Daughter of the Ganges

by Asha Miro

  I continue reading the baptism certificate. Place of birth: Shaha. I feel a tingle of excitement. All the pieces fit! If in 1995 I had insisted on reading this page of the registry book myself, I would not have spent all these years thinking that I had been born in Nasik. I finish going through the entries on the page. Father’s profession: farmer. Godparents: Stanislaus Gonzalves (Nirmala explains that he was the father of Meena, one of the Dev-Mata nuns) and Maria Angela Dias (Nirmala’s cousin). Chaplain: Martín de los Ríos. I breathe easily. It looks like everything makes sense now, that it has all taken its final shape, that there is no longer room for any more confusion.

  The day is coming to an end and I embrace Nirmala for the last time. She is crying. We are all crying. I don’t know what to say to her. I don’t know if I have told her everything I wanted to say, everything I have felt. I don’t know if I can find the words to thank her for having asked Francis to find out everything he could about my past, for having helped me to find my sister. More than anything else, though, for having accepted the request made by Radhu and Francis’s father when I was a baby, one day toward the end of the 1960s. For having looked after me when I was little, during the years at Dev-Mata, and later for having insisted on transferring me to Regina Pacis in Mumbai so that I could receive an education. I suppose that she must have realized that sending me to Mumbai would increase my chances of having a better future. How many important things have happened in my life thanks to the woman who I am now embracing!

  Nirmala stays there with Merlyn but tomorrow will return to Mumbai, where she now lives most of the time. She is worried about her health but she is strong and I hope to visit her many more times. I leave the Dev-Mata grounds through the iron gate, my face covered in tears, and with a profound sense of gratitude, knowing that I shall always have a home here; Merlyn, who is now in charge of the convent, told me this seriously, and I believe her.

  That evening, when we arrive at the hotel outside Nasik, they ask me at the reception desk if I am Asha Ghoderao. It is the first time anyone has asked me that question and I am quite struck by it. “Yes, I am. Why?” One of the receptionists hands me a sheet they use for noting down messages for their guests. Someone has called asking for Asha Ghoderao. From that moment on I receive a number of phone calls from cousins and relatives of every kind living in Nasik who have found out that I am staying in this hotel. They have heard all kinds of details about the meeting between the two Ashas …. Since their English is as precarious as mine, the conversations can’t really get too involved. One of them gives me his email address and asks me to write to him; another asks me to come to their house to meet all of their family …. I tell them all that I have to leave for Mumbai soon and that from there I am flying back to Barcelona. They don’t understand. If I have now managed to find my family, why am I going back to Barcelona? I realize that for many of them it seems a great pity to be living so far away from India, while others think I am very lucky. I continue to be torn by contradictory feelings: Now that I know I am from here originally, I would like to understand the way of life in this country a little better, but I am so European that it would be very difficult for me to adapt.

  I didn’t dream it all. I wake up in Nasik and realize that everything that happened yesterday was real. Asha and Usha, the two Ashas. We managed to meet again years after our paths in life were separated. The hotel staff greets me with a special smile: the newspaper Sakal has published Vinod Bedarkar’s article with a color photograph of me and Asha on the front page. Thousands of readers all over the state of Maharashtra are now acquainted with our story. While the article about our reunion circulates around Maharashtra, the English-language press continues to concern itself with talk about Bollywood cinema and its latest hits, about the disputes between Muslims and Hindus over the construction of a temple, the spectacular growth of the class of wealthy Indians, the deaths of hundreds of people in a terrible accident on the night train between Karwar and Mumbai, the consequences of the invasion of Iraq in March—invasion is the word they use. Between the international news and the most modern photographs there are two pages full of parents looking for the ideal husbands or wives for their sons or daughters. It is surprising to note that the most sought after are the NRIs (Non-Resident Indians), who live abroad. India is a country of great contrasts, with some extremely rich and Westernized people living only a few meters from people who have practically nothing. A country that is advancing, that has some great intellectuals, the largest cinema industry in the world, but which, in contrast, continues to be ruled by ancestral customs such as marriages arranged by parents.

  I put aside all the other papers and sit with Sakal in my hands. It gives me a strange feeling to see the photograph of me and my sister on the front page. I ask them to translate the text and find it funny to hear the story being told once more. After breakfast I take a walk around the center of Nasik and use the opportunity to buy several copies of Sakal from a small newsstand on the street. I pass a big elephant and give it a few coins, which it takes with its trunk and hands up to its owner sitting on top. The diversions of Sunday morning on the streets of this town. I walk across the bridges and down the narrow streets with more peace of mind than ever, at ease, as if I were at home. Nasik could have been my hometown, and in fact it is my town.

  18.

  SITABAI AND SAKUBAI

  Several days have gone by since I was reunited with my sister. I have lost all sense of time, it seems as though it were ages ago. In India, time feels different, as if it passes more slowly. I still don’t know quite what I feel, it’s very difficult to describe. I still have so many questions to put to Asha! It all happened very quickly and I need to see her again. I want to know more about her. And I suppose that she has even more questions for me.

  Taking advantage of being able to escape from filming, I ask Francis to help me a little more. I need him to act as an interpreter and I want to get to the bottom of my story, to find the few remaining pieces in order to understand what happened to my family, what became of my parents. Francis doesn’t hesitate for a second and asks the director of the school where he works for a day off so that we can go around the little villages that we need to visit. This time we go without the cameras, only Anna and myself in a hired jeep. The new driver is named Kumar.

  We leave early in the morning on the road to Kolpewadi without anyone else finding out we were going. It is hot, and the car runs a slalom around the hundreds of holes in the road, avoiding trucks, bicycles, and dogs. “If we tell them we are coming and word spreads, there will be at least five hundred people waiting as we enter the village,” Francis assures me. “Especially after the article in Sakal, which touched a lot of readers.” Which is why we are not saying anything. I am only hoping that Asha will be there!

  While we are going over some of the anecdotes in my story, Francis tells me that Sakubai, the woman who nursed me when my mother died, one of my father’s daughters from his first marriage, to Shevbai, lives not far away from the place we are driving through. “Is she still alive?” “Oh yes, she certainly is,” he says, and it seems that she was quite upset the other day when she found out that I had suddenly turned up out of nowhere and had not gone to see her! My immediate instinct is to ask Kumar to turn off onto the dust road that leads in the direction of Ujani, the village where Sakubai lives.

  We stop the jeep and Francis, Anna, and I walk toward a solitary house with a straw roof and mud walls surrounded by fields. The silence is complete. Between the bajra plants in one field, which is a kind of maize but smaller, longer and thinner, I see an old man, dressed completely in white, cutting grasses. Francis tells me that he is Sakubai’s husband. We go over to him. The man looks at us in surprise and waits. When Francis introduces us, his feelings overwhelm him. Close-up, his shirt and trousers are not as white as they appeared at a distance. His skin is very dark, and he looks very old, though he could not be more than sixty. He is Hari Jagtap, my half-sister’s husband.


  Sakubai is not there. At first, it seems as though she has been admitted to the hospital in Shirdi with respiratory problems. Then it turns out that she is visiting one of her daughters in a village on the outskirts of Shirdi, because she has very bad asthma and needs treatment. Every day she goes to the hospital and she can’t move around very much. Shirdi is not far from where we are now. Since it is early and in India time seems to stop for me, we decide to go and see her. Another surprise visit. But Hari wants to come with us. He doesn’t close the house or take anything with him. He simply rolls down the sleeves of his shirt and is ready. Hari and I walk from his fields to the jeep parked on the dust road holding hands. He takes my hand. I feel the rough, dry skin of his hand, which a moment ago was touching grass and earth, against my hand and I know that this man feels something special for me.

  Now we are going to go to Kolpewadi to see Asha and then bring her with us to visit Sakubai. We talk all the way from Ujani to Kolpewadi. Francis translates nonstop all the questions and answers. Hari seems to have a very good memory and unraveling the twists and turns of a story that happened thirty-five years ago seems to pose no problems for him. He remembers perfectly how his wife, Sakubai, nursed me at the same time as her son, Baly, who is the same age as I.

  The jeep advances slowly along the road and with each jolt I fix every new image of my story inside me. Between one piece of the story and the next, Hari watches me from deep within the depths of his dark gaze.

  I ask him what my father was like, what he remembers of him. He knows everything, apparently, but he doesn’t know where to begin. He tells me that my father had his own land, he wasn’t rich but he had enough to feed the whole family. He had some cows and buffalo, and even a horse, which he used for getting around. Both he and my grandfather, Kasinath Ghoderao, loved horses very much. Ghoderao means horseman.

  Radhu had five children by his first wife, Shevbai. Hari doesn’t say it like that, because, like everyone else, he counts the boys separately from the girls. So Radhu had one son and four daughters. The sons are always mentioned first, even if they were born last. The boy was Janardan. The girls were Kamala, Vimal, Sakubai, and Yamuna. Janardan was the third and Sakubai was the fourth. He had inherited the land from the family and he worked it with his son. But Janardan became an alcoholic and didn’t do all the work needed of him, and Radhu couldn’t do all of it alone. Janardan started to sell off the land piece by piece until he had lost it all. According to Hari, my father died in Shaha, in the same house where my mother died. He also remembers Sitabai well. Her hair was lighter than mine and she was more than thirty years younger than my father. She was only twenty years old when they were married. Just as Francis did, Hari tells me that she had two sons and three daughters. Matura was the eldest. The two boys were named Dingar and Ananada and they died when they were little. Then came Asha and I.

  We arrive at Kolpewadi. Along the river, under the bridge, there are once again many women washing clothes along with a lot of bicycles and small shops where tailors sit working at their black sewing machines, watching everyone who comes and goes from the village. I recognize every detail until we reach the street where the Meherkhambs live. It is not raining today and everything looks different. In the sunlight the unmetaled road doesn’t look the same at all. There is little activity. It is an ordinary day and no one is expecting us.

  Suddenly the silence is broken by cries of, “Maushi! Maushi!” Savita, my niece, is the first one I see and she runs to embrace me, laughing all the while. Her hands are wet because she has been doing housework, but despite this she is dressed in a yellow sari and looks very elegant. Maushi means “aunt.”

  She introduces my eldest niece, Sheetal, who arrived just yesterday with her daughters to spend a few days. Rahul is there too because he didn’t go to school today. But the others are not there. Asha is in the field and Bikhaji is probably at work in the factory. Bausaheb is still at school. We sit on the red plastic chairs on the porch to wait. They have gone to fetch everyone. The neighborhood women are appearing out of curiosity. They recognize us immediately and it amuses them greatly to see us again, just as it is does us to see them. Kalgaon-Thadi is not a neighborhood that is used to receiving visitors of this kind. One of the neighbors takes the initiative and lights the fire on one side of the porch so as to heat up some milky tea while we are waiting.

  Finally Asha and Bikhaji arrive on a motorbike. Asha is sitting side-saddle in a purple sari. We embrace in front of her house. She doesn’t understand what I am doing here but it doesn’t matter. She thought it would be a lot longer before we saw each other again! She is very happy. I take a good look at her, from top to bottom. My sister. It is difficult to imagine that she wears such a lovely sari to work in the fields. I am still surprised by the contrast between the elegance of the Indian women and their way of life.

  After having tea and calming down a little, as well as getting to know Asha’s mother-in-law, and after having a long talk with my nephews—with Francis’s indispensable help— Asha and her husband climb into the jeep with us and Hari. Together, we all drive back along the road to Shirdi to go and visit Sakubai. Asha and Bikhaji think it is a very good idea to go and see her.

  Coming into the town, we pass the Sai Baba temple on our left and follow a small road toward the outskirts, to a place called Nandurkhi. Hari points out the house and we stop in front of it. It resembles Asha’s house. It is small and made of brick with a corrugated roof and a cement floor. Sakubai and her daughter Suman come out to meet us, or rather to see what is going on, and who Hari is with. They don’t make a big fuss; clearly, we are a long way from Mediterranean customs. Here people seem to keep their feelings inside rather than let them out. But the look in their eyes and the expressions on their faces say so much! Sakubai knows immediately who I am. The first thing she asks Francis is to translate that this visit is a great gift to her. She tells me this while holding my arms firmly in hers. She was very sad to hear that I had been to the Meherkhamb house in Kolpewadi and that she didn’t have a chance to see me. Sakubai is probably much younger than she looks. She is wearing a white and pale pink sari with a purple blouse underneath, glasses, and a lot of glass bracelets on each wrist. She has a very special way of looking at me. It is impossible that she could recognize me. The last time she saw me I was only a few months old. But I can sense that there are traces of the features of Sitabai and Radhu in my face, the faces of my parents. That is what she sees, that is what she is looking for in my expression. She is looking for them.

  We sit down together on the only bed there is in the one-room house, the two Ashas and Sakubai. Just as in Asha’s house, there is nothing more than one bed pushed up against a barred window with no glass. Two white plastic chairs and a clothes hanger with some trousers, two shirts, and a turquoise sari. Under the bed are some garlands of orange flowers alongside a pile of dried herbs. Hari sits on the floor next to a dozen people who have come into the house. They are the sons and daughters of Hari and Sakubai. All of them are very quiet and respectful. Sakubai takes my hands, touches my face, and looks at me. She cries and wipes the tears away underneath her glasses with her sari. “When a woman has breast-fed a child which is not her own she remembers it forever.” This is one of the first things she says to me.

  I begin to ask her about everything and she answers without pausing even for a second in finding the answers. It is all still very fresh in her memory, as though it happened yesterday. My mother, Sitabai, was her stepmother, the second wife of her father, Radhu, who was also my father. Normally, a man’s children have to show respect to his new wife if he decides to marry again, both in their manner of addressing her and in their gestures. Sitabai had asked her and her other sisters not to bother with this show of respect. Sitabai was a few years younger than Sakubai and they became great friends. Such good friends that they ended up forgetting the family relationship that existed between them. They shared a lot of things, their worries, the birth of their children. They
lived four kilometers apart, the distance that separates Shaha from Ujani. Sakubai had already had Balu when Sitabai’s health began to fail. I had been born three months earlier.

  The numbers don’t really add up, the years don’t fit. When it comes to calculating dates, all of us are guessing. Apart from Anna, I don’t think anyone in this house really knows for certain which day and in which year they were actually born.

  They took Sitabai to the doctor in Kolpewadi, but they had to bring her back home again. My mother was already very ill and nothing could be done for her. Her asthma problem had grown worse and she had great difficulty in breathing. She was suffocating. I will never know exactly what she had or what she died of. “Sitabai died lying down on the bed in the house in Shaha, with her head resting on my skirt,” Sakubai tells me. “I took care of her until the end.” We are all crying. Sakubai gives me her hand and I squeeze it. Thirty-five years later, she is crying over the death of her friend, over the death of my mother, with such feeling that I am left speechless. Now I am the one who is drying her tears with her sari. She takes off her glasses to let me do it. Between sobs, Sakubai tells me that one of the last times she went to see my mother they had had a long conversation. Sitabai told her that she knew she was going to die soon, and she asked her to take care of me, more than anything, not to let me die. “I promised her that I would look after you, that you would not die.”