Beyond The Sky And The Earth Part 8

In the staff room, I am congratulated and felicitated. I am so lucky, they tell me. I will have electricity, better quarters, bus service to Tashigang. Kanglung is a much better place; I will be working alongside tiptop lecturers, I will be teaching the cream of the crop. Mr. Iyya tells me I will be at the zenith of my glory. Yes, who wants to teach cla.s.s II in such a remote and backward place? they ask each other. My throat hurts and I cannot speak.

At lunch time, I sit on the front steps of the school, watching some of my kids playing soccer. I think about that library, reference books open on a long polished table in front of me, I think about preparing lecture notes instead of spelling tests, teaching Macbeth Macbeth instead of instead of Herbert the Mouse. Herbert the Mouse.

I think about my kids, my dear, sweet, smiling, smelly, runny-nosed, barefoot kids. The school is already suffering from a terrible teacher shortage, and it will take weeks and weeks for a replacement to arrive. My kids will fall behind. But since their first-term exam results, I've been wondering what good I am doing them anyway. I love them, but I don't seem to be teaching them anything. Surely they would be better off with a trained primary-school teacher, someone who could explain the concept of division without using the word "divide."

On the other hand, my replacement could turn out to be another Mr. Iyya. I cannot bear the thought of someone beating them. And perhaps it would be foolish to move now anyway, after I have finally become used to Pema Gatshel, the Lotus of Happiness. I have acclimatized, and it was no small feat. No, I should speak to the headmaster and tell him I don't want to go, ask him if I can stay.

A wireless message arrives for me after lunch, from the field director in Thimphu. Received notice of your transfer, Received notice of your transfer, he writes. he writes. Will process if you want to go. However will support you if you decide to stay in P/G. Will process if you want to go. However will support you if you decide to stay in P/G.

There, I can stay if I want to.

But I want to go. I am pulled away by the idea of new stories, a different view out over other valleys and ridges, another way of understanding Bhutan. A new posting. I send a message back to say that I will go to Kanglung, and ask if a new WUSC teacher can be sent to Pema Gatshel to replace me.

The kids come to visit in the evening. They stay for dinner, five of them, and afterward sing songs in Dzongkha and Sharchhop and Nepali. Karma Dorji translates for me: a mother cries for her child, the teachings of Buddha bring light, oh Lhamo I told you not to go, the song of the river tells the coming of spring. The session ends with their favorite English songs, "Chili Eating," sung to the tune of "Clementine," and the "Momo Song": Five fat momos Sitting in the shop Round and fat with chili on the top Along comes a boy with a ngultrum in his hand Gives it to the shopkeeper and eats one momo up!

It is too late for them to go home after, so they spend the night, sleeping on mats and quilts on the floor, covered with blankets and kiras and towels. The next night there are eight, the next, sixteen. After dinner, they act out skits for me in costumes made of kiras, a badminton racquet, sungla.s.ses, plastic bags and my woolen tights. They do homework and flip through magazines and draw pictures for my new house. They write me goodbye letters and leave them in elaborately decorated envelopes on my bed.

They tell me ghost stories while we cook dinner, all of us crammed into the tiny kitchen chopping onions and chilies in the wildly flickering candlelight, and then they are too scared to leave the kitchen and must go to the bathroom in groups of three and four. They wash the dishes, argue over the walkman and fall asleep on the floor.

I check their homework and admire their pictures, settle disputes and explain magazine pictures as best I can. "Doen," I say of an ad featuring Freddie Krueger of Nightmare on Elm Street. Nightmare on Elm Street. "A ghost. But not a real one." I go to the market for extra rice and eggs and b.u.t.ter and salt (I have finally been paid and now have a cartoon sack of money containing four months' salary-twelve thousand ngultrum-all in fives and tens). I peel ma.s.sive quant.i.ties of tubers for meals, but make no dent in the pile I have acc.u.mulated. I never did resolve the money-for-vegetables dilemma with the students, and when I leave for Kanglung, I will take with me a twenty-five kg jute bag of carrots, radishes and potatoes. I fall into a dead sleep around midnight. I know I have to leave at the end of the week, but for now, I am here with my kids, and I am happy. "A ghost. But not a real one." I go to the market for extra rice and eggs and b.u.t.ter and salt (I have finally been paid and now have a cartoon sack of money containing four months' salary-twelve thousand ngultrum-all in fives and tens). I peel ma.s.sive quant.i.ties of tubers for meals, but make no dent in the pile I have acc.u.mulated. I never did resolve the money-for-vegetables dilemma with the students, and when I leave for Kanglung, I will take with me a twenty-five kg jute bag of carrots, radishes and potatoes. I fall into a dead sleep around midnight. I know I have to leave at the end of the week, but for now, I am here with my kids, and I am happy.

Finally, I have to tell them to go home. I have not packed a single thing. They leave, but just before dark, Norbu and Karma Dorji return. A man died suddenly in the house next to Norbu's, they explain, and they are afraid to sleep at home. The people are saying the man was killed by black magic. They sit at the table quietly and refuse all offers of tea, crayons and books. Occasionally, I hear one of them murmuring a mantra. It begins to rain, a sudden, completely familiar rush of sound. "See, miss," Norbu says sleepily. "That man is died and now rain is coming."

I go into the bedroom to pack, but I get nothing done. I sit at the window instead, thinking about doen, all the possible meanings, all the possible ghosts, from demons and the spirits of the dead to G.o.ds of rocks, trees and earth. I think about the magicians who still know the old religion, the rituals from before the arrival of Buddhism over twelve hundred years ago. They are said to be able to summon the spirits and send them off to do their bidding-bring hailstones to flatten crops, dry up rivers and wombs, suck out someone's life force, cause madness, disease and death. I can no longer say, "I don't believe in ghosts and black magic." Everyone around me believes. Even the other foreigners are unsure. A Canadian teacher in Dremitse awoke to see green lights dancing at the foot of her bed, a British teacher saw a child temporarily possessed by the distraught spirit of a dead uncle, the teachers who lived in this flat before me reported voices coming from empty rooms, too close and distinct to be from outside or downstairs. I heard these stories in Thimphu, ages ago, when I could still say, "Nonsense." If, as Buddhism teaches, separateness is an illusion, if we all partake in and help create a much vaster reality than we can know, then everything is interdependent, and anything is possible. The rain grows heavier, a thunderous roar, the hair on the back of my neck stands up, and I am cold. I light every candle and lamp I have, and sit with Norbu and Karma Dorji until they fall asleep at the table.

The rain stops, and I wake Norbu and Karma and put a mattress on the floor for them. They curl up under a blanket, and I stand in the doorway, watching their small faces relax into sleep. I must squeeze my eyes tightly to stop the tears. If I feel this sad leaving Pema Gatshel after five months, I cannot imagine how I will feel leaving Bhutan after two years.

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Peak of Higher Learning If there is a paradise on the face of the earth, It is this, oh!

it is this, oh!

it is this.

Sliced Bread

The college truck swings off the main road through a gate, stopping outside a row of white two-story houses separated by well-tended gardens. Four young men step out of the shadows of a cypress tree. "Good evening, ma'am," they say, bowing gracefully before heaving my hockey bags out of the truck and carting them off. I am struck by how neatly they are dressed: the folds of their ghos are perfectly straight, their white collars and cuffs are immaculate, and they are all wearing dark knee-highs and polished shoes. The vice-princ.i.p.al, a soft-spoken man in a plain navy-blue gho, appears with a ring of keys. "Welcome to Sherubtse College," he says. "We're very glad to have you here. Shall I show you to your quarters?"

I follow him over a wooden footbridge. "Here we are," he says, stopping outside the last house. "Each house has four flats. The upstairs flats have balconies, which are quite nice, but the downstairs ones have gardens. I prefer a garden." He opens the door to the downstairs apartment, and we file into a sitting room. I stand gawking at the peach-colored walls, the fireplace, the bookshelves, the divans with rose-colored cushions. There is another fireplace in the bedroom, a white-tiled toilet, shower room, dining room, and a kitchen with cupboards.

"I hope these quarters will be adequate," the vice-princ.i.p.al says. "They're very simple, of course, but if there's anything you would like us to do to make them more comfortable, please let us know."

Is he kidding? After my place in Pema Gatshel, this looks like a spread from Better Homes and Gardens. Better Homes and Gardens.

In the sitting room, the four students who carried my luggage are examining my keyboard with interest. I smile, remembering how cla.s.s II C had subsided into an awed silence the first time they saw it. Karma Dorji had pressed a key gingerly, and they had all backed up, startled at the sound. Zai Zai, yallama! What is inside, miss? yallama! What is inside, miss?

"That's an electronic piano," I inform the four college students.

"Casio or Yamaha?" one asks. "What's the voltage?"

"Uh, Yamaha."

The vice-princ.i.p.al clears his throat and the students bow again. "Thank you," I say.

"Thank you, ma'am. Good night, ma'am," they answer, and disappear into the growing darkness outside.

The vice-princ.i.p.al invites me to dinner and leaves me to unpack. I wander through the rooms again, running my hand along the fireplace mantels, turning the lights on and off. I arrange my books on the shelves, and then sit on one of the divans, overwhelmed. It is all so neat and orderly, I don't know how I will ever adjust. Even my thoughts seem sloppy and unruly, and I struggle to impose some order on my perceptions. I've only been here for an hour and already I want to go back. I want my rough unpainted flat in Pema Gatshel and my barefoot, grimy students. From the open window, the smell of flowers drifts in.

At dawn the next morning, I sit on the front steps, watching the sun set fire to the clouds above a dark ridge. The staff quarters are set on an incline, over the campus which looks like a cross between a community college and a summer camp. From my steps, I can look across the valley to the temple of Dremitse on a hilltop, or north to the sharp toothy peaks along the border. The strip of garden all around my house is ablaze with crimson poppies, orange gladioli, yellow dahlias, and several varieties of roses. A flowering shrub climbs up the door frame and drops tiny pink petals on my lap. Huge crows swoop and circle overhead, and a bird I cannot see sings sweetly from the gracious arms of a cherry tree. I sip milky coffee, missing the sound of one of my kids climbing up the stairs to present me with an armful of potatoes or infected flea bites.

Later, I put on a kira and walk across campus to the main academic buildings. "Good morning, ma'am," students say, bowing politely as I pa.s.s. I wonder why I have gone from "miss" to "ma'am," and notice again how neatly everyone here is dressed. I am conscious of my bare feet in rubber flip-flops and my wild hair. My kira is faded, and I am wearing it too short, hoisted up over my ankles (for walking through mud, of course, but there is no mud here, only smooth rolling lawns and neat paved pathways). I may have to buy a new kira, and I will definitely have to find my shoes. I haven't worn them since March, when the first rains rolled into Pema Gatshel.

I study the framed pictures of English poets on the walls of the vice-princ.i.p.al's office as he explains the history and functioning of the college. He is extremely precise and formal, but his smile is warm and his whole face lights up when he talks about teaching. Over dinner last night, he spoke primarily of the students, and the difficulties and unexpected insights he had gained teaching another culture's literature in Bhutan. "But, of course, there are universal stories," he said. "How else would we ever be able to connect?"

Sherubtse, which means "peak of higher learning," started out as a public school, the vice-princ.i.p.al says, and is now affiliated with the University of New Delhi, which fixes the curriculum, sets and marks the final exams, and issues the degrees. Most of the lecturers are from Delhi, although the number of Bhutanese lecturers is slowly growing. Canadians have been involved at Sherubtse since Father Mackey founded it in the late '60s, the vice-princ.i.p.al explains. Mr. Rob, the WUSC lecturer who I am replacing, taught here for five years. The students are divided into two groups: the pre-university students (called, most unpoetically, PU) who are completing cla.s.ses XI and XII, and the college students who are majoring in arts, commerce or science. "You'll be teaching all levels," the vice-princ.i.p.al says as a typist enters with my timetable. "Do you have any questions at all?"

What I really want to know is how old the students are, and are they all as sophisticated as the ones I met last night, and is it too late to change my mind.

"I couldn't help noticing the phone on your desk," I say instead. "Is the college connected by phone to-?"

"To Tashigang and Samdrup Jongkhar," he says. "Do you want to make a call?"

"No, no." I smile down my disappointment. For a brief moment, I had imagined calling Robert.

I walk up the road into the village of Kanglung, which seems no bigger than Pema Gatshel, but much more prosperous. Past a row of large shops with verandahs, at a deep bend in the road marked by a dozen white prayer flags, I sit and look out over the land below. Pema Gatshel, two thousand feet lower, was wild boisterous green, overgrown, un-contained. Here, the forests are less dense, growing in small groves, and the fields are larger and flatter. Wide footpaths wind around rice paddies, past chortens and cl.u.s.ters of prayer flags, to solid farmhouses. I watch the sun sink into a bed of cloud, staining it pink, and wonder what cla.s.s II C is doing right now.

Back at home, I rummage through my luggage in search of my shoes in between myriad visitors. The man from upstairs, Mr. Chatterji, economics lecturer, comes to say h.e.l.lo and welcome. Next is Miss Dorling, who teaches history, an exceedingly thin lady of indeterminate age and nationality, in a long pink skirt and jacket, leading two white yapping Apsoo dogs on a leash, welcome, welcome, she says, if there's anything I need.... Mr. and Mrs. Matthew from southern India are next. Mrs. Matthew has warm, smiling eyes, but Mr. Matthew reminds me of a loud, disagreeable uncle. He gives me a short history of the college's past princ.i.p.als, all Jesuits. "Now that Father Larue is gone, there is no one to say ma.s.s," he tells me grimly. "You are Catholic, yes?"

"No," I say firmly. I have learned my lesson from Mrs. Joy. "I'm not Christian at all." Two students arrive, bearing a stack of books for my courses: Macbeth, Pygmalion, Macbeth, Pygmalion, collections of poems and essays, a syllabus. Two more lecturers come to fill me in on the advantages and disadvantages of college life: the store, which stocks dry goods, vegetables and sometimes meat, the electrician who runs the generator and changes lightbulbs if he's not drunk, the collections of poems and essays, a syllabus. Two more lecturers come to fill me in on the advantages and disadvantages of college life: the store, which stocks dry goods, vegetables and sometimes meat, the electrician who runs the generator and changes lightbulbs if he's not drunk, the dhobi dhobi who washes clothes for the staff, the infirmary. And did I know that the college has its own VCR? And a grand piano? And a bakery? Yes, bread is available from the bakery on Wednesdays and Sat.u.r.days but I should be knowing this, since the bread slicer was just purchased with funding from WUSC. Bread slicer! Wait till the others hear this, I think. Lorna doesn't have a cla.s.sroom to teach in, and I can get sliced bread. who washes clothes for the staff, the infirmary. And did I know that the college has its own VCR? And a grand piano? And a bakery? Yes, bread is available from the bakery on Wednesdays and Sat.u.r.days but I should be knowing this, since the bread slicer was just purchased with funding from WUSC. Bread slicer! Wait till the others hear this, I think. Lorna doesn't have a cla.s.sroom to teach in, and I can get sliced bread.

When I finally return to my luggage, it is dark outside. Pressure cookers sound in the flats around mine, students' voices float up, doors bang, vintage John Lennon competes with Duran Duran in the hostels. By this time in Pema Gatshel, an exquisite silence would have settled over the valley and I would have been reading in bed by candlelight, not looking for a pair of proper shoes. I find the nun's kira I bought in Samdrup Jongkhar, which I cut into curtains and staple over the wooden curtain rod in the sitting room. I set my blue teacup on the mantel. I find the pictures drawn by cla.s.s II C, smiling suns, golden dogs, dancing girls, a bounteous blue moon, and tape them up all over the house. And finally, I find my shoes, wrapped in plastic at the bottom of a cardboard box. They are completely covered with the thickest green fungus I have ever seen.

Oh Dear

The college has everything that was promised: a library with racks of newspapers and stacks of books, an auditorium with a red-curtained stage and a public address system. The science labs have microscopes, Bunsen burners, test tubes, snakes and mice pickled in formaldehyde. There is a photocopier, and a computer room for the new computer-science course. The buildings themselves seem remarkably well-kept after the corroded cement corridors of Pema Gatshel Junior High School. There are blacktopped basketball courts, volleyball and badminton courts, a soccer field with bleachers. I walk around and around the campus, trying to adjust to the sudden and staggering luxury of it.

I meet Shakuntala, the librarian, a tall Indian woman about my age, dressed in grey corduroy trousers and a dark-red blouse, her expressive face framed by wavy, shoulder-length dark hair. Her direct, unconstrained manner puts me at ease, and I know instantly that I have a friend. "Let's go to Pala's for lunch," she says, and we walk across campus to a canteen overgrown with bougainvillea just outside the college gate. Inside the low-ceilinged room, Pala, a silver-haired man in his fifties, gives us a brief smile, and his wife, Amala, clears a s.p.a.ce for us at a table under the window. Beneath her short, feathery black hair, she has lively eyes in a sharp, thin face. "Come in, come in," she tells me briskly. "You from Canada, I think, yes?"

Students swarm in and out, asking for lemon tea, fried rice, Pala where's my thukpa, Pala can I put this on my tab, two coffee one cigarette how much? Pala remains unruffled, counting out change from a drawer, calling out orders to the kitchen, knocking a persistent grey kitten off the counter. In spite of the faded gho tied sloppily around his waist and his rubber flip-flops, he has a stately, dignified bearing; Shakuntala says that he was born a Tibetan prince and came to Bhutan when he married Amala.

We order baleys, baleys, wheels of soft Tibetan bread, and the national dish of chilies and cheese. It is so hot that my eyes run and I choke. "Today ema datsi very hot," Amala advises me, clucking sympathetically. "Better you eat more baley." wheels of soft Tibetan bread, and the national dish of chilies and cheese. It is so hot that my eyes run and I choke. "Today ema datsi very hot," Amala advises me, clucking sympathetically. "Better you eat more baley."

On the wall across from me is a collage of pictures cut out from fashion magazines, lollipop models in severe makeup and frizzy pink hair. Someone turns on a ca.s.sette player and pop music bubbles out around us. Two young men enter, exhaling ribbons of cigarette smoke. They are wearing jeans and tee shirts emblazoned with "Guitar Heroes" and "Metallica." I am surprised to see them out of national dress. I feel very far away from Pema Gatshel, from cla.s.s II C who had never seen a keyboard before and thought Johann Sebastian Bach was my mother. I have a strange feeling that I have left Bhutan.

But when the students see Shakuntala and me, they put their cigarettes behind their backs and bow gracefully. "Good afternoon, ma'am."

I look up at the same time and notice the picture above the window. Instead of the usual formal portrait of the King of Bhutan, there is a black-and-white photo of His Majesty as a teenager, dressed in a gho, accompanied by a young woman, perhaps his sister, in a white miniskirt and high white boots. A fitting photo for this place, I think, a mix of tradition and fashion, Guitar Heroes and driglam namzha. I am still, most definitely, in Bhutan.

Back at the library, I begin to prepare notes for my first lecture. The information seems to be coming from a small dark room far back in my head, and my notes are spa.r.s.e. The literature section of the library has two ancient critical texts on Shakespeare, neither of which helps much. The next morning, I sit in the empty staff room, practicing my lecture in my head. My hands are damp, my stomach queasy. I have managed to clean most of the fungus off my shoes but cannot get my kira down past my ankles. Lecturers drift in and out, greeting each other with an exaggerated formality. Good morning, my dear sir, and a very good day to you, and I thank you most kindly, sir. Mr. Bose, the other English lecturer, a small, dapper, grey-haired man from Delhi, is explaining the intricacies of attendance to me, pointing out the registers on their shelf by the door. "You have to be careful," he says. "The boys bunk from cla.s.s but get their friends to answer for them during roll call."

"The boys? But not the girls?" I am confused. Out of the five hundred students, only eighty are female.

He waves a hand impatiently. "No, no. When I say the boys, I mean the girls, too. And you mustn't forget attendance. It must be taken in every cla.s.s."

"Even for the degree students?" I ask.

"But of course!" he answers cheerfully. "Especially for them! They're the worst rascals."

The bell rings, and I pick up my chalk and notes. "You forgot the attendance register," Mr. Bose calls out. "Good luck!"

I open the door of the cla.s.sroom and walk into a heavy silence. "Good morning," I say. The cla.s.s slowly rises, and there is a weak chorus of half-hearted "good-mornings." I introduce myself, write my name on the board, smile brightly until my face hurts. Cla.s.s XII stares back coolly. According to my attendance list, there are six girls girls and forty-nine and forty-nine boys. boys. No one in the room looks younger than twenty. No one in the room looks younger than twenty.

"I, uh, I've been told that I have to take, uh, attendance," I say, wondering why my voice sounds so thin and apologetic, how I can stop my hands from shaking. The attendance list contains several Nepali names which I have not seen before. How do you say Bahadur? Bah-hay-der? Bay-hah-der? I settle on Badder, which elicits a few snickers and an outright snort.

Enough of this. I launch into my lecture. Who was Shakespeare, what is tragedy, why do we study it. I ramble on and on. After several long minutes, someone calls out from the back, "We finished Macbeth Macbeth last term." last term."

They have finished Macbeth Macbeth and I still have forty minutes left before the end of cla.s.s. "Oh dear," I say, chewing on a thumbnail, and someone repeats mockingly, "Oh dear." I scan the rows: one student meets my gaze. He has longish hair and a proud handsome face, and he is leaning back in his seat, legs stretched out in the aisle. For a brief moment, I think he is going to smile but it turns into a smirk. and I still have forty minutes left before the end of cla.s.s. "Oh dear," I say, chewing on a thumbnail, and someone repeats mockingly, "Oh dear." I scan the rows: one student meets my gaze. He has longish hair and a proud handsome face, and he is leaning back in his seat, legs stretched out in the aisle. For a brief moment, I think he is going to smile but it turns into a smirk.

Now what? I think. We cannot very well draw pictures or sing the "Momo Song." "All right," I say, "then ... write me a composition."

There is much scuffling and rummaging for paper and pens.

"On what topic?" someone asks.

"On anything," I say.

"Anything?" someone echoes. It is Smirk.

I am suddenly very tired. This is not cla.s.s II C. This is not fun. I should have stayed where I was. I sit at the front of the cla.s.s, watching the students write and waiting for the bell to release me.

My next period is a batch of new admissions. At least they cannot have finished Macbeth Macbeth last term, I console myself, but when I push open the door, I am unnerved. The long, narrow cla.s.sroom is packed. As far back as I can observe, students are squashed together on the wooden benches. I cannot even see the back rows. I pull out the attendance list: nine last term, I console myself, but when I push open the door, I am unnerved. The long, narrow cla.s.sroom is packed. As far back as I can observe, students are squashed together on the wooden benches. I cannot even see the back rows. I pull out the attendance list: nine girls, girls, seventy seventy boys. boys.

"Good morning," I say, and the response is deafening. Benches are pushed back as the cla.s.s rises and the room echoes with "good mornings." Someone misses the seat on the way back down, a desk is overturned, and laughter rises up in a wave. "We'll take attendance first," I say, but they cannot hear me. I can barely hear me. "Cla.s.s Eleven," I say. "Cla.s.s Eleven! " Finally I shout, "Cla.s.s Eleven!!"

The noise subsides, but there is still some kind of disturbance going on in a back corner. Two students have straitjacketed another with the sleeves of his gho. "Cla.s.s Eleven! Untie him! Don't tie each other up with the sleeves of your ghos." And then I am laughing because it's just like cla.s.s II C, only there are more of them and some of them have mustaches. I stand at the front of the room, staring at the cla.s.s. Seventy-nine students! "It's a zoo," I marvel aloud. They seem pleased with this description.

After cla.s.s, I find Catherine from Rangthangwoong and Pat, a Dutch nurse posted in Tashigang, sitting on my doorstep. "We've come for afternoon tea," Catherine says, "and then we're going back to Tashigang on the four o'clock bus."

"But how did you find out so fast that I was here?" I am pleased to have company already.

"There are no secrets in eastern Bhutan," Catherine says. "Come on, let's go visit the Fantomes."

"Who?"

"You'll see."

Behind the infirmary is a cottage hidden by cypress trees. On the wooden verandah, dozens of orchids grow out of clay pots and mossy logs, the names of the flowers inscribed neatly in English and Latin on wooden plaques. I stop to examine a spray of delicate white blossoms with scarlet tongues. Lady's Slipper. "People eat this one," Pat says. "Orchid curry. It's a great delicacy."

In a book-lined sitting room, Mrs. Fantome, a plump woman in a crisp, apple-green sari, pours tea into porcelain cups. "Cream or lemon, dear?" she asks. Cuc.u.mber sandwiches cut into dainty triangles and slices of vanilla pound cake are pa.s.sed around. Mr. Fantome wears white trousers and a worn brown sweater and speaks with a faintly British accent. He studied at Oxford, Mrs. Fantome tells us. They have been at Sherubtse for the last twelve years, she teaches chemistry, he is a retired English lecturer. They used to teach in Sikkim but had to leave after the tragedy. I have no idea what this tragedy might be and am too embarra.s.sed by my ignorance to ask. Mrs. Fantome gives Pat her recipe for pound cake, and Mr. Fantome and I discuss Milton, or, rather, Mr. Fantome discusses Milton and I try to look like I remember what Milton wrote.

On the way back to the college gate, where the bus to Tashigang will stop, Catherine explains the Fantomes' unusual name. "Mr. Fantome's grandfather or great-grandfather was a French convict who apparently jumped ship in India and then changed his name to Fantome," she says.

"And what was the tragedy in Sikkim?" I ask.

"It was annexed by India in the seventies. Sikkim used to be a separate country, like Bhutan. Remember there was that American woman who married the King of Sikkim?"

"Sort of. But why did India annex it?"

"I'm not sure. Something about a power struggle between the Sikkimese and Nepali immigrants."

Over the next week, I am invited to almost every lecturer's house for sweet tea spiced with cardamom or ginger and plates of samosas, pakoras, fried peanuts. During these visits, I begin to piece together the network of alliances and shifting hostilities that exists beneath the daily my-good-sir routine. At Mr. Gupta's house, I am warned to keep away from Mr. Matthew, at Mr. Matthew's house, I am warned to stay clear of Mr. Bose. Mr. Bose advises me to have nothing to do with Mr. Chatterji, Mr. Chatterji claims that the Mr. Bose is not trustworthy. Mr. Ratna says Mr. Nair is a drinker, Mr. Nair says Mr. Harilal is a trouble-maker. Mr. Krishna allegedly carries tales to the princ.i.p.al, and I would do well to be careful of what I say, to whom, and where. "I wouldn't pay the slightest attention," Shakuntala says when I see her again in the library and recount the various warnings and dark allusions. "Some of them are well meaning and genuinely interested in their work, but a lot of the others are only here to make money. These little plots and subplots keep them amused. I stay clear of all of them. The students are much better company, anyway."

I am not sure about the students yet. The Zoo is my favorite cla.s.s because they are loud and enthusiastic, but last week, one young man informed me that I looked "d.a.m.n fat" in my kira. (He himself looked as if he was put together out of wire coat hangers.) I had barely recomposed myself when another chimed in, "But ma'am is very simple." Fat-d.a.m.n fat-and stupid! Thank you, I thought to myself, you've both just failed English. And Smirk's cla.s.s continues to be difficult. Difficult in comparison to cla.s.s II C. By Canadian standards, their manners are exquisite. They still stand up when I enter the room. They hand me their homework with both hands and bow when I pa.s.s them in the hall. But they are also testing me. They mimic the way I say their names but when I ask for the correct p.r.o.nunciation, they remain silent. They ask me how old I am, and if I am married, and how long I have been teaching. I refer to the poetry of Wordsworth and Coleridge, and Smirk smirks and calls out, "What do you mean by fat-and stupid! Thank you, I thought to myself, you've both just failed English. And Smirk's cla.s.s continues to be difficult. Difficult in comparison to cla.s.s II C. By Canadian standards, their manners are exquisite. They still stand up when I enter the room. They hand me their homework with both hands and bow when I pa.s.s them in the hall. But they are also testing me. They mimic the way I say their names but when I ask for the correct p.r.o.nunciation, they remain silent. They ask me how old I am, and if I am married, and how long I have been teaching. I refer to the poetry of Wordsworth and Coleridge, and Smirk smirks and calls out, "What do you mean by Romantic?" Romantic?"

I fold my arms and try to look bored, but I am thinking that maybe Father Larue was right after all. "What do you you mean by 'Romantic'?" I ask. mean by 'Romantic'?" I ask.

There is an uncomfortable silence that stretches out and out.

"I don't know, ma'am," he finally says, embarra.s.sed.

The small cla.s.s of third-year degree students is easier because they are mostly silent. They are extremely attentive, sitting quietly with pens poised above thick notebooks, but they will not speak. I spend a week on a Shakespearean sonnet, talking about structure and imagery and language, and I have no idea at the end of the week what the poem means to them, if it means anything at all. I have no idea why I am teaching it beyond the fact that it is in the syllabus, and the fact that it is in the syllabus here, here, of all places-well, this is what we should be discussing, instead of laboring over the intricacies of every metaphor. I ask the students if they have any questions, comments, of all places-well, this is what we should be discussing, instead of laboring over the intricacies of every metaphor. I ask the students if they have any questions, comments, anything. anything. No ma'am, they say, no questions. I pick up a piece of chalk and fill the blackboard with big white letters: TALK. They laugh at this, but they do not talk. No ma'am, they say, no questions. I pick up a piece of chalk and fill the blackboard with big white letters: TALK. They laugh at this, but they do not talk.

In my other degree cla.s.s, I am to teach "language," but the only set topic in the syllabus is precis writing. "What am I supposed to teach them for the rest of the year?" I ask Mr. Bose. He advises me to take attendance and then release them. "No, seriously," I laugh, "what should I do with them?"

"I have told you seriously," he replies.

In the evening, I sit at my desk under the glare of a bare bulb and write letters. I write to cla.s.s II C, telling them that I have put up their pictures and that I think about them every day.

I write to Lorna: We have a VCR and a grand piano and a bread slicer. The students are all very cool and sophisticated. Some of them have informed me that I am d.a.m.n fat and simple. I think I hate it here. We have a VCR and a grand piano and a bread slicer. The students are all very cool and sophisticated. Some of them have informed me that I am d.a.m.n fat and simple. I think I hate it here.

I try to write to Robert. I want to tell him how everything has changed for me, how I marvel at the distance I have come. I want to tell him how difficult it is to imagine going home at Christmas, but I cannot. My mind seizes up. I reread the letters I have received from him, but I cannot reconnect myself. I can still close my eyes and see him in the armchair in his apartment, but the picture gets smaller each time I call it up.

Cla.s.s II C writes back. The letters are addressed to "The Miss Jeymey," and the envelopes bear instructions: "Fly my letter very quick" and "Open with smile face." Sangay Chhoden writes: Dear Miss, I am very happy to write without no reason. How are you that side. Here I am fine with my kind teachers and friends. Dear Miss, I am very happy to write without no reason. How are you that side. Here I am fine with my kind teachers and friends.

Karma Dorji writes: Dear Miss, I am very unhappy at pema gatshel, why means you is went. Dear Miss, I am very unhappy at pema gatshel, why means you is went.

Norbu writes that they have a new sir and he is beating them nicely. I put my head down and cry.