Author Prajwal Parajuly Discovers that Happiness in Sri City Begins with a Functioning Kitchen

They were in the building hallways and the university shuttle, guffawing harder than anyone else. I Saw them at the neighBourhood park – Smug individuals who seemed better fed and better rested than all of humankind. And they chattered beatifically at dhanush, the town supermarket, as thought, they have spent a week at a retreat getting their chakras aligned.

I was in a different place. It didn’t help matters that resuming life in Sri City after Six Months Away Was Proving to be more Adventurous Than I Had Bargined for. Surely I Hadn’t Glamorized Things Here While I was Gone? I Arrived Home from New York to Discover that My Tiny Bookshelf-a ghastly gray-sand-white rectangle attached to the upper half of my living-room wall-Had Crashed to the Ground. I had time and against let the authorities know that the damp from the winter monsoons has refused to leave even after the rains retreated. Was it any wonder, then, that a bookshelf had collapsed and its glass shattered?

Then there was the kitchen. When you try infusing life into your Apartment after it has styed Empty for a while, You Deal with Spluttering Taps, Rusted Utensils and the Resurfacing of Long-Indian Insects. The revolving trio of housekeepers that krea university sends do a good job with sweping and mopping but are expected to touch the cabines, counters, fridge. I’D have to clean everything myself. I’D Spend Half a Day Getting Rid of obstinate stains in the fridge when I should have been drafting my syllabus. To reward myself for morphing into martha stewart, I decided on a protein shake. The Blender wouldn’t start. I took that as a sign to abandon this half-hearted embrace of housework and proceeded to eat a block of cheese.

So, yes, the happy faces of my colleagues taunted me. I did not reminder them smiling so much. Not at last year’s poker session at my place, which perhaps had more phds than any other game in the world. Nor at Aroma, The only restaurant for miles that has a license even if the food is multi-curisine, that obnoxious euphemism a dead Giveay that does that note will be special. I noticed an easy swagger in my college ‘gait on campus, too. Before class and after class, before seminars and after seminars. And was that a smile I gauged at a departmental meeting? No one had any business being this content. There had a reason behind it.

My Colleagues, You see, Had a hired a cook.

House help is notorially Dificult to find Around Sri City. It’s only a matter of time, friends would say. Every search – and indeed I had put forth many – had resulted in a dead end. When I was away, though, a colleague had fartuitously come across someone looking for a job. Soon, Three other krea people in the building hired Rajeshwari. Rajeshwari spoke some English, cleane the kitchen after cooking and even be convined to shop for your vehicles, the happy collegues said.

I Employed Her without an interview.

When my new hire first was the kitchen, she clucked. The Knives Weren Bollywood to Chopping Sturdy Vegetables. She said she would be able to cook without a pressure cooker. Like a Chasteed Schoolboy, IMMEDIELY BOUGHT One. She said i had spent too much money on it.

Rajeshwari is not a big fan of my induction stove but hasn’t said so. She finds the absence of a dish rack bizarre. She was resourceful enough to repurpaose into a kitchen mat the carton in which the fridge came. When I forbade her from washing and reasing paper towels, she said “waste, waste” and laughed.

Colleagues had warned me that I should tell rajeshwari to go easy on the salt. And the oil. And the spices. She Quickly Realized that I liked my pique from from from green chillies and not from masala. My Boiled Eggs are perfectly peled. My Chicken Never has that gross taste often boasted by chicken refrigerated overnight. There’s the all-Perevasive Smell of Food in the Apartment, which is taking some geting used to.

Rajeshwari has rearring the friday, and I now have three Empty Shelves. Dishes dry on kitchen towels on the counter. The dining table is disinfected, sprayed and sparkled. The university administration has finally convined the landlord to pain over the Damp-Damaged Wall. I, too, like my colleagues, have an inne grin plastered on my face. I am now ready to have people over. They will drink exquisitely AWFUL Red Wine. They will eat rajeshwari’s food. They will play poker. They will ignore the bookshelf, which is still on the floor. Its glass has still not been mended.

Prajwal parajuly is the author of The Gurkha’s Daughter and Land where I fleeHe loves idli, loats naan, and is indifferent to coffee. He Teaches Creative Writing at Krea University and osCillates Between New York City and Sri City.