Celebrating Onam
Nimi Kurian
8 February 2008, 08:12“Is lunch ready?” he asked.
It was one, so obviously it was ready. But she didn’t say anything. Just nodded. Nita worked like clockwork. Her husband, Mohan wanted his meals at the right time and his tea and snacks at regular intervals. Yes, food was an important part of his day.
Well, there wasn’t much else he had to do. So perfectly cooked meals – or rather, nutrioutious meals, as he called them were the order of the day.
He sat down to lunch. Nita never sat with him because he always watched her plate to see if she took too much chicken or vegetable. He served himself nice large helpings.
“How did you cook this chicken. Its so tasteless.” Nevertheless he did finish what he had served himself and helped himself to some more.
“The vegetables have been cooked too much. They have no nutrition now. Haven’t you seen how my mother cooks the vegetables? That’s the way to cook them!”
He continued with his criticism and his meal. Forty five minutes later he had had his last slurp and got up to wash his hands.
Nita had to decide what he would like for his four o’clock tea break. And after that it would be dinner. And then the next day, the routine would continue. The cooking, the feeding, the criticism, the eating…
“I don’t know how I am going to spend the rest of my life cooking this man’s meals!” she thought to herself. As she lay down to sleep, thoughts crowded her mind. She imagined herself, ten years from now…twenty years…thirty years…. A cold shiver went down her spine. Tears filled her eyes. No, she couldn’t let this happen. She had to do something. But what? She had no job, no money, no house…
“Oh! Its all so hopeless!” she sighed as she turned over in her bed.
She woke at five a.m. and began cooking. By 7.30 breakfast was ready. She set the table and waited. Promptly at 8 he appeared.
“Is breakfast ready?” he asked, sitting down. She nodded, and brought out the puttu and kadala.
“Where is the banana?”
“I want sugar.”
“And some pickle.”
“Make me a fresh pot of tea. The tea you made in the morning was so weak…”
He began to eat and the complains began. There was not enough coconut in the puttu, the kadala curry was not tasty enough and on and on and on…
Nita’s head was swimming by the time he got up from the table. She snatched a hasty breakfast, washed up and got dressed to go down to the grocery store and the vegetable market. Before that she had to get some money from him. He questioned her thorougly about what she wanted to buy, the quantity of each item, the relevance of others. Then he checked out the prices on his computer and decided on a sum of money which she could have for the shopping. There was no money there for an auto, so she had to walk.
First she went to the grocery store.
She gave the list to George. “Try some of our halwa. Its freshly made,” he said. Nita looked across the counter. The halwa was there, freshly made, oozing oil. She couldn’t resist it.
“Ok George. I’ll have a quarter kilo. It looks too delicious to resist.”
“Ha ha, I know you have sweet tooth. Don’t worry I will send it with your groceries.”
Nita rushed off to the vegetable market. She had half an hour in which to finish buying the vegetables and get back home. If she was late Mohan would get suspicious and then question her about where she had been, and who she had seen or who she had spoken to. Initially, this questioning had upset her. But now, with the years, she had learnt to handle it better – she just refused to talk. But all the same it was unpleasant and she could do with less unpleasantness in her life. Quickly she finished her vegetable shopping and rushed home, carrying the heavy basket.
She had barely put the vegetables in the kitchen when the doorbell rang. She went to answer it.
“Who is it?” shouted Mohan from his room.
“It’s the groceries,” said Nita.
Immediately Mohan was there. He collected the list from the boy and began to check each item – the price, the quantity, the date of manufacture, date of expiry. Item by item. Suddenly he came across the quarter kilo halwa. He pounced on it.
“What is this? What is this?” he shouted.
The boy answered, “Halwa sir, Madam wanted it.”
“Nita, Nita. Come here. Did you order this halwa?”
She nodded, already humiliated before the delivery boy.
“But it is not on the list. How can you buy it? You did not ask me…”
Nita walked off, unable to stand it any longer.
“Take it back. And now retotal…”
Finally, Mohan had paid the boy and send him away. Then he came into the kitchen to check out the vegetables. Nita gave him the list and showed him what she had bought and how much each had cost. Then he totalled the bill and strecthed out his hand for the balance. She handed it to him and began to put away the vegetables. Then she picked up the groceries and went into the kitchen. It was time for lunch.
The phone rang. She went to answer it. It was her mother-in-law.
She asked her to hold on and went to call Mohan.
She overheard his side of the conversation.
“Oh yes. Next week is Onam.”
“Yes, yes. All of you can come for lunch.”
“No. there is no need for you to come and help. Nita will manage fine.”
When he put the phone down, he shouted into the kitchen.
“Next Wednesday is Onam. Everyone will be coming for lunch.
The children want adprathaman, but ammachy wants semiya payasam. And Rachel says make sure there is inji puli…”
Something snapped in Nita’s mind.
“Inji puli, adaprathaman, payasam…” she thought. “I’d show them all!”
That night she checked out the amount of money she had managed to secrete away over the years. It was barely 500 ruppees. The next morning, when Mohan had locked himself in his room, she ran out of the apartment and asked the caretaker to book her rail ticket. She told him to keep it till she came by and picked it up.
The rest of the week she cooked and cleaned, and cooked and cleaned. Mohan thought she was getting ready for Onam and he nodded his head approvingly.
The Onam holidays had begun and on Tuesday all the shops closed. The whole state celebrated the festival and shops would open only next week. Tuesday night, she had almost cleared up everything in the fridge. There was just enough foodstuff for breakfast.
After breakfast Mohan disappeared into his room. She cleared the table, washed up and stacked away the dishes. Next she cleaned out the fridge. She wiped and polished till it shone. Then she packed a small bag.
She left a note:
Dear Mohan,
Happy Onam. I am sure you and your family will have a great time celebrating the festival. I will not be there to celebrate with your family as I am leaving.
Nita.
P.S. Oh! And I almost forgot. You are short of vegetables, meat, fish, chicken and groceries…
VERY POWERFUL, VERY TOUCHING BUT EXTREAMLY DISTRESSING.
Men without shadows….,
This story makes ones eyes fill up.
— JUDE THADDAEUS · Feb 10, 03:10 · #
feel sad for nita, an eye opener for all us men.
— raaj · Feb 11, 14:29 · #