Mr. Pasang

Tsering Tsomo Gurung

Mr. Pasang didn’t like eating outside, but he couldn’t refuse his daughter, whom he hadn’t met for almost a year. Dolma brought a new pair of pants from her husband’s drawer and asked Pala[i] to change his old grayed-out trousers, which he had worn throughout his journey to Kathmandu. He acted a little embarrassed, even though he was at his own daughter’s house. If Khando had been here, she would have persisted in cooking at their own home, he thought. In the bathroom mirror, he smoothed his hair with water and slightly rearranged his precious white T-shirt. As they walked out of the house, Pasang La remained quiet, clueless about where they were going. Dolma asked her Pala to hold her bags while she tied her baby to her front with the shawl.

A few minutes later, a taxi came to their door. Mr. Pasang watched the driver rather suspiciously because he had never seen a taxi come by their house before. Once, when Mr. Pasang had come to Kathmandu with his wife, he had to walk all the way to Swyambhu Chowk and bargain with the taxi driver, yet they would still be deceived in the end. “These days, it’s easy, right? Good for educated people.” He said while getting into the taxi. On their way, Pasang La noticed a bunch of lights decorating the streets and the foreigners lingering around the shops, amazed by the brightness of the city. He had never seen [so?] many foreigners walking around at night before. He looked for his wallet in the back pocket of his son-in-law’s pants. He felt relieved that it had a zip so that it wouldn’t fall. Mr. Pasang was good at losing stuff.

“You have reached Thamel. I can’t take this route, Miss. You have to walk from here.” The driver stopped the taxi a little above the Garden of Dreams. Mr. Pasang stepped out of the taxi and took out his wallet. “I have 500 Rs, Bhumo[ii].” He stretched his hand towards Dolma, who was holding a baby in one arm and tapping some numbers on her phone. “Pala, I can pay from my phone,” she said. Mr. Pasang frowned, pondering how a mobile could even carry money these days, but he didn’t intervene to ask more about how it worked. “Pala, Follow me, lo.” Dolma said. He walked hurriedly behind Dolma. Amidst the bustling crowds, his curiosities quickly vanished into the air.

On the day before Mr. Pasang’s arrival, Dolma rose early to prepare some Tibetan tea and bread. She cleared off the table and some flower vases from the kitchen so that her Pala could sleep there during his stay. She bought extra kilos of chicken meat and ordered some local alcohol from the Sherpa restaurant nearby. Dolma remembered her mother, who would always save alcohol for her Pala whenever they visited Kathmandu during the winter. In the absence of her mother, she felt that it was her responsibility to fulfill that role as a daughter, even though it was something her Pala hadn’t asked for.

Through these efforts, Dolma found a sense of fulfillment, which helped her a little to ease the guilt she felt for not being there with her Pala. Dolma hadn’t seen her Pala since the last time, when her mother passed away from cancer in Kathmandu. He had stayed in the capital throughout the entire 49 days of the funeral procession, and then he left even though Dolma urged her Pala to stay back with her family. When the relatives had gathered for the mourning, Dolma overheard the people whispering behind their backs, “Poor Mr. Pasang, he now only has a daughter.” Nevertheless, Dolma made it a routine to contact him every once a week. She would often ask where he was and whether he had his food on time. But the ritual Dolma had created slowly changed between them. The calls became less frequent. Sometimes, it stretched to only once every two to three months. Dolma, on the other hand, became excessively occupied with her parenting chores. She left her teaching job at the monastery. Lobsang, her husband, frequently traveled to Bangkok to bring merchandise back for their clothing store in Kathmandu. It was the only source of income for them. By allowing herself to leave her job to look after their child, Dolma’s life changed significantly over the months. She gained weight. For the first time after her marriage, she began to envy her husband’s freedom to travel outside, and she felt as though she was living off her husband’s pay. Surprisingly, over time, she found that the influence of her husband and in-laws had grown so powerful that it made her less capable of making decisions within her own home.

“Annyeong haseyo[iii]!” a young Nepali guy with a red uniform greeted Mr. Pasang and Dolma at the entrance of the Hankok Korean restaurant. Mr. Pasang grew quite timid as he found himself in a room full of people. Back in the village, he had grown accustomed to eating alone with no one to judge his behavior and the way he dressed. “Annyeong haseyo!” Dolma replied.

The restaurant was bustling with customers. It was Friday. The tables where people could sit cross-legged were all full. Dolma thought it would be easier if they could sit down and eat. She also needed a place to put her baby down to sleep. “Ma’am, the tables are all full at the moment but the couple over there are nearly finished.” The waiter led them to a nearby table and asked them to wait for a while. Mr. Pasang watched a young couple next to him with a bunch of food on the table. He was amazed by the variety of dishes put on those small plates. He wondered if people could eat all of these. Before they came out of their house, Mr. Pasang had wanted to ask his daughter if they could eat whatever was left there in the kitchen, but Dolma was insistent they go out. As he aged, he came to realize that his role as the head of the family was also changing. Dolma makes most of the decisions at home now. She was the one who came up with the idea to put their land up for sale, and to sell the rest of their animals for the average amount people were willing to pay. He felt as if his role in the family was slowly diminishing.

After a few minutes, the waiter waved at them from the counter, gesturing for them to take their seats. They walked back to the entrance.

“Pala, take off your shoes.” Mr. Pasang unfastened his leather shoes, which he had got from his wife’s brother years ago. He neatly put them alongside Dolma’s white slippers in the shoe rack before joining her at the table. “Pala, sit in the corner. You could lie back if you want to.” Dolma said. He felt relieved for his sore knees when he sat down on the soft mattress, legs crossed. Dolma placed two more pillows on her side to make a small bed for her baby.

The waiter came with two big menus and placed one in front of Mr. Pasang. He immediately passed it on to his daughter. “All I know is how to eat.” He said it humorously in front of his daughter and the waiter, partly embarrassed with himself.

“Pala, what do you want to eat? You can look at these pictures and tell me.” Dolma said, gently passing the menu back to him.

“Bhumo. I have no idea. I will just eat what you order.” He left the menu unopened on the table.

Dolma ordered Samgyepsol with pork, tuna gimbap, and some Korean soups. The waiter took back the menus to pass them on to the other guests.

There was a long pause between them.

After a while, the waiter put a stove in the middle of their table and beautifully placed the side dishes around it. Dolma then turned on the gas and slowly set the pork meat on the heated stove, which gave off a sizzling sound. Mr. Pasang stared at the food in astonishment. It must cost a lot, he thought.

Dolma initiated the conversation. “Pala, maybe you can stay with us. You are all alone in the village.”

Mr. Pasang’s face turned red. He knew that his daughter was going to ask him again, but at this moment, he didn’t have a good reason to say no to his daughter’s offer or to leave Kathmandu. He raised his glass to his mouth and drank the water. “I have some work left to do. I must go, Bhumo,” he said, trying to sound calm and certain. Dolma knew that her Pala didn’t have any important tasks to do, as if he would be fired if he didn’t arrive on time.

“If you are working to earn the money, don’t do it, Pala. I can send you the money.” Dolma said.

“Of course. I have to work.” He replied.

Mr. Pasang understood that his daughter was offering him a place out of her love. It was a dilemma for him, which Dolma didn’t understand. He felt that his daughter didn’t understand the nervousness he felt about living in the city, as he had grown up in a village all his life. Not only that, he wasn’t feeling prepared to live with another family his daughter had created in the city. Coming to this city reminded him of the worst moments of his life. He still remembered the endless journey to Kathmandu; in an ambulance, his wife’s frail body lay in between. He hadn’t slept a wink the whole time. When Khando passed away after a month in a hospital, a part of him died along with her. For weeks after her death, Mr. Pasang kept reminding himself that the turmeric was in the peanut butter container and salt in the baking powder. He couldn’t locate the extra packet of salt that Khando had kept as a backup. For the first time, he brewed himself alcohol, something he had never bothered with when his wife was around. Sometimes, he would ask his neighbor Maya for a bottle of rice alcohol to drink. He had smoked when he was a young man, a habit he had got from his friends, but he quit. He remembered during one of the Dashain holidays, Khando barged into his neighbor’s kitchen and slapped him across the face. “Don’t you dare smoke.” His friends laughed from behind as he followed after her. That was the first time he had seen his wife filled with rage. He abandoned smoking after that.

Mr. Pasang didn’t have a permanent job. The villagers would reach out to him when they needed to fetch wood from the jungle, and at times, he would work in someone else’s field. On other days, he would assist in carrying tourists’ luggage. The tourists called him “Mr. Pasang.” As long as people paid him, Khando didn’t mind. But sometimes, she complained. “These people… they come right to our door the moment they need us, but they don’t pay on time. Go to each house and ask them for the money.” “What could I do? Sonam said his son is having surgery, and Kalu needed to save money to build a house,” he replied. Sometimes, violence stumbled into their house.

Suddenly, the baby started crying. Dolma took the milk bottle from her other bag, where she carried all her baby’s necessities, and she put it in the baby’s mouth. She checked the baby’s diaper. “I think he has diarrhea. Can you help me hold him for a while?” She passed the baby to Mr. Pasang. He gently rocked the baby up and down to soothe him.

“You should take him to a hospital,” he said.

Watching her Pala, Dolma remembered the time when she had gone to hospital for the baby’s check-up. She had received a call from Saila Dai. He had sounded worried as he said, “Dolma, your father has been drinking a lot these days. We found him sleeping under the bushes today.” The very next day, she called her Pala, who picked up the call only after five attempts. She yelled into the phone, “Pala, aren’t you feeling ashamed? Quit drinking.” She was distressed every time by such calls, which sometimes escalated to arguments between them. Pala had promptly hung up the phone, and for months, they hadn’t talked. However, Dolma found herself surprised that she could never confront these fears and anger when her Pala was right in front of her, the way she would do over the phone. There was a constant sense of guilt inside her heart, which always nagged in the back of her mind saying, “You haven’t been a good enough daughter to complain about his actions.”

Mr. Pasang will turn 65 next year. Meeting now after almost a year, Dolma couldn’t help but notice his sunken cheeks and shaved face with visible pockmarks. His hair had turned gray, but it was thick and plentiful. Dolma was concerned that her Pala might feel lonely, and if he got sick, there would be no one to look after him. Pala is in good health for his age, she thought, and she believed she could take care of him if necessary. Yet it worried her. She was afraid people would label her a “neglectful daughter,” since she was the only child he had. But she couldn’t imagine tending her Pala while she had a child to look after and a husband’s family who frequently visited her house.

“How’s Makpa’s[iv] business doing?” Mr. Pasang asked, still holding the baby. This interrupted Dolma’s train of thought.

“He has to travel all the time.” Dolma lamented. “He is earning well, Pala. But now other people are starting to sell the same clothes we do.” Dolma wanted to explain further to Pala about the competition in the market and share how, in recent months, her husband had been complaining about the diminishing profits, but she refused.

“That’s good,” Mr. Pasang said.

There was a prolonged silence again. Mr. Pasang watched the couple across from them who were already ordering another round of pork. He had never seen pork meat cut to such an equal size. In the village, they chopped everything off in bits and pieces. By the counter, he noticed a group of tourists huddling, waiting in line. One by one, they drew some cash out of their wallets, which looked freshly out of the bank, unwrinkled and shiny. He carefully took one green leaf out of the basket and shoved it into his mouth. He remembered his vegetable garden back in the village and started to think that this might be how the lettuce could be eaten with rice, without cooking it.

The day before Mr. Pasang planned to travel from Manang to Kathmandu to meet his daughter, he went to his backyard where there was an abandoned house built by someone who had died a long time ago. He dug out two pits and stored some potatoes in them, and then covered them with dead leaves. He only had six sacks of potatoes from the harvest this year. He set one aside for Kathmandu. He picked out some fresh carrots and radishes from his vegetable garden. “Maya, could you please look after my two chickens while I am away? I won’t take long.” He took them over to her place and put them inside with her chickens. They started making noise. Right after that evening, he visited Kamal’s house. “I have to go to Kathmandu. I need money for the traveling expenses.” He had fetched five loads of wood from the jungle for Kamal. Sometimes, Mr. Pasang felt relief for the reasons he could come up with to ask for money.

“Do you need anything else?” the waiter asked in Nepali.

Mr. Pasang waited for Dolma to answer even though he could understand what the waiter was saying. In the city, he often felt at a loss in his ability to communicate with people, a problem he never faced in his village.

“We are good for now,” Dolma said.

Mr. Pasang picked up the chopsticks that were neatly placed before him. He remembered the time when he used to break two sticks to eat his food while going to the jungle. Maybe I should have a pair of these, he thought to himself.

Dolma watched as her Pala took off his yellow North Face jacket. Sweat was dripping from his head due to the heat inside the restaurant. At that moment, Dolma found herself overwhelmed with a mix of emotions. It was as if she was standing at the crossroads of emotions torn between two worlds: one who had given life to her, and another she was yet to build upon. However, at the same time, she couldn’t shake the feeling of relief that there wouldn’t be extra responsibility added for another year, until she needed to ask her Pala to stay again.

And in silence, they ate.

Notes

[i] Pala is a Tibetan word for father.

[ii] Bhumo means daughter in Tibetan.

[iii] Annyeong haseyo means ‘hello’ in Korean.

[iv] Makpa is a Tibetan word for son-in-law.

Tsering Tsomo Gurung is a writer and researcher based in Nepal. Drawing on her mother’s experiences and those of other Tibetans, she writes/tells stories about the Tibetan community around the topics of migration, identity, and belongingness. In her spare time, she loves painting, food, and traveling.