Talking to Monica: Part Two

The Cemetery.

Monica hollered over the wall of the cemetery, “Yes, I am coming.” Ben and I had just reached the walled-in gates of her home, and peered up and over the high barrier between us and her family. (pictured: cemetary entrance) She skipped to the iron gate and unlatched the heavy chain-linked lock. “We saw you coming” she smiled, and I looked up to where she tilted her head. Three boys sat on an invisible structured hidden by the wall and starred, blank-faced, at the three of us. An elderly women aged in years and weathered by sun and rain also watched. “Namaste ji” Ben and I echoed one another with hands pressed together and our heads bent into them. Our greeting was chorused by “Nameste” from the small group overhead. Monica giggled towards her father who watched from a nearby stone with a smile creased in his eyes. “Please tell your father “thank you” for letting us see your home” I told Monica. She spoke this message to her father and he nodded at us.

“Follow me” Monica said and she skipped ahead. We followed, picking our way through small stumps of grass and rolling waves of dirt. The cemetery was gently terraced, each level baring tombs dating back to the 1800’s. One grave held a cross laden with a marble-cut designs of ivy woven around its frames. Another cross was simple and straight-edged with the engraved words “She died in her youth.” Monica beckoned us to follow. We joined her at a gravesite where the angel, with outstretched arms broken at the wrist, sat adoringly above a tombstone. Monica smiled endearingly back at the angel. “It’s so peaceful here,” she said. “Do you study for school here” I asked. “Yes” Monica said, and added mischievously, “My friends and I play hide-and-seek too!” Seeing the tombstones as we tiptoed through the terraces, Ben and I read aloud many names and dates dating back to the days the British ruled India. Many, we noted, were youthful death, from 18 year-old brides, to newborn babies. Life must have been difficult.

After spending some time following Monica and her brother around the cemetery, she invited us into her home. Eager to thank her parents for their daughters touring skills, we gladly we obliged. Dipping my head to enter her home, I took two steps forward and, being in the center of the home, took the offered seat on the sagging bed. Ben followed, grinning ear to ear at the family that squatted in the shadows of their home. Three boys with caps pulled around their ears smiled up at Ben. His glasses were instantly fogged as he sipped hot tea and the three boys giggled into their sweaters. Monica’s father handed me a cup of tea as well, and I asked if the boys liked their sister. We all giggled at the assumed answer of sibling rivalry. Ben and I then explained we also had brothers that we used to both play and fight with.

We chatted in the hollow of the room for twenty minutes. A blackened tea pot sat diligently over the sleepy coals in a nook of the room. Above the three crouching boys, about eye-level, hung several articles of clothing, messed and jumbled together on a stick acting a hanging rode. The smaller boy pulled his cap around his head, latching his fingers in its holey fabric for a snug tug.

Thanking Monica for showing us her playground and insisting we would, we could, we should return again soon, we returned the cooled and empty cups of tea to her mother. Being granted permission to leave, we raised our hands once again with “Namaste” and followed our young friend to the heavy chain-linked lock. Without a moment’s hesitation, the lock was undone, and we were ushered out by smiling, gratified Monica. “Wave hello when you run by in the morning” she said to me. Of course I will.