Paradise

Yusuf has reservations about the journey to the interior because of Mohammed Abdalla, the mnyapara, who leers at him and makes suggestive comments. The crew deems the journey an opportunity to see their civilization in contrast to that of the “savages,” with whom they’ll be trading hoes. When Yusuf complains to Khalil about the crew’s disrespect, he shushes him. Yusuf feels he is guilty of some sort of betrayal, but he doesn’t understand why. A half-Greek, half-Indian trucker who swears frequently and tells dirty stories amuses the porters. Just before the caravan leaves, Yusuf sees Khalil being obsequious to Aziz, something he hates to see.

For nearly three days, Yusuf travels on the train with the porters. It’s hot and smelly, and tempers flare. At one stop, Aziz negotiates with a man. As the crew wait for him, they see two ochre-covered warriors bearing spears jog past them. A porter says the warriors believe they must hunt lions and eat the lion’s penis in order to marry. The caravan arrives at its destination.

Aziz arranges for Yusuf to stay with the shopkeeper with whom he negotiated, Hamid Suleiman and his wife Maimuna, instead of going to the interior. The shop is in a little town in the shadow of a mountain. They treat Yusuf kindly but with a little suspicion. He accidentally offends them by saying the land on the way there looked parched, unlike Uncle Aziz’s walled garden. Hamid tries to clear a space with a machete for Yusuf to make them a garden but gives up after laboring for a while. He keeps white pigeons, and Maimuna jests that Yusuf can build them a garden of paradise for all kinds of birds, not just Hamid’s captives. She jokes that Yusuf will be her new husband. She asks him many questions.

Yusuf mainly runs errands and does household tasks for Hamid and Maimuna, including looking after their three children, since their eldest daughter is too preoccupied to do it well. The house has three storerooms, but one remains locked and contains the mysterious hessian-covered packages the foul-mouthed driver placed there. One night, Yusuf hears Hamid in that room, speaking in a whimpering voice, but Hamid says nothing about it the next day. Hamid enjoys when traders pass through the town, and he sometimes invites them to stay, especially if they are Arab or Somali. They occasionally bring him news of Aziz. One visitor talks of how Europeans are taking all the best land and says that they can revive dead people and have poisonous spit.

Hamid decides to take Yusuf on a trade journey to the mountains. His friend, Harbans Singh, called “Kalasinga,” is a Sikh mechanic who drives them, though his van breaks down often. Hamid teases him and suggests he must send all his money back to Bombay instead of getting a better vehicle. This angers Kalasinga, for Hamid and others seems to think all Indians are the same, and they call them “banyan.” Kalasinga sends money to his brother in Punjab. At a stop, Yusuf refreshes himself in a beautiful waterfall. The three are about to camp when a guard in a European-style worker’s outfit approaches them and tells them the “Bwana” doesn’t like them and they should move off. Hamid responds with hospitality, and the guard abruptly leaves. Back at camp, Kalasinga says the Bwana is a European man from the south who works for the government. He knows him because he fixed the man’s generator once. The man yelled at Kalasinga, and his many dogs howled. Seeing the expressions on Hamid’s and Yusuf’s faces, Kalasinga teases Hamid about Muslims being afraid of dogs. At night, Hamid speaks of Paradise being like the area they’re in, how Paradise is the seventh level of Heaven, which is divided into seven additional levels, the highest of which is the Garden of Eden. Kalasinga responds that there are places like that in India, so Paradise must be there.

Four days into their journey, they reach Olmorog, a government station that had once been a settlement of the cattle-herding, ochre-covered people. It had been an agricultural station where the government hoped of turning the nomadic warriors into farmers, but which failed. The trio stays with a man from Zanzibar named Hussein. Hussein points out the green lights of the mountains. He says that people know the lands to the north and east, but the west is a land of mystery and monsters. Kalasinga says he’d like to translate the Koran into Kiswahili so that Muslims can read what an angry, intolerant god they worship. A local woman comes with uncovered breasts, and Kalasinga acts lustily toward her, but Hussein speaks to her in her language about her new baby. Later, Hussein admits that he’s afraid for the future because the Europeans are taking land and forcing people, especially children, to learn their ways. Kalasinga doesn’t think that’s a problem. He suggests that Hussein should learn about them and learn their language. Hamid doesn’t know what’s so special about their ways of life that they should protect it. Hussein also warns Hamid about continuing to do business with Aziz, saying that someday Hamid will get cheated or caught in the middle of a bad situation. Hussein believes the system of making people pay their debts by giving up their children as “rehani” is a form of slavery. Yusuf shares Hussein’s perspective on Hamid, having sensed the man’s desperation.

After the trio returns to town, Aziz arrives from his trade journey, which had some perils. Two men were injured by animals and were left behind to be cared for by a couple Aziz paid well. Mohammed Abdalla fell into a gully and hurt his shoulder. Aziz gives Hamid sacks of corn, but the gold, gum, and other valuable things are loaded on the train. Aziz leaves shortly thereafter so he can spend Ramadhan at home and dispense the goods so he can pay off his porters. He reports that Belgians are pushing into some of his trade territory and are, in his opinion, worse than the Germans or English. Before Aziz leaves, he hands Yusuf some money and says he’ll see him next year.