Let Me Live Another Summer

By Monika Rauth

A tale about women,twenty-first century women brave confident and independent who leave the cosy nest of their boarding school and embark on the journey of life,each one with hopes,dreams and hearts full of love. Moon meets every challenge and faces all odds to prove that it is possible to rise above the ordinary and make your life sublime. So do her friends Anjali and Roma. Although they tread over thorns and thistles, there are roses too along the way. There is hope and disillusionment,dreams and disappointments.Relationships bring heartache and loneliness. They also bring love comfort and fulfillment.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing India
• Release date: Mar 24, 2015
• ISBN: 9781482843101

Monika Rauth

The author has spent her childhood in the north-eastern region of India. She has travelled widely and inter-mingled with people from all over the country. Her rich experience of life and her deep understanding of human values and human emotions will touch the hearts and minds of people all over the globe.

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

It was one of those old sprawling mansions set among whispering pines that the British in India had built and left behind. It had big latticed windows large breezy rooms and open verandahs. The grounds in front levelled down gradually to the orchard below, there was a flight of steps on one side. Sparrows built nests at the crevices of the building. Once in a while a little baby bird fell out of a nest and little girls would pick it up, nurse it back to life with water and bread crumbs and deliver it back into the nest. The nuns had converted the mansion into a boarding house in the convent. Here on the steps before the portico, sat the three girls, watching the sunset. Anjali was the writer among them, she could create dreams with her pen. Janet was a tomboy and the most intelligent. There was about her an aura of something, an indescribable charm, endearing and powerful. Moon was the youngest of the trio. She was junior by a year and not as mature and so she looked up to the other two with awe, loving their company. Janet harboured an intense affection for Moon. She felt an elder sisterly protection for her. Moon basked in that sunshine Janet had lost a kid sister some time ago and so she showered all her affection on her little friend. Often Janet would take Moon to the orchard below the study hall. She had to take Sister Mary’s permission to help Moon work out a mathematics problem.

The orchard was a haven of peace and beauty. In spring the trees blossomed in pink, white and mauve, slowly into summer the flowers were replaced by tender green leaves, then came the raw fruit which slowly ripened. Pears, plums, oranges and lemons. The girls were prohibited from picking the fruits. Once in a while a few of them would make excuses of a headache or toothache and stay away from the morning mass in the chapel and when the nuns were deeply immersed in prayer they would sneak out and pick up the fallen fruit. Some brave darlings would even dare to climb up a tree and pluck some. Here in the orchard, Janet would sing songs in her girlish voice Moon loved to sing too though she didn’t have a voice like Janet’s and yet Janet appreciated her and it was this bonding which made Moon feel that something special between them. Whenever Janet’s mother visited she would bring a large packet of goodies for Moon too. The little girl reminded her of her lost baby. Janet was the captain of the school. Moon felt a tinge of jealousy whenever the other girls craved to get Janet’s attention but today she was all hers. Tomorrow was the annual cultural day and she was playing the princess and Janet the prince. At other times during the breaks they enacted out theatre roles, she the heroine, Cleopatra or Juliet and Janet the eternal hero.

The sunset in this part of the town was a splendour of colour, orange, red, fading into lighter shades of yellow till twilight set in with an ethereal light all over the school compound and then dusk. The sky darkened, the sparrows flew back to the nests and the girls walked into the hall for dinner. It was always early dinner at the boarding. After dinner some of the girls had to help the helpers with the washing up and clearing the tables. The nuns believed that work experience was a part of good education and girls must first and foremost learn to be good home-makers and dignity of labour was a principle that could not be compromised with. Sister Alphonse recited the prayer before meals. The convent boarding was full of prayers. Morning prayers, evening prayers, prayers, before meals, after meals, and bed-time prayers, apart from the church services.

The church services were beautiful. The lights in the large cathedral had a majestic glow. While most of the elderly congregation listened to the pastor’s sermon, the girls went into their own world of fanciful reveries only to come out of them, when the organ struck up the notes for the hymns. Going to church was a romantic outing of sorts as the cathedral was about a kilometre from the school and on the way they passed the boys’ hostel of St Johns. The best part of the church services was the annual Corpus Christi Service when the boarders were taken to the little hamlets on the outskirts of the town. After the service which included a little procession around the village with the priest leading, the girls prayed. On the way back they stopped in the woods, sat by little mountain streams and enjoyed the tea made in large kettles over a fire made from dry twigs and pine cones. The goodies which were brought in cute picnic baskets included ham sandwiches, scones and oranges.

Monday morning saw Evelyn standing in the compound with a soiled mattress on her head. Why o why didn’t matron understand that wetting her bed was a problem over which Evelyn had no control and punishment wouldn’t help. Why did matron have to humiliate her this way. Evelyn with her dreamy eyes, slender waist and angelic face. She was already an endearing thirteen year old.The humiliation was heart-rending even to her fellow-mates. Why didn’t matron with all her age and experience understand what these young girls with their breasts still not fully grown did. They could see the pain and shame in Evelyn’s eyes.

Her father like so many Englishmen after India’s independence had left for England, leaving behind in India his wife and two daughters. Evelyn’s mother was now living with a Muslim gentleman. Evelyn couldn’t accept her new father, she missed her daddy, who didn’t have the heart to care for his growing daughters. Evelyn hardly ever spoke about her family and whenever her mother came to visit she was more sad than happy. She once confided to Moon that Niyaz Ahmed her step-dad had lifted her skirt and put his hand under her panty while her mother was away shopping. Evelyn despised him.

Like the sprawling mansions they left behind,British sahebs also left the wild oats they had sown. Many had taken in native mistresses whom they could not acknowledge in their English snobbish society back home and could not carry this baggage to their well- established homes with English wives and children.

So in the boarding there were girls like Majorie, Mary, Anne and Ruth. Anne and Ruth were left in the care and custody of the nuns who after their education, would send them to be settled in England. But what about the lonely days they spent in school during vacations with no place to go to. Their mothers had found other men and settled into new relationships. Bored and lonesome Ruth found solace in the company of the gardener, a kindly man much beyond her years with a wife and kids. She often went down to the garden to spend time with him as he tended to the bushes. She looked for fatherly affection. He too took pity on the little girl who had no home to go to. One day he took her home to his family. His wife asked don’t you go home during vacations?

"No I have nowhere to go to.’’

Where are your parents dear?

I don’t know about my father and my mother doesn’t like to take me home. Her new family doesn’t like me.

Don’t worry dear we love you.

Another of those bad days for Evelyn. Matron Emelda could be so merciless and cruel. Perhaps life had made her so. She troubled everyone with a vengeance as if she was getting back at fate. Matron Emelda, still pretty, though wrinkled too early for her age had married a German soldier who had come to the north-eastern part of the country during the second world war. He had died leaving Emelda with two small children. Ever since it had been a rough life for her and perhaps she derived a sadistic pleasure by taking it out on the poor boarders. She would make a girl forego all her meals till she found her handkerchief or socks if she had lost them, notwithstanding they could have been blown away by the wind. The girls called her Reptile.

The year had come to an end and it was time to go home for the winter break. These days were all a hustle and bustle with suitcases, trunks and travel bags being brought out of the lofts. They were sunned, dusted and cleaned. Canvass hold-alls where bedding had to be packed for the train journeys were aired. Matron took count of everyone’s clothes, lingerie, towels and other accessories to see that nothing was missing. The parlour maid was running to and fro with slips of paper to say whose parents had arrived to take them home, others waiting in anticipation. Anjali was going to a town in an upper district of Assam. Moon would be going to a border town in Arunachal Pradesh where her father was posted. It was a sad farewell for the three friends as Janet was leaving for good. Her father who had been a manager in one of the tea-estates, was offered a job in a shipping company and the family was moving towards the middle east. Moon was sobbing since morning,Anjali was in a pensive mood. She wrote a poem and the three sat and read it together, then held each other and wept. Janet knew she would never meet Moon again, her dear little friend, her beautiful Moon. Life would never be the same again in that quaint boarding house with the large bay windows and pines that seemed to whisper secrets in the night.

Julie Brown wasn’t going home that winter. Her father was too busy on an adventure trip to the foothills of the Himalayas. Julie wasn’t allowed to visit her mother’s home who lived in one of the humble cottages built for the tea-garden workers at the edge of the Ria-Mari tea-estate. Julie’s mother was a tea-garden labourer while her father was a British manager in the same garden. Julie Brown was only allowed to live in his posh bungalow, where her mother was allowed to visit her once in a while. This was a secret hidden from the girls in the boarding school but such secrets cannot be hidden and almost everyone knew. No wonder Julie Brown was such a quiet unassuming girl with a sad distant look in her eternally painful eyes.

It was the year 1963. The Chinese had encroached into parts of the northern and eastern borders of India in spite of the friendly relations between the two nations. All right thinking citizens were taken aback at the sudden aggression. They wondered what blunder had Prime Minister Nehru made to have allowed this to happen. The Indian army was most ill-prepared to face this sudden war. There was news of soldiers dying at the front, some from Chinese bullets, some from cold and frost-bite. Women were knitting socks, gloves and sweaters to be sent to the jawans. The school closed down early for the winter break and most of the children were sent home. Moon’s father who was posted at a border town in Arunachal had his family shifted to a safer place in Assam, while he was busy getting his office shifted. Moon’s grandma arranged for her to be brought to Kolkata but she was too anxious and wanted to be with the family so when everyone else had left she was still at school with a few other girls.

In this little town there was a community of Chinese folk. They had lived here for generations, Indian Chinese. They had been running restaurants and shoe shops. Now with the Chinese banging at the borders, the government had given strict orders that they must be kept under strict surveillance. Rita Chang was afraid as her parents lived in another town in Assam. Her parents had not reached so she was one of the girls in the boarding with Moon. The nuns kept her under their care and protection so that the security officers don’t find her. One night two of them came to the convent gate enquiring if there were any Chinese inmates but nuns are a clever lot and they would never let any harm befall on those placed under their care.

And so everyone left for home that fearful winter. There was sadness all around as the bitterly cold winds engulfed the school building, the frost-laden branches of the pines bowed their heads in shame, the sparrows had all flown away, leaving only the lonely mist and a feeling of desolateness all around.

CHAPTER 2

The steamer was jugging down the great river Brahmaputra. There were not many people on board. Moon, her parents and the rest of the siblings were on deck watching the fishermen’s boats pass by. During the day, the boats were specks of grey and black on the bluish-green water but at night with the dim lanterns there was a mysterious charm about them. Fishermen generally caught big fish as well as small fry which filled the markets. There were fluffy clouds in the sky. The family were on their way to Moon’s maternal Grand Parent’s home in a far-away village in the farthest end of Assam close to the Arunachal border. As they got off the boat, her Kokoi uncle was waiting expectantly, with a smile so winsome, a smile honest and sincere. He picked up the youngest kid piggy-back and they proceeded on the road to the village. There were no macadamised roads in this part of the country, although it had been a decade since independence. The roads were narrow and dusty, country-roads without any bus service. But the walk was delicious with little hamlets interspercing the forests full of wild flowers, krishna-chura, radha-chura and azar blossoms and trees with wild fruit and berries. Here and there was a tiny rivulet and a boat or two and women washing clothes or filling up their pitchers. The village of Haripur situated in Sadiya was a new settlement. The people here were extremely poor. There had been a great earthquake in 1950, the floods which followed had washed away the original village and the people had rehabilitated themselves in small settlements after clearing the forests. There was no help from the government so it was a new life full of struggle for the people of Haripur.

The earthquake had shattered their lives, a hill had broken and blocked a part of the river. Later when the muddy sediments eventually cleared there was water gushing furiously destroying everything, paddy-fields livestock, homes and hearths.The new Haripur was a tiny village, a settlement of mud huts with thatched roofs. Moon’s grandfather’s was one of the three houses made of bamboo and clay with a proper tin roof. There were tears of welcome, hugs and kisses as neighbours and friends kept pouring in throughout the evening. For the village folk the visit of the townsfolk was an event.

In the morning Moon accompanied her aunt to the stream at the end of the village. This was an out of this world experience for the city girl, utterly heavenly. She loved nature with all its bountiful gifts and here in the village she found it all. She bathed in the shallow water and ventured out into the deep to catch tiny fish, which came into her frock as she spread it out in the water. The fragrance of the water weeds was intoxicating. The other women who had also come to fetch water smiled at her joy as she splashed water on her aunt. Aunt Madhuri was a sad woman, not able to have any children. Moon’s mother had taken her to a hospital in one of the bigger towns to get her tested and she was even operated upon. But the efforts were in vain. She was a pretty woman, modestly so in her simplicity and she had a heart of gold. She did all the household chores and went to the paddy fields to help with the harvesting. Her husband kept blaming her for not bearing him a child although medical examinations did not find deficiencies in her and advised that he be examined too but his ego came in the way and so Madhuri had to live with the stigma of a barren woman.

Kokoi uncle took the children around the village sometimes to the woods on the outskirts, picking wild berries, or trying to shoot birds with a catapult. The most exciting was sitting by the river with a fishing rod. It was hours before a fish got on to the hook. Kokoi would sometimes wander off by himself. One day he took Moon and there on the other side of the river they met Loni, a maid most charming, a face innocent and pure. Her clothes were faded and darned at places but you couldn’t miss the sparkle in her eyes and when her face lit up with a smile she could have won a crown at a beauty pageant. Loni had lost her father to tubercolosis and looking after her mother and two kid-sisters fell on her young shoulders. She taught at the primary school in the town a few miles away from the village and had to walk the distance every day. She was respected by the villagers. Kokoi was in love with her since childhood and wanted to make her his wife but she couldn’t leave the family just yet and so life went on for the lovers.

In the evening a fire was generally lit in the small backyard in front of the kitchen and everyone sat around it. Moon carried in her lap the two little new-born lambs. The lambs smelt fresh and their skin was smooth and velvety to touch. Potatoes, brinjals and fish were roasted in the fireplace while rice and lentils were cooked in the main kitchen. Grandpa was addicted and needed his daily dose of opium. He was a man of little substance, but fortunate, for his wife more than compensated for his inactive life. Grandma worked in the paddy fields, worked at home and wove cloth in her loom which she sold to the cloth merchants in the town.

The holiday would soon come to an end and mother was making her visits to the families here, some old friends some relatives. She couldn’t say when she would come again and everywhere she went there were warm welcomes and sad farewells. She had been a village belle, who had the fortune to marry an educated towns-man and visiting her village home brought torrents of nostalgia.

Moon’s mother had been a naughty tomboy, climbing trees, playing truant at school and running around the village, helping people find the cow that had grazed away too far or helping another bring forth a new-born calf. She was hardly fifteen when she met the young man.

That was in the old village, before the great earthquake that brought floods and devastation. In those days the farm-houses were prosperous with granaries full of the rich harvests, children played merrily, the lanes were lined with mango, jackfruit, coconut and beetle nut trees as every farm had an orchard in the frontyards. As you entered the village, you were greeted with the fragrance of newly mowed hay, the sound of rice being ground for pancakes, little lambs bleating away and ducks quacking around.

It was to this village that he arrived one spring afternoon. The young man had been a member of a group of freedom fighters, carrying messages from one group of revolutionaries to another. After independence and partition of the country, he had opted to settle in Hindustan, leaving behind all the ancestral property in Syllhet, his family too had come to India. In the new post independent government he was able to secure a good job. His first posting was in Sadiya town and one weekend he decided to visit the countryside and came to Haripur village. He was passing by looking for a teashop for some refreshments. He noticed a group of young damsels eating berries under a tree and enquired. The boldest among them suggested he come home with her for tea as there weren’t any tea-shops for miles around. He was fascinated by her openness and sense of freedom and often visited her home and spent his weekends in her company and one summer