Tanya Tania (25 page)

December 6, 1992

Bombay

Dear Tanya,

Dude where are you? Things have gotten really bad and strange. I keep calling you but when someone finally picked up—I think it was Bibi—she said you weren't at home. And she hung up before I could ask for Chhoti Bibi. Dude I hope you're okay.

So first of all, they broke down that mosque today. It was all over the news. It was horrible Tanya. I mean I don't care about any of this stuff but it was horrible watching it on TV. All these people all wearing orange like a huge human wave on the wall and then all over the mosque. It's huge that mosque. It looks like a temple.

And our policemen? Just standing there doing nothing. I mean what were they there for?

And now everyone seems really worried and there's a very weird feeling all around. As if something is going to happen. But what more can happen right? The mosque has already been destroyed. Do you know it was from the 15
^th
century? What assholes! How can you do that! I mean people barely live one hundred years and this mosque has been there for over four hundred years. It wasn't cool man.

I also got really mad at my dad because obviously my mom was totally right and he was totally like STUPID to not see the signs.

Anyway, they sent us all home from school early. My dad came and picked me up and he looked so sad and so worried I didn't say a word to him. Of course he had NOT known that the Hindutva people were going to do this. He had believed them when they had said that the kar sevaks were just going to do puja and stuff. Puja is a good thing. Puja is not breaking things. My father hadn't known what these guys were going to do. How could he have known? He did not know.

Anyway so he took me home and we dropped Jenny home along the way. Well, Jenny couldn't go home actually because she lives in Dadar so she went home to her friend Aanchal's house. I don't know them really well, they're not in my group. Well, my old group. But I saw them standing outside the school looking lost and it seems that the school bus wasn't working so they didn't know what to do. My dad dropped them home to Aanchal's house. Aanchal lives in a house not a building. It's in a weird part of town I haven't seen before. But they were super nice and said thank you many times to my dad. My dad barely noticed he looked so sad and upset. He waited though till they went upstairs and waved from the balcony.

When we got home, Nusrat was there. Her school was also let out early and apparently the road to her house has been closed so she came here.

But Tanya, Nusrat is acting weird. I don't get it. She's not talking to me. She's super worried about her parents and so my mom called them and spoke to them and Nusrat got on the phone and just started crying—her crying you know—where she makes those sounds. And I felt so bad I went to give her a hug from behind and Tanya she just like flung me off! It was so weird! It was like she didn't want me to touch her.

My dad saw that I was feeling bad and she whispered to me that Nusrat is really worried and that I shouldn't feel bad. I mean hello I am her best friend of course I know she is totally worried you don't need to tell ME!

Anyway, I'm going to post this letter now so that hopefully you get it soon. Maybe you didn't get my last letter. I don't know. But it's really scary to not hear from you while all this shit is going on. Please write. Give me a blank call and I'll call you back. I'm going to try you again tonight.

Love,

Tania

PS: Just saw on the news—150 people have been killed. My mom says it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

December 8, 1992

Bombay

Listen dude I don't know what your problem is but you're being a real asshole. I have called you like a zillion times and I know that you know because one time Chhoti Bibi picked up and I could hear her calling you and I could hear her telling you to come talk to me.

I don't get it. What happened? Did I do something? Did I say something bad and like insensitive? Come on Tanya you know I didn't mean it. Please call me.

Nusrat is still being weird and Bombay is burning. You can see the smoke from our balcony in so many different directions and every day it feels like there it is coming from a new direction.

The names of places don't seem to matter anymore as names of places but only in saying whether Muslims live there or Hindus. And the funny thing about Bombay is that there is no one place where it's all Hindus or all Muslims, at least not in the poor places. Except the Jain and Marwari buildings. I guess you can do anything when you have money. It is like SO important to be rich.

Although nothing is sacred right now, not enough money. Even in our building we have taken down all the name plates of all houses so that if the mobs come they won't know where the Muslims live. And dude Tanya, our building is one of the nicest in the city. If the mobs really come here then they can go anywhere.

Names on TV: Ghatkopar, Bhandup, Jogeshwari. Dadar, Matunga, Mahim, Tardeo. Deonar, Pydhonie, Dongri. Dadar, Byculla, Mohammed Ali Road, Bombay Central. Dadar is where Jenny lives. Byculla is where Aniza Khumri lives. Bombay Central is where we go to buy fish at Crawford Market. Mahim is near the beach. Matunga is where our driver lives.

Nusrat lives in Bhendi Bazaar. She lives in a chawl. Do you know what a chawl is? It's like a really old building with a long narrow balcony where people string out all their clothes to dry. And they live like ten people to a room and then they have to share a bathroom with other rooms that also have many many people. But even these rooms cost thousands and thousands of rupees because Bombay is like really expensive.

Nusrat is being really weird. I mean I get that she's really worried about her dad because he's super hot-headed and you know there are Muslim gangs as well right now going around trying to kill Hindus. The more you hear about the Muslim gangs, the more orange flags and the more columns of smoke I can see from my window.

On TV and in newspapers, there is a scary political party saying the worst kinds of things. They want to kill Muslims. They want to kill people from other states. They want to kill people who are not born here. They want to kill a lot of people.

Isn't it weird that I, Tania Ghosh, am sitting here writing you this letter and I am using the word ‘kill'? I mean when did that happen? When did normal people like you and me begin to talk about killing as if we're talking about clothes or cricket or a new restaurant? You know what I mean? Like it's not supposed to be in our vocabulary. Not normal people.

So anyway I get that Nusrat is really worried about her dad and she has been crying a lot but sometimes she looks at me and I feel…this is so weird but I feel like she is crying about me, not her dad. But she won't like talk to me it's so weird. She made a huge fuss when my mom told her to sleep in my room. I mean we used to love it when she stayed to help at parties and spent the night in my room. I thought maybe it was because she was suddenly feeling touchy about sleeping on the mattress on the floor but when I told her to sleep on my bed she just looked at me like I'd slapped her and tried to say no. And Nusrat trying to say anything is really horrible. So I just said okay, okay, you don't have to.

She won't watch TV with me, we're not allowed out of the house, she will barely stay in my room. She really, really wants to go home because she's convinced that her father will run off to join the gangs. But my parents won't let her leave the house. And at least they haven't said Bhendi Bazaar on TV yet.

You know I never really thought about who is Muslim in my class until now. And I had to sit down and write out all the names and then show it to my parents and ask them. I don't see any rhyme or reason to it and don't know how they can tell. Sometimes a wala is a Bori and sometimes it's a Parsi. Sometimes a Dalal is Hindu and sometimes it's Muslim. How do you know? And how come there is an Ayesha Parekh when we all know that Ayesha is a Muslim name and Parekh is a Hindu surname?

Why doesn't it make any sense? Why has no one taught us this in school? I mean isn't this more important to learn especially if no one takes the Constitution seriously and goes around doing random morchas and killing people? I mean what is up with that?

My mom is acting like all of this is my dad's fault. She's so crazy sometimes. I mean he picked the wrong side but obviously it was a mistake.

There are nine Muslims in my class of forty. I called all of them even Mustafa Habibwala who I haven't said one word to since we were four years old in Nursery School and he bit me on my bottom. They are all fine. Anizaa Khumri sounded really surprised to hear from me and also, really scared. She told me she lives in Byculla. As soon as she said it I knew it was bad because I was hearing Byculla on the TV all the time, more than the other names. She actually started crying on the phone. Said they were locked into the house from the outside and her grandmother was going to die because she needs dialysis. I wanted to tell her to come to my house but that's the thing with riots no one can go anywhere. It's the worst feeling in the world to sit in your house and watch crazy, angry people on the TV doing things, doing horrible things all with torches and swords and huge sticks and broken bottles of glass and their eyes are all mad and you know it's not far away. And then you go stand at the window of the opposite side of the house, the window that doesn't look out on the city and there's the sea. And the sea doesn't know because the sea is just the same as it is every day, grey with white foam, coming in every few minutes to crash like a crazy person on the rocks and die. Over and over again. And if you watch the waves long enough you begin to forget the other window and everything outside it. And you begin to feel like a little bit better like a little bit normal and your brain even begins to think about what's on TV tonight and then you suddenly notice that no one is down there, no one is down by the rocks and you remember everything and it's not a bad dream.

There's no one by the sea. No one. Not even the lovers who are always there. Not even the children from the government building nearby throwing bags of rubbish into the sea. Not even the poor people who go there to shit in the dark so people can't see their bums.

Where are they going now?

December 8, 1992

Bombay

Dear Tanya,

No one is allowed to leave the building. There are lots of police outside. Things have become really, really bad dude. Like really bad.

My parents keep watch on the TV so that one of them is always watching it. They throw us out of the room when bad stuff comes on. I wish they wouldn't do that. The stuff in my head has got to be a lot worse than what they are showing. It's got to be because it's really bad.

Nusrat has completely lost it. They said Bhendi Bazaar is engulfed in fire.

It happened this morning. She has just lost it. She ran to the front door as they were saying it but my dad grabbed her and pulled her back. It was so awful Tanya. The way she was crying the way she's not even able to speak. Just those horrible, horrible sounds that seem like they're coming from the pit of her stomach. She collapsed on my dad and just cried and cried and cried. My parents gave her something that made her sleep.

We haven't been able to get through to her parents. I've been calling every ten minutes.

Things are really bad. They're stripping men to see if they're Hindu or Muslim.

Many houses have lost electricity and water. Everyone is telling everyone else to stay calm and not believe rumours. I mean if they don't want people to believe rumours they shouldn't have the news show all this stuff. Because they say different numbers every time. Sometimes it's 30 people in Nalla Nagar and sometimes it's 200. Sometimes it's Byculla and sometimes it's not. But Tanya Bhendi Bazaar is one of the worst hit areas. It's like really bad.

I'm so scared. I'm so scared of what will happen to Nusrat if something has happened to her parents. Her parents are her life. How will she live with it?