From the Assam region of India, Rosy is a sprite of a girl, a power packed little package. After only a week of training Rosy, I had no choice but to trust her to mind Max and the house over our one month holiday. I left her with a lengthy list of chores which Ambrose faithfully translated and explained daily. UV, David's assistant, reported a few hiccups with Rosy but in all, the chemistry of things seemed to have worked out. Once on a plane away from India, I refused to worry about domestic details. I left my fate to UV and Ambrose who would inform me of any major disasters. I didn't want to know about dhobis and malis. I only wanted to be informed if the house burned down!
Last year's horrors of settling in are indelibly impressed on my mind and I feared that after enjoying first-world comforts for a month (oh the wide open spaces of California, the fresh air, stupendous Trader Joe's) divine retribution would have me reliving those horrors. The hygiras would not come knocking this time round but I suspected the commencement of another hot apprentice season.
You may already know the Ambrose story (A Governmental Disruption). So now I will tell you the Rosy story. Life in India is full of stories. Perhaps that is why most Indian friends start off a conversation with "so tell me...."
Rosy and I have been working together for a month and a half now. Though I was skeptical that our arrangement would not work, I was still willing to give it a try, let it run its course so to speak. With her limited English I was forced to rely on exaggerated sign language to get my message across. Rosy frowns. She was always frowning till I realized her frown had more to do with the heat of the day or the proximity of any English spoken. However, we are starting to iron out the kinks in our relationship. She frowns less these days, why, I've even heard her singing in the kitchen!
If I could have only three words to describe Rosy, those words would be LITTLE, LOUD, and LIGHTNING. A little girl of about 90 pounds, she has the lungs of an operatic singer when she opens the door and yells "ba-hi-aaaa" calling for Ambrose to do her heavy lifting. She bangs pots and pans with lightning speed at the kitchen sink as though she were gunning for the Guinness record. In the evenings we work together slicing and chopping, preparing dinner. Inevitably she is impatient to grab the chopping knife from me smiling, "I do quickly, quickly. You are too slow because you don't work, you no practice."
Though I fear that writing this might jinx it, I am hopeful that Rosy will turn out to be my Mary Poppins. People and things are not always what or how we expect them to be. She isn't the English-speaking, lasagna-baking whiz of a housekeeper I hoped for. But she is here with me and each evening we learn about each other. She is proud of her beautiful Assam. She declares that Hindi is a good language. She explains that without chili, no food is good. She admits that her big brother says she moves too fast and talks too loud. She is eager to learn (last night she took the Hindi-English dictionary up to her room to study). She enthusiastically explains how she made her dahivada (not surprisingly, mixing dahi and vada makes dahivada!). I honestly admit there is much I don't understand about India and her people. But so far, Rosy I understand, and this is a good start.
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