went way beyond the stories of a grand-aunt and my great-grandmother. I was sure something had happened to one of the women before them. I wondered why it was so deeply ingrained in my memory for as far as I could remember, it had not bothered any of the other women in my family, but had disrupted my world.
Living alone, I had a lot of time on my hands, so I tried to grow vegetables in my backyard, and made sure that the coconut and areca-nut trees were looked after. I also checked on the harvest and began maintaining an account book of returns. In the afternoon, I met old friends and took an hour-long nap. Twice a week, I worked as a volunteer in the local library and brought back novels, which I read before falling asleep at night.
In contrast, my Friday evenings were spent in a state of agitation after I attended the Sabbath prayers at the synagogue in Israel Lane. I returned home soon after, ate a hasty meal of leftovers from lunch and sat next to the telephone, abstractedly watching the news in Marathi. At around 10 p.m. my eyes would wander to the old grandfather clock on the wall, above my wedding photograph, as around that time Ezel would call me. Our conversations were always short, followed by the excited shouts of Amy and Benny. Then Ezel would return to the phone and end the conversation with his statement that it was the children’s bedtime. Once I heard the click of the phone being put back on the holder, I would return to my bedroom with a heavy heart, feeling an oppressive loneliness. I fretted about the fact that my daughter-in-law Tamar never spoke to me. So I spent an uneasy night on Fridays. Yet I did not want to tell Ezel that it was hard to live alone, without any direct family in Alibaug.
As if that was not enough, I became obsessed with fish of all kinds and colours. These often turned into nightmares—when tiny fish with shiny scales transformed into enormous whales and almost swallowed me up, like the Biblical tale of Jonah and the whale. That was when I would invariably wake up at around 2.30 a.m. in a sweat. I tried to fall asleep again, but could not, so I counted whales, in the way that one counts sheep and falls asleep. At 7 a.m. I would wake up with a start, when the milkman called out to me, make my morning tea and sit on the veranda and read The Raigadh Times, before starting my day.
One such year, there were heavy rains in Alibaug and I had to stay home, however much I disliked it. That morning, I made a simple lunch of dal and rice, ate it while watching my favourite Marathi serial, rested and then pulled out the old bags and tin trunks stacked in various places of the house, having decided to clear up unnecessary baggage. Just then I heard someone rattle the main gate of the house. I opened a window and saw the fishmonger Durga, who went from house to house selling fish, which she carried in a huge basket on her head. It was covered with an enormous plastic sheet, which enveloped her entire body. Seeing her standing there, I had a strong desire to have fried fish for dinner. I knew Durga well and asked her to come to the veranda. She squatted on the floor and uncovered the fish. I saw that she had a good catch of pomfret. But as soon as she held one up to show how fresh it was, I again felt a deep aversion for my favourite fish and wanted to throw up. Much to Durga’s shock, I refused to buy it and closed the door. Not that I wanted to be rude, but I was afraid I would vomit right there on the basket of fish. From behind the door, as Durga covered her basket with the plastic sheet, I heard her murmur, ‘Strange woman, never know when she wants fish and when she doesn’t…’
Feeling sick, I lay down for an hour. Later, when I was better, I pulled out an old tin trunk from under my bed and tried to open the rusted lock. Unsuccessful, I asked Sonbai, who had just walked in, to help me. She oiled it, turning its bolts with its enormous key. As she turned the key in the other direction, the lock opened with a loud click.
I spent the entire week discarding old, mouldy papers from the trunk. That is when I came across an old hand-stitched diary, which was torn and discoloured with time. Some pages were stuck to each other and I was afraid they would tear. The writings were in old Marathi and although it was damaged, some of it was readable.
That evening, I put on my spectacles, sat at the dining table and started reading while listening to the rain pounding on the roof. As it often happened in Alibaug, the electricity kept fluctuating, so I lit a hurricane lantern, which I kept on a table near my chair, and got totally absorbed in the interesting details of my family history.
At first I thought it was just an account of daily life and expenses, written in a clean floral hand by my great-great-great grandmother with the unusual name of Delilah. I wondered what she had looked like. Luckily I found a photograph of those years in another trunk, where I had stored ancient, faded sepia-tinted family photographs.
Studying the photographs, I was fascinated by one particular face. I do not know if I was right, but I was convinced that it was Delilah. In comparison to the other women, she was thin and tiny with a long vixen-like face. She was dressed in a nine-yard Maharashtrian sari, and wore a nose ring much larger than the lower part of her face, heavy silver anklets with a serpentine design, a broad armlet with silver bells, innumerable glass bangles and a waistband, which showed off her tiny waist to advantage.
I sighed and wished that I was half as beautiful as Delilah. I looked at myself in the mirror and the face looking back at me was plain and ordinary.
Like Jonah, it took me three days and three nights to read the old Marathi script, as it took longer to understand some of the words. It was during this time that I came across a part which clarified my issues. It was late in the night, so I put a bookmark on that page, placed the diary next to my pillow and slept.
The next morning, Sonbai cooked a simple meal for me and I sat all day at the dining table, reading the diary. The rains were receding and I could hear the soft roar of the sea. Delilah had written,
…that month, it had rained continuously and we could not go out to buy fish—we would cook fish every day, either for lunch or dinner. So we had to survive on dal, rice, yoghurt, potatoes or any vegetable we could buy at a high price from the farmers living around our house. Besides that, we always had wheatflour, rice flour, chick-pea flour, rice and pickles. We also made a chutney of onions, garlic, sesame seeds, dry red chillies and salt, which we ate as an accompaniment to most foods. From the storeroom of the house, we tried to make a variety of interesting dishes. We had a good stock of dried Bombay Duck, but one morning, we woke up to the stench of rotting fish, as it had spoilt because of the humidity. We had to throw away our precious bags of Bombay Duck in the manure pits of our fields. That afternoon, when the rains receded, I took my bamboo umbrella and went to the fish market with my elder son, hoping to find a small quantity of fish, for which I was prepared to pay a high price. There was knee-deep slush around the fish market, so I hitched up my sari to reach there. When I reached, I saw a scene I can never forget. The fishermen and their families stood in small groups, wailing, crying and beating their chests, as though they were at a funeral. Gradually, I understood that when the rains receded, the fishermen had gone fishing but had returned with dead fish. From a distance, I saw that the entire surface of the sea was covered with dead fish, the stench of which hung ov
er Alibaug like a dark cloud. That month, we had to go without fish.
I was impressed by Delilah’s graphic narration. I was so obsessed with the diary that I rushed through the morning chores, made a simple lunch with Sonbai, had a bath, ate, took a nap, wiped my spectacles and read on,
…Bene Israeli Jews crave fish. Whatever else we may have for lunch or dinner, we always have the desire for even an inch of fried fish or a slice of pomfret in rich red curry served with a mound of rice on our thalis. So the absence of fish caused a vacuum in our lives. But at the end of that month, one night, we woke up with a start. There were shouts and cries coming from the direction of the sea. Although, it was still raining, the men took their umbrellas and ran towards it. We sat huddled on the veranda, until a neighbour returned and informed us that a huge whale had been washed up on the beach. The British officer stationed there said that it was a white whale. We were curious to see it, so when the men returned, we made a hasty meal and went to the seashore to see the huge fish, which was still alive and breathing. She looked like a white mountain, obstructing our view of the sea. At first we were afraid to go closer, as we were sure she would swallow us. She lay there for ten days and every day, we went to look at her. Slowly, we inched closer to her. There were always big crowds around her, but we went nearer so that we could have a good view of this enormous creature which had erupted from the sea, elusive, yet attractive. We wanted to touch her. As for me, I was fascinated by her round head, large eyes and lips, which opened and closed as she sucked in air, making her look like a baby.
Maybe at that moment I sinned, as I started salivating and wondering why the Lord had sent such a big fish into our lives, when we were only craving for a small piece to satiate us. At that moment, I forgot all our dietary laws instilled in me as a child by my mother and later my mother-in-law. All I wanted to do was go close to this enormous mass of fish-flesh, claw it, take a huge chunk and rush home. I would cook it, serve it to the family and eat a piece. For me, it was like nectar that had been sent to us, maybe by the Lord.