Chinna stood near the well, well outside
the gates of Ammachi’s kitchen, drawing buckets of water. The Municipal
Corporation water had not filled the pipes that day; some burst near the slums.
She passed on pales of water so Ammachi could boil it for her cooking, cribbing
all along about how the slum dwellers were using her well. Chinna though unable
to hear or speak, challenged by the senses, knew every comma and full stop
Ammachi voiced, for years of life together.
She uttered not a word, only twisted her
lips in disgust thinking with indignation of her employer’s, perhaps hypocrisy,
perhaps fate. Limping, she stood at the door and handed my cousin Emmanuel the
bucket of water 'to pass along to the old lady,' she seemed to say. Ammachi in
turn gave Emmanuel a coconut to pass along to her lower caste help, her
lifeline. “Ask her to grate it in the service kitchen please.”
Chinna did as she was told. My cousins
and I squatted around Chinna to munch on fresh coconut as Ammachi cribbed away
while making delicious fries with her expert, wedding-supervisory hands, from
tales of yore. Our babbling Chinna lovingly let us dig in, though feigning
anger when she perceived her employer’s stare from the kitchen. This was my
earliest memory of my grandmother’s kitchen.
When the task was done, Chinna got up on
her limp to hand over the plate to Ammachi. When I refused to pass the parcel, she
raised her lip and arched her eyebrows towards the lady at the helm. That’s
when I understood she was not allowed in the kitchen.
And, as I passed the plate to Emmanuel,
the chosen one, Chinna realized that she was only as much an outcast as me,
Ammachi’s daughter’s daughter.
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