A Brahmin from outside the camp married her to Ravi Karki, a Nepalese from Birtamod. She’d be Ravi’s second wife. The first wife attended the wedding, too. Anamika was asked to summon her as her sister. The first wife had given birth to one daughter after another, and after four daughters, it was understood that Ravi would take another woman. The wedding took place in a temple outside the camp. No one from the camp was invited. Diki would live with her grandfather.
Anamika’s new marriage was different from her first. With her eighth-grade education, she was the most schooled person in the family, but that didn’t mean she was allowed an opinion. She had to learn to shut up. Ravi’s word was the final word. Anamika didn’t talk back to him. She had seen Ravi whip the little girls and their mother for no reason. When Ravi beat up the girls, Anamika trained herself to wait for his anger to subside before she talked to him.
Anamika was thankful she was spared the thrashing. If angry at her, Ravi yelled, threatened to hit her, called her a whore, but that was where it ended. Anamika attempted bonding with her “sister,” tried to get her to confide in her, but the first wife was distant, as though her husband had specifically asked her not to be friends with Anamika. Her stepdaughters reminded her of Diki, and she often played with them. When Ravi first saw them immersed in hopscotch outside the hut, he asked his new wife if she hadn’t anything better to do. That put a stop to the games.
Anamika received her first beating when she dared make a request to Ravi. He had been in a good mood—only one of the girls had received a light spanking.
“I was wondering,” Anamika muttered, “if Diki could live with us here.”
For a few seconds, Ravi had no idea whom she was talking about. “Who’s Diki?”
“My daughter.”
“You have no children by me.”
The matter would probably have ended there had she not gone on further.
“We already have four daughters in the house. What difference will one more mouth make? I can work myself to feed her if I have to.”
To Anamika, it hadn’t seemed an outrageous request. She had seen her daughter only once after the marriage five months before.
“I will not have some other man’s daughter anywhere near my house,” Ravi said, and then, as though struck by lightning, he pounced on her.
“Do you hear that?” He slapped her. He yanked out tufts of her hair. “I already have four useless daughters to feed and clothe because the randi is cursed, and you now want me to bring someone else’s daughter into this house. I give you a home when you most need it. I marry you when everyone questions your character, and this is how you show your gratitude?”
Then getting up, he kicked her stomach and made a declaration.
“I don’t ever want you visiting your daughter or your father. If you do, I promise your daughter will be my third wife once she is old enough.”
He then slapped each one of his daughters.
“All you women will destroy me one day,” he shouted.
The next morning, he was polite, almost apologetic. That was the last time Anamika ever asked him for anything. The first wife didn’t comfort her later that day. The little girls kept stealing glances at Anamika as she massaged her wounds. She contemplated running away, but the thought of a permanent return to the camp was too much to bear. Her father would be mortified. She’d be a woman with no man again, and she didn’t want to live through that. It was easier to fear just one man inside the house than to live in constant paranoia of all the men—and women—at the camp.
When Shambhavi was born, Ravi asked Anamika to pack her things.
“I married you so you could give me a son,” he gently said. “I can’t feed all of you. You and the other randi have emasculated me. I have become the laughing stock of the entire neighborhood. I worked hard, I didn’t drink, I treated you well, didn’t even beat you like I beat her, and what have you given me in return? Yet another burden.”
In broad daylight, trying to ignore the whispers and nudges of her neighbors, Anamika, a bundle on her back and a baby in hand, returned to the camp. Her father refused to make eye contact with her. Diki didn’t recognize her. Ravi showed up once or twice a year, good-naturedly asked her father for some money and left. He never saw Anamika or his daughter.
The interviews at the International Organization for Migration offices were difficult, everyone said. Just yesterday, a family returned exhausted, the father complaining that they had failed the interview because the American found out they had left Bhutan on their own accord. He could have been lying, but Anamika was nervous.
The white woman wanted all the details. Anamika had problems revisiting them, as she had locked them in the recesses of her mind and hoped she had forever lost the keys to them. Complicating matters was Ravi, who sat there with a forced sullen look on his face, as though he had lived through the harrowing experience himself. He had come into the picture two days ago. News of his wife’s good fortune had reached him in no time.
“I’ve come to see my daughter,” he had said. He greeted her father with a Namaste.
“Ten years after she was born?” She was emboldened. “In ten years, you have never asked to see her.” It was fury. For a moment, she also forgot how much the man frightened her—he was the only person in the world she was afraid of.
“I can see my daughter whenever I wish.”
“She’s at school. She doesn’t know you exist.”
“She soon will.” He looked confident.
“I have work to do.”
“I know what your job is. It’s to give those men at the singara shop a view of your body. I should have always known you were a whore.”
“So, it was the cat-voiced bajiyaa who told you? Is that what you came to tell me—that I am a whore?”
“No, I came to ask you when the interview is.”
“Why should you know of it?”
“I need to prepare for it.”
“You aren’t a refugee. What makes you think we will take you there?”
“It’s simple. I am your husband, and I’ll go to America. I want to try having a son one more time with you.”
“The third wife didn’t do the job either, did she?”
“It must be your curse. It has to be.”
“Maybe the problem lies in . . .” She saw the look on his face and cut herself short.
“If I don’t get to go to the interview, I shall let the people at the migration office know about your character, your bad character. At least I married you despite your flaws. I should get to go, too. Otherwise, I’ll let them know about your ill treatment of my daughters. I have heard these Americans are very serious about violence against children. Violence isn’t the answer to everything. Now to discipline a stray woman, maybe.”
“You’re blackmailing me.”
“No, I am not. I married a Bhutanese refugee who gets to go to America. As her husband, I will go, too. Otherwise, they’ll know everything. I’ll tell them.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Simple. I want to be with my family.” He broke into a smile. “In America. Maybe I will have a son there—an American son to carry my family name forward.”
She looked at her father, and Ravi looked at her. She gave him the date.
At the IOM office, her father needed no prodding.
“Fools—we ethnic Nepali were, big fools,” he spat out.
The white woman jotted something. A black reporter from some foreign paper took notes, sometimes asking the white woman to translate what she didn’t understand. Just yesterday, documentary filmmakers had tried to interview Anamika. It now seemed like the entire world was suddenly interested in her. Maybe she could tell the woman about her past after all.
“We Nepalese were annoyed that we had to wear the gho and kira.” Her father’s teeth were speckled with khaini. “Look at me—why should that be a problem? People in India wear Western clothes. Is that a problem? We lived in Bhutan, and daura suruwal
isn’t their national costume. We could have compromised a little.”
“So you think the uprising is in many ways the ethnic Nepalese population’s fault?” the white woman asked in fluent Nepali.
“Of course, it is.” He looked around to spit out his khaini. “Look at me—I am a sixth-grade dropout. The Bhutanese government sent me to Japan twice on trainings. I received my promotions on time. My boss at the office still checks on me to see if we need anything.”
“Yes, to see if we need anything,” Ravi said.
The white woman looked at Anamika. She nodded; her father was speaking the truth about the promotions. She didn’t know his boss tried keeping in touch.
Her father continued: “They wanted us to learn Dzongkha. What’s the problem with that? If the Drukpas were to settle down in Nepal, they’d have to learn Nepali. We are fools. We like charging at everything with our khukuri. Had we thought with our brains, none of this would have happened.”
The woman looked at Anamika and then at Ravi, on whose lap sat a clearly uncomfortable Shambhavi. “Suffering, suffering,” Ravi said.
Anamika tensed up. Ravi would probably say something stupid. “I don’t want to go back to Bhutan,” said Anamika. “Not in a hundred years. Not until I die. The country has treated us worse than animals. I am aware of the difficulties resettlement in a foreign country will pose, but I’ll learn.” Should she share the story of her character? What if they found out later? Would they remove her from the list of refugees selected to move to America?
“That’s why we have this interview.”
“And I want my daughters to grow up with a country, to know that they won’t be removed from another country again.”
Ravi interrupted. “Can America ask us to leave, too, like Bhutan did?” He looked at Anamika when he asked the question.
“No, once you’ve been resettled, which could take more than six months from now, you will get your permanent residency—your green card—in a year. You can apply to be a citizen five years after that.”
“Can we leave the country and return as we please?” It was her father.
“Yes, you could, you are as free as any American,” She laughed. “Let me warn you, though, that plane tickets are expensive.”
“Can we go to Bhutan?” Ravi asked.
Anamika rubbed her big toe on the floor. The man would ruin her.
“If the Bhutanese embassy grants you a visa.”
The father looked like he was about to faint. “What has the world come to? We need permission to visit our own country.”
“It’s better than now,” Ravi said. “We don’t get to visit it with or without a visa.”
This had a calming effect on his father-in-law. “What about our land and property in Bhutan, then?” Ravi asked.
“That we have no control over,” the white woman said. “The international community will continue pressuring Bhutan to figure out a solution for repatriation. It ultimately rests on Bhutan.”
“Will there be other Bhutanese in our town in America?” Anamika asked. What if a Bhutanese in the town complained to the American police about her character flaws?
“Yes, there will be. If you want to be in the same town as your relatives, we could probably work on that, too.”
“No, no, I don’t mind being the only Bhutanese in town.” That way, her story was probably safe from American authorities.
“No, some voluntary organizations will take care of your needs in the beginning. The organization will also help you out with finding suitable jobs.”
Anamika liked the idea of being a useful member of society again. She wouldn’t have to depend on anyone for her livelihood after the first couple of months, the white lady had said. Now if only she could get her story out of the way. It had to be done now.
“Is it a problem if one of us in the family doesn’t have good moral character?” She was hesitant.
“I don’t understand you,” the white woman said.
“I am her second husband,” Ravi quickly explained. He was about to add something else, but Anamika punched him under the desk. He slapped her hand away. The white woman most definitely noticed.
“We don’t care how many husbands you have, Anamika,” said the white woman. “What you do in your personal life isn’t any of our business.”
Ravi got up. Anamika dug the nails of her left hand into her right palm. “What about her?” he asked. “Will she have to wear pants once she moves to America?”
“She can wear anything she wants. It’s a free country.”
“I’d prefer that she not wear them,” he said by way of explanation.
Anamika let out a deep breath when Ravi let matters rest there.
The reporter asked Ravi if she could take a picture of his family. “Only the four of you,” she raised her hand with the thumb down, “father, mother, and daughters.”
She motioned Diki and Shambhavi to a wooden bench while Ravi and Anamika stood up behind them. “Can you all smile for me?” she asked in a language no one understood.
“Haasnu rey,” the white woman translated.
The camera whirred and clicked. Once. Twice. Three times.
“Perfect family, perfect picture,” the reporter said in Nepali. “Thank you.”
THE GURKHA’S DAUGHTER
The day after Gita and I combined our miniature kitchen sets, we boasted to the other girls at Rhododendron International Boarding School that we owned a bigger bhara-kuti collection than any other nine-year-old in Kathmandu. We had steel utensils, plastic ones, a glass set and gold-plated ones, and these did not include the new set Gurung Bada and Appa had recently sent us from Hong Kong. In addition, Aamaa had, in a charitable mood, given us a few plates—real-life plates—from her kitchen. The glass set we used when we had special pretend guests.
That day, our special guests would be our Gurkha fathers. We’d play our respective fathers and ourselves. Gita had stolen two fake mustachios from Drama Sir’s desk in the staff room.
We donned our mustachios, and Gita even wore a black hat. Gurung Bada never wore a hat, but Gita took a little wardrobe liberty. Her Phantom cigarette sweet that dangled between her lips was again out of character—for neither of our fathers smoked—but I didn’t mind because she gave me one, too, which I tucked above my ear.
“Give me some beer, Budi.” Gita looked back. “And Gita, turn the jaabo tape recorder off. Your Appa and Bada are talking.”
“Okay, Appa,” Gita said in a meek voice, and took off her mustache.
“We are nothing but killing machines to them,” Gita spat out, her mustache back on. “They still treat us like dogs.”
“No, Numberee, no, don’t be angry,” I said, not knowing what to add.
“All these years in service, but will they take care of us after that?” Gita said, angry. “No. We will be discarded like socks and shoes. The pension will be worth nothing. How is it that all the other regiments in the British Army get a proper pension? It’s only us, brave Gurkhas, who get a fifth of what the others get. Brave indeed! Foolish is what it is.”
“Let’s count our blessings, Numberee,” I countered, stopping my mustache from falling by supporting it with my thumb. “We’d otherwise be in the police, making nothing. What is there to do in this country? We are lucky we got out on time.”
“And that McFerron chutiya,” Gita slurred, taking swigs of water from her miniature glass cup and almost breaking it when she placed it on the ground with force. “He has asked me to bring my drinking down, like it’s his father’s alcohol I am consuming. Stupid Tommy Atkins that he is—he thinks we are unequal. I haven’t created a scene, have I? I haven’t picked fights with anyone. I am a peaceful drinker. But the white bastard doesn’t think so. I am tired of it.”
“Think of it, Numberee,” I said, conscious that my part was small and that I wasn’t doing a very good job of it. “Our daughters are in a good English-language school. Our wives live well.”
“I think I wil
l be the first Gurkha court-martialed because McFerron doesn’t like me drinking.” Gita was now biting her cigarette sweet. “Bloody English.”
“He says he’s Irish.”
“English, Irish, Scottish—who cares?” She drank some more of the imaginary beer. “They are all the same to me. They all get regular pensions—five times more than we do. It’s only we who are inferior to them—we the brave Gurkhas.”
“Aamaa, I am hungry,” I said, taking my mustache off.
“Yes, Budi, I am hungry, too,” Gita said, her mustache still on. “Feed us Gurkhas, feed us brave people and our families, for with the pension we receive, we may be starving a few years from now.”
“Aayo bir Gurkhali,” Gita sang, in an unmistakable imitation of Gurung Bada’s voice. It was a song both Gita and I knew—our fathers had taught us. Sometimes, our mothers sang it to us as a lullaby. I joined in as Gita sang one line in her father’s voice (with the mustache on) and another in hers (with the mustache off). I tried doing the same, but both my voices sounded similar.
Gita had only the bottom pink portion of her cigarette left.
“Here,” I said, breaking mine into half. “You can eat some of mine.”
She bit the half into another half.
“Delicious,” she said.
“I know,” I said, and then back in character again, with the mustache on, I added, “Let’s eat all we can here because there is no food like home food. Numberee, this is after so long that both your family and my family are together under the same roof.”
“Yes, I know.” Gita said, bored now.
I’d need to think of a new character to keep her interested.
“Call the pointy-nosed astrologer,” I said. “Call him so we can all see the white hairs covering his ears.”
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