Nicole is a diplomat and poet. All she writes describes her personal point of view and in no way represents the official position of her dear government (especially on matters of love and life). Currently stationed in Shanghai, she finds this land of beauty and history to be endlessly inspirational. Her muses are dreams…and the flowering streets of this city.

after a summer rain

this fresh scrubbed morning
buttered rays shiver
against cornflower blue

even traffic embraces
the light— silver, black, white trout
slip through capricious currents

I took my potted plants outside
yesterday at dusk, leaving
jade palms turned up waiting

to fill dew-slicked cups

night delivered on its warm promise
washing away every regret

only I forgot to let my darkness
receive this moon-lapped baptism
have the joy shaken from my leaves

~

self-portrait as an island

“let this be a moment of remembering,

my love, as I stand at the edge of myself

cliff and sea grass”

                                    -Donika Kelly

let me describe how I understand the geography of

us—dew on hibiscus hips, rain-rippled lapis waters–

be it dawn or nightfall it is always you.  you an entire

ocean and my heart a rock-strewn island– cacti

and winds hungry for green. your waves meet my

coast, pearl foam blooms at the touch of tide and

a sandstone cliff—that, my love, is us.  I imagine you

taking my photograph– gulls overhead, the sun’s soft sigh

into warm stone releasing endless tones of crimson

and persimmon to the murmured mantra of blue, sway

over motion, ripple of brine and fish, a whole universe

one body…and I float, I float in you, my dear. I rise reborn

another day buoyed by the simple bliss of being…and you

shoveled from “Love Poem” by Donika Kelly

~

self-portrait as a lake

I have my seasons—

when darkness extends

deep and slow

hours thicken

to ink

a poet told me that passion can exhaust

and

I am exhausted

my ice sighs

water turning like an animal

in its burrow

white moon tracing

feathered fingers

across my midnight

as

every wave aches

for the shore

we all must break open

for the sun to warm

our wounds

listen for that breath

taken, then held deeply

as love

slipping into the silvered stillness

of a glass-covered heart

“They”

Güelga Fonda

Esti poema entamelu

nel mio maxín

fai cincu años, nel cuartu

d’un hotel de Shanghai,

Shanghai ye un llugar

que dexó una güelga fonda

na mio memoria

-un poema ye xustamente eso-.

Ye un d’esos llugares

au puedes atopar un bon poema

per cualuquier requexu de la ciudá

(o atopate a ti mesmu

nesti mundiu llíquidu).

~

Deep Mark

I started this poem

in my mind

in a room of a Shanghai hotel.

Shanghai is a place

that left a deep mark

in my memory

-a poem is just that-.

It is one of those places

where you can find a good poem

in any corner of the city

(or you may find yourself

in this liquid world).

BIO

Xe M. Sánchez was born in 1970 in Grau (Asturies, Spain). He received his Ph.D in History from the University of Oviedo in 2016, he is anthropologist, and he also studied Tourism and three masters. He has published in Asturian language Escorzobeyos (2002), Les fueyes tresmanaes d’Enol Xivares (2003), Toponimia de la parroquia de Sobrefoz. Ponga (2006), Llué, esi mundu paralelu  (2007), Les Erbíes del Diañu (E-book: 2013, Paperback: 2015), Cróniques de la Gandaya (E-book, 2013), El Cuadernu Prietu (2015), and several publications in journals and reviews in Asturies, USA, Portugal, France, Sweden, Scotland, Australia, South Africa, India, Italy, England, Canada, Reunion Island, China, Belgium, Ireland, Netherlands, Austria, Turkey and Singapore.

Rachel Fung graduated from King’s College London where she read law. She is particularly interested in stories of modern life and identity in South East Asia and has lived in three different cities in the region. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in a number of publications, including an anthology of flash fiction – A Girl’s Guide to Fly Fishing.

One Call

I

He slipped his hand into his left pocket and a chill ran from his ring finger along to his heart. He pushed his hand deeper, burrowed, repeated a mirror routine with right hand, right pocket but again – nothing. The chill by now had successfully reached its destination and encased his heart in a thin layer of ice. He sighed.

He had left his handphone behind.

II

The wheels of a pram over his shoes snapped him back to himself and his surroundings rushed to present themselves to him all at once. Lanterns flashed with multi-coloured aggressiveness as “cai shen dao” re-looped for the 7th time that evening. Shopping malls were particularly unbearable during festive periods. He had an important meeting with a key client but could not remember where they were supposed to meet. Everything was in his phone. He thought of calling for a cab but was hit anew by the lack of his phone. He mentally cast about himself. A sea of impassive faces carrying the burdens of festivity weaved about him. Cursing him silently for standing still in a busy thoroughfare. The mall was swallowing him up. He had to get out.

The sky was newly dark with stains of pink by the time he exited the mall and raining lightly. He estimated the time to be around 7pm. The taxi line snaking around the mall cut short any quick plan of redress or escape. Resigned, he sat down on one of the cold metal benches that dotted the periphery of the building and watched the rain fall in thin sheets lit up by the shop windows behind him. He usually loved this time of the night. The new darkness felt hesitant yet promising. He watched as the streetlamps around the mall flickered on. All at once and not consecutively like they do in cartoons.

Only when the lights were on however, did he see that just 10 feet from where he was sitting, there stood an old phone booth. It must have been one of the earliest models from the 60s for it was a proper standalone phone booth with a swing door to enter and exit. A relict from a time when the country looked to Great Britain for guidance on how to structure practically everything in society. The phone booths in the country had evolved since then to be more cost and weather effective. Completely enclosed phone booths like the one before him now turned into mini glasshouses under the unforgiving tropical sun. Still, looking upon this near obsolete dinosaur of a phone booth before him gave his heart a little nostalgic tug. Hide and seek, sticky fingers on 999, screeching laughter and running. He studied its weathered exterior – all metal seams rusting at joints and scratchy glass panes. He had an overwhelming urge to be inside it. He finally had a reason to as well. Perhaps if he even dialled his handphone number, some straggler at the office may pick up and he could coax or bribe them to bring his phone over.

A pre-emptory storm wind passed, blowing his tie over his left shoulder, making him choose very suddenly whether to stay by the safe confines of the mall or venture outwards and risk being marooned in the phonebooth during a thunderstorm. Before he knew it though, his feet were cutting across the manicured lawn ring-fencing the mall. Rain brushed past his face, down his neck and trailed down to the small of his back. And then he was inside. Feeling like he had disturbed a space enshrined in time. He couldn’t describe it then but on later reflection he would explain this feeling as arising from the fact that the air inside distinctly felt, a decade old.

III

Change.

He forgot you needed change to operate these dinosaurs. He started fidgeting on the spot. An old nervous tick. The sky was now black outside and the storm was working itself up to a not too distant crescendo. The phone booth was located by the road turning into the mall. So every time a car made the turn, he would be momentarily bathed in brilliantly bright headlights. It was a disconcerting feeling. Like he was watching death brush by with every car. The sound of jingling coins made him stop fidgeting and he remembered the 50 cents in his right pocket. Perfect. That should be just enough to cover it. He withdrew the 2 twenties and 1 ten from his pocket and in a gesture which showed his age, fed the coins into the machine with one hand. Index and thumb acting as feeder; palm and other fingers acting as hold and release levers. He waited until he heard the last coin tumble down that dark rabbit hole to the bottom of substitute gold and then he reached for the clunky bright red receiver.

The wind outside was now howling, spinning, dancing. A particularly strong gust travelled with the headlights of a car and caused the entire booth to shake, making him grab the receiver a little faster than he meant to. He brought the receiver close to him and angling his neck, cradled it snugly between shoulder and ear. Right hand hovering in front of the number pad, he stared at the pad trying to remember his number, when his ear was suddenly greeted with a

“hello”

Then before he could even respond, the voice – female, light, airy, like a voice standing in a brighter, sunnier place with a taste of ocean wind and sun imbued in it, continued: “Is this Mary’s Cake Shop?”. And the necessity of a question waiting for an answer made his voice sputter back into action. What must it sound like – cold, hard, lonely, like a voice trapped in a tin box with no one to hear it.

“I think you have the wrong number. This is a phonebooth.”

Crackle. The warning of a tenuous line threatening to cut off.

“Can I order your classic cheesecake please”

“I wish you could. But again, this is a phonebooth.”

The crackling stopped.

“A phonebooth?!” the sun exclaimed. And he waited for its light to recede, but it burst forth even brighter with beaming laughter. “That’s really strange.”

To his surprise, he found himself laughing too. Hesitant but genuine laughter. “Yes, I was really shocked too actually.”

But her voice, suddenly serious, like a thin veil of clouds had floated in front of it, asked, “But is Mary’s Cake Shop nearby you?” Then, because he had lived his whole life in this city, he could answer with certainty: “No, they’ve closed down.”

“Oh”, she said. And the disappointment in that “oh” seeped through the line and dripped into his ear.

“I believe they closed over 10 years ago actually.”

“Oh really?”

“Yea.”

“Oh.”

The rain outside showed no sign of letting up. There was a small jam leading into the mall now as cars piled up and inched through the rain. They didn’t swing around the turning anymore. So headlights came and focused on him for extended and alternating periods of time. He felt like he was in a play, readying himself for each time the spotlight would fall on him again.

IV

The next thing she said was, “My mother is dying.”

He said he was sorry to hear that.

“Is it strange me telling you that?” she asked.

“No”, he lied.

“Do you mind me telling you that?” she asked.

“No”, he said.

V

He lost track of how much time passed after that point. Because for the duration of that call, Time couldn’t reach him as he hurtled through Then, Now and To Come with no regard to its linear character and became simultaneously both young and old. Thus with Time eluded, he could laugh, cry and speak freely on the phone. He shared how he coped with the passing of his own mother. Told her that he had never talked about that period until this moment. Which was true. She told him why the cheesecake was crucial. That it was the only cake her mother ever ate. They left the city 10 years ago for a small coastal town when her mother’s health deteriorated whilst living costs kept accelerating. But she wanted to surprise her mother with some cake. She said she didn’t tell anyone else the real reason for her move. That distance and circumstance would tear at friendships till you were only left with shreds of birthday greetings on Facebook walls. Better a clean break than drawn out ends.  He asked whether sunsets there were truly better. She said they were. Like God himself had set the skies alight in a slow blaze to wipe out each passing day. She said the sunsets here could bring you to tears. He said he believed her. That he hoped to see it with his own eyes one day.

Thus in this manner, word chased after word and the conversation spooled like a gossamer thread with no end. He felt like he could talk to her forever. Feeding on words, on feelings captured, solidified. This phonebooth felt like it was the entire world and this tenuous call the only thing that mattered.

Then she said, “I have to check on my mother. She’ll be waking up soon.”

Like a man jolted awake, he whipped up his head and saw that it had stopped raining. There were no more cars waiting to turn in. A security guard was doing his rounds in sleepy silence and the sky was cloaked in a muted midnight blue.

Then her voice again, “Is it raining your end anymore?”

“No,” he said

“That’s good.” Pause. “It was really nice talking to you.”

“You too,” he said.

“Bye.”

“Bye.”

Then after a beat, “Take care.” But she was already gone.

He looked down at his legs. Gave them a shake to wake the one that was asleep. Then slowly, he reached out to put the receiver back to its holder, which in turn triggered a mini shower of coins in the change receptacle at the bottom. He collected them – 1, 2, 3 coins, making 50 cents in total. He stared at the coins for a while. Then he picked up the receiver again. He fed the coins back into the phone, waited for the clang of the last coin caught and then looped the receiver over the top of the phone. He could give this city one call.

Xiu Wei writes from Malaysia. She was born in Klang, a small town where big, black crows fly amok. The crows have inspired her to (attempt to) fly amok as well. She aspires to acquire the gentle, happy disposition of an alpaca, and to be the best human she can possibly be.

Eggshells

The conjuring of one’s primary school memories usually gave Big People a fond feeling in their belly. “Those good old days,” one would say. “It was the happiest time of my life,” said another. Or: “I wish I could go back.” At least, this was what she observed. It happened with her brother, who was not really a Big Person per se, but he was two years closer to becoming one compared to her. She heard the same echoes from her mother, father, and relatives too. “Appreciate the time you have now at school,” the Aunty at the store would tell her. “You’re going to miss it when you’re older!”

But she wasn’t so sure about that. For this little girl, school was strange, to say the least. It was a time of such fixity that it often made her feel quite uncomfortable. I mean, even the categories of their age groups were called Standards. She was in afternoon class Standard 3, just one year before she turned 10, when she would become a morning upperclassman. The teachers’ words whipped their world into shape. Everyone had to wear uniforms, and she didn’t quite like the dark blue pinafore and white button-up blouse combo. The uniforms she wore were hand-me-downs outgrown by her mother’s friends. They were older, bigger than her, but still the uniforms fit rather snugly. They had always said that she was tall for her age. In fact, she was the tallest girl in class. She towered over even the boys – but she must stress that inside she always teetered rather daintily.

And that was why she was always a different shade of color compared to the other girls: her pinafore a little less blue, and her blouse just a little more gray. She had to wear a cloth belt too, and it cinched in her waist a tad too tightly. It had already been altered by her mom; she took out the hook and sewed it at the very far-most edge of the belt possible. And yet all that extra space was not enough for her – she would sheepishly, ashamedly, secretly undo the clasp of her belt during class when nobody was looking and breathe a little easier after that, hooking it back when they have to go for recess.

Everyone in class had a nickname, but you could not choose it. Her classmates called her Tsunami because of her very curly hair that stuck out in all directions like strong waves. Nobody knew who exactly came up with these nicknames, but they just appear out of thin air and cling onto you like goosebumps. Tsunami walked into class every day with a ponytail so tight that it raised her eyebrows 2 millimeters higher, and she wore a pair of big, black metal pins that clipped her bangs onto her scalp like a jail – she would always hope that this taming would make her seem less Tsunami-y, but the nickname never dropped. Shi Yi’s hair was jet-black, silky straight and soft, and yet, her nickname was Dove. Like the shampoo Dove and like the gentle white bird dove. Tsunami thought it was rather unfair. Why not call her Seaweed or Crow instead?

But still, all was tolerable because Tsunami had a window seat. There were 45 little boys and girls in class, and because she was the tallest, she sat at the back-most row by herself, right next to the window that overlooked the big rectangular school field (which was also right in front of the class dustbin). Tsunami was the only one in class who knew that if you leaned back against the wooden chair until it stood on two legs (exactly like how the teachers say you were not supposed to), and peer just across the missing panel of the folding glass window, you could catch a glimpse of it. There! At the eye-level of a tall 9-year-old girl, within the foliage of a thin tree, nestled a nest of tiny bird eggs. Quail eggs, grey and frail and speckled with brown. The tree housing the nest was shaped rather oddly, being sparse and spindly, and its branches extended towards Tsunami’s window like an outstretched palm as if it were offering her a gift. Tsunami took this as a sign that she was fated to watch over the eggs, and she would puff up with pride even though it made her belt constrict even tighter. Whenever Tsunami checked on the nest – discreetly of course, so nobody discovered it – she dared not look down. She dared not look down because the nest balancing on the two-story tall tree would suddenly seem so very far away from the ground, and the eggs would seem so very precious that it made her heart ache in a rather peculiar way. She didn’t lay them, she knew that of course, but those were her eggs all the same. They made her special.

It was class intermission time and Tsunami was performing her usual nest-checking before Ms. Fang, their homeroom teacher, entered the classroom. Ms. Fang was a very thin lady with big bulbous eyes that tended to glaze off halfway during class when she would drift into stories of her younger years. Everyone was rather fond of her, though she could get a bit too naggy at times. Tsunami thought Ms. Fang was alright except for the fact that she looked a little scary up close – her eyes always seemed to stare right into your insides. And Tsunami could never be sure what exactly Ms. Fang saw inside of her.

The eggs were alright as usual, peacefully residing in their nest, when they were suddenly seemingly seized by an invisible hand and began to shake in a frantic manner. Tsunami’s eyes opened as wide as Ms. Fang’s and she held her breath, afraid that the eggs would plummet onto the pavement below. Sticking her head out of the window hole with the missing panel, she forced herself to look down and quickly realized that this shaking was caused by an upperclassmen boy. He was almost bald with tanned skin, and his shirt was untucked into his pants (which was a sure bad sign). He also had the stupidest, biggest grin on his face as he shook the thin tree with both his arms, with all his might.

Tsunami’s heart beat so violently it was about to fly away from her ribcage. She had to do something.

“Hey, you!” she yelled after summoning all the courage that hid in her marrows. She rarely yelled.

The boy ignored her and continued shaking the tree in a demented manner.

“YOU! BOY!” Tsunami roared desperately.

He finally heard her.

“What?!” he said.

Tsunami knew the boy was shaking it because of the nest. So it was no use to tell him not to harm the eggs. Frantically, she thought about how to convince him to stop.

“If you keep shaking the tree, I’ll tell the teacher!” she threatened.

The boy sneered and jeered like an idiot. “Yeah right! You would already have if you could!”

Frustrated, Tsunami turned around. Ms. Fang wasn’t there yet. Tears started trickling out of her eyes like a leaky faucet.

“Hey,” Tsunami quickly stopped one of her classmates, Mei Fang, who was passing by after throwing pencil shavings in the dustbin behind class.

“Hey, Tsunami,” Mei Fang exclaimed in surprise. “Why are you crying?”

Tsunami pointed helplessly outside to the tree that was quaking in fright.

“There’s a boy shaking that tree.”

Mei Fang frowned.

“He’s just one of those naughty boys,” she said dismissively. “Don’t mind him.”

“No, no,” Tsunami said hurriedly. Mei Fang didn’t understand. She took a quick breath and decided to share her secret.

“There’s a nest in the tree.”

Mei Fang peered at where she was pointing and caught sight of the dainty eggs sitting on the tree, behaving so well despite the havoc being wrecked upon their home.

“Ohhhh,” Mei Fang exclaimed. She didn’t react as much as Tsunami had expected her to. “That boy is so naughty.”

“We need to stop him,” Tsunami said commandingly although she did not know what to do. She knew Mei Fang would not know what to do either. It was just simply unthinkable to run out of the classroom during class time; nobody did that. Especially not well-behaved little girls. And she couldn’t bear the thought of tearing her eyes away from those precious eggs. What if they fell while she was gone?

“I don’t think we can,” Mei Fang said gravely. Tsunami’s heart sank. Just at that moment, the steady click-clack-click of heeled footsteps clocked into their ears, and Mei Fang hastily patted Tsunami’s head before rushing back to her seat. “Don’t cry Tsunami,” she whispered compassionately. Ms. Fang entered the class.

“Atten-tion!” The class monitor commanded.

“Good morning, Ms. Fang,” All of them rose, droned, and bowed to the teacher.

“Sit down,” Ms. Fang said.

“Thank you tea-cher,” they droned again before sitting back down. Tsunami’s tears were still sliding down the curve of her cheeks.

The classroom was quiet now, stiflingly quiet, as they awaited Ms. Fang to announce what they were going to do that day. It is important to know that Tsunami was usually very good at keeping her sorrows in the drawers of her chest. They shut tight when she breathed in deeply and opened when she breathed out, during which some sorrowful wisps would escape through her nostrils. But it did not work for now no matter how hard she tried. Now she was suffering in quiet indignation. She badly needed to tell Ms. Fang about the boy, but to tell her now at this very moment would be to cause a scene – and the idea of everyone turning around to look at her and her wet face was just simply too much to bear.

Ms. Fang was looking around at everyone’s face in the class with her bulbous eyes before they landed on Tsunami at the back of the class. Ms. Fang squinted, as if she couldn’t tell if Tsunami was crying.

“Girl,” Ms. Fang said, looking at her pointedly. She got up from her seat and started walking towards her. “Why are you crying, girl?”

This recognition made Tsunami suck in a quick, shaky teary breath. It was time to tell.

“There’s a boy,” she pointed outside the window with a dart of her finger. “Shaking the tree. There’s a nest in the tree. He’s killing the baby birds!”

Then they both looked out the window together – Ms. Fang standing, Tsunami on her two-legged chair. The boy spotted Ms. Fang and ran off without a word. Tsunami couldn’t tell if the nest had fallen onto the floor while seeing out of misty eyes, but her heart was a ship sinking in sorrow.

“I need two prefects,” Ms. Fang commanded.

Two prefect boys stood up – A and A, Aaron and Anson, the twins who loved running teachers’ chores that required getting out of the classroom.

“Go down and check on the nest,” she said. “And see if you can get that boy’s name.”

A and A went out of the class eagerly at a speed just below running (they weren’t allowed to run in school).

Ms. Fang walked back to her desk at the front of the class and rummaged in her handbag. Since all eyes were on the teacher, Tsunami allowed herself some sobs. She sniffled and snorted, when suddenly she saw a tissue paper being handed to her.

It was Ms. Fang. Tsunami took the tissue gratefully as her nose had exceeded its mucus-holding capacity, just like how her chest had exceeded its sorrow-holding capacity.

“Class,” Ms. Fang said in a grave tone. “What the boy did there was very bad. He had fun at the expense of innocent unborn lives.”

Ms. Fang started pacing around regally like a queen departing a most important message.

“We should always respect nature,” she added like a commandment.

“But,” Ms. Fang continued, and turned to Tsunami. Tsunami’s heart stilled. She thought she was going to be reprimanded for leaning back on her chair. Or for failing to tell her earlier, for disturbing the class. For causing a scene. Or perhaps, for keeping the eggs her secret.

“I think Xin Mei’s provided a wonderful example for you all to learn from,” Ms. Fang said gently. “She was brave to try to stop the boy, and the fact that she’s crying shows that she has a big, good, kind, heart.”

Tsunami’s tears stopped and she looked up and met Ms. Fang’s bulbous eyes in surprise. She saw two images of herself reflected in Ms. Fang’s eyes, looking back at her.

“And for that, I think she deserves a round of applause,” Ms. Fang told the class.

Just like that, a magnificent round of applause ensued.

Ms. Fang was clapping as well.

The tears on her face dried up slowly due to all the wind from everyone’s clapping hands.

Tsunami knew that her classmates were only clapping because the teacher told them to. She also knew that if it weren’t for Ms. Fang, none of them would have –could have–helped her. But somehow it all didn’t matter. She had 45 pairs of hands dedicated to her heart.

Tsunami’s breast swelled with something like pride and she felt as if she were hatching out of a shell. Deep down she knew that the nest had fallen. In her mind’s eye she could see the eggs with their shells cracked, watery yellow bleeding out of them before they could morph into feathered flight. But in that moment, everything was covered by the sound of congratulations. So she let the thunderous applause gently rain down on her, with arms outstretched like wings.

Habib Mohana was born in 1969 in Daraban Kalan, a town in the district of Dera Imsail Khan, Pakistan. He is an assistant professor of English at Government Degree College No 3, D. I. Khan. He writes fiction in English, Urdu, and Saraiki (his mother tongue). He has four books under his belt, one in Urdu and three in Saraiki. His Saraiki novel forms part of the syllabus for the MA in Saraiki at Zikria University Multan. His short stories in English have appeared in literary journals in India and Canada. In 2010 and 2014, his Saraiki books won the Khawaja Ghulam Farid Award from the Pakistan Academy of Letters. His book of short stories in Urdu, titled Adhori Neend, won the Abaseen award from the Government of KPK. He is currently seeking a publisher for his novel The Village Café.

‘The Deserter’

Six-footer Ditto was a renowned kabaddi player. He had avid fans in every village in the district of Dera Ismael Khan, and some of his fans had named their sons and nephews after him. He was a brown-complexioned man of twenty-three, with dark curly hair and a long bushy moustache. He played kabaddi in the village fairs, to which he was always accompanied by a group of friends. At the edge of the ground his friends would stand in tight circle around him while he removed his clothes and tied a loincloth around his hips and groin. Like any other wrestler, he entered the ground half dancing and half jogging to the beat of the drums, his lithe athletic body glistening in the sun. If he won, his friends would hoist him onto their shoulders, showering one rupee notes over him. The drummers would scramble to collect the money. Several men had offered their daughters hands to him in marriage, but he politely refused, arguing that he was married to kabaddi.

He was born into a prosperous farming family of Daraban – a village located five miles east of the Suleiman Range and famed for date palm groves. Since he was a source of fame and honour for the family, his brothers kept him away from the toil and sweat of farm work. Every month his brothers slaughtered a billy goat for him. He ate some mutton fresh, while the remainder was first lightly grilled over embers and then hung on the clothesline for his subsequent use. In summers he drank sherbet made from almonds and poppy seeds and in winters he ate halva made with wheat flour, butter oil and cow-feet jelly to enhance his physical strength. His afternoons passed doing vigorous exercises and rubbing mustard oil into his toned body to make him strong and healthy.

Every year on the first Friday of April, people from the villages of Damaan Plains converged on the shrine of the saint Kaloo Qalandar at the village of Shah Alam to celebrate the annual fair, which coincided with his birthday. Some of the villagers reached the venue on horses and camels while some took vehicles, and they pitched their tents in the fairground around the shrine. The shopkeepers sold toys, sweets, sherbets, and agricultural tools in tents and reed sheds. The villagers spent two nights in the fairground dancing, singing, and playing, or watching games of strength.

In the late morning the kabaddi players were doing warm-ups in the fairground to the music played by the drummers and pipers while a gigantic crowd of spectators restlessly waited for their favourite players to go into action. There were four tiers of spectators: in the front tier, people sat in a massive circle on the bare ground; behind them, people perched on charpoys; the third layer consisted of standing spectators, while in the outermost tier were the ones who sat atop busses, trucks, and tractor-drawn trollies. More than twenty parties of drummers and pipers hailing from different villages were walking and playing their instruments, creating the chaotically lively background music for the action.

The rules of Damaani kabaddi are primitive and simple: a raider sprints to reach the finish line while two defenders chase to intercept him. The rivals shove one another using hands and shoulders. Slapping is not allowed. The teams are divided on the basis of the two main tribes of the area, and final victory depends on team effort as well as individual performance.

It was Ditto’s turn to carry out the raid. He dashed towards the finish line while two players from the rival team leapt at him to deter him from reaching it. Ditto levelled the first defender to the ground by pushing him with his shoulder, however the second one clutched at his loincloth in desperation. It came off, rendering the raider stark naked. About one lakh* eyes stared at him. A grunt of grief and anguish emerged from his friends’ and fans’ mouths, while his rivals and the majority of the spectators erupted into jeering and whistling and clapping their hands. All players wore bikini-like underwear under their loincloths and he too used to wear it but that day, as the bad luck would have it, he had left it at home.

He had a blackout, and on coming round he found himself sitting cross-legged on the ground. The drummers had stopped banging their drums, his ears buzzed with the rush of blood and he wished the earth would swallow him up. He felt as if the sky had cracks, the ground spewed smoke, and the busses and trucks were on fire. He felt like he was a circus beast on the loose and that the spectators would charge at him and beat him to a pulp.

With their shoulder sheets open and waving like unfurled flags, his friends rushed to Ditto and enfolded him in the sheets. One of his friends had brought him his clothes, and he scrambled into them, his eyes directed to the ground to avoid catching their gaze. Wrapping arms around him his friends ushered him out of the ground, which still faintly echoed with clapping and whistling. They brought him to the tent, and said reassuring words to him but it was of no avail as he had taken the thing to heart. Without eating his dinner, he curled up on the charpoy, wrapped a quilt around his face and cried into it. All night long he lay wide awake with the images of the morning’s incident playing and replaying through his mind. ‘Life will never be the same again for me,’ he thought. ‘I won’t be able to live among these people who witnessed me standing without a stich on.’

Next morning, his friends took him to Daraban but he dared not face the women of his family so he stayed in the guesthouse of one of his friends. He mulled over several options to stay away from his village so that the people would not poke fun at him for having seen him buck naked.

After extended consultation with his friends and brothers he decided to enlist in the army as a soldier. As the educational requirement for this job was fifth grade certificate, he fortunately had the requisite qualification.

After training he was posted in the desert of Bahawalpur near the Indian border, and after two years his company was transferred to Rawalpindi. His third year was in progress and he had not returned to his village even for one day. Whenever his colleagues went home for the vacations, his heart flew to his village but the unsavoury incident that occurred three years ago prevented him from visiting his home and seeing his loved ones. He spent the annual long vacations in the long gloomy army barracks listening to his radio or wandering around the cantonment roads, sulking and fretting as he saw no end to his suffering. Several times his brothers visited him and begged him to return to his home village but he would not listen. He did not feel at home with army life, although it provided him a shell under which he could hide his shame.

Once his father and elder brother visited him at the Rawalpindi cantonment to persuade him to go home with them. ‘People don’t remember things for such a long time. They’ve other headaches,’ his father said.

‘People of the area miss you at their fairs and festivals,’ his elder brother claimed.

‘I can’t go with you. I don’t have the grit to face people,’ Ditto replied.

‘You’re wrong! For how long will you keep avoiding the people of your village and area? One day you have to return to your people,’ his father said.

He had served in the army for over four years when one evening he absconded from the Rawalpindi cantonment. To avoid arrest by the army men, the deserter did not return home. After wandering in different cities for about two months, one night he secretly arrived home. He revealed to his family that he had quit his job, and they hid him in a room, but within a fortnight his secret was out.

One noon while he was having lunch with his friends in the palm-tree grove at the edge of the gurgling stream that meandered through the village, three soldiers in plain clothes sneaked upon him to arrest him and take him back to his regiment. With a half-chewed morsel in his mouth and without bothering with his shoes, he tore away. The soldiers chased after him in hot pursuit. The gruelling race continued for some time but he, being an experienced kabaddi player who also knew the village streets like the back of his hand, soon lost his pursuers. After this incident, the army men came to Daraban several times in plain clothes to apprehend the deserter, but each time he escaped them.

About eight months had passed since his desertion, and now he sometimes walked the village streets in the daytime, and sometimes he assisted his brothers in the farm work.

April brought a pleasant change to the weather, and the villagers gathered in the village of Shah Alam for the annual fair. It was the last day of the fair, and the kabaddi match was in full swing. Ditto sat with his friends on the charpoy watching the kabaddi match, his face half swathed in the turban sheet to hide himself from the public, as he had not forgotten the unpleasant incident that had taken place in the same place. His friends had been urging him to play kabaddi since early morning, but he would not listen. Some kabaddi players approached him and requested him to play, but he did not accede to their request. Next, the chief of his tribe in white clothes and a tall turban approached him and without heeding his protestations dragged him to the place where the action was. Half-heartedly, he stripped off his clothes and tied the loincloth around his waist and groin. Clutching Ditto’s wrist the chief held his arm aloft for the audience to see that he was back. The entire audience rose to their feet, clapping their hands with delight. The musicians played even more vigorously.

Ditto accepted the challenge of the two veteran players. He made a dash for the finish line and the defenders chased him to nail him down. He was midway when he noticed that four men were chasing him: two in loincloths and two in full clothes. The men in loincloths stopped when they saw Ditto had won, but the two in full clothes kept perusing him. First he thought that they were his friends who were racing after him to give him money as a reward and hoist him to their shoulders. But when he had a closer look at them, their unfamiliar faces and army hair cut suddenly pressed an alarm button in his head. He increased his speed to lose his pursuers, but they were bent upon catching him.

The drummers had stopped beating their drums. All the spectators stood up, and buzzing emanated from them like thousands of bee colonies on the move. Some of the spectators thought that the pursuers were his enemies who had found an opportunity to settle some old scores, so they encouraged him to run faster. His worried eyes searched for a cleft to pass through in the four-tiered human bulwark, but there was none. For a while he raced in a zigzag pattern to evade arrest, but then he began to run towards the northeast where his friends were. He had only just drawn closer when a fissure appeared in the human bulwark, and he wove his way through the spectators. In the meantime two more army men had also joined the chase. Ditto was on the brink of surrendering when he found himself near a bus. He frantically clambered the ladder of the bus and reached its roof, which was crawling with kabaddi fans.

The army men surrounded the bus and the spectators jostled for the best place to view the live drama. The tribal elders strode towards the bus to investigate the affair. The tall, grumpy hawaladar told the crowd that they were only acting upon orders, and warned people not to interfere in their business. Next, he yelled at the deserter to get off the bus.

About 50,000 people stood packed around the bus, which had become the focus of all eyes and ears. The elders requested the pursuers to allow the deserter to put on clothes and shoes, after which he would go with them of his own accord. His friends threw him his clothes and shoes while the impatiently curious multitude pressed closer to see and hear better. After donning the clothes and shoes, Ditto wrapped the turban around his head in a way that nearly hid his face. Standing close to the bus, his friends and fans instructed him to jump into their arms. He followed their instructions and thus made it to terra firma. Yelling with excitement and waving their hands and caps, the people urged him to run, which he was already planning to do. He ducked and pushed ahead through the cooperative and sympathetic throng. Flailing their arms and shouting furiously, the army men tried hard to catch him, but it was tantamount to finding a needle in a haystack. In the ensuing tumult the army men were put off the scent and the deserter dissolved into the sea of people.

* a unit in the Indian numbering system equal to 100,000.