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Serious Men

Serious Men

Titel: Serious Men
Autoren: Manu Joseph
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sit and watch TV?’
    Her nostrils flared a bit but she chose to remain silent. That was her strategy.
    ‘You know, Oja,’ he said, as he began these things, ‘rich people have a name for everything. They even have a word for the time a man spends with his family.’
    ‘Really?’ she asked, without turning round.
    ‘They call it Quality Time.’
    ‘It’s English?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Why should they name something like that?’ ‘They name everything out there,’ he said. ‘You know, Oja. There are people in those tall buildings who suddenly begin towonder, “Who am I? What am I?” And they have a name for that too.’
    There was a knock at the door. Oja muttered that there was no peace in this place. When Ayyan opened the door, two little girls walked in. One was about ten and the other must have been two years younger. They said, both at once, ‘Guests have come to our house, we need chairs.’ And they carried away the two plastic chairs.
    Oja shut the door and latched it firmly as though that would protect her from other intrusions that were lurking outside. She then sank onto the floor again. But the television erupted in the cheerful jingle of a shampoo commercial. She got up briskly and went to the kitchen. She knew the exact lengths of the commercial breaks. The first break was the longest and in that time she always tried to do most of her cooking.
    ‘Look at this,’ Ayyan said pointing at the commercial. ‘This woman has a problem. She has a big problem, actually. Her hair is thin and weak. That’s her problem. Now she is using a shampoo. Look now. She is happy. Her problem is solved. A man is ogling her and she looks at him sideways. Now her hair is very thick and strong.’
    Ayyan was laughing, but Oja knew that the muscles around his temples must be moving. She did not turn from the trembling vessel on the stove. She waited for him to empty all his hate.
    He was saying, ‘This is what these bastards think is a problem. Hairfall. That’s their big problem.’ Then he asked, ‘Where is Adi?’
    Oja answered, ‘Girls and butterflies; boys and monkeys.’
    Ayyan did not understand most of her proverbs. ‘Oja, where is he?’
    ‘God knows what that weird boy is up to,’ she said. Yet, it was she who had enthusiastically asked him to go away when the serial was about to begin.

O N THE VAST tar-coated terrace that was surrounded by distant looming buildings, people sat in small scattered groups. Beneath the starless sky children screamed and ran. One boy, about ten maybe, stood silently in a corner. His hair was oiled and severely combed. He was in a T-shirt that had the image of Einstein sticking his tongue out jovially. The boy had clear black eyes: Oja’s eyes. A hearing-aid was strung to his left ear. Its white wire ran into his T-shirt.
    He did not seem very keen to run around, though he appeared very interested in what was happening around him. After a while, the children came together, close to where he was standing. They were panting gleefully, and someone decided that since they were all very tired they would play husband-and-wife. In their opinion it was a relaxing game.
    Without too much conflict they split into pairs. A remaining girl was quickly joined with the silent boy. She looked at him condescendingly, because she was a girl and he was just a boy. Though he didn’t ask for directions she explained the game to him. ‘It’s easy,’ she said, as an incentive. They had to just behave like parents. All the other pairs walked away to various nooks of the terrace where there were imaginary markets and theatres. The boy looked at his girl for a few seconds wondering what they must do that parents did. Then a solution entered his oddly large head.
    He gently eased the girl to the ground and spread her legs. She looked confused but tried to figure out what he was trying to do. He climbed on top of her and bobbed his hips clumsily. Theyoung mothers, who until now had gazed lazily in intervals at their children like wild animals on grassland, came to life. They let out embarrassed chuckles and rushed to separate the boy from his temporary wife. The boy went back to his corner with a foul look on his face. The girl disengaged herself from the adult intervention. Now that she understood what he was doing, she continued with the game by pretending to tie her hair, a hint of boredom on her face. Then she went to sleep on the tar-coated floor.
    Since all the pairs were busy, and
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