Unmarriageable(42)

‘That’s because we bring home the bread and you bring home the baby and there’s no biological clock on bread and there is one on baby.’

‘We can do bread too,’ Alys said. ‘And as for baby, science allows for babies at any age now.’

‘A-L-Y-S, surely you don’t have to worry for a long time about any such thing.’

‘Flatterer!’ Alys laughed. ‘I’m thirty, soon to be thirty-one.’

‘You are not.’

‘I am!’

‘You don’t look it.’

‘Good, but I don’t really care. Age is just a number.’

‘That it is. I’m twenty-six.’

They were quiet for a moment as they registered that he was younger than she.

‘Well,’ Alys said, ‘now that you’ve seen the acre, I guess we should head back.’

As they walked to the car, Wickaam said, ‘If you’re free, Wagah border is not far from here, and if you haven’t had the pleasure yet of witnessing the Pakistani–Indian closing-of-the-border-gates ceremony, it’s truly an experience I recommend.’

‘My father took me as a birthday present ages ago,’ Alys said, ‘but I’d love to go again.’



Alys and Wickaam chatted amiably about films and foods as she drove out of Lahore and entered the border village of Wagah, where the ceremony took place on the Pakistani side. On the Indian side, it took place in Attari village, which connected to the bigger city of Amritsar, home of the Sikh Golden Temple. Alys drove past sun-wrinkled women slapping dung patties to dry onto the outer walls of their mud huts, and she and Wickaam waved back at matte-haired children in bright sweaters who paused their play to wave at them.

At the venue, Alys parked outside the red-brick amphitheatre overlooking the border gates. Last time she’d come, the stand had not been segregated, but now Wickaam entered the men’s enclosure and she the women’s. Climbing the stairs to the backmost row, she sat down at the end of an aisle beside a woman whose elaborate mehndi patterns on her palms and up her gold-bangled wrists indicated that she was a newly-wed. A crow swooped over their heads, startling them. Together they watched it fly between the trees on the Indian side and the trees on the Pakistani side, its guttural caw-caw-caw reverberating freely in the open air.

The Pakistani and Indian spectators were sitting a stone’s throw away from each other – or a flower’s toss away, depending on international relations between the two countries on any particular day. The ceremony began. On the Pakistani side, a soldier beating a drum walked from the gates towards the audience. He was followed by mascot Chacha Pakistani, with his pristine white beard, holding aloft a Pakistani flag, the green representing the Muslim majority in the country and the white stripe the minorities. On this side, handheld flags fluttered green and white. On that side fluttered the tricoloured green, white, and saffron flags. The crowds on both sides cheered and roared their patriotism.

‘Pakistan Zindabad!’

‘Jai Hind!’

Two giant soldiers from either side, rendered taller by their plumed turbans, stamped past each other in a mutual display of power. The two countries’ flags, hoisted over their respective gates, were rolled down in unison, until the next morning, and, with that, the gates to the Wagah–Attari border crossing closed for the evening.

After more cheering and slogans, the audience headed out of the amphitheatres. Alys was milling outside the men’s enclosure, on the lookout for Wickaam, with a crowd swarming around her, when she bumped into somebody.

‘Oh, hello,’ Darsee said, his momentary confusion replaced by a quick smile. ‘What a surprise.’

‘I happened to be in the vicinity, believe it or not,’ Alys said, also flustered for a second, ‘and decided to see the ceremony.’

‘Bungles and I,’ Darsee said, nodding at Bungles, who appeared beside him, ‘are in charge of sightseeing for Nadir’s wedding guests from abroad.’

Alys exchanged congenial hellos with the guests: Thomas Fowle, Harris Bigg-Wither, and his girlfriend, Soniah. She asked them if they were enjoying Pakistan, and they assured her that they were loving it. Pakistan was beautiful, Thomas Fowle said. The people were so friendly, Harris Bigg-Wither said. It was far from the mess they saw on the news, Soniah said. Alys smiled. She pointed to the shopping bags in Soniah’s hand.

‘I see you managed to squeeze in my mother’s favourite activity.’

‘Yes! We went to handicraft stores and open-air shops in A-naar-kaa-lee Bazaar. Darsee and Bungles were very helpful with the bargaining, they tell me. I got choo-naa-ree doo-pa-tuss, embroidered wallets, velvet-coated glass bangles, and some pure henna, different from the one I get back home in Addis.’

‘We’ve been to the Badshahi Mosque and the Sikh Temple,’ Bungles said. ‘Shalimar Gardens, the Wazir Khan Mosque, and now here.’

‘All in one day! I’m impressed!’ Alys said. ‘But you must be exhausted.’

‘Our feet,’ Soniah said, pointing to her sneakers, ‘are killing us, but so worth it.’

Bungles peered over Alys’s shoulder. ‘Are your sisters with you?’

‘No,’ Alys said, grinning at his supposedly subtle enquiry about Jena.

‘There you are, Alys.’ Wickaam appeared, holding two bottles of chilled Pakola. ‘I was looking for you outside the women’s section.’