The lesson goes on in this fashion for well over an hour, until both sides of my sheet of paper are filled with phrasebook Hindi. When Mr. Shukla comes to “Aapki yatra mangalmay ho,” “Wish you a happy journey,” he comes to the end of his first lesson.
“Now we pray to goddess Saraswati, Hindu goddess of learning, for what we have learned, and to ensure the successful completion of Hindi language studies.”
We shut our eyes, as before, and Mr. Shukla recites another prayer.
“Now we have tea,” Mr. Shukla announces, and, as if on cue, a grumbling Jyoti produces two cups of sweet tea. “What time will you come tomorrow?”
Hopeful that the lessons may improve when we move beyond the introductory material, I attempt to work out an arrangement that will accommodate both of us, suggesting perhaps sessions three times a week, at a time in the afternoon that might be convenient for Mr. Shukla.
“In Hindi language study, most beneficial learning time is seven a.m., after yoga,” Mr. Shukla announces with certainty. “Do you do yoga?” he asks.
I shake my head no. He looks surprised.
“Foreigners are very fond of yoga. I myself do yoga practice all seven days, as does my wife. It is excellent for health! Never mind, you come at seven a.m. irregardless.”
I explain that 7 a.m. is a little early for me; would it be possible to come at 9 a.m.?
“Nine a.m. is not possible.”
“Ten a.m.?”
“Not possible.”
“Two p.m.?”
“Two p.m. is not preferable.”
“Six p.m.?”
Mr. Shukla pauses, thinking this over with his eyes closed.
“Six p.m. Decided,” he says, opening his eyes.
We decide upon a figure for his fees that is acceptable to both of us and make plans to meet the day after next.
“Memorize the paper, and come back with supplies. Remember, Pencil Number Two!”
I nod, thanking him for the lesson and Mrs. Shukla for the tea, and scramble down the staircase and down the lane to my house before Mr. Shukla decides to add to his lesson.
14
NATIVE PLACES
BOMBAY, FEBRUARY 2002
My brother, Cassim, graduated from college a year ago and won a fellowship to study the legacy of indenture and the racial politics of the recent coup in the Fiji Islands. He’s been living there for five months—long enough to have walked the length of the main island, made friends in the local Irish bar, and been adopted by a local Indo-Fijian family. Suva, the capital city, where he lives, has a population of eighty thousand people. Because numbers are incomprehensible to me, it sounds big. Cassim chides me over the phone that I should know better: it’s about the size of Newton, the suburb of Boston we grew up in. To illustrate his point, he tells me that the previous day he was frustrated with his research and walked to a movie theater in the center of the city. He thought to himself, “No one in the whole world knows that I’m doing this.” When he ambled into the pub afterward, the bartender said, “How was the movie?” Cassim asked him how he knew he had been to the theater, and the bartender replied, “Fiji is not a very big place.”
“Come visit me in Bombay,” I tell him. “I need your help, and you’ll be inundated with anonymity.”
IT TAKES CASSIM THREE DAYS to travel from Fiji to India—retracing the steps that indentured Indian laborers took by boat in the 1860s, uprooted from home against their will, and forced by British authorities into long, unpaid contracts. Cassim crosses the black water in a series of planes: Suva to Auckland, Auckland to Sydney, Sydney to Delhi, and Delhi to Bombay. When he arrives at my apartment by taxi early one morning, we begin talking and don’t stop until late afternoon. Fiji has given Cassim’s skin a warm brown color. He seems instantly at home everywhere he is, in ways I wonder if I will ever be.
“You look thin,” I say.
“Fijians aren’t known for their cuisine,” he says.
Julie arrives, and I proudly introduce Cassim to her. Julie, ever distrustful of “mens,” gives his rumpled appearance a quick look and says, “He is needing clothes washing. I think so?”
It’s true. Cassim and his Fijian friends thought that it would be an adventure to walk to the airport, which required a trek through a wet forest. Thanks to his waterlogged shoes, my brother smells like a tropical swamp.
He tells me about his work, and I tell him about mine. Cassim laughs at me and shakes his head affectionately at how rapidly I am speaking. He silently accepts my offers of tea, toast, lunch, and I feel as if we are at home, in our parents’ house. It is so exciting to share my newfound knowledge and my frustrations with someone who knew Nana and who has the same associations. I lay out a map of Maharashtra on the floor, tracing the short distance south from Bombay to the Konkan Coast with my finger.
“Here is where the Bene Israel believe they were shipwrecked. . . . Here.” I point to the village of Navgaon. “And this is the area they settled into, several Bene Israel families in each village, working as oil pressers.” I point to a series of villages, mostly scattered along the coastline. “These are small synagogues, built in the mid-1800s, after the Bene Israel came into contact with British missionaries who recognized that they were Jewish.”
“This is wild,” Cassim says. “I had no idea.”
I take out a hand-drawn map from a book about the Bene Israel.
“This is a map of Konkan villages in Raigad District where Bene Israel families lived. See, they took their surnames from the villages where they were based. Kar means ‘from’ in Marathi. So—see the village of Pen; those families would have been called Penkar.”
“Nana’s father—I remember he had the name of Bhorupkar.”
“That’s right. See, here’s Bhorupali, right here,” I say excitedly. “And Nana’s mother was a Chordekar. I found that out from a taped interview I did with her. So her ancestors must have originally been from Chorde.”
“I see Chorde. It’s not too far from Bhorupali.”
“If Nana’s parents were typical of the time period, probably their grandparents or their parents grew up in these villages, and they more than likely grew up in Bombay. But Nana did say that her mother was from a village inside a fort.”
“That sounds like a riddle,” Cassim says.
“I know.”
“Well, let’s go check it out. I’m down for anything,” Cassim says, poring over the map.
WHEN I CALL TO MAKE a reservation for a car to take us along the Konkan Coast, I ask Bimal, the owner of the rental company, if it’s possible to hire a Marathi-speaking driver. Cassim studied Hindi in college. I figure that, between the driver’s Marathi, Cassim’s Hindi, and the maps, we should be able to fumble our way along.
“I myself will come,” says Bimal.
“Do you speak Marathi?” I ask.
“Actually, I’m originally from Delhi. I speak Hindi only. But my friend will come. He speaks Marathi and is in need of a vacation.”
The following morning, Bimal, his friend Vinod, Cassim, and I set off at six and drive south, toward the Konkan Coast. We leave the center of the city for its outskirts, passing through patches of green, then stretches of highway. I did not anticipate what a relief it would be to get out of Bombay, its thick air, the constant barrage of images crowding the brain. Within three hours, we are surrounded by a landscape of reassuring sameness: green and brown fields on both sides, a scattering of trees, local phone booths and cigarette shops, and the occasional bullock cart ambling by the side of the road.
Bimal seems unimpressed with the view, but his friend is enthusiastic. Vinod rolls the window down and breathes in the fresh air. “First class!” he exclaims, but then rolls it back up in favor of the air-conditioning that Bimal prefers.
As we get closer to our first stop, Bimal and Vinod inquire about my project.
“So you would like to meet some people who are from Israel?” Bimal asks me, creasing his forehead.
“Actually, they’
re from here. They speak Marathi and they live in this region, but, yes, they believe that they are originally from Israel. They believe they were shipwrecked in India two thousand years ago.”
“But they are basically Israeli?”
“They’re Jewish. They practice Judaism, but they have lived in India for many hundreds of years, so they are quite Indian.”
“They look Indian itself ?” Vinod asks.
“Some of them are quite fair, but, yes, on the whole they look Indian.”
“I see,” Vinod says, looking skeptical.
ALIBAG, OUR FIRST STOP, is a midsized town with beach resort aspirations. “Golden Sea Side Hotel Six Stars!” “Lilac Family Style Inn!” “Color TV!” proclaim the signs that adorn buildings in the town center. We approach a group of rickshaw drivers gathered around the central bus station, waiting for passengers, and we ask the men where we can find the synagogue; the request is met with stares.
“What is this place?” the drivers ask, gathering around. We explain that it is a Jewish temple, yahudi ka mandir, a place of worship.
“It’s a kind of church?” one driver asks. I nod yes.
“Like a church,” I reply, “or a temple. For Jewish people. Where they go to pray.”
The rickshaw drivers shake their heads in dismay.
“No, there is no such place,” one says to another. And then to me, in English, with gravity: “Madam, we are not finding this place.”
I am using the word yahudi for “Jewish,” a term with Semitic roots. It is clear that the drivers are unfamiliar with it.
“Have you heard of a community, a small community, that has been here many, many years, and they believe in one God, like the Muslims, but they don’t work on Saturdays?”
Vinod asks me what caste they are. This might help to identify them.
“They used to be known as the oil-pressing caste,” I say tentatively.
“Oh! You’re looking for the Israeli masjid !” they respond instantly, in a kind of chorus. “Why didn’t you say so earlier?”
Masjid means “mosque,” and I am surprised to hear the word used to describe a Jewish house of prayer. There is a small scuffle over who will lead us to the “Israeli masjid,” and then it is decided among the drivers that the one who lives closest to it knows it the best and should be the one to guide the way. Despite the relative clarity of the conversation with the rickshaw drivers, we are taken in a cavalcade of rickshaws to a convent school, where the lead driver parks his vehicle in the driveway and walks inside the building. I wonder to myself if he has linked the Christians and the Jews together in his mind somehow, and wish that I could ask him.
The driver ambles back, looking nonchalant, and we make a U-turn, pointing ourselves in the direction we came from. We drive at alarming speed through shady lanes until Cassim sees something out of the corner of his eye.
“Sadia, isn’t that a Star of David?”
I turn my head and see a star carved into a stone gate, with a series of Bene Israel names of people who donated money for the gate, and, in keeping with local tradition, the amount of money they gave. Behind the gate is a beautiful, crumbling old building that must be the synagogue. Bimal parks the car, and Cassim and I venture tentatively inside. The front of the structure is anchored with several pillars, which still hold a faint blue stain. The building has a kind of porch with inlaid tiles, and a large and impressive carved wooden door with an ivory mezuzah. A lone pair of sandals sits by the door frame, and we peek inside to see a very elderly gentleman dressed all in white performing his prayers on the raised platform in the center of the synagogue.
Cassim and I sit quietly on the bench. I fish out a yarmulke from my camera bag, borrowed from ORT India for this occasion, and hand it to Cassim to put on his head.
“I never thought I’d wear a yarmulke for one of your harebrained schemes. How does it look?” Cassim asks, chuckling.
“Perfect,” I say.
WHEN HE COMPLETES HIS PRAYERS, the elderly gentleman walks slowly out of the synagogue and looks unsurprised to see us standing there. He gives us a vague, benevolent smile and waves as if he is in a parade, floating by us.
“Excuse me, are you the caretaker here?” I ask, a phrase I have been practicing with my teacher, Mr. Shukla.
He looks back at us, waves again, points to a building across the street, then back at the synagogue, and keeps walking. We watch him walk down the lane slowly, with the help of his cane. I’m not sure how to proceed.
Just then we hear a loud sound of metal pots and pans crashing into one another, coming from a house across the street, and another older gentleman, slightly younger and rather portlier than the first, bursts into the lane. He has blue eyes and a large white trapezoidal mustache, and is dressed in a stained shirt that looks as if it was at one point a uniform of some kind.
“Baba! Baba!” he calls to the older man, running after him. “Sorry, sorry,” he says, and offers the man his arm, helping him reach a door several houses farther down the street. “I’m just coming!” he calls back to us, over his shoulder. “Wait right there! I am just helping Uncle here, then I will be there!”
Bimal and Vinod are parked on the opposite side of the street, listening to a cricket match on the radio.
“These are Jews itself ?” Vinod asks, pointing to the men, and I nod.
When the man reappears, he does so with a flourish. He gives a small skip, then twirls his mustache as he approaches us.
“Please excuse me. My job is to help that uncle there, from his house to the synagogue and back. He is quite old now, and in not such good health. I was eating, and I quite forgot that prayers must be finishing.”
“Are you the caretaker of the synagogue?”
“Yes, I am Mr. Ellis. I am the caretaker here. You are from which country, please?”
We explain that we are from the United States and that I am photographing the synagogues of the Konkan.
“Welcome, welcome. We have many foreigners who come here. From Israel, from U.S.A. Many people come here and see our synagogue. We are undergoing a renovation—this is why the building is in some disarray—but when we finish it, it will be more beautiful. You will have tea?”
He leads us to an open-air kitchen area in front of the house he originally emerged from, pointing to a charpoy, a kind of flat hammock bed, for us to sit on.
“Hello?” he calls, and an older woman comes out, looking sleepy and slightly cross. He speaks to her in Marathi.
“She’s your wife?” I ask after she goes inside.
“No, no,” he says hastily. “I am living alone here. This is a Hindu lady. She and her family are taking care of me, paying-guest type thing. They are giving me food on payment.”
“Does she mind making tea?” I say, feeling awkward about giving the lady trouble.
“No, no, of course not. You are my Jewish guests! Shalom!”
“You said the community is restoring the synagogue?” Cassim asks.
“Yes, yes. We will have a car park! We will have A/C! It will be more beautiful.”
“How many families are here? How many people come to the synagogue?” I ask.
“About fifty Jews are left here. And from the surrounding villages, people come to this synagogue as well. We don’t always get ten men for a minyan, but we try. On the High Holy Days we have good attendance. And sometimes people come from Bombay, or from outside. Tell me, do you know St. Louis, Missouri?” he asks us excitedly. “Do you live close to there?”
The Girl From Foreign: A Memoir Page 17
