Raji, Book Three. Charley Brindley
she answered right away. “I would be happy for your company on walk to the bank. It is quite long way to go.”
We chatted easily along the way about Burma, Mandalay, the hotel, her job, her boss, and just as we neared the personal information I really wanted to know, she stopped me.
“Well,” she said, “here it is, the bank where I must leave hotel money.”
I looked up at the imposing Romanesque building rising four stories above. Chiseled into a marble slab over the doorway were the words “Reserve Bank of India.” At that time, Burma was still part of India, and the British used the same currency throughout the area.
“Already!” I was genuinely surprised we were there. “But you said it was a long way.”
“We have come more or less twelve blocks, probably.” She stood beside the bank door, smiling sweetly.
“Oh,” I said after a moment. “Where is that temple?”
“Just go down here this way two or more blocks, then on your left side, walk a bit until you see bright color yellow side of house. Stop and try to see small bridge right just ahead of your left-hand side, another few minutes you will be presented in front of Shwe Nadaw temple.”
I couldn’t be sure, but I had the distinct feeling she tried to disorient me with her rapid directions.
“Did you say on my left was the yellow store, or right?” I tried to make it even more confusing.
“Wait right here three minutes or little more, then we shall walk by that place together.”
With a bright smile, she went inside the bank. I watched her through the window as she handed over the hotel’s money to a teller, then went to a young lady sitting at a desk and leaned over to tell her something. The lady glanced in my direction, and I looked away to watch a policeman ride by on his bicycle.
After leaving the bank, we walked along Yadanar Street to the banks of the Nadi Canal, where I purchased ohno khauk swe from a street vendor for our lunch. The food consisted of rice noodles and chicken cooked in coconut milk. It was very spicy, as most Burmese food is, and delicious.
We were late in getting back to the hotel, but Kayin assured me it was all right. I told her if she got into any trouble with the manager, I would make it up to her with a nice dinner at a nearby restaurant.
“Well,” she said, “might be just a bit of trouble I get into.”
At 6 p.m. when she got off duty, she would go home to change, she said, then meet me in front of the restaurant at eight.
It was a long wait for me, and I realized during that interminable afternoon that I’d never been on a date with a girl. Raji and I had done many things together, but nothing one could actually call a date. I was twenty-one and uninitiated, as my father would say. I wondered if Kayin was initiated. Why had I never been out with a woman? Why had Raji and I never made love? What was it like to make love? And why was I thinking about it so much now, since I never had before? And much more of the same, for many hours.
Finally, the evening came, and I’d already been pacing in front of the restaurant for forty-five minutes, wondering if I were on the wrong street. But there she was, promptly at eight, coming along the sidewalk toward me, her heels clicking a quick cadence.
I was very nervous and self-conscious. Sitting at a candle-lit table with a beautiful woman was new for me. I didn’t know whether to ask questions or talk about myself. I’d spent a lot of time with another beautiful woman; Raji, but we had an easy, almost familial relationship. Nothing romantic. I had a feeling there wouldn’t be any romance between Kayin and me either. I was such a klutz that I was sure to bore her to sleep. If she yawns, I decided, we’ll get out of here and I’ll walk her home.
But Kayin was no boor. She talked easily about Burma, her job at the hotel, and she asked questions about America and the freedoms we enjoyed.
At first I kept my answers short and to the point, not wanting to dominate the conversation. She moved from one topic to another, keeping a nice balance between questions and answers.
Our food came and an hour passed quickly, then another.
After the delightful dinner, we strolled for hours through the parks, past many temples, and all the way up to the Golden Palace, with its wide moat and tall towers at each of the four corners.
“Have you ever been inside?” I asked.
“The Golden Palace?” she said. “That is where King Rama lives.”
“Ah, King Rama’s palace. But have you been inside? I wonder what it’s like.”
“Oh.” She hesitated and watched one of the towers for a moment before she went on. “In the photos I have seen, it is, how you say, ornament?”
“Ornate,” I said.
“Yes, ornate. I am sorry my English is no so well.”
“Your English is wonderful. Will you teach me Burmese?”
She looked at me for a long time. “Why did you come to Mandalay?”
We stood at the edge of the moat, tossing pebbles into the dark water.
“I’m on my way to Myitkyina,” I said. “My friend is meeting me at the hotel in a few days. I signed the two of us onto a riverboat called the Gaw-byan. I guess we’ll be working as deckhands, I’m not sure. But we don’t mind hard work.”
“Why Myitkyina?”
“Just to see what’s there.”
“But what do you do?” she asked.
At that time, I still called myself a medical student. Actually, I was no longer one and probably never would be again. So what was I? A bum, that’s all I could think of, but I couldn’t tell her that.
“I’m a medical student.”
“When will you finish medical school?”
Her questions were much better than mine. She was getting to the heart of things, and I was feeling a bit uncomfortable.
“To tell you the truth, Kayin, I may never go back to school.”
“Why?”
“I’m discouraged, disillusioned, and sick of how the politicians and businessmen have ruined our world.”
“And you have come to my Burma to find what?”
What indeed. Why was I in Burma? Why was I anywhere? This wasn’t the way I thought our evening would go.
“I’m beginning to believe I came to Burma to find you.”
Kayin removed her sandals and sat on the edge of the moat. She splashed her feet in the cool water, then picked up a handful of pebbles.
“Not possible,” she said.
I sat down beside her. “What is not possible?”
She didn’t answer; only tossed the little rocks into the water, one at a time. I removed my shoes and socks. The water was much colder than I expected.
“It is not possible you came all this way to find me.”
“But I did find you.”
“Then you came for nothing, no reason.”
She seemed to struggle with her emotions as the stones splashed into the dark water. Finally, she turned toward me and held my gaze for a long moment, then she dropped the last stone into the moat and dusted off her hands.
“You see these eyes?” she asked.
I nodded.
“My eyes are from my Scottish father. All my life I have been an, how do you say, an outlaw?”
“Outcast?”
“Yes, an outcast.