The Scent of Mogra and Other Stories

by Aparna Kaji Shah

  I know now that she thinks of me often. I can see that she writes stories, and some of the characters she creates are based on me. I didn’t realize that I had such an impact on her, for it was her father with whom she had intellectual conversations. I guess, because I did not go to college, we didn’t talk about serious things. But we did spend time together, and what did we talk about? Oh, new recipes, what I saw at the bazaar, about our friends and relatives. She would tell me about her colleagues and her students. Then she would pick up a book to read. She was always reading novels. Sometimes, she would tell me a little of the story, and say, “What do you think she should do? Should the heroine leave home, or stay and make the best of things?”

  “But where would she go?” I would ask.

  “She would have to be courageous, earn money, and lead her own life. It’s better than putting up with hypocrisy,” she would say.

  “It’s more difficult than it sounds.” I would then get up to make tea, and bring her a cup before she started grading papers.

  When Tina was in elementary school, I would buy her books like Cinderella, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and would tell her stories about kings and queens, and palace intrigues. I changed the stories a little each time, and that fired Tina’s imagination. I would also recite nursery rhymes that I had learned at school.

  She was growing up fast though, and started spending more time with her brother. But I think that I did instill in her a love of words.

  I feel as if I am aloft a current of air that is gently pushing me along. I see a light ahead. It doesn’t hurt my eyes, though. It is bright, but soft. Maybe I’m about to be born again. No, I’m still in the world of the dead. Is it what we called heaven? For it is full of light and fragrant air; there is mellifluous music, and when the breezes touch me softly, I overflow with love and joy.

  ***

  “Princess Megha! Come back, it’s time for your sarangi lesson.” Her lady-in-waiting, Gangabai, is running towards her, and she lets go of her friend’s hand as she turns to leave. Her father, the maharaja, will be angry if she is late for her lesson. She enjoyed playing the sarangi. She also loved to listen to her other tutors talking about distant lands, their myths and legends. Her friends were not as lucky, either because they were the children of lesser courtiers, or because their fathers were not liberal enough to let their daughters study.

  But which life am I describing? I had started talking about my life with Ramesh and Tina; it was the scent of mogra from an incense stick that set me off. Megha’s life as a princess is, I think, one of Tina’s previous lives. Perhaps, it unfolds before me for a special reason; perhaps, it will give me an insight into Tina’s suffering.

  “Megha, you have to understand that you’re growing up. We must find a match for you. You’re almost seventeen.” The maharaja said. The rani, her mother, was there too, nodding in agreement. Megha had been downcast ever since she had heard that a young prince from a neighbouring state was coming in two weeks, with his parents, to see her. Now she looked down, twisting the satin ribbon with which her plaits were tied around her index finger.

  “I don’t want to get married yet, I want to live with you,” she said. “I want to study more, I want to learn dancing, and I want to play with my friends at court.” Her mother smiled, but her father was not amused.

  “Child, it’s time to grow up and live in the real world. Prince Uday is a bright young man, a brave soldier, and very fond of music. You will like him.”

  “But what will I do if I can’t have my tutors, if I can’t be with my friends?”

  “You will have enough to keep you busy with family and social responsibilities,” replied her mother.

  Her father said, “No more discussion. Make sure you’re ready to greet them when they arrive next week.” Megha spent the rest of that day playing soulful melodies on the sarangi.

  The next week, when Prince Uday and his family arrived, their palace was decorated with mogra flowers and incense, and there was music everywhere. Once all the welcome rituals were performed, and the guests were finally seated, Megha was asked to enter the sitting room. Her mother came to get her. Megha was dressed up in a new silk ghaghara, and bedecked with gold and pearls. The queen told her daughter to keep her eyes cast down, and not to look at their guests straight in the eye, as she usually did when she was spoken to. But she quickly stole a glance at Prince Uday, who was looking at her. He smiled when he caught her glance. Well, at least, he doesn’t seem to be the grim and stuffy sort, she thought. And within a matter of days, her marriage was fixed up.

  It was such a relief when Tina’s marriage was fixed up. She was twenty-eight, and we thought that she would remain unmarried. She was so caught up with her teaching career and college life, and she didn’t seem to be particularly interested in anything else. She was going to be far away, all the way in Canada, and we didn’t know anyone there. When I got married at seventeen, I only moved from Ajmer to Ahmedabad.

  Prince Uday was such a charming man —bright, articulate, and well-read. Megha enjoyed being with him and was falling in love. It was a joyful time in her life. Of course, she missed her home, her friends, parents, and tutors. But Uday was a wonderful teacher. They had different musicians come and play for them almost every evening. Women found him handsome and exciting, and Megha felt her first twinges of jealousy. Sometimes there was dancing, and even the dancers looked at her husband. But then Uday always looked at her and smiled in that special way that made her heart melt, and she brushed aside her jealousy, even if she thought that he was returning their glances. On some other evenings, it would be just him and Megha in the sitting room. He would read from new books that he had ordered … history, poems, or stories. She cherished this time with him.

  In their second year of marriage, she was with child. Uday and his family were thrilled. He treated her with such gentleness. There would be an heir to the throne. His father, the maharajah, was old and unwell, and there was talk of him handing over his kingdom to his son. Megha would be a rani. Would Uday then be able to spend time with her as he did now? But, she thought, she too would be busy with the baby, and with her duties as a queen.

  It was a girl. All the pampering and tenderness suddenly stopped. Uday seemed excited about being a father, but Megha could see that he was covering up his disappointment that it was not a son. Some of her in-laws looked at her almost disdainfully, as if to say she was not capable of producing a son. Though Megha didn’t think Uday believed that, she felt some tenseness creep into his interactions with her. Nor did he have the time any more to read with her, as he was weighed down by important matters of state. His father participated less as each day went by. Sometimes, Uday returned to their chambers so late that Megha was already fast asleep.

  But the joy of Megha’s life was her little daughter, the princess Yamini. She had large dark eyes and a mop of black hair. She was fair with rosy cheeks and a ready smile on her face. She was alert, and seemed to notice every little thing, especially a change in her mother’s moods. Megha often thought that the baby would speak to her if she could, for her eyes spoke volumes, and she seemed to understand every nuance of what Megha felt.

  Then one day Uday told her curtly that they were at war with her father’s kingdom, and that she was not to communicate with friends or family in her home state in any way whatsoever. “What?” she said. “I’m to go home next month with Yamini. They haven’t even seen her yet.”

  “You cannot go now. There is no way that I will send a child of mine to the enemy.”

  “You forget that the enemy is my family, and your child’s grandparents.”

  “You cannot go, Megha. Unfortunately, this is a state matter.” Uday’s tone was softer now.

  And that was that. She longed to be with her parents. She wasn’t allowed to go there for her delivery as was customary, for Uday’s parents wanted their grandchild to be born in their palace.
She wondered for how long the war would continue, and when she would be able to go home.

  Home. I made homes in so many cities, just like Tina. How did you manage this, you ask? A good question. Yes, it drains you both physically and emotionally to live in different places, and then pack up and leave again, just when the unfamiliar has become familiar, just when you feel that you now know people you can talk to. I, of course, was happy being a housewife, but Tina could not have a career because of all their moving about. They moved from Toronto to London, to Singapore, then Mumbai, and back to Toronto. A very disruptive life. But enriching at the same time. Everywhere they moved she tried to find something meaningful to do and enjoyed it. She thought of herself only after the children were settled and the house was set up. It’s high time though she starts to think of herself first, now that the children have grown up; this is her time.

  The war was about a narrow tract of land between the two kingdoms, a piece of land with rich soil. Each side claimed it for itself. What a thing to fight over and cause so much anguish for me, Megha thought. She hadn’t seen her parents for so long. Uday was hardly spending time with her, and she was lonely without real friends. It was almost three years since her marriage, and instead of being closer to one another, she and Uday were drifting apart. He wasn’t particularly interested in the child, and didn’t have much of a relationship with her. Every evening he was busy, or so he said. Busy with what? Megha would ask. And he would mumble something about the affairs of the state, the war, and so on. And then he stopped coming to her bed, using Yamini as an excuse. He didn’t want to be woken up by her. He needed a good night’s rest for all the hard work he put in during the day. Though Yamini hardly woke up in the nights now.

  The worst can never happen to me, we all think, and when it does we are totally unprepared. Megha found out that Uday had taken up with a dancing girl. I’m still so young, she thought. Why does he need a concubine? Megha confronted him the same evening. Uday just shrugged his shoulders, and said, “I’m a man, a prince, and it is normal to have a mistress. I’m taking care of you, and you are my queen. I can seek my pleasures elsewhere if I want.”

  Megha said, “But I love you and I thought you loved me. Why don’t you ever come to my bed? Why don’t we spend time together, reading, talking, as we used to do?” Uday raised his eyebrows and left the room.

  The years passed. Uday’s parents passed away and princess Yamini became a young woman. She was better educated than her mother. Megha had made sure of that. But she fell in love with her tutor, and wanted to marry him. Uday brought suitors to the palace, young men from noble families, some highly educated, and others who had seen the world. Yamini was adamant. Megha tried to reason with her, as mother and daughter had a close bond.

  Megha thought of her daughter as a friend. She was the love of her life, as she had lost the love of her husband. Yamini was an only child, and though she had a few friends, she was closer to her mother than to any of them. She had grown up seeing the distance between her parents, and her mother’s melancholy, and so now she refused to marry someone “suitable” and risk not being loved. Megha secretly empathized with her daughter. Finally, late one evening, she sent her off with money and jewels to be with her love, when Uday was in the arms of his mistress. There was great confusion and feverish activity, when in the morning, the princess was missing. Megha participated in the outcry, and then the search. In the meantime, Megha had received news that her daughter was safely on her way to a place far away from her father’s kingdom, and would soon be married to the man she loved, in the presence of his parents. Megha hoped they would love her like a daughter. Megha cried her heart out, not because Yamini was missing as the others thought, but because she had no companion to lighten the burden of her lonely life.

  Megha, as her life unfolds before me, reminds me of Tina, as she grew up from a little girl to a mother of two sons. Perhaps, Tina is unhappy just as Megha was, for the same reasons. Has she then not finished with unfaithful or unsuitable husbands? Or does she have to live through this over many lifetimes? Perhaps, it is a lesson she has not yet learned — to let go, to seek contentment within herself.

  Tina had often thought of what it would be like to live in another age, a period far back in history. How exciting it would be to be part of Emperor Akbar’s court! But if she had been there in yet another life, she may have also experienced deep loss. So often, the same problems follow women across generations, across cultures; a princess in Emperor Akbar’s court in the sixteenth century may have been betrayed by her prince, just as now, my Tina feels the anguish of her husband’s infidelity. And we have seen Megha, somewhere between those two eras, suffering in the same way. And ironically, it is sometimes women who perpetuate injustices against women; whether it is the cruel mother-in-law, or other women who cast their spell on men. Tragedies and disillusionments cling to women like dark shadows, never letting go. To be free, the victims must change, must grow. I see Tina growing now, growing in a spiritual sense, nurturing the strength within her. Just as Megha did after Yamini left, while Uday led an increasingly decadent life.

  Many months after Yamini was married, Uday found her whereabouts. Knowing that she was happy and with child, he decided to leave her be. It would be worse to bring the matter out into the open, drag her back home, and make his family a target of jibes and sneers. His reputation, thankfully, Megha thought, was more important to him than his daughter, and so she would be left in peace. Nobody ever found out about Megha’s part in Yamini’s escape. And since Uday and Megha led separate lives, Megha could visit her daughter from time to time and see her grandchildren. If Uday knew that Megha was away for short periods of time, he did not care. When she went, she took with her gifts for her son-in-law’s family, and especially for her grandchildren. She was made to feel very welcome, and mother and daughter spent long hours together talking. Megha attempted to help with the household chores Yamini had to do, though Megha had never lifted a finger before in her life. She, however, was good with the children, and got them ready for school on time. In the evenings, when Yamini was preparing dinner, Megha would sit with the two boys and the little girl, and tell them stories from her childhood, and about their mother when she was a child, and the three pairs of eyes would shine with fascination. When it was time for Megha to return home after a visit that often lasted a couple of weeks, her grandchildren begged her to tell them when she would come again.

  I visited Tina for a couple of weeks when they were living in London. I played with my youngest grandchild. The cough I had developed in Mumbai before coming to London persisted, though Tina gave me different cough syrups. They seemed to help for a while, but the cough always returned. A month after returning to Mumbai, I had bad news; I had a disease that filled my lungs with mucus. I had less than a year to live. Little did I know when I was in London that it would be the last time I would see my daughter’s children. The other bad news was that Tina and her family would return to Canada soon, and so be further away from Mumbai.

  Megha spent the time between visits ordering gifts and clothes for her grandchildren. She had taken up playing the sarangi again. A court musician oversaw her progress. It was a surprise that she had not forgotten what she had learned as a young girl in her father’s palace, and with practice, it all came back to her. Her parents were still alive. The war with her husband’s state had left her father’s fortune depleted, and her father looked old beyond his years. Now that the war was over, she could visit her parents and she went often. She loved to meet her childhood friends and talk with them about their lives. Sometimes, when it was possible for Yamini to get away, she came to her grandparents with the children.

  We were not there for Tina when they moved to Mumbai; we had already passed over. She felt that keenly. We could have spent some golden moments with our grandchildren, but it was not to be. Fortunately, Tina has fond memories of my parents. When Tina was little, she would come with me wh
en I visited them. She would sit next to her grandfather and play with his short silver hair. “Your hair feels like a hair brush,” she would say to him. My father would look at her with his twinkling grey eyes and laugh. When Tina finished school with high grades, my father gave her a red and white batik sari and a small statue of the goddess Sarasvati, the goddess of learning. For years, Tina would not part with these gifts.

  Tina’s sons do not have such memories of us. Now she hopes that she will be a part of her grandchildren’s life when her sons get married. Megha was lucky, that she was so loved by Yamini’s children. That made her life bearable, and slowly she ceased to care what her husband did. Will Tina find love in the form of her grandchildren? We all hope to love and be loved in return during our short time on Earth.

  When Uday passed over, Megha was sad that her marriage had been a failure and she mourned for him for some time. Uday’s nephew became the next maharajah, and was very considerate of his aunt, and of his cousin, Yamini. Megha continued to have her own quarters in the palace, and now that Uday was no more, Yamini and her husband could visit with the children during the holidays. And Megha had never been happier. She found fulfillment in teaching her grandchildren, in arranging music lessons for her granddaughter, and martial arts lessons for her two grandsons. She followed their progress avidly, and discussed the lessons with the tutors. As for herself, Megha studied the scriptures, and had a teacher come in to discuss difficult points with her. Finally, now that she was almost fifty, she felt that she was leading a full and happy life.

  Joy and sorrow are a part of what it means to be human. The trick is to “treat those two impostors just the same” as Rudyard Kipling said in his poem “If.” Tina read the poem out loud to me when she was in college. Some people achieve a degree of equilibrium, and then they are the happier for it.