SELECTED PROSE
Finger
The needle-like drops of rain were falling rapidly on the tin roof. If this was the case in Singapore, what would it be in India?
Pavadai was very worried. But would he get a break because he was worried? He stirred the curry he was making, and checked if it was done by taking a quick sip of it from his palm.
He thought it was too salty. So he hurriedly took two potatoes and cut them into small pieces, adding them to the curry. In the meanwhile, he packed the cabbage into the Tupperware container. He fried some pappadams for himself. Before he could pack them, the curry was ready. Now the salt was fine. His friends had taught him that adding potatoes would help if the curry turned out too salty.
The cooking was done once he had packed the curry. It was a good meal – curry, cabbage, meat and pappadams. Heaven!
He had never gone to the kitchen as long as he had been in India. Neither his mother nor his wife Ponnuthayi had allowed him to do so. But as a construction worker in Singapore, he had no choice but to cook for himself. And his food was not bad, too! Pavadai and his friends would buy a whole chicken at the end of each month and prepare a sumptuous meal with chicken curry and cucumber dipped in yoghurt with pappadam. The meal would afford them some relief from their hard work.
Once lunch was over he would go to Little India where he would meet up with friends from back home. For many workers like Pavadai, there was no joy comparable to spending their Sunday afternoons in the streets of Little India with friends from their home villages. Meeting old friends gave them the momentary satisfaction of seeing something of the home they missed so much. If they had some money, they would catch a new movie after meeting their friends.
What else could they do? They had no one here, no relatives, and no friends. This was not our country, Pavadai would think with resignation once in a while.
He would leave for the construction site with its monstrous machines immediately after waking up and after filling his stomach with some food each morning. He would only stop work at his welding machine when it was time for lunch.
He would open the packet of canteen food. His shirt would already be crumpled and stink of perspiration. The canteen food was not too bad – they sometimes had a piece of fried fish or a piece of chicken. It was the price that terrified him. Moreover, he could not eat the Singapore food such as tempeh, tahu goreng and kangkong that sometimes made an appearance in the canteen fare. He usually threw the local dishes away and just ate rice and curry. For this reason, Pavadai never attempted to eat canteen food again. He would just eat some watery soup and rice with pickles and carry on with his work. He would usually do overtime if was available after five p.m. The friends who stayed at the same container with him would have prepared dinner by the time he returned at night.
He would shower, eat and call Ponnuthayi if he still had some money left in his handphone. Ponnu was now pregnant. His elder son was three years old. She had conceived her second child when Pavadai went back on leave following a work injury. Although he had wanted to control himself, God’s will had been different.
Ponnuthayi’s soft body and her loving words broke all his resolve. He was an ordinary man after all. Although Ponnu said that God would take care of all things, she was suffering a lot since the second child had been conceived. Pavadai had been around for the first child and he had bought her all her favourite foods during her pregnancy. His mother also chipped in to take care of Ponnu and cook nutritious dishes for her. Nourished by all this, Ponnu had given birth to a strong baby boy.
But now, there was no mother. His mother-in-law was looking after his wife and son now. Although his father-in-law was his wife’s father, he would only be able to provide for them if Pavadai sent him money monthly. And still Ponnu would forget her own troubles and keep reminding him on the phone to take care and to eat well. He would really feel like embracing her at that moment. But India was too far away and there was no way he could make it. It was already a big thing that he had come all the way to Singapore from a very small village near Tiruchirapally.
He had to sell all of Ponnuthayi’s jewellery except her nuptial symbol, to make this trip. He had even mortgaged his family’s agricultural land in order to pay the agent.
So, Pavadai would send almost all of his salary to India, keeping just enough for his food and petty expenses. Ponnu had said that her father was buying her the tonic suggested by the village midwife. Yet, she still suffered from swollen legs. Pavadai could not erase the memory of her pale face. He had worked hard to pay off the debt to the agent over this one year.
Now he had to redeem his land. This was why he was working overtime. But still, his expenses always threatened to overtake his income.
It was then that he met with the accident. He lay in the hospital, his finger amputated and the place where it had been a bloody stump, covered with thick bandages. He had cried inconsolably when he had regained consciousness. His throat was now sore from all that crying.
The only help he had at that time was his supervisor Mr Maniam. He visited Pavadai without fail every day. He spoke to their boss and got Pavadai sent back home after his discharge. Although he was on four months’ medical leave, Pavadai could not sit still on his return to Singapore. Since he could not go back to welding, Pavadai helped to break the bricks and mix the sand. At the very least, he helped with the painting or the sweeping.
Maniam had also kindly arranged for him to receive some insurance money. He was happy when Maniam sir told him that his money would come by next week. The very thought of money delighted him. Time had passed and Deepavali was, after all, around the corner.
There was a festive spirit all over Singapore. It was impossible to walk in Little India – there was such a huge crowd of shoppers everywhere. From where did these people get so much money? The clothes, jewellery and even the shoes they bought were all expensive. Pavadai was stunned at all the money that changed hands. He would not have been able to afford all these things even if he worked the whole year. He decided that he wanted to be born in Singapore in his next life.
Worry began to creep into Pavadai’s heart as Deepavali drew closer. Although his finger would had healed well, he was still not getting any overtime. He now took over the cooking since he was back by five each evening. He washed the clothes and hung them up on raffia strings stretched out near the container. He had to wait until ten p.m. for the radio news. He did not feel like watching movies or T.V. serials. He was forever thinking of Ponnu. He also remembered the voice of his little son – “Daddy, mommy is going to have a baby. Don’t forget to buy me a toy when you come.” The memory of the little boy seared into him. He broke down on the phone.
He had named his son Veeramuthu after his own father. But everyone called him ‘Tyre’ after an incident where his son took apart a bicycle toy that his grandmother had bought for him and played with just the tyre. Pavadai was first to call him ‘Tyre’. What did it matter what his name was? The boy was his son, his precious one.
“Are you thinking of home, Pavadai?” asked Mr Maniam as he stopped his motorcycle next to him. When Pavadai said yes, Maniam said, “Don’t worry Pavadai. Your insurance money will come in two days’ time. It’s been ten months since your injury, right?” His friends gathered around him after Maniam left. They told him that the boss would only give him what was left of the insurance money after deducting the hospital expenses and air ticket back home. Pavadai was devastated.
His friends continued to talk about another employer who had dumped his injured Bangladeshi worker into a drain. Another employer had reported one of his injured workers to the police as an illegal immigrant.
“All bosses here are blood-sucking mosquitoes,” said his friends. “See, even now, our boss is going to deduct all your expenses and just give you fifty or hundred dollars. What to do? Just have to accept your fate and go back home in one piece.”
“Anyway, don’t worry Pavadai. You can use the money and set up a provision shop in India. You can survive with that, can’t you?” Even his friends’ consolation sounded like a curse to him.
Pavadai did not even feel like praying in the morning. He followed Maniam like a dead man to collect his insurance money. He could not control his tears as he looked at the bald stump of what had been his finger. “Why did I come to this terrible country? Singapore, bah!” he spat out. “I should have just stayed back home even if it meant surviving on gruel. I could have been with my wife and children at least. How will I now go back home? Ponnu! I can’t even buy you a simple nose-stud. Forgive me, Ponnu. How will I even face our villagers?”
“Come in, Pavadai.”
His Chinese boss smiled at him as Maniam ushered Pavadai into the office. The boss started speaking to him, gesturing to some forms at the same time. Pavadai could make no sense of what the boss was saying.
Pavadai bent down to sign one of the forms. The boss handed him a cheque and Maniam smiled at him,
“It’s almost three hundred thousand rupees. Ten thousand Singapore dollars,” said Maniam. “Wipe your eyes now at least.”
Pavadai could not believe his ears. “Three hundred thousand rupees – for me? Is this all for me?”
“Of course, you have lost a finger. The company is responsible, isn’t it? But – don’t ever do something foolish like this again, ok? It’s quite easy to spot the difference between an injury caused by a machine and an injury caused deliberately. I know what happened but I did not tell Boss. Think – if the injury had been worse, who would have taken care of your wife and children? Do you know how worried I was?”
Pavadai sobbed like a baby. He clung on to Maniam and cried to his heart’s content. Maniam, too, had tears in his eyes.
The rain had stopped after three days and the sun was shining brightly now. Only the leaves did not understand the silence of the trees alongside the Singapore streets.
© Kamaladevi Aravindan. Transcribed by Sumi Baby Thomas.
