Buttertea at Sunrise

by Britta Das

  Ugyen accompanies me to the shop and dutifully tries on the last available sizes. The shopkeeper stares at me. As a newly born foster parent, I feel shy and unqualified.

  “Do they fit?”

  I have no idea how to size any of the clothes and finally rely on Ugyen’s preference. The jacket looks much too big, even if one adjusts for a possible (but unlikely) growth spurt. Ugyen beams an elated smile and, in the end, that settles the matter. We decide on one item each, sticking to the red rubber boots for her weak and deformed feet. Walking out, I notice that Ugyen is half drowning in her uniform, and yet her steps seem less shuffling and her head is held a little higher.

  On Wednesday morning I pick Ugyen up from the police camp and, together with her little sister Karma Dema, we negotiate the curved street past the dzong and down to the primary school. Karma Dema beams with pride to walk beside her older sibling and carries both girls’ schoolbooks with extra care. Neither girl says anything, but the experienced class one student is in the best of spirits. Occasionally, she runs ahead to chat with her classmates, but most of the time she stays beside us, and with a bright smile, she encourages Ugyen’s wobbly walking.

  At the school, many curious stares and the welcoming voice of the viceprincipal greet us. “Ah, so this is Ugyen. You will come to join us in school now?” I can see that the kind man tries his utmost to make Ugyen comfortable. Still, Ugyen remains shy and answers all questions with a bare minimum of words. Worried, I look at my little protégé. She seems overwhelmed by the secretive whispers and childish stares from other students but holds her head in a stubborn gesture of indifference.

  The VP and I discuss the possibilities of getting Ugyen caught up with the current curriculum, and by the time we have settled on a temporary plan of action, classes have started. A proud Karma Dema heads off to class with her sister. Ugyen’s teacher joins us and, confused, I inquire if she is not teaching today. The petite Indian woman reassures me with a lovely smile, “Yes, madam. I will be teaching Ugyen, do not worry. But right now, they have Dzongkha class. Dzongkha is taught by the Dzongkha lopon. I will go back after this hour.”

  We talk for a little while longer and, finally, I make my own way to the cement building that houses the first and second grade classrooms. It does not take me long to discover Ugyen. The door to the classroom of IB is wide open, and Ugyen is perched on her seat in the front row beside Karma Dema. The little wooden table and bench are far too small for Ugyen’s size, and the added cushion that I made to protect her pressure sores does not help the set-up. Still, Ugyen is sitting tall and proud. She does not notice me coming, and I am able to watch undisturbed for a few minutes.

  The Dzongkha lopon, a serious-looking young man, has drawn a few pictures on the blackboard, labelled with letters that I cannot recognize but assume must be the Dzongkha alphabet. Pointing to the board, he reads out the letters and a boy in the last row recites them.

  To my surprise, the lopon now asks Ugyen to repeat. Ugyen is flushed with concentration and bravely pronounces each sound. Nodding encouragingly and correcting her pronunciation, the lopon asks a few more times, and after she volunteers several timid attempts, he seems satisfied. Smiling, he calls out “Lekso!” and on cue the entire class starts clapping their hands in applause. Forty little pairs of hands encourage Ugyen on her first day of school. All of a sudden, I am not worried any more about how IB will accept their new student.

  21

  town planning

  After five months in Mongar, the stony, winding staircase up to the bazaar is not only familiar but also dear to me. The narrow passage leading from the football field to the shops signals freedom from the hospital and promises the world of villagers and lamas. I love balancing up the wobbly incline to emerge among the colourful house fronts and large prayer wheels. Today, something has changed, though. I stand beside the chorten of the village square and stare in disbelief along the road.

  I always imagined change in Mongar would be slow in the making, and indeed, over the last few months, it has been. The mutations sneaked up gradually, quietly, so subtle you could barely notice them.

  First, there was the undeniable shift in the town population. Where initially only a handful of villagers and shopkeepers had chatted quietly in the evening hours, now the streets are filled with dark Indian faces. The construction site at the hospital is expanding, and more and more manpower and materials are assembled in town. With no entertainment other than a few shops-cum-bars, the lonely men displaced from their country by the wish to find work collect in the streets of Mongar. They are neither noisy nor disturbing, only different, unexpected in this remote district where households have lived secluded for centuries.

  After the men came the road. Town planning, as it is called. Mongar was to receive a bypass; where and how was never clear to me. In fact, why was not that certain either, other than the reason that Mongar had been blessed with someone’s decision to develop it. What became painfully clear, however, is that town planning meant death to the trees. Every last one was felled, and after a brutal frenzy of slash and burn, Mongar is now bare and dusty, exposed to wind and weather. The green giants that used to shelter the town under their protective arms have been chopped and bundled and are waiting to be fed to someone’s wood stove.

  I have watched these mutations in surprise and disappointment, wondering what will be sacrificed next to the gods of modernization. My doubtful eye is unappreciated, I know. Mongar is embracing its advances with open arms.

  Though perplexed and shocked, today I am no longer surprised by any changes—except for this one. I shut my eyes, convinced that the hallucination will fly away once I catch my breath from the arduous climb, but alas, when I peek through half-closed eyelids, the illusion remains. On the right side of the road, where before an entire row of shops had surveyed the bazaar, now an empty hole gapes at me. The wooden shacks have up and disappeared overnight, and all that remains is scattered garbage and some orphaned plastic bags garlanding the bushes. The shops must have advanced to somewhere else.

  Within a few days, the changes become more permanent. The hill on which the shops used to live is removed and the road is widened. Now instead of a one-lane dirt road, we have a two-lane dirt road. Villagers and Indians alike can be seen sprawled along the construction site, loudly hammering the mountain into gravel. The shops appear not where I had expected them, higher up in town, but in the gully that leads to the hospital. There, the wooden shacks have been re-erected among pastures of mud, and the whole market looks like a refugee camp. I am told that as soon as town planning is completed, they will move again to their permanent location. “Where to?” I ask, but there is no answer.

  In an attempt to find a piece of undisturbed road, I leave Mongar town and walk down towards Redaza. The road is filled with activities and humming with life, nowhere more so than at the Indian road worker camp, just ten minutes out of Mongar. At a bend that looks towards Lhuntse, a small shanty town has been born out of dismantled and flattened mustard oil tins, corrugated sheet iron, bamboo matting, and oily pieces of cloth. The shacks line two levels of semi-flat terraces above and below the road, and are connected by a network of muddy pathways. Between the huts, strung wires are embellished with torn or worn-out pieces of clothing, washed but still stained by layers of tar and grease. Children of all ages play with stones, pieces of wood, and cast-off plasticware. Women can be seen around their houses, sweeping, dusting, and cooking, while the men have disappeared.

  When I approach, a group of scrawny, runny-nosed children jump up and wave enthusiastically.

  “Ta ta! . . . Ta ta! Ta ta!” It sounds more like a hysterical scream than a friendly greeting.

  “Ta ta!” I call back. Used to being ignored, the children giggle in obvious delight.

  My unfamiliar voice draws a few suspicious stares from the surrounding huts, but on a doorstep to my left, a thin woman smiles. I squint a little into the setting sun. Her figure seems familiar. I wave. Then I r
ecognize the slender lady. She was one of my earliest patients in the hospital. It is Dhan Maya, the Indian labourer whose back pain was my first lesson in the ways of the roadwork. We smile at each other for a while. I point at my back and mimic the universal hand gesture of a question; the woman understands. Sadly, she shakes her head. Her pain is no better.

  Cautiously, she signals me to come. Her wave with an outstretched arm is polite, her palm pointing towards the ground, as if her fingers were teasing some unseen dust towards her. I look at her “house,” the pathetic shack amid a sad pile of poverty.

  All of a sudden I need her to know that she is my friend and that I am not “too good” for her home. I would like to visit her. So I plunder through the carefully laid out rules of class and social ranking and break all unspoken laws of Mongar town. I know that I look out of place with my clean white shirt and my flowery long dress prancing through the little shantytown. There are more curious stares but no one makes a comment. The women size me up quickly with an appraising glance and then return to their chores.

  Dhan Maya beams from ear to ear. Losing no time, she asks me to enter. It is dark inside the iron hovel, but everything is tidy and clean. Immediately beside the door on the ground is a fireplace, and to its left, a kitchen corner with a couple of pots, a plastic container, and a dented aluminum bowl. There are no windows, and the light falling through the door barely illuminates the bed on the far wall. I cannot see what exactly the bunk is made out of, but it is covered by a big clean blanket and from now on serves as my honourable seat. An older, shorter lady, another familiar face from the hospital, comes in and begins to stir the fire. Then a young boy enters with a bucket of water, and Dhan Maya fills a pot.

  Our conversation is patchy at best, and must sound comical to any outside ear. Dhan Maya communicates in Bengali, and I respond in my broken Sharchhopkha. The cards are definitely stacked in her favour since she can at least understand some of what I am saying, while I am one hundred percent ignorant of the translation of any of her words. Still we chat amiably.

  Dhan Maya moves over to where I am sitting, but instead of joining me, she pulls out a key from somewhere within her sari. Quickly, she unlocks a big steel box beside the bed. Her “cupboard” makes me feel at home. I have one of those boxes myself. It stands in my bedroom, and I keep my camera and diaries locked in it—Bikul calls it my “Vietnam box.” For Dhan Maya, though, this seems to be the genie’s case. She pulls out a cup, a spoon, tea leaves, sugar, and milk powder, and then carefully locks the treasure chest again.

  While Dhan Maya prepares tea, she crouches in front of the fire. I look at her back, and my thoughts drift to her daily work on the roads. Her spine looks like a ridge of high bony bumps underneath the thin cotton blouse of her sari. Her whole frail being is folded into a meek bundle of cloth, the long, thin arms sticking out like two unconnected appendages. Only her head is held proud and erect.

  The sweet tea is delicious. While I sip on it a little awkwardly, my generous host is still busy with the fire. She gestures to her pots, and then at me. She is inviting me for dinner. With many difficulties, I excuse myself. I tell her that it is getting dark outside and that I really should return home. Dhan Maya will have none of that. With a smile, she starts preparing some potatoes. I shake my head guiltily. How can I accept food from her when I know that she cannot feed her family? Determined, I get up and gently tap her on the shoulder. I try my old excuse.

  “Pholang ngamla.” She does not understand, but her son does. He translates, and by the pitying look she sends to my stomach, I know that an aching belly is something that she is more than familiar with.

  Nodding, she puts the potatoes aside, but then she obviously reconsiders or thinks of something else. Expertly, she rekindles the fire. Again, she opens her treasure chest. This time, she pulls out two eggs. There is simply no stopping her. I accept the hard-boiled eggs with a humble gesture of gratitude. Dhan Maya watches happily while I eat the offered fare. Unsure of the proper etiquette, I peel my eggs and then dip them into the coarse salt on a side plate.

  When I finally get up, Dhan Maya understands that I have to go. Outside, darkness is about to swallow the ragged outline of the rough shantytown. Candlelight seeps through the many cracks and holes in the walls and plays in ghostly shadows on the ground. A few women gather outside Dhan Maya’s hut, and a gentle commotion stirs. I wait. Through the whispering voices, Dhan Maya’s son approaches from the neighbour’s hut. He carries a flashlight, the heavy-duty, indestructible kind that you find all over India. Touched by their kindness, I bid my Indian friends goodbye. With her gentle voice, Dhan Maya thanks me for coming. In her chapped, hardworking hands, two white eggs reflect the light of the moon. Timidly, she offers me the gift. I am humbled and ashamed that I have nothing to give to her. Desperately, I hope that she understands how grateful I am. “Kadinche la, Ama, Kadinche la.”

  Her young son lights the path for me back to the road. Back to the construction site, back to their daily merciless labour. I turn down the trail to the hospital.

  22

  dharma or dollars

  A Hole in the Sky

  A patch of white cloud appeared

  and drifted behind the mountain range

  A lama turned the last page

  of an ancient script.

  Ten years, ten months, ten hours

  and ten minutes inside a lhakhang.

  And now, he was ready to read

  the last page.

  Down the valley,

  somebody fired a bullet

  And the sound echoed off the mountains.

  The white cloud stopped drifting.

  His eyes were sunken

  and his skin was dry and wrinkled.

  The ancient script dropped

  as the old lama started to shiver.

  “Om . . .?”

  —Annitt Kumar, 1997

  At the end of November, our DMO moves to the large home of the previous hospital supervisor, vacating his house at the centre of the hospital campus. After some initial misgivings by the hospital’s administration, I am offered the now empty Class A quarters. Delighted to leave the damp ground-floor apartment, I decide to move my few belongings one more time.

  “That’s great!” Bikul is immediately enthusiastic. “You will live next door to me. And the house is not bad—but it’s all cement, of course, like the other staff quarters. We’ll need to paint the walls.”

  Next thing I know, he arrives with several buckets of light yellow paint and an assortment of brushes. Looking at the foreign labels, I start to feel guilty about how much these treasures must have cost.

  Bikul frowns, astonished. “I want to do this for you. You need a good home. Come!”

  Heedless of all potential stares from the neighbours, he takes my hand and pulls me into my new abode. I laugh, thinking that Mongar’s rumour mill might get scandal-born indigestion at such an outrageous sight. Quickly, I plant a kiss on his cheek. “Let’s start painting then.”

  Together we attack the horribly stained pink walls. After each finished metre, we step back and survey our accomplishment.

  “I never knew that I like painting,” Bikul declares when the kitchen gleams in a happy yellow. Affectionately, he smears a drop of paint all over my cheek. “We’ll do the rest tomorrow, let’s go and celebrate now. I’ll take you up to Pancholing, and we’ll get more artistic inspiration.”

  Happily, I lace my fingers into Bikul’s, and only reluctantly let go of his hand once we step out into the bright sunshine of the afternoon. At this moment, the world seems like a perfect place.

  Our walk through Mongar turns into a stroll through a picture book. Beyond every ridge another valley tempts the imagination, and civilization seems to disappear in the magnificent jungles of the Himalaya. The day is quiet but for the splashing of creeks and rivers. Peaks stretch all around us, green mountains dropping in steady slopes to narrow river valleys. Bikul points out the villages he has been to in order
to treat patients. To the west, Jeposing and Lingmithang, and far away the hills of Kheng; to the south, Depong and Jungling. Southeast lies Phosrang and beyond it Chaskhar. To the east lies Mongar town, on the opposite mountain Takchhu, and marking the horizon is Kori La.

  At the top of the hill we reach the Pancholing lhakhang. Though modest and greyed by age, this small temple is very important for the villagers of this area, Bikul explains. Here, a lopon of Shabdrung Ngawang Ngamgyel came nearly five hundred years ago. As on my previous visits, a heavy padlock secures this site of ancient wisdom.

  “Bikul, does anyone ever come here?” I am curious what surprises the old temple might hold.

  “Of course, but there is only one gomchen who has a key. He lives halfway down to Norbu’s house. Do you want to go meet him?”

  I think for a minute. Looking for this lama will mean first descending the hill, only to turn around and climb up again. I consult my legs and they advise against such follies. Still, curiosity wins the upper hand.

  “Okay, let’s see if he’s there.”

  Bikul nods, then seems to think of something, pulls me aside, and whispers: “There are several very important statues inside the lhakhang and the chortens around it. Some years ago, many of the treasures were stolen, and now this gomchen is the only one who is allowed to have a key.”

  “Who stole the statues?” I ask.

  “Well, no one knows, of course, but at that time, a caretaker from over there,” Bikul points at a hill a few miles to the left, “was in charge of this lhakhang plus a few other temples in the area. One night when he was sleeping in the little house beside Pancholing, someone broke open the chortens. A lot of valuable things, including gold and zee—you know, cat’s eye?—they disappeared.