Where The Conflict Stagnates

‘Dhemala huththi’

‘Dhemala wesi’

The bright lights and the uproarious laughter seemed almost vulgar as I listened to the old woman huddled in a corner. She was dressed in a red sari which lent some fullness to her scant frame. Her graying hair was neatly plaited and her smile took away some of the gauntness of her face. Laying on the bare wooden surface of the little dais which served as a tv area, she said the music gave her a headache. 

‘I have been to Muskeliya. It’s so beautiful there, and the air is so clean. Achchi why are you living here in Colombo? Do you have no work there?’ 

‘No I had work there. I have enough money. I am here because of my daughter. She can’t take the cold, she gets sick a lot. She has asthma. I couldn’t send her to Colombo alone so we live in Rajagiriya in a slum. I hate it there. But what to do. I miss Muskeliya a lot.’ 

‘What does your daughter do, Achchi?’

‘She works for a family of foreigners. She cooks and cleans for them.’ 

‘Do they treat her well?’ 

I could feel the burning stares of my relatives as they wandered through the house, congregating here to discuss the plight of some unmarried niece, joining a pair of whispering women to add to the scandal under dissection, being pulled into dancing by a pack of tipsy old men or being forced to eat some more. 
Why is she sitting on the floor talking to a servant? their stares clearly said. 

‘Yes they do. My daughter is honest and hard working. They like that. It’s the people in the neighborhood that I don’t understand. There’s so much jealousy and hatred. Now in the neighbourhood we used to live in there was no discrimination. We were so happy there. The people used to call me Rani akka or amma. But we had to move here because of my daughter’s new job. The women in the slums don’t do any work so they gossip the whole day. They always harass me on my way to work every morning, calling me dhemala wesi, dhemala huththi. And I say to them; ‘Nangi why do you say this? Doesn’t the same blood run in our veins? Colour is the only difference we have. I am human too, just like you.’’ 

I sat there, tears in my eyes, marveling at the strength and wisdom of this woman. 

‘See this chain? I never wear it at home. We never wear any jewelry when we step out of the house. Baba, we can’t even dress well when we leave the house. Those women ask me where I’m going dressed so well and I tell them you must look presentable where ever you go. You can’t go about looking shabby. There was this old amma who lived behind our house. Her treasure, 10 thousand rupees and a little jewelry, was inside a battered ice cream container. She guarded it with her life and slept with it under her. One night she was stabbed and robbed.’ 

‘I’m not lying to you, baba.’ She said in reply to my shocked look. 

Finally, I had to get up to go, echoes of dhemala wesi and dhemala huththi downing out the loud music. 

- This is a true story. 


Christina De Silva 
18 June 2010