CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The Hindi word for welcome is swaagat.
Kishore received a telephone call from his parents regarding his Aunt and Uncle’s impression of their meeting with me. Apparently, to Kishore’s and my great relief they told his parents I was a lovely, sweet girl. As in conventional arranged marriages the parents of the intended boy and girl seek advice from friends and family about the marriage of their child. Kishore’s Mum and Dad could only use Aunt Bhamini and Uncle Harilal's comments to judge the girl their son was engaged to. They were really keen to meet for themselves, the red headed, freckled girl who had stolen their son’s heart.
We made a few stumbling phone calls to his family home. Kishore handed the phone over to me whispering in my ear, “Say Namaste,” (hello) then, "Kei ha lai” (how are you). I repeated what he told me and could hear a tiny voice deep within the phone lines reply, “Namaste, mai theek hu,” (Hello, I am good). I was talking to Kishore’s Mother, as I spoke I imagined an older version of the woman I had seen in the photos at his Aunt and Uncles house. I saw, in my mind’s eye, his Mother dressed in a sari holding the phone up close to her ear. I thought she must be wondering, who is this English girl that my son is so intent on marrying? Is she genuine? Is she a good person? A Mother is a Mother regardless of race, culture or religion and only wants what is best for her child.
Secretly, I was scared. I was beginning to realise just what I might be getting myself into if I married Kishore. I hoped his family would like me and support our decision to marry. We knew meeting his family was exceptionally important, so as a couple we made our first big decision.
We started planning a trip to India.
When I told my friends my exciting news, they were not as enthusiastic as I hoped they would be. In fact, as they each voiced their own opinions, their remarks astonished me. Louise, with a hint of sarcasm affectionately called me a 'curry lover.’ Michelle said, ‘what if he sells you to a white slave trader?’ Kerry’s concerns were, ‘be careful, Julie, Indian men treat their wives as slaves’ and ‘what if he takes you to India and dumps you there?’
When I sadly told Kishore these comments he surprised me by laughing. He especially found the last comment funny, “Julie, my jewel,” he said, “Why would I spend our time and money on planning a trip to India to meet my family, if all I do is dump you when we get there? What would that achieve? Why would a person do that?”
We decided the best thing to do was to ignore the comments and continue saving for our trip.
We loved each other deeply, that is all that mattered to us.
We were discussing travel plans one afternoon at Mum’s house when I got up to get a drink of water.
“Julie,” Kishore called from the lounge where he was busy petting Penny, his new best friend, “Can you please have a look in my wallet for a business card that has the name of a travel agent on it.”
I picked up his wallet that was sitting on the bench next to his keys. While looking for the card, I found a folded note tucked behind his driver’s licence. Curiosity got the better of me and I opened it. I was surprised to see my own handwriting. I realised with astonishment, it was the note with my phone number I had given to Linda that day in the lunchroom when Kishore presented me with the flower. Confronting him, I waved it dramatically in his face, teasing, “Mmmmm, whose number is this, a secret girlfriend, aye?” To my surprise he took one glance at the piece of paper and said, “Julie, that’s the note with your home phone number, 472-9023.” He had not only kept it but also knew my number off by heart.
We headed out one Saturday night to Michelle’s house, she had also become engaged and organised a pre-wedding couples games night with inventive competitions that would make for an interesting evening. After introductions and drinks the games began. The first challenge was to see how many pegs each girl could fit into her hand while hanging out washing on a make-shift clothesline. A length of string had been stretched between two chairs while knickers and bras (which were clean!) were used as clothes - I lost, miserably.
A boys game was next, Kishore was very eager to participate in this competition, which was called ‘see who could eat the most spring onions.’ Peeking at each other we snickered behind our hands. Kishore had already told me of the competitions he’d had with his brother to see who could eat the most chillies. Compared to chillies, spring onions were like raw carrots. While his competitors had tears streaming from their eyes, my fiancé munched his way through those spring onions like they were raw carrots! He won, of course, easily.
*
Our first big argument was over a pair of jeans.
We had been saving for our trip for a few months when Kishore arrived at my house one Saturday morning proudly wearing a brand new pair of expensive Levis jeans. He waited for the expected compliment but that was not what he got. I had always been thrifty, so saving came easily to me and with Kishore being an accountant I thought he would also be frugal. And he was, most of the time. This one time however, he’d blown caution to the wind. Kishore was oblivious, he didn’t even realise what he’d done. Although, the look of thunder on my face was enough to make him realise I was not at all happy.
He asked hesitantly, “What’s wrong, Julie, are you okay?”
With a scowl, I answered the only way a woman knows how to reply when she is not in the mood for talking.
“Nothing,” I seethed.
The poor man persisted, pushing me and falling innocently into the trap he was setting for himself.
“Come on, Julie, I can tell something is wrong.”
Not able to contain myself any longer, I exploded.
“Jeans! Not only jeans but Levis jeans! How can you be wearing an expensive pair of jeans? We are saving!” My eyebrows hit the top of my head as I continued ranting rather loudly, “If you want to buy something expensive we need to discuss it first, that’s what couples do, I am desperately trying to save every cent I have so we can go to India to meet your family, so we can start our lives together and you go and blow money on an expensive pair of jeans!”
Kishore’s face crumbled like a broken biscuit as the bottom of the packet. Never before had he seen his dear sweet Julie get so mad. He then realised for the first time in his life, life didn’t mean, ‘I’ anymore, it meant, ‘we.’ He was most excited to hear me referring to us as, ‘we’ and a ‘couple.’ He was also wise enough to realise that this was not the time to revel in that fact. He knew he had some serious buttering-up to do and started by apologising, many times over.
For the next few hours I only talked to him in one-syllable words. He pleaded with me to forgive him and I eventually gave in. He smiled so sweetly at me with his beautiful brown eyes and promised to always discuss big purchases with me from now on.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at the surprise I received at work on Monday morning when a courier arrived with a big bunch of pink carnations. I stared astonished at the flowers and a tear fell from my eye as I opened the note:
To Julie my precious Jewel,
Please don’t be mad that I have sent you these flowers,
I love you and wanted to show you my love.
I promise this will be the last thing I will buy without us discussing it first.