Maila Dai  
 

I was a little kid then. The day rolls back to somewhere around 1980.Our house was at Bhojad , a small village in Chitwan district. Chitwan, was a big forest then. People were slowly clearing the Jungles and establishing themselves in huts and shacks. It might have looked like a head with an uneven haircut if view aerially. Chunks and chunks of the forest were cleared off for the settlements of immigrants from different parts of Nepal and from India. Vast majority of the people were illiterate and at this juncture, my father used to teach at the Chitwan model school situated at Bharatpur, a couple of kilometers from our village. It was considered as a big torture to live in Chitwan at that time as it was infested with malaria. People belonging to the hills feared death from this dreaded malady. The government had tried every measure to eradicate malaria but hadn’t achieved mush success.

Our family comprised of five members viz. father, mother, grandmother, brother Prabin   and of course our enigmatic Maila Dai. Our younger sister hadn’t been born yet. Everyday my father used to cycle towards the school in his old phoenix bicycle along the dusty trail of Bhojad. He loved his bicycle dearly. Early morning after the refreshment, he used to start cleaning his bicycle. He made sure not a speck of dust remained behind.

The road from the village to Bharatpur wasn’t as suave as it is now, it was rampant with potholes and they looked as if they were waiting for some incident .The monsoons filled them up and made the journey more ominous. My father used to teach social science .Once he had to go for training towards Birjung for some weeks.

One evening, we were desperately waiting for our father to return home, at about six pm my dad finally came. He wasn’t alone this time, a thin boy of Mongolian origin who might have been sixteen years was with him carrying his trunk. My father introduced him as Maila dai .Maila dai soon got acquainted with us and our proximity grew even more. He used to take us to the shops, buy us chocolates, ride us on his shoulder, play elephant .He was always at the beck and call of our wishes. We juggled him much with our puerile fancy. He used to be with us the whole day until we were admitted to a boarding school nearby.

He did the household job more adeptly than anything. Washing dishes, grazing the cattle, cutting grass for them, collecting firewood etc. My grandmother used to shout, “ Maila go and bring sugar form the shop ”

“Maila wash these plates”

Maila Dai bounced from one job to the other attending the order of each family member. Despite this workload, he never forgot to carry a smile on his face, the possession I valued the most. Whenever he smiled, we knew that it was direct form the heart and had no vias. He always had time for us kids even at the end of the day when he was dead tired.

One day, my father told him to bring tea dust form the shop. The nearest shop was sat a distance of fifteen minutes walk. I used to follow him like a tail wherever he went and this time too he wouldn’t go without me. In front of the shop ,some people were playing cards which was considered an indecent occupation  during that time when the villagers had a whole lot of time to spend. Cards were his weakness and this time also he bought for me a chocolate and told me to be beside him while he sat down to gamble .For the gamblers gambling is timeless. It outgrows every watch. Hours pass away reflecting on those diamond spade still, one wants more of the play, more of the fun. My chocolate finished and my fun too. Either he had to buy a new chocolate or else I would run home and tell my parents. It was the easiest way to blackmail him. He told the shopkeeper to give me more chocolates. An hour had already slipped away but he never showed any sign of going back. Suddenly I saw my father rushing towards the village casino with a headful of temper. He snatched the cards and threw it away. Everyone there stood shocked and spellbound. They respected him a lot and called him “Master Sahib ”thus no one retaliated. However, he never did anything to Maila ,He just scolded him and advised him never to repeat again .During the festivals ,he made beautiful kites for us .The kite was an insignia of our childish dreams .When it flew in the sky, our mind flew with it too .These festivals kites carried our fancies .When it glided smoothly on the blue sky  it seemed as if I was gliding myself and an extremely pleasant warmth reigned through my body and when the kites went down ,goose pimples emerged on my skin and an electrifying fear triggered on my spine.

We were so much, a part of the play,

That we used to pass the entire day.

Now many pages of my life has been turned  with the ebb and flow of time .I have finished my schooling ,my college .I have sustained two horrendous  accident  that nearly took my life .I have married and expecting a child soon. Maila dai was in my mind, safe and sound .Despite my early attachments with him, I never thought of enquiring about his whereabouts because today, I am a successful person, an urban literate, reputed and never thought of running after a simple country illiterate or just another run of the mill.

I was more beautiful as a child because I was stubborn and demanding. If I could swap my present temperament with that of the childhood fancy, perhaps I would have searched him from any corner of the country but today I have become more matured and with maturity one becomes more compromising, more adjustable, more clever, more diplomatic, more careful, more cautious and above all more ugly. I have realized that this adulthood has given me all the ugliness one requires to become a so called gentleman.

The person who cared for me, the person who reared me was now buried in some parts of the mind and I know I would have never made any effort to dig it back and live those precious moments all over again at least in reflection if not in reality. Today, I do not know where he is or whether he is dead or alive. This great soul, if he is ever alive must be smiling somewhere .His smile was one of the most wonderful gift  I have received .I have tried smiling many times  but cannot smile wholeheartedly as he used to do. These days, I have given up the hope of smiling and live with an ugly excuse, “The world never lets you smile.”

 ©Nabin Kumar Chhetri, 2005