Miscellaneous
An Elegy to Ghagha
Ghagha died in a hospital bed at the age of 76. I was not there. There is something quite surreal about death in transnational living and dying.Ang Sanu Lama
Ghagha died in a hospital bed at the age of 76. I was not there. There is something quite surreal about death in transnational living and dying. In the former you largely don’t perform death, apart from that phone call, whereas in the latter it has to be imagined, performed and reinforced; and still your subconscious trips you time and again. They said it was an easy death, much easier than her spouse’s. How like her to go so quietly. Even when alive she repeatedly said that she didn’t want to trouble anyone.
Akin to most women her age, she loved having her rakhar, newly growing white hair, plucked. Like some kind of addict she would look at me expectantly. When I reluctantly conceded, she’d flatter me by saying how I was much better than my sisters. ‘Better’ meant ‘hard working’ with regards to household work, an ideal that is thrust upon Sherpa girls with encouragements like ‘tyamu khisa’, shaping our womanhood and oppression. The praises weren’t much help because I knew she told that to each of us.
On the terrace, taking in as much of the winter sun as possible, ghagha would quell my fear of body hair by saying that they will all fall on their own accord with time, likely unaware that I had already foiled nature by using father’s razors. She’d oil her long gray hair, braid them in colourful threads and ask me to do the same. It wouldn’t do to have straw-like unmanageable hair, especially not let down. After all, only the wrong kind of woman let her hair down.
She was all bones and flabby meat, breasts hanging, papery skin warmed by the sun. She was barely there. Her ears, as long as Buddha’s, the constant pull of thick gold earrings over the years had left their mark. The wax inside, papery and stuck against the walls, you could easily see everything through her big ear holes. I would use tweezers and the wax would peel away like a second layer of skin. The ultimate challenge was to pull out bigger chunks, each brimming with utter satisfaction.
In those moments she would recount bits and pieces of the family’s past, society scandals and family networks. Some of the fascinating ones were about pagha, my grandfather; he who travelled on foot to Tibet for trading across the mountains, with nothing but tsamba for sustenance. The travelers would not even carry a bowl, let alone other luggage. Why bother with all that, they would just create a bowl-like hole on ice. I would play the scene out in my head many times like a spectacle.
Back in the days my family was involved in farming. We had horses, among other not-so-glamorous livestock, and a hotel that operated on weekly Saturday haat. In addition, pagha was involved in the occasional trading of chilies, garlic and timbur, among other things. Later on he started working as a thekedar in different parts of Nepal. Ghagha would often emphasise on the hard life he led, how he single-handedly built our house, with the help of one other person. Among other things, she boasted about his ability to drink continuously and still not be rowdy. Although her stories held momentary interest, I didn’t appreciate them much. I would let her drone on without interruption as I decorated her brown angi with rakhar, marveling instead at the patterns I created. Soon she’d fall asleep and I could stealthily make my escape, at last.
We never got real close. I barely remember the times I talked to her, really talked. She was just another family member and we lived in Kathmandu—the Diaspora. Although growing up it seemed like time moved much too slowly, there were always other things to do. Of course at that time, all adult relatives were people we could not relate to, who could not relate to us. They must have been lonely, both she and pagha, day in and day out. But what could be done? Thankfully, the arrival of my cousins one after another was a blessing in more ways than one.
There were times I hated her with vengeance. I hated her for selectively acting frailer than she was, leaving everything in my mother’s care since forever, her double standards, religious antics, her self-subjugation, her adamant refusal to allow my brother to work in the kitchen. Apart for some harsh words and hurt feelings there were not many confrontations though, we preferred to live in our own separate worlds.
Ghagha loved gardening. She grew essentials like chilies and garlic scapes, and Geraniums as a reminder of home. Each afternoon, after lunch, she left salted cooked rice in the kitchen window sill for the neighbourhood pigeons. She loved wrestling and was very animated while watching it. It is so visual and dramatic that you can understand everything from body language. There was no convincing her that they were faking it. Thinking the giants in leotards and singlets were really killing each other, she would shout and scold them when they cheated.
When I accompanied her during morning koras in Swayambhu, she would tell me what sort of beggars to give alms to and what sort to avoid. Her regular customers were select elderly women and a blind man. She’d tell me about the various deities we came upon along the way and encourage me to utter and memorize prayers that were in a language foreign to both of us. But understanding was never the point; you scored points for just having said them aloud and having faith.
On days she didn’t go for kora, I’d wake up to her chanting prayers in the bed with her thanga and mani in her bony hands. This was much later after pagha was bedridden with paralysis and could no longer bear the sight of her fussing over him. She would be wrapped carefully in blankets so as not to catch a chill, the bane of her old age. She’d encourage me to sleep a bit more. This is the age she would say; when you are old sleep will elude you. She did not say this because she was an elderly woman, she had said the same to her own daughters, I’d find out later. It was just her, soft and kind, something that was rare among the adults. Without any further encouragement, I would creep closer to her to borrow some of her warmth.
Ghagha had fake teeth and was conscious about being seen without them. Sometimes she would give me a glimpse of herself toothless. That is how I think of her now, smiling adorably. It’s been a while since she died. Her singularity strikes me now, the fact that there will be nobody like her in my life ever again. I realise how careless I can be.