The Sound of Things to Come
II
‘But how does a chapatti know when to puff up? And how?’
Mari smiled a cheeky smile.
‘That’s why I’m here. I want to find out once and for all how a chapatti knows when and how to puff up…When and how to rise.’
She winked at me.
‘I intend to meditate on that until I find out. I don’t care how long it takes.’
Mari was an Austrian woman in her fifties. She had cropped grey hair and beautifully smiley crow’s feet eyes. Her face was tanned and wrinkled in the right places. I thought to myself that if she had the face that she deserved, then she must be truly special. An angel or a seraph, or something.
‘Is that what you plan to do today Mari?’ I asked, ‘Meditate on chapattis?’
‘Why yes, of course!’ Mari replied, ‘I just told you. That’s what I’m here for. Every day for the next six months, without fail, I will meditate on how a chapatti knows…’
‘When and how to how to puff up…’ I joined in.
‘Exactly!’ Mari beamed. ‘It is very, very important you see. It’s a complete and utter mystery. No one knows. No one I have asked seems to know how a chapatti knows when and how. I have asked scientists. I have asked chefs. I have asked professors. Not one of them has the answer. Not a single one of them!”
‘Well, I wish you the best of luck. I am afraid that I am quite content with eating chapattis. I’ll leave it to you to contemplate their deeper mysteries,’ I said, as I stuffed a piece of dahl-laden phulka into my mouth.
‘Thank you,’ said Mari.
‘Well,’ she continued after swigging a mouthful of sugary sweet chai, to tell you the truth, I am taking a break from my chapatti contemplations for today. It’s all too much. It has made me quite stressed and confused. I am going to see my dentist in Mumbai instead, to contemplate the mysteries of my aching tooth.”
‘Too much sweet chai. It’s not a mystery at all,’ I replied.
Mari smiled and her eyes wrinkled up beautifully.
‘Wow. Your dentist is in Mumbai? Really? Is it safe?’ asked Jody.
Jody was staying at the guesthouse with her partner David for a couple of days. They had come to the village from California with the particular task of building a huge domed temple on a plot of land in the valley. They had never been to India before. Nor had they any experience in building huge domed temples.
‘Safe?’ Replied Mari. ‘Well, he’s been fine so far, but I suppose you never can tell with these Indian dentists.’
Jody gave me a baffled frown, looked at Mari then looked back at me.
‘Oh, no…ha…haha I see!’ she exclaimed eventually. ‘Funny! I didn’t mean the dentist! I meant Mumbai…the city…Is it safe?’
‘As safe as ever. Maybe safer,’ replied Mari. ‘There are police everywhere. They were stopping just about every car and auto-rickshaw and truck entering the city last week. The traffic was dreadful. Yes. Annoyingly safe.’
The three of us were sitting at the kitchen table eating our chapatti and dahl breakfasts from stainless steel plates. Attached to the refrigerator beside me were postcards and hand-written notes and lists and a snoopy magnet. On the wall, silver paper letters said ‘Merry Christmas’ next to a small cardboard cut out of Santa Claus and a 2008 calendar.
‘Did anyone else hear that drumming this morning?’ I asked.
‘Yes, what was that?’ Exclaimed Jody. ‘It woke me up real early. It was going from before four a.m. I’m sure’.
‘Yeah, it was incessant wasn’t it?’ I said. ‘It sounded like Stomp were practising somewhere in the jungle.’ I laughed, imagining a band of Antipodeans with dungarees, banging plastic pipes and oil drums up a mountain in India; but the reference seemed lost on Jody and Mari, who looked at me blankly, ‘…It was amazing though. Along with all the other morning sounds. I’ve never heard anything like it.’
‘That’s the temple up at the top of the mountain,’ said Mari, ‘They drum at different times of the day and night. It’s quite a racket. You really should go up there though, although perhaps not in the middle of the night’.
‘Why not?’ Jody asked.
‘Oh…Well…It’s just a little weird,’ replied Mari.
‘Weird?’ I asked.
‘Yes…yes. Imagine those incessant drums pounding in your ear up a mountain in the middle of the night. It’s quite full on. You might not come back the same person.’
‘Sounds great.’ I replied.
‘Well, yes. It is quite remarkable. Go up there later on. Go with your friend.’ Mari smiled her warm wrinkled smile again.
‘Okay, yes, definitely. How do we get up there?’
‘There’s a path leading up there from the main road in to the village, said Mari, as she stood up and pushed her chair under the table. ‘You’ll see some orange flags and an arrow on an orange sign. Follow those and then keep following the signs up past the back of the houses…’
Mari made her way over the room and opened the kitchen door.
‘In the meantime, have a lovely day,’ she smiled at me ‘and you too Jody. See you both later. I have a car waiting for me. I really need to sort out this damned tooth of mine,’ she said, holding her jaw.
‘Thanks Mari, see you later,’ we both replied as she left the room.
‘It’s on the left hand side. Your friend knows the way,’ she called to me from somewhere outside.
‘Does she? Really?’ I called in response.
But Mari had gone. A car door slammed and the rumble of her taxi’s engine disappeared down the lane.
