Rains Finally Arrive

July 27, 2006
Last night the rains finally arrive. I was told that monsoon rains came early this year but never fell since I arrived in middle of June. We had a good drenching in the night. I hope it is not a false start again. When the rain started I stepped out into the balcony to hear a chorus of croaking frogs singing in the rain. It is 18 years since I've heard this music. I wanted to pull my sons from their tutor and run outside and drench myself, stick out my tongue and taste the rain, slush in the muddy water, grab branches and shake another rain out their branches. I hesitated, my sons, who already think I am wierd by bringing them to India, might find it too filmy (a la Gene Kelly) .

After dinner, my eldest son Rahath, who is already upset about leaving US, stubbed his toe to a chair. In his pain, not knowing whom to get angry at, he gets upset at India. He eventually breaks down and cries saying that he misses US, his friends, school, neighbors, and everything. He calculates how many more weeks before he returns to US. Panic grips me - are they ever going to appreciate what India has to offer?

Before putting kids to bed, I open windows to let in the cool rain air. We have insect mesh on the windows to prevent mosquitoes from getting in. Around 1:30 AM, we are suddenly assaulted by mosquitoes. We all wake up scratching. It was a ruthless assault. Sujani gets Odomus cream for all of us, I switch on the mosquito repellents and kids get back to sleep. We have another session how they hate India from the kids. I couldn't get back to sleep so I go into my office and work. Sujani walks in few minutes later and says, "Baboy! mosquitoes are making me miss America". Neither heat nor dust nor mosquitoes could prevent the British from conquering India and staying here for more than 250 years. Could a phalange of mosquitoes drive an NRI family with their ABCD kids back to Americas?

I wake up late next morning, and look at Golconda and the domes of the tombs. They look freshly washed and clean. The nocturnal croaking was replaced by chirping and cooing of the birds. Will my sons be in better mood for India today? Rahath has been been vascillating on this matter. Few days back he came back from School and was saying how he will smash Pakistan with his fists if they touch India. This is from a kid whose babysitter was a Pakistani till he was 3 years old, who would sit next to his mother and while she does the puja he would spread a napkin and do the namaz until he was 5 years old. I wonder how he got these nationalistic feelings from an ABCD dominated International school.