Orphans

We orphans we lament to the world:
World, why have you taken our soft mothers from us
And the fathers who say: My child, you are like me!
We orphans are like no one in this world any more!
O world, we accuse you!

-- Nelly Sachs (1891–1970)
“Chorus of the Orphans"

Haritha steals up to me after breakfast and whispers in my ear. The driver has gone home to his family. Can you walk Shalini and me to school? Ask Auntie. Go fast.

To the children, Swarna is the ever-compassionate, yet no-nonsense, matriarch Auntie. To me she is still the slender, singly-braided South Indian that studied computer science at the University of Iowa and went to church on Sundays with Kevin. It was only over the course of many meetings that I learned of her long-held ambition to start an orphanage/old persons home in her native country. It had, at that time, sounded to me like so many childhood dreams – something to be taken down from the bedroom closet shelf next to the family albums, dusted off and shared with the occasional guest as a quaint reminder of a once-innocent universe. But her dream persisted.

Haritha fires the green-apron-and-white-blouse uniformed missile of a body over the twenty-yards of crumbling concrete separating us, altering her trajectory at the very last by thrusting a bobby-soxed leg down hard and going airborne for my torso. She wraps her arms around my neck and pushes her button nose into my cheek to half-kiss her query. We go? Yes, we go, I assure her, but where is Shalini?

After graduation, Swarna found employment, first in nearby Cedar Rapids, then later in Davenport off of I-80 on the Mississippi River. Kevin and I would visit once every few months and try, most often without success, to tempt her out to dinner and a movie. She preferred to live austerely and save whatever money she made for that persistent vision born in her youth of creating a refuge for the homeless, both young and old. Her co-workers, growing ever fonder of the reticent, but quick-witted girl from Andhra, began to plant in her seeds of doubt. Wouldn't it make more sense to just send money to India and let others do the work over there for her? Her earning potential in the US was almost five times that in her homeland and she could have so much more impact. Maybe it was ego-gratification that was calling her to India and not purely concern for orphaned children and street-dwelling seniors.

Weeks of intense prayer put an end to the growing incertitude and strengthened Swarna's resolve. A deadline was set for departing for India. She was going to go for it. I remember clearly our last supper together before she left the States. We ate at a nondescript Indian restaurant under the drab-gray pall that perpetually enshrouds economically-challenged Davenport. My memory of the meeting, however, fired by the intense force of her conviction, remains saturated with color. It was a seminal moment – she was willfully drawing the stuff of dreams into the flash-bright intensity of waking reality. In spite of this, she recounted the trials that she had endured and their ultimate verdict with complete modesty. She was just an instrument and He was the doer. Classic Swarna.

With military precision, Shalini rounds the corner of the administrative villa at nine fifteen and announces she is ready to depart. I lift her unto a ledge contiguous with the building's facade, so that we are standing very nearly eye-to-eye, and then straighten her collar and adjust her belt till it is perfectly centered. I take a step back for one final inspection, and then snap my heels together before crisply saluting her. She giggles, and in a move that spanks of insubordination, jumps into my arms. I swing her to the ground and then take her and Haritha by the hand and walk through the compound gates.

Kadapa, with a sizable population of needy and relatively unserved by other agencies, was chosen as good city to pull the enterprise down from the ether and into the realm of the manifest. A hostel was found with the help of the local dioscese and populated by ones and twos with youngsters and oldsters alike. Swarna's genius was to create a household that would foster a symbiotic relationship between the two displaced populations. The children would create a vivacious environment and provide physical aid for the seniors, while the oldsters, in turn, would scold the children for their hyperactivity and not being helpful enough. Perfect.

Never married to founding principals, Swarna availed the newly christened Nav Jeevan to all manner of guest irrespective of age and familial background. Stories with a distinctly Mother Theresa flavor began to emerge. A young woman, rejected by her family and withered away by AIDs, was found languishing by the bus stand. Swarna brought her to the orphanage where she was given a bath, fed a warm meal, and provided with a clean cot upon which to sleep. Before passing away peacefully in the early hours of the morning, the woman had managed her first smile in many months. Others, suffering from physical or mental disabilities, were found work in the kitchen or cleaning the compound. Never a bleeding heart, Swarna always had a heart for the bleeding.

Immediately I start to whine. How far do we have to walk? It's not far, according to Shalini, just across the football field and... I've never walked across a football field before I complain. I'm cold, hungry, wet and tired and I have to go weewee. I wanna go home. Haritha is delighted at my apparent suffering, while Shalini, quite matter-of-factly, points out that I'm not wet. But it feels like I'm wet, I counter with hyperventilated snorts and start to remove my shirt, ostensibly to dry off. Shalini shouts her disapproval and tells me to walk simply. She will come to rue this directive as my legs immediately turn to strands of spaghetti and I start to waltz catatonically. No, walk simply. Not like that! But this is simple, I counter. You just relax your hips and knees and start to waddle like a peg-legged sailor.

The story of how Shalini came to be an inmate at Nav Jeevan is lost on me now. All too frequently the backstories here involve the death of a mother and the life of an alcoholic father, unwilling or unable to care for them. The common conception of the orphan is that where both of the child's parents have perished. The word itself comes from the Greek 'orphanos' which literally means 'deprived' or 'bereft.' But just as often as not, it is not death that robs the child of parents – it is only that the child has perished in the eyes of one or both parents. Alcoholism can kill a parent, although the alcoholic may be alive and kicking. Ironically, it is often alcohol that greases the machinery leading to the child's conception in the first place. So many young lives shaped by cheap sharaab, the influence of which is now held at bay by an imposing eight foot wall topped with broken glass.

Haritha's story is no less tragic. Her mother was found hanging in their apartment and foul play at the hands of her often inebriated father was suspected. Neighbors persisted in the casting of aspersions and a few weeks later the father, too, was found floating lifelessly just inches above the broken tiles of the bathroom floor. Grandparents cared for Haritha and her elder sister for a few short weeks, before her grandfather suffered a fatal heart attack. The widowed and grieving grandmother, too frail to serve as guardian, brought them to Nav Jeevan.

Emails, unimaginatively entitled, 'Hello from NavJeevan,' were sent every three or four months and provided updates on progress on the orphanage/old persons home. Swarna's roots in software development could be detected in a schizophrenic toggling between the very techie 'NavJeevan' sans space, and the more traditional 'Nav Jeevan.' Her spelling of Kadapa still followed the older British interpretation: C-U-D-D-A-P-A-H. A typical offering from December 1, 2003 follows in its entirety.

Dear friends in Christ,

Hope this letter finds you all in good health. We wish you all a happy holiday season. Hope you will have a meaningful advent and welcome Jesus into your hearts happily. I remember a Telugu song which says that it is true Christmas only when Jesus is born in our hearts. So let us all strive to have Jesus in our hearts always and one-day we may become like Jesus!

Hope the ones at St.Paul's had a chance to watch the video I have sent. If not contact Mary Adams. We have got 40 children with us now and 26 elderly. We have finished 3 years this October, since we started this home.

In the last 10 days we lost two old men. One man, Hussain, was with us for the last two and half years. He is diabetic and has Blood pressure. He broke his leg at the beginning of last month and was bed ridden for the last 17 days of his life. He was a huge man and we had plenty of good exercise taking care of him! The other man who died was Obaiah. We picked him up from the street at the beginning of November. He has nothing but bones. We had to give him bath and feed him. He was smelling awful and was in his last stages. He pulled on for 3 weeks before he died. He was afraid to die; though I kept talking with him. He kept calling Amma, which means mother, looking at me before he became unconscious to the surroundings and later died. That afternoon he told me that he will live for another two days, but by evening he got worse and died at 7:30PM.

A day before he died we picked up another old lady from the street. You must be wondering from where all these people are coming. Well, Obaiah did not have anybody. As long as he worked he was okay, but once he started growing old and couldn't work then he has no other option but to live in the streets. This old lady was abandoned by her son, who cheated her of her property and put her on a train. She came to Cuddapah and was lying near the Church with high fever. We brought her in and gave her a good bath. She is not doing that well. God only knows how long she will live.

We have got a new sweet little girl, Suma. She has no parents. She is 5 years old. She has a grandma who was begging for food and feeding Suma. The little girl was very much attached to her grandma and it took her nearly 2 weeks to get used to us. She is very quiet but observes everything very keenly. In a short time she found out the names of all the children in the home and calls them all by name! Yesterday she made me take her around to the grandma's and learnt their names.

Here are some funny things, which happened in our home this last year.

One day one of our old women was having severe diarrhea and became very weak. She thought she was going to die. As she is afraid to die she tied herself securely to the cot! She is doing very well now and we make fun of her sometimes.

On All Souls day we went to the cemetery to celebrate Mass there and some of our children also came with us. One of our little ones said, "It is full of Samadhanalu (Peace)‚" instead of saying Samadhulu (Graves)! We all had a good laugh at that. When you give a thought to it, what he said is very true. Right?

Our old lady, Subbamma sometimes loses track of time. Once she got up at 10PM and got ready to go to Church!

Well that's all for now,

In Christ,

Swarna

Haritha, infected by the enthusiasm with which I cataloged my imaginary complaints, bats her eyelashes and notes that her legs are paining her. She smiles surreptitiously at Shalini. Just watch me get a ride from Mark Uncle. If your legs are already hurting then you shouldn't mind carrying me I point out. I promptly offer my fanny in her face and drop to the ground. I have been in India for over a year and can't be suckered so easily anymore by a cherub's saccharine smile. Haritha has met her match, and if not for the gap of considerable years, we would promptly be married and sent packing in a bullock cart. As it is she contents herself to fall in line behind me and join in singing 'This Old Man' with extemporaneous lyrical amendment.

I promised Swarna I would come and help at the orphanage when she left for India. But six years would elapse before I made it back to the land of tigers and Tatas, and another ten months would go by before I embarked for Kadapa. So it was only after a bruising overnight bus trip two days before Christmas 2005, that I would finally make good on the offer made in 1999. On arrival at Nav Jeevan, John and I discovered a handful of recumbent oldsters dispersed about the entrance. They greeted us with mute repugnance and looks of consternation – a countenance, I would later discover, that was more or less perpetually engraved on their faces. The children, however, welcomed us like conquering heroes. Within minutes I was being pulled hither and yon to perform my limited repertoire of song and dance numbers. When it was discovered that I was willing to give all manner of piggyback rides I became the eye of a inward-spiraling hurricane. Wave after wave of children threw themselves at me, jumping, grasping and shouting. Their war cry (intended to convey 'Me too!' or 'I'm next') was the charmingly life-affirming declaration, 'I am!' Over and over. I am! Uncle, Uncle. I am! I am! And, indeed, by sheer force of will, they were.

The intermittently drunken-stumbling and shabbily-dressed foreigner with a smartly uniformed schoolgirl by each hand attracts every available eye on the road to school. This suits the attention-loving Haritha just fine, but causes Shalini to issue her injunction more forcefully. Walk simply. But even she is not totally averse to the neck-craning smiles left in our wake and can only manage a lukewarm upbraiding. Shortly after passing the Police Fancy (???) building a roadside officer with pouting potbelly and high leather boots orders our party to a full stop. He very deliberately looks me over from head to toe and back again. And just where are you going? Emboldened with the equally devilish Haritha in my company, I am not inclined to make life easy for the exceedingly imperious policeman. I am a child peddler from Bihar and am looking to unload my captives. The smiling one is a handful I concede, but I offer to make some allowance for the shortcoming. Two for the price of one and one half, provided you promise not to inform the authorities.

A couple of eavesdropping college boys rescue me from my foolhardy attempt at bureaucratic suicide. He must be taking the girls to school, sir. I'm sure he is only confused, sir. We've seen him over at the orphanage, sir.

The policeman is torn. He fingers his lathi thoughtfully. It is his first and probably only opportunity to whack a whitey and the idea has its appeal. Before he can come to a decision on it, I tug my wards into motion again. We are going to get late for school. Say goodbye to the officer. Chalo. Haritha flashes such a smug smile at the lawman I am momentarily afraid his desire for engagement will be rekindled. Chalo chalenge. So long solenge. Shalini remains silent in semi-bemused shock while Haritha's chortles her approval at our run in with the law. Unlike the protagonist of John Cougar Mellenkcamp's signature anthem, we have fought authority and won.

At my behest, Swarna, John and I would spend the better half of Christmas Eve day shopping for small stocking stuffers for each of the seventy or so children, seniors and staff at Nav Jeevan. Each of us soon succumbed to gift-giving fever and a fat box of cricket bats, rubber balls, plastic purses, hair ties, candy and colored markers was put together in the bazaar. The quality of the merchandise was marginal and Swarna wisely insisted upon a two-day warranty from the shop's reluctant proprietors. She also dissuaded me against purchasing stockings. What would the children do with unpaired socks in perpetually toasty Kadapa?

When we returned to the orphanage John and Swarna created a distraction while I smuggled the box of goodies inside. Haritha, ever cognizant of my whereabouts, located me just as I had finished secreting away the day's bounty. You come, Uncle. She led me to the neighboring churchyard which was alive with Christmas lights of every color. Next to the chapel a small stand was offering various religious icons and knickknacks for sale. There, Uncle. Haritha pointed to a box of plastic rings flecked with gold paint and topped with faceted faux topaz in the shape of crosses and hearts. Wow, I lied, they're really beautiful. But did you put it on your Christmas list? Haritha stamped her foot down with frustration. No, Mark Uncle. You...on. She took one of the rings and with considerable effort attempted to shimmy it down my index finger. I'm too young to get married, I protested. She paid no heed to me and with unbroken concentration redoubled her efforts, this time on my pinky. Torqued with sufficient vigor my smallest of fingers gave way to accommodate the sparkling band. I was about to ask the vendor how much I owed when Haritha produced a five rupee coin and dropped it in his hand. Ring for you, she said taut with pride. What do you say when someone possessing so little gives so much? It's really beautiful, I told her. And truly it was – transformed from kitsch to kingly adornment by her act of unbound generosity.

When I was a child, I explain to Shalini, it was a matter of pride to be able kick a rock all the way to school. Here, let me show you. I locate a decently spherical rock and send it tumbling with the side of my sandle. I jog after the rock and give it another boot before it loses momentum. You see, it's best if you can keep it in motion the whole time. Shalini locates a rock for herself, and Haritha, unwilling to be left out of anything, does likewise. Shalini exhibits considerable skill in keeping the rock under control and becomes quite absorbed in the challenge. Haritha, on the other hand, loses interest almost immediately and takes turns attacking my and Shalini's chosen targets. Impressively, the unperturbed Shalini persists, and manages to shepherd her rock all the way to the school gates. I show her how to put her pet rock put to bed in a molehill of dirt until the afternoon's return trip. I stroke the rock with my middle and index fingers and make contented purring sounds. It's a big responsibility taking your little friend to school, I explain.

Christmas Eve, John and I, hidden from the eyes of prying children, would spend the better part of the night assembling the gift packages. One by one the residents of Nav Jeevan were checked off the list Swarna had hastily compiled. A slip of paper identifying the recipient was tucked under the rubber bands that secured each prismatically-colored, teflon wrapped package. I found myself reenacting the occult ritual performed thanklessly by my parents for so many years. How easy it is to take parents for granted, until, that is, you find yourself serving as a surrogate father of forty over the holidays.

At six I was awoken by voices in the hallway. Excited conversation was followed by a sonic explosion. I stepped into the `
hallway to find a bemused Swarna watching over the fracas of Christmas morning. A grave Joseph approached me to pinch both my cheeks and then bunch his fingertips at his pursed lips. It was the vicarious method of kissing to which I had already become accustomed in my short 48 hours at the orphanage. Thank you, Mark Uncle. No, I respond dumbly, thank you.

Shalini, reluctantly charmed by my rascality on the walk to school, is still sober enough to promptly inform me that I can return home after thanking me for serving as chaperone. Okay, Uncle, you go back now. Haritha, however, is not eager to see me depart. Free from any anxiety of having her unpredictable temporary guardian seen by classmates, she takes me by the hand and pulls me inside the campus grounds. You come, Uncle. You come! Shalini's face registers chagrin as I heed Haritha's call. Not wanting to cause Shalini undue stress I offer again to go home, but Haritha will have none of it. No, Uncle you come only. You come! The school yard is dotted with doting parents biding their young ones adieu. The scene, to my eye, is amusingly topsy-turvy, as I have the impression of exceedingly well-dressed and meticulously groomed micro adults releasing their slightly disheveled Brobdingnagian brood for playtime. Okay, Mommy and Daddy have work to do, so you kids go outside and play.

On Christmas Day we took the kids to a city park in a fleet of sputtering auto rickshaws. The park is closed until noon so we gathered at the gates and stared inside as idle park attendants stared back at us with curiosity to match our own. Inside a carpet of intense green grass was crisscrossed with sidewalk and inhabited by a menagerie of larger-than-life critters happily clutching waste bins. Landscaped hillocks were crowned with smallish trees and colorful plantings. Three flattened, wrinkled wads of vinyl were dragged from a storage shed and inflated by giant fans into a castle, hot air balloon, and octopus-shaped amusements. The park was a dreamy vision of primary colors in the otherwise dusty expanse of Kadapa.

Once opened, the park's dreamlike quality was made more intense as the grounds were quickly populated by a vast assortment of differently dressed locals. It was as if the sparkling dots of Seurat's 'La grande Jatte' had been extruded into the third dimension on a distant planet. Before I could cross over to the inflatable rides I found myself completely encircled by a giggling black curtain of burka-attired college girls. Questions were issued by the largest of their group in tentative English. Where are you from and why did you come to Kadapa? Who did you come with and how long will you be here? Each of my responses was followed by a new wave of tittering. I'm from the United States of America. Oh, tee hee hee. Tee hee hee. I came to Kadapa to check out the orphanage. Oh, tee hee hee. My parents were incinerated in a horrible fire, so I'm hoping Nav Jeevan will take me and my pale-skinned brother in. Oh, tee hee hee. Tee hee hee. A platoon of orphans penetrated the circle of bad comedy and tugged me by my shirt, pant legs and both hands to the puffed-up octopus. I managed to pull a hand free to wave goodbye to the muslim girls inducing one last burst of laughter from their group.

The ride cost five rupees a head and the minute I sponsored a couple children, then all demanded the satisfaction of bouncing on the cellophane cephalopod. The few willing to heed my call to form a queue were immediately pushed into noncompliance by belligerent peers. Slightly older local boys could smell blood and elbow their way to the front of the growing mob. Uncle, you give us too. When I didn't heed their demands they became aggressive and my t-shirt was grabbed from behind until it ripped and my bandana was pulled down round my neck. I was fast sinking in a sea of choking, pulling and prodding lilliputians. With the last bit of energy left in my sleep and food-deprived body I tore free from the maddening crowd and jogged to the far side of the park where I found protection in Swana's fellowship. Still reeling from the attack, even the formerly cute garbage-guarding monkeys, rabbits and frogs took on a beastly appearance – as if preparing to disgorge in their respective containers.

Before I can usher Shalini and Haritha to their classroom I am spotted by the principal who recognizes me from his visit to the orphanage. He invites the girls and me to his office. Even the normally unflappable Haritha is on edge in his office which is reserved almost exclusively for disciplinary action. She and Shalini eye each other nervously. They won't get in trouble for getting to class late? The principal laughs. He is the only one that can make trouble for the students he assures me. He directs his secretary to bring three cold drinks. Two days earlier the principal and his wife had generously sponsored a dinner for the residents at Nav Jeevan complete with ice cream for dessert. I thank him again for the kind gesture, but he is quick to deflect the praise. The pleasure, he explains, was all his in seeing the smiles on the children's faces. When the cold drinks arrive I set one in front of each girl, but they aren't convinced they are the intended recipients. Is it a cruel test of their resolve? Drink, drink, urges the principal.

By nightfall all of Swarna's predictions with regards to the Christmas gifts had proved true. Half the children had lost their cricket balls, one of the bats was broken, both badminton rackets were bent, and the majority of the girls' purses had malfunctioning zips. John and I sought refuge from the day's hubbub in our room and were successful for all of twenty minutes, before Haritha cracked the door open and squeezed her ever-piquant face in the gap. Uncle? The room we were staying in was usually reserved for visiting priests and the children know it is largely off limits, or, at the very least, so pregnant with the air of religious severity that it best be avoided. Uncle? Haritha slipped in the room while keeping a cautious eye on the hallway behind her, lest someone spy her trespass. She proceeded to my bed where I was resting and took a seat next to me. John, as is his custom, lay in his bed with his laptop perched on his chest busily firing off emails. Haritha coursed her fingers through my goatee before finally giving it a gentle tug. Mark Uncle? Chocolates? I sat upright bringing my index finger to my lips, then tip toed with exaggerated effect to the adjoining storage room. I returned with two candies and slipped them in Haritha's eager hand. Don't tell Auntie, she whispered. Don't tell John, I whispered back. Ajma's face was the next to appear at the door and her entry proved to be the cork off a bottle of bubbly newcomers. John had mastered the art of adult gravitas and the kids left him to his keyboard, choosing instead to pile on top of my bed in an orgy of giggling and hair pulling.

The grappling was interrupted by Swarna's appearance at the doorway. The children scrambled to their feet and filed out of the room under Swarna's disapproving stare. It was well past their bedtime and they knew it – Swarna was cutting them some slack only because it was Christmas. Mark, your food is ready, she announced. I expected to eat alone at that late hour, but Swarna stayed up to sit with me as I broke my fast. We shared a laugh about the abysmal condition of the gifts we bought, while Swarna peeled an orange and washed grapes. Food is always potent stuff after a fast, but the home-cooked repast, set aside for my benefit, induced in me a particularly profound thankfulness. It had been the best Christmas ever.

I offer to talk to the girls' class and avail myself for questions, but the principal requests I speak to his ninth through twelfth standard students instead and I accept. After dropping Shalini and Haritha in front of their claustrophobic classroom of wall-to-wall concrete, I am taken to the neighboring room which is considerably larger and already elbow-to-elbow with buzzing students. The kids fall pin-drop silent as I give my spiel on looking for opportunities to be of service and then introduce the idea of writing letters to friends in Pakistan. So, what do you think, should we write some letters? Nary a heartbeat. I lean over to the presiding teacher. Is it okay if they write letters? Do they have to be somewhere? No, no, she replies. Oh, what's wrong? They can't go to Pakistan with you. What? No, I was just hoping for letters. The students aren't be required to come with me to Pakistan. I'll deliver the letters myself.

Once the confusion is cleared up the teacher starts barking with rabid enthusiasm at the students to compose letters. They haven't had a moment to think and already she is goading them like a drill sergeant. Come on. Come on. Start writing those letters. I want to see everyone's pen moving. Come on. Come on. Get those pens moving. Somehow the children are able to produce under the intense pressure and the letters turn out decently. Afterwards the students crowd around me for autographs. Why did you come to Tirunelveli? I had to come here to walk my girls to school, I answer cryptically. Confusion is writ large in the student's expressions. He has girls in school here? Haritha and Shalini appear in the doorway and are awed by the attention the upperclassmen are paying to me. They snake their way through hips and legs to flank me on either side. My girls, I announce, squeezing them to my torso with each arm.

John and I had to take an early bus back the day after Christmas and anticipated leaving without fanfare. At five thirty a half-asleep Ajma staggered in our room, gift purse still in hand, and came over for hugs. She was immediately followed by an equally drowsy Haritha who pawed the cobwebs of dreams from her eyes with the back of her hands. I slipped them each an extra candy and swore them to secrecy. Within earshot of Ajma I tell Haritha not to let Ajma know about the extra sweets, then turn to Ajma and do the same regarding Haritha. Shhhhh! Haritha mat batao. Both can manage only wry grins in their somnambulism. As John and I hauled our luggage into the hallway, we were met by eight more orphans who had us bend over to administer a flurry of finger kisses. Outside we stood in the cool stillness of pre-dawn as Swarna scootered off to secure us an auto rickshaw. When she returned we enjoyed one last round of hugs before she provided us with a police-like escort to the bus stand.

Swarna insisted on waiting for our bus with us in the nascent hubbub of the faintly pee-scented station. When our vehicle growled and lurched to life we stood by its door where John shook Swarna's hand and I blindsided her with a half hug. How to quantify my feelings for her? She represents for me that crystallization of will that transforms our best intentions into action while remaining free from ego attachment. Where I am the blare of vainglorious trumpets, she is low notes on the cello, bowed with even-keeled sensibility. As we rolled away in the Bangalore-bound bus, I craned out my head out the window to wave goodbye to Swarna's helmeted profile one last time. I was longing to stay, but even then knew that fate would lead me back to the kids. So when Swarna emailed me some weeks later that she had moved operations to Tirunelveli in Tamil Nadu I roughly unfolded my map of India on the floor and started plotting my return visit. How close was this new place to Bangalore? Just two moon cycles later would find me in the deepest south of South India, entrusted with walking the girls to Magdelene Matric Higher Secondary School.

I have been at the school for almost two hours by the time I bid Haritha and Shalini adieu at the front gate. Haritha points a questioning finger up at my nose. You come to get us at three thirty, Mark Uncle? Does someone usually pick you up from school? I thought you just walk home on your own. Shalini's confirmation that they always walk home on their own is shot down by Haritha. No, Mark Uncle, it is compulsory that you come. Compulsory? Yes, compulsory. What does that mean? It means you come. Zarur. Then I will come. Compulsory? Compulsory.