My wife.
I cherish calling her that, as possessive as it sounds, simply because there is a part of her that is beyond such ties of emotion, a part that is calm and reasoning. I know that once she has shed tears of relief to hear that I am alive and well, she will listen to the proposal Indra delivers – my proposal – without a trace of partiality. She will then seek clarifications, some of which Indra will provide, some of which he cannot, and he will be forced to send a report or come back to Tumasik himself.
What I am not prepared for, in the least, is to see Vani, young Vikrama on her hip, wading through the last few feet of foam to step on the sand with regard neither for her clothing nor for the impression she makes on the island’s residents gathered on the beach.
Without meaning to, I rush forward to greet her. She gives me a deliberate glance, one that says she is glad to see me as much as it warns me that this is not the place for obvious shows of affection.
I settle for squeezing Vikrama as hard as I dare, and showering him with kisses that I mean for them both. He responds, at first with the disenchanted submission of an infant, and then with a wordless shriek that is currently the extent of his speech. The thought of my son on these shores removes what little doubt there may have remained in me.
It is a while before Vani and I are alone, and we can turn to the conversation for which she has come here.
We walk along the shore, our bare feet leaving fleeting patterns on sand. Vikrama is asleep on my shoulder; his curly hair tickles my chin as it is whipped about by a gust of wind. I instinctively lift a hand to his face, shielding his closed eyes from flying sand and salt-spray. Vani stands next to me, squinting her eyes to stare right into the oncoming squall. In a characteristic manner, she makes it easy for me with her plain statements. “What trouble are you getting us into now, Sang Nila Utama?”
“I’d say the trouble began a long time ago, Vani. In fact, it began when we ousted those pirates from Bintan. You do remember them, don’t you?” I know she does, but I cannot resist teasing her.
Vani replies in kind, “How can I forget them? If it had not been for their actions, I might have escaped fate...” she says, sighing for dramatic effect.
“In that case, you must have wondered what forces of misfortune conspired to make them choose Bintan as their base, thus unsettling your life?”
“I’m hardly worth misfortune’s conspiracies. Bintan’s location made it a strategic choice...”
Her mind moves in leaps and bounds to see what I already have, and further. I try to keep pace with my explanations.
“Without the threat of piracy, it made sailing through the strait north of Bintan, the waters between Tumasik and Bintan, more attractive than passing the port of Tanjongpura. And so, over these past years, more and more trade ships have been passing close to Tumasik – the first landmass available once you are out of the monsoon currents that carry ships from Cina.”
“And because more ships pass this way,” she continues in my stead, “the region attracts new pirates; in turn giving the traders and also the Palembang navy cause to attack the Sea People just as they did the innocent people of Bintan. Is it your intent to help these islanders oust the pirates? Will that be enough?”
“It is more complicated than that, Vani. The title of ‘pirate’ is enough to remove what little dignity and grace may have been afforded to the Sea People, and not without cause – for yes, many like them, even some among them, do finally turn to piracy. But does that justify the traders coming ashore and attacking them? Is their plunder a consequence of the piracy or is it the cause? Where does the circle begin and where does it end?”
Vani heeds the rhetoric but makes no attempt to respond to it. She says, “Indra told me that you need men. But he also said that it is not your idea to defend this island. What do you intend to do?”
“To build.”
Vani is stunned, not by the audacity of my statement, but by the fact that I make this suggestion. I reach out to take her hand in mine and trace meaningless symbols on her palm with my thumb, play a silent beat with her fingers; they are pliant and trusting in my grasp. I want to share my plans, give her the explanations she deserves. I want to tell her that we shall create a huge trading centre here at Tumasik, its waters also protected by Bintan, that we shall be beholden neither to Cina nor to Majapahit, that this balance of one against the other shall be our way of ensuring independence from them both, and that my grandfather and Arya would be the perfect emissaries to represent this to both powers.
And we shall be of use in our own way, for Tumasik shall be several things: the long-needed means of connecting the entire peninsula of Malaya to the trade route of the oceans, as well as a place where merchants from both east and west can berth their ships in anticipation of seasonal winds without foregoing their trade. This they shall do to the benefit of those who matter, ought to have mattered the most: the people, not just the Sea People of Tumasik, but those who remain my people though I may have long forsaken them: those at Palembang, those of Tanjongpura who fought by my side during the Majapahit emperor’s wars, and those who have been my family all these years at Bintan. Tumasik will be the future for them all, a future that I finally dare aspire to, for it will not be born out of my desire alone. But these words stay buried deep in contentment.
Instead, I say, “I have constantly looked to the past, Vani, trying to find peace in understanding how things came to be the way they are. I use sonorous terms to describe forces beyond our control, I talk of trade and politics and religion and how they have shaped empires and destinies around us, because I can then accept the present state of things as the outcome of inevitability.”
“Well, it seems to have worked, has it not? You’ve been a satisfied man.”
“Yes, because that peace was my only redemption from my family’s failures to protect the past, their glorious legacy... Or so I thought...”
Vani stops and turns to face me. We stand in a cocoon of thundering silence, the heartbeat sound of sea against shore. I feel my son’s content drool pool on my shoulder, an ocean in itself. I still do not see it all completely or clearly and have only the sailor’s sense of heading in the right direction despite endless seas and starless nights. Some call it instinct, others a smell or a sound on the wind, the way the cool breeze caresses your face, not like the inviting touch of a courtesan but the reassuring hand of a mother.
I say, “But it was not just failure from which I was trying to flee. It was also my own fear. You see, we can look to the past for acceptance, but it is the future we must look to to decide on our actions; it is the unknown that we must take responsibility for, not the inevitable.”
“But how can one take responsibility for the unknown?”
“By taking responsibility for what must remain constant, immutable, no matter what history decrees or the future brings.”
Vani vacillates between irritation and amusement at the ambiguity in my response. She looks away, her eyes tracing the path we have walked on the sand. I follow her gaze. The tide is slowly coming in, and the sea is already washing our footprints away. In my arms, Vikrama wakes from his tired sleep.
Excerpted with permission from 3, Krishna Udaysankar, Hachette Books.
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What I am not prepared for, in the least, is to see Vani, young Vikrama on her hip, wading through the last few feet of foam to step on the sand with regard neither for her clothing nor for the impression she makes on the island’s residents gathered on the beach.
Without meaning to, I rush forward to greet her. She gives me a deliberate glance, one that says she is glad to see me as much as it warns me that this is not the place for obvious shows of affection.
I settle for squeezing Vikrama as hard as I dare, and showering him with kisses that I mean for them both. He responds, at first with the disenchanted submission of an infant, and then with a wordless shriek that is currently the extent of his speech. The thought of my son on these shores removes what little doubt there may have remained in me.
It is a while before Vani and I are alone, and we can turn to the conversation for which she has come here.
We walk along the shore, our bare feet leaving fleeting patterns on sand. Vikrama is asleep on my shoulder; his curly hair tickles my chin as it is whipped about by a gust of wind. I instinctively lift a hand to his face, shielding his closed eyes from flying sand and salt-spray. Vani stands next to me, squinting her eyes to stare right into the oncoming squall. In a characteristic manner, she makes it easy for me with her plain statements. “What trouble are you getting us into now, Sang Nila Utama?”
“I’d say the trouble began a long time ago, Vani. In fact, it began when we ousted those pirates from Bintan. You do remember them, don’t you?” I know she does, but I cannot resist teasing her.
Vani replies in kind, “How can I forget them? If it had not been for their actions, I might have escaped fate...” she says, sighing for dramatic effect.
“In that case, you must have wondered what forces of misfortune conspired to make them choose Bintan as their base, thus unsettling your life?”
“I’m hardly worth misfortune’s conspiracies. Bintan’s location made it a strategic choice...”
Her mind moves in leaps and bounds to see what I already have, and further. I try to keep pace with my explanations.
“Without the threat of piracy, it made sailing through the strait north of Bintan, the waters between Tumasik and Bintan, more attractive than passing the port of Tanjongpura. And so, over these past years, more and more trade ships have been passing close to Tumasik – the first landmass available once you are out of the monsoon currents that carry ships from Cina.”
“And because more ships pass this way,” she continues in my stead, “the region attracts new pirates; in turn giving the traders and also the Palembang navy cause to attack the Sea People just as they did the innocent people of Bintan. Is it your intent to help these islanders oust the pirates? Will that be enough?”
“It is more complicated than that, Vani. The title of ‘pirate’ is enough to remove what little dignity and grace may have been afforded to the Sea People, and not without cause – for yes, many like them, even some among them, do finally turn to piracy. But does that justify the traders coming ashore and attacking them? Is their plunder a consequence of the piracy or is it the cause? Where does the circle begin and where does it end?”
Vani heeds the rhetoric but makes no attempt to respond to it. She says, “Indra told me that you need men. But he also said that it is not your idea to defend this island. What do you intend to do?”
“To build.”
Vani is stunned, not by the audacity of my statement, but by the fact that I make this suggestion. I reach out to take her hand in mine and trace meaningless symbols on her palm with my thumb, play a silent beat with her fingers; they are pliant and trusting in my grasp. I want to share my plans, give her the explanations she deserves. I want to tell her that we shall create a huge trading centre here at Tumasik, its waters also protected by Bintan, that we shall be beholden neither to Cina nor to Majapahit, that this balance of one against the other shall be our way of ensuring independence from them both, and that my grandfather and Arya would be the perfect emissaries to represent this to both powers.
And we shall be of use in our own way, for Tumasik shall be several things: the long-needed means of connecting the entire peninsula of Malaya to the trade route of the oceans, as well as a place where merchants from both east and west can berth their ships in anticipation of seasonal winds without foregoing their trade. This they shall do to the benefit of those who matter, ought to have mattered the most: the people, not just the Sea People of Tumasik, but those who remain my people though I may have long forsaken them: those at Palembang, those of Tanjongpura who fought by my side during the Majapahit emperor’s wars, and those who have been my family all these years at Bintan. Tumasik will be the future for them all, a future that I finally dare aspire to, for it will not be born out of my desire alone. But these words stay buried deep in contentment.
Instead, I say, “I have constantly looked to the past, Vani, trying to find peace in understanding how things came to be the way they are. I use sonorous terms to describe forces beyond our control, I talk of trade and politics and religion and how they have shaped empires and destinies around us, because I can then accept the present state of things as the outcome of inevitability.”
“Well, it seems to have worked, has it not? You’ve been a satisfied man.”
“Yes, because that peace was my only redemption from my family’s failures to protect the past, their glorious legacy... Or so I thought...”
Vani stops and turns to face me. We stand in a cocoon of thundering silence, the heartbeat sound of sea against shore. I feel my son’s content drool pool on my shoulder, an ocean in itself. I still do not see it all completely or clearly and have only the sailor’s sense of heading in the right direction despite endless seas and starless nights. Some call it instinct, others a smell or a sound on the wind, the way the cool breeze caresses your face, not like the inviting touch of a courtesan but the reassuring hand of a mother.
I say, “But it was not just failure from which I was trying to flee. It was also my own fear. You see, we can look to the past for acceptance, but it is the future we must look to to decide on our actions; it is the unknown that we must take responsibility for, not the inevitable.”
“But how can one take responsibility for the unknown?”
“By taking responsibility for what must remain constant, immutable, no matter what history decrees or the future brings.”
Vani vacillates between irritation and amusement at the ambiguity in my response. She looks away, her eyes tracing the path we have walked on the sand. I follow her gaze. The tide is slowly coming in, and the sea is already washing our footprints away. In my arms, Vikrama wakes from his tired sleep.
Excerpted with permission from 3, Krishna Udaysankar, Hachette Books.