Swimming in the Monsoon Sea

By Shyam Selvadurai

Amrith comes to terms with his sexuality in this sweeping coming-of-age story set against the stormy backdrop of monsoon season in 1980s Sri Lanka. For fans of Call Me By Your Name.

Shyam Selvadurai’s brilliant novels, Funny Boy and Cinnamon Gardens, have garnered him international acclaim. In his first young adult novel, he explores first love with clarity, humor and compassion.
 
The setting is Sri Lanka, 1980, and it is the season of monsoons. Fourteen-year-old Amrith is caught up in the life of the cheerful, well-to-do household in which he is being raised by his vibrant Auntie Bundle and kindly Uncle Lucky. He tries not to think of his life “before,” when his doting mother was still alive. Amrith’s holiday plans seem unpromising: he wants to appear in his school’s production of Othello and he is learning to type at Uncle Lucky’s tropical fish business. Then, like an unexpected monsoon, his cousin arrives from Canada and Amrith’s ordered life is storm-tossed. He finds himself falling in love with the Canadian boy. Othello, with its powerful theme of disastrous jealousy, is the backdrop to the drama in which Amrith finds himself immersed.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tundra Books
• Release date: Dec 4, 2012
• ISBN: 9781551997209

Shyam Selvadurai

Shyam Selvadurai was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka. Funny Boy, his first novel, won the W.H. Smith/ Books in Canada First Novel Award and the Lambda Literary Award in the United States. He is the author of Cinnamon Gardens and Swimming in the Monsoon Sea, and the editor of an anthology, Story-wallah! A Celebration of South Asian Fiction. His books have been published in the United States, United Kingdom, and India, and in translation.

Book preview

Sri Lanka

1980

1

The Silent Mynah

Amrith, reaching the top step to the terrace, paused for a moment and looked out over the rooftops toward the sea, visible through the palm fronds of coconut trees in the various gardens between his house and the beach. In the dawn light, bands of silver were appearing on the crests of the waves, as if a giant louver in the sky was opening up, one slat at a time. A breeze was coming up from the ocean, bringing a saltiness to his lips. Amrith could usually tell, by the sound of the waves against the sand, whether the tide was in or out. But this was a monsoon sea, wild and savage, and it had eaten up the beach. Even at low tide, the waves still crashed against the rocks that held them back from eroding the land.

The birds in the aviary had noticed Amrith’s presence and, as he crossed the terrace, the budgerigars twittered in anticipation of the food he might be bringing them. There had been a monsoon storm last night, and Amrith had to walk around large puddles to reach the aviary. Once he had let himself into the safety porch, he secured the door behind him and looked around.

The storm had not caused any damage to the aviary. A few feeding cups had been knocked over by the wind, their seed scattered on the ground, and a perch broken. These were minor destructions, considering the fierceness of the storm. Kuveni, the mynah, was already in the shelter part of the aviary, where the food and water were kept. She was flapping her wings and making little darts in the direction of the hexagonal flight area to keep the budgerigars away so she would have first rights to whatever food Amrith was bringing. Kuveni, named after the mythical demoness of Sri Lankan lore, was vicious and spiteful and bossy, and not really suitable for colony breeding. Yet Amrith could not bring himself to isolate her. He liked her spunk, her bossiness. He just wished that she would talk. He had been trying for the last four months, since she was brought to him, to try and get her to say his name, but she remained mute. Now, he stood back, holding out the halved papaw he had brought and repeating, Amrith, Amrith, over and over again, hoping that, by tantalizing her, she would speak out of desperation or annoyance. Yet she said nothing, and only beat her wings against the mesh that separated them.

With a sigh, he let himself in. The moment he put the papaw down on a ledge, Kuveni flew to it and began to devour the pulp.

Until Kuveni had been given to him, Amrith had not realized how beautiful mynahs were. Here in Colombo, they were common as crows and he had not paid them the slightest attention. Being this close to one, however, had made him see how exquisite they were — their silky black heads; their warm brown plumage; the golden yellow of their throats, upper breasts, bills, and feet; the snowy white tips of their tails.

Voices in the side garden below distracted Amrith from his contemplation. Aunty Bundle and her old ayah, Jane-Nona, were discussing the damage caused to the living room roof by the storm last night. Some of the tiles had blown away, leaving a gaping hole. Roofers were very busy during the monsoon period, and the women were worried that, if the hole was not repaired in time, they would have to cancel the big birthday party for Aunty Bundle’s daughters, which was to take place next month.

The women had finished their conversation and Aunty Bundle started up the stairs that led to the terrace. As her footsteps drew near, a black mood, which Amrith had managed to hold at bay, swept over him like a wave, carrying him out to a darkness he did not want to face.

Amrith?

Aunty Bundle stood on the top step, looking towards him in the aviary. Her plump face, usually merry, was sober and stark without any makeup, and her eyes, which always sparkled with laughter, were dull and red from crying. Instead of her regular bright sarong and crisp lace blouse, she wore the plain white sari of mourning. The jeweled peacock that hung from a chain around her waist was gone, as were her gold bangles. The only jewelry she wore was her gold cross on a chain.

Amrith felt a sharp anger take hold as he looked at her through the mesh. Why did she insist on dressing in clothes of mourning every year on this day? It had been eight years since his mother’s death and yet, from Aunty Bundle’s clothes, one would think it was the day of the funeral itself. He wanted to yell that it was all too ridiculous — this remembering, this anniversary. He was sick of it, sick of the whole thing. Today was the first day of his holidays. It was unfair, utterly unfair, that he had to get up so early and go to Mass and then the graveyard. He should have been allowed to sleep in.

Son, Aunty Bundle said, taking a step forward, it’s time to go.

"Um, yes, Aunty, he replied politely. I’ll come in a moment."

She nodded and went back down the terrace steps.

The moment she was gone, Amrith leaned against the mesh and closed his eyes. He thought of how, on the first anniversary of his mother’s death, he had rebelled against going to church and the graveyard. He wished that he was seven again and not fourteen — that he could once again throw a tantrum and refuse to go. On that first anniversary, he had lain on the floor and screamed when Aunty Bundle tried to make him put on his church clothes. Finally her husband, Uncle Lucky, had intervened. Though Amrith, by then, loved and trusted Uncle Lucky more than anyone else in the world, he was still afraid of him. Uncle Lucky would not let him get away with anything. And so, while Uncle Lucky had stood over him sternly, he had hiccuped and sobbed, but got dressed. When he was done, Uncle Lucky had sat on the edge of the bed and made Amrith stand between his thighs, while he combed his hair. As he did so, he had spoken to him gravely, telling Amrith he must never forget his mother; that the past was very important as, from time to time, we could call on it to help us. And if we did not know our past, then we could not call on it.

Kuveni had sated herself on papaw and she was perched on a swing, looking at Amrith, her head to one side. His anger flowed towards her. You’re useless, he said softly, his eyes narrowed. I should just release you into the garden and get another mynah that will talk.

The car was starting up downstairs in the garage. Amrith left the aviary, closing the door behind him and checking the lock twice.

The aviary was a gift from Aunty Bundle, for Amrith’s thirteenth birthday last year. Her close friend and colleague, the famous architect Lucien Lindamulagé, had a giant aviary in his back garden; he was almost as passionate about his birds as he was about his buildings. Amrith, from the time he was little, would spend hours in the old man’s aviary. Aunty Bundle consulted Lucien Lindamulagé on the building of the aviary. She did not allow Uncle Lucky to contribute a cent. It was to be solely her gift. She told Amrith and her two daughters, Selvi and Mala, that construction was going on to turn the terrace into a properly landscaped roof-garden and that they were forbidden to go up there. Then, on Amrith’s birthday, when he came home from school, Aunty Bundle had taken him by the hand and hurried him through the side garden and up the terrace stairs. He had gasped when he saw the aviary, all the budgerigars twittering and flying around at the sight of humans, whom they associated with food.

As Amrith went down the terrace stairs, he thought of how Aunty Bundle’s generosity always made him feel uneasy. He felt that what she did for him, she did out of guilt. Aunty Bundle blamed herself, to this day, for his mother’s death.

Usually, when Amrith went to church, it was on Sunday for late-morning Mass. The church would be flooded with sunlight through the dome above the altar and the side windows. The various murals — Saint Sebastian, his head lifted in rapture to the heavens, his scantily clad body pierced with a hundred arrows; Mary Magdalene kneeling before Christ, wiping His feet with the veil of her hair; benevolent Saint Anthony — would be clearly visible.

Though Amrith found the Sunday Mass boring, Aunty Bundle’s daughters, Selvi and Mala, were present, and so they ended up having a good time. Selvi, who was plump, pretty, and vivacious like her mother, was frequently in scrapes for being a tomboy. Her goal during Mass was to make Amrith and Mala laugh. When Father Anthony would say, Let us stand and bow our heads to receive the word of God, Our Heavenly Father, Selvi would lean over and whisper goad, which was the way the priest pronounced God. This would set Amrith off with a snuffle of laughter. Then she would add in a sibilant whisper, "Amrith, Amrith, Amrith, look at Father Anthony’s hair. It’s like an Afro, nah." Amrith’s shoulders would shake uncontrollably and, to push him completely over the edge, Selvi would give a soft wolf-whistle and say, "Hoo-hoo, sexy-sexy Disco-Father. Amrith would almost weep with silent laughter, begging her in a whisper, Shut up, men, please shut up."

Even Mala, who had recently become very religious (and who participated in the Mass with fervor, her hands clasped tightly to her chest), would lose her devout expression and start to giggle, which was the ultimate triumph for Selvi.

This Monday morning, however, the church was almost empty. The scattering of worshippers had gathered in the front pews, as the lights and ceiling fans in the rest of the church had been turned off to save electricity. They appeared huddled against the gloom of the church behind them. The darkness of his surroundings seemed to enter Amrith’s very soul as he automatically stood and sat through the recitation of the Mass. To his right, just beyond the pew, was a statue of Our Lady, her arms held out in a gesture of welcome as if beckoning the supplicant to her, the smile on her face gentle and loving. As Amrith gazed at her, his mind, over which he kept such rigid control when it came to the past, slipped silently away from him, and he was back on that tea estate where he had spent the first six years of his life.

He was coming home from school, so longing to see his mother after their morning separation. He ran through the massive iron gates into the graveled front compound of the estate bungalow and around the side of the house to the back, where a veranda flanked the rear of the house. There, as always, he found his mother. He loved that moment when he turned the corner, dashed up the veranda steps, and saw her sitting in her chair wearing a cream cardigan and cotton trousers. A magenta batik scarf, folded into an Alice band, kept back the frizzy exuberance of her hair. When she held her arms out to him, the bangles on her wrists would tinkle in welcome. He would run to her, snuggling into that familiar smell of eau de cologne.

She always sat in the same cane chair, which had a back shaped like a fanned-out peacock tail. If she was not there when he ran up onto the veranda, he would bury his face in the cushion, breathing in her eau de cologne, not lifting his head until she had come back out to him.

He was six years old by then and he knew that, compared to the fair-skinned, plump female stars of Sinhala and Tamil films, his mother was not considered conventionally beautiful. Her skin was too dark; she was too thin, too awkwardly long-limbed. But he loved her eyes and the way she would look at him mischievously from under her long lashes when they were playing; the way her frizzy hair would burst out all over her face when she released it from her Alice band. She was, in her own way, beautiful.

Later, after she had fed him his lunch, he would take his afternoon rest on a daybed on the veranda. His mother took her rest on another daybed, a little away from him. He had learnt to judge his mother’s mood by what she did during that time. If she was at ease, she would invite him to lie with her, while she read her Femina magazines, one arm around him as he cuddled up against her side.

If his mother was in a low mood, however, she would lie by herself or, most often, go through the French windows into the drawing room. After a moment, Amrith would hear a scratching and hissing before the music started. She played the same two records over and over again: Pat Boone and Nat King Cole, records from her youth. Above the sound of the songs, he would hear her pacing. Sometimes, she strode out onto the veranda, as if she was going somewhere. But when she got to the edge, she stood, her right arm over her stomach, her hand clutching her left elbow. She would stand like that for a long time, occasionally brushing her palm across her cheeks.

Amrith knew the cause of her sorrow. It was his father.

This man was a stranger to Amrith. He had never actually seen him. His father was gone from the house by the time Amrith awoke; his lunch was sent to the office in a tiffin carrier; he had dinner at the club. On Sundays his father stayed home, and then Amrith remained with his ayah, Selamma, in the tea workers’ quarters, until his father left for the club at five. Amrith only knew his father as a sound, a voice shouting in the night.

When he knelt beside his bed to pray each evening, he would repeat the last line of his prayer over and over again as if it was a mantra that would bring peace that night, a mantra that would stop his father’s raging.

When the night sounds did occur, Amrith would sit up in bed, his knees drawn to his chest, his eyes squeezed tight, trying to persuade himself that his father’s shouts were actually sneezes, that the rising inflection of his mother’s voice was tinkling laughter as she tickled his father’s nose with a feather; that their dog, Bhootaya, was baying outside the front door because she had been left out of the fun.

Later, when Amrith was half-asleep, he would feel his bed heave as his mother got in beside him. She would curl around him, her hand slipping into his. The smell of sweat on her was sharp like the Singer oil she used on her sewing machine. Her body would be trembling from trying not to cry.

Amrith, child.

He came to himself, to find Aunty Bundle holding out her handkerchief to him. He stared at it for a moment, puzzled, then he felt the wetness on his cheeks. He took the handkerchief, hurriedly turned away, and wiped his face. When he handed it back, he avoided her sympathetic gaze. His anger towards her returned sharply.

The graveyard, where his mother was buried, was in the center of Colombo. Its many acres were divided into different sections for the various religions of Sri Lanka. One part of the graveyard was taken up with crematoriums for the Buddhists and Hindus, who did not bury their dead but rather cremated the bodies and scattered the ashes in the sea or in rivers. The Muslims had their area, as did the numerous Christian sects.

Aunty Bundle’s driver, Mendis, parked the car outside the gate that led into the Christian section, and she and Amrith got out.

There were hawkers in front of the gates selling bunches of flowers, marigold garlands, lotuses, and sticks of incense from their stalls. Aunty Bundle stopped at one of them to buy two bouquets of flowers. She handed one to Amrith and, as he took it, he smelt the sharp odor of carnations, a smell he always associated with death and funerals.

They entered through the gates and made their way among the graves, towards the place where his mother was buried. They were passing through a section of the cemetery that, during the time of colonialism, when the British ruled Sri Lanka, had been White Only. The British had buried their dead in this separate area, apart from the Sri Lankans. It was in a dilapidated state, as the descendants of these dead colonizers were no longer around to keep their ancestors’ graves up. The few tombstones that were still standing were so covered in moss, it was impossible to read the engravings. Most of the stones, however, had disintegrated under the tropical heat and humidity. Just fragments lay in the tall grass, with surnames like Smith, Barclay, Woodson — names that had once belonged to someone’s father or mother or child or sibling. Another fragment had the words Dearly Beloved, with an engraving of roses around it. Another fragment, just the word Mother. As they made their way through the knee-high grass, Amrith was sure that they were stepping on graves.

When they reached his mother’s grave, the grass and weeds were high on the mound. The flowers Aunty Bundle had laid, when she visited a month ago, were withered and crisped brown. There had been a recent burial in the adjoining plot, the date of death on the tombstone reading July 1980. Clods of soil were scattered on his mother’s grave.

Ttttch. Aunty Bundle clicked her tongue against the back of her teeth in annoyance. I pay that cemetery keeper, and see, nothing has been done.

She knelt down and began to pull at the weeds and grass. Amrith did not help her. He stood there, his face averted from the grave, wishing that this whole ordeal would end.

Once Aunty Bundle was satisfied with the state of the grave, she indicated for him to kneel beside her and together they said a decade of the rosary. When they were done, Amrith got to his feet and dusted the knees of his white trousers, which were stained with soil.

Amrith?

He looked up to see Aunty Bundle regarding him with a mixture of worry and hope. Even before she spoke, he knew what she was going to say. She asked him the same questions every year.

Son, don’t you remember your mother at all?

He shook his head.

You don’t remember that time, when I visited you at the estate?

He shook his head again and avoided looking at her.

Later, as they were walking back towards the gate, Amrith kept a few steps behind Aunty Bundle. He felt a curious bitter

Reviews for Swimming in the Monsoon Sea

[meggyweg · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The dust jacket makes it seem like this novel is just about a boy falling in love with another boy, but really, Amrith's love for Niresh is only peripheral to the plot. More important is Amrith's reconciling his feelings about his dead parents and the trouble in their families, and his adoptive parents and sisters, who he both loves and hates. All the main characters in the story are fully real, and Amrith's growing maturity is well portrayed.

However, this book did have some flaws. It was overly didactic -- obviously written for a Western audience that had no notion of Sri Lankan life, there was a little too much explaining about customs and architecture and the weather. The other, bigger problem (in my mind) is that way too much was told rather than shown, particularly about Amrith's feelings. It was as if the author didn't trust the reader to draw the correct conclusions and had to spoon-feed them everything.

I would give this book a B, and might be tempted to pick up more of this author's work in the future. I hope he works out his showing-telling problem.

[callmecayce · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Swimming in the Monsoon Sea is another partly heartbreaking story of first loves. Unlike previous young adult stories about gay young men, Selvadurai's novel is different. The story takes place in Sri Lanka, a place where (at least in the 80s, when the novel takes place) homosexuality is not something that's common or even talked about.

Amrith, a 14 year old boy, lives with his adoptive parents. His past is complicated and sad, but we don't find out the details until near the end of the novel. And in many ways, this is one of strongest coming of age novels I've read recently. In many of them, the boys have already come to terms with being gay, but Amrith doesn't even understand what's going on in his head. He doesn't even realize how he feels until his long lost cousin from Canada appears in his life.

Up until we meet Amrith's cousin, Niresh, the only things he cares about are not thinking about his mother's death and acting. He desperately wants to be in the school production of Othello -- and manages to win the part of Desdemona (a part he covets, after winning an award for his acting as Juliet in Romeo and Juliet). But the Niresh shows up, and Amrith's world is shaken up.

The world Selvadurai creates is both believable and emotionally driven. We follow Amrith as he struggles with his friendship with Niresh, slowly falling in love, and his relationships with his family (adoptive parents and sisters). Selvadurai allows us to watch as Amrith is torn apart, through his love of Niresh, mourning of his mother and love of acting and then how he must find a way to put himself back together.

As I was reading, I kept waiting for something to happen and then when it did, it was beautiful and heartbreaking. This novel is not like the majority of YA gay fiction I've read, there's no implied sex, no reciprocation of feelings. Instead, it's a story of love and loss, because when your first love with is your straight cousin, there's no way it can work out.

But don't let that stop you from reading. Swimming in the Monsoon Sea is so much more than just that storyline. Selvadurai is a brilliant story teller and I can't wait to read more of his books.

[peonygoat_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Amrith, who lives with his adopted family, comes to realize he’s different as he begins to observe the people around him. He realizes he has strong feelings for his male cousin Niresh who is visiting from Canada.