Robert and the Dog

by Ken Saro-Wiwa

Robert’s new employer was a young medical doctor just returned from abroad. He was
cheerful, exuberant and polite. It was obvious to Robert that he had not been in the country
for a long time. Because he did not once lose his temper, he did not shout at Robert, he
called him by his first name, and always asked him about his wife, children and other
members of his family. Robert, accustomed to moving from household to household, thought
he had at last found fulfillment. The more so as the young doctor appeared to be a bachelor.

Stewards, including Robert, prefer to serve a bachelor. Because every bachelor is as wax in
the hands of his steward. The latter determines what is to be spent on grocery, how much
food is to be served at meal times, what is to be done with the remnants of food. In short, he
holds the bachelor’s life in his hands. And that is tremendous power.

Robert quickly settled into his new situation and took full control of the house. Experience
had taught him never to occupy the servant’s quarters, which were attached to the main
house. It made dismissals or the abandonment of a situation rather messy. So it was that
Robert’s family lived in the filth and quagmire of Ajegunle, which the wags termed ‘The
Jungle’. In his one-bedroom apartment in The Jungle, Robert was king. And he always
repaired there nightly to exercise his authority over his wife and six children. The experience
he had gained in running his household helped him a great deal in organising the life of each
new employer. Robert was particularly happy in his new situation because the young man
was carefree and happy. There was, as has been said, no wife breathing down Robert’s
neck and limiting his abundant authority. There were no children whose nappies and
numerous clothes had to b e washed. He did not have to cook several meals a day. The
young man ate but once a day, except for the cup of coffee and toast early in the morning.

Trouble began when the young man announced after six months that his wife was about to
join him. Robert’s face fell visibly at the announcement. But he did not worry very much at
the expected curtailment of his wide powers. Who knew, the lady might not be an ogre after
all.

Which is precisely what happened in the event. The lady was as young and cheerful as her
husband. She, too, took an interest in Robert. She was European and excited about her first
visit to Africa. She appeared pleased to have Robert’s assistance. She spent the day asking
Robert about African food, watching Robert at work in the kitchen and lending a helping
hand where possible. She made sure Robert stopped work early so that he could get home
to his family, and she did not make a fuss if Robert turned up late some odd mornings. And
she got Robert paid every fortnight. She even offered to go and visit his wife and family in
The Jungle. Robert carefully and politely turned down her offer. He could not imagine her
picking her neat way through the filth and squalor of The Jungle to the hovel which was his
home. Maybe, he thought, if she once knew where he lived and sampled the mess that was
his home, her regard for him would diminish and he might lose his job. Yet the young lady
extended every consideration to him. Robert began to feel like a human being, and he felt
extremely grateful to his new employers.

The only source of worry in the new situation was the dog. For the young lady had arrived
with a dog called Bingo. And Robert watched with absolute amazement and great incredulity
as the lady spoke tenderly to the dog. She ensured that he was well fed with tinned food and
milk and meat and bones. And she held the dog lovingly in her arms, brushed his hair and
tended him carefully. The dog appeared as important to the lady as her husband and,
indeed, Robert thought, in the order of things, the dog was more important than himself. Try
as hard as he might, he could not dismiss from his mind the fact that the dog was doing
better than himself. And he detested this state of affairs. He could understand a dog being
invited to eat up an infant’s faeces. He could understand a stray, mangy dog with flies
around its ears being beaten and chased away from the dwellings of men. He could
understand a dog wandering around rubbish heaps in search of sustenance. But a dog who
slept on the settee, a dog who was fed tinned food on a plate, a dog who was brushed and
cleaned, a dog who drank good tinned milk, was entirely beyond his comprehension. On one
occasion, the lady took the dog to a doctor. And that was the straw that broke the camel’s
back.

All that day, Robert felt his stomach turn. and when he got home in the evening and saw his
children, with distended stomachs, gambolling in the filth that simmered in a swollen stream
at his door, and watched them hungrily swallow small balls of eba, he asked himself, ‘Who
born dog?’ And all of a sudden he developed a pathological hatred for Bingo the dog, his
master’s dog. All night long, he saw in the eye of his mind, the dog cuddled in the warmth of
the settee, which he would have to clean and brush in the morning. And he asked himself
again and again, ‘Who born dog?’

The object of Robert’s hatred was totally oblivious of the feelings that he bred in the cook-
steward. He revelled in the love of his master and mistress. He ate his food with relish and
wagged his tail in contented gratitude. He loved and served the lady, doing as he was bid.
And he wagged his tail contentedly at Robert. He slept in the day and kept watch over his
owners at night. But each wag of his tail was like so many pinpricks in the heart of Robert,
who secretly vowed to ‘show’ the dog some day.

That day duly arrived and much sooner than Robert had expected. The young doctor
announced to him that they would be going away on holiday for six weeks. He wanted
Robert to take care of the house. As they would not be travelling with the dog, he would be
most delighted if Robert would be kind enough to take care of Bingo. They were going to
leave enough tinned food and milk for Bingo and some money so Robert could purchase
bones to supplement his food. He hoped Robert did not mind.

Not in the least, Robert replied. But in his innermost heart, he knew he had found the
opportunity he wanted.

After the departure of the couple, Robert, true to his training, obeyed his master’s orders to
the letter. On the first and second days. On the third day, watching the dog lap his milk from
a plate, a voice spoke to Robert. ‘who born dog?’ And to this ponderous question, Robert
could find no other answer than ‘Dog’. And the anger in him welled. He looked at the dog,
and the dog looked at him, wagging his tail. ‘Well may you wag your tail,’ Robert thought,
‘but I can tell you, I’m not going to waste my life taking care of you.’

He gathered up all the tins of dog food, all the tins of milk, tethered the dog to the settee and
walked off, out of the house and the job he had loved to do. He gave the milk and dog food
to his children when he got home.

And the dog died.

By R.K Narayan

Punctually at midday he opened his bag and spread out his professional equipment, which
consisted of a dozen cowrie shells, a square piece of cloth with obscure mystic charts on it,
a notebook, and a bundle of palmyra writing. His forehead was resplendent with sacred ash
and vermilion, and his eyes sparkled with a sharp, abnormal gleam which was really an
outcome of a continual searching look for customers, but which his simple clients took to be
a prophetic light and felt comforted. The power of his eyes was considerably enhanced by
their position—placed as they were between the painted forehead and the dark whiskers
which streamed down his cheeks: even a half-wit’s eyes would sparkle in such a setting. To
crown the effect he wound a saffron-colored turban around his head. This color scheme
never failed. People were attracted to him as bees are attracted to cosmos or dahlia stalks.
He sat under the boughs of a spreading tamarind tree which flanked a path running through
the town hall park. It was a remarkable place in many ways: a surging crowd was always
moving up and down this narrow road morning till night. A variety of trades and occupations
was represented all along its way: medicine sellers, sellers of stolen hardware and junk,
magicians, and, above all, an auctioneer of cheap cloth, who created enough din all day to
attract the whole town. Next to him in vociferousness came a vendor of fried groundnut, who
gave his ware a fancy name each day, calling it “Bombay Ice Cream” one day, and on the
next “Delhi Almond,” and on the third “Raja’s Delicacy,” and so on and so forth, and people
flocked to him. A considerable portion of this crowd dallied before the astrologer too. The
astrologer transacted his business by the light of a flare which crackled and smoked up
above the groundnut heap nearby. Half the enchantment of the place was due to the fact
that it did not have the benefit of municipal lighting. The place was lit up by shop lights. One
or two had hissing gaslights, some had naked flares stuck on poles, some were lit up by old
cycle lamps, and one or two, like the astrologer’s, managed without lights of their own. It was
a bewildering crisscross of light rays and moving shadows. This suited the astrologer very
well, for the simple reason that he had not in the least intended to be an astrologer when he
began life; and he knew no more of what was going to happen to others than he knew what
was going to happen to himself next minute. He was as much a stranger to the stars as were
his innocent customers. Yet he said things which pleased and astonished everyone: that
was more a matter of study, practice, and shrewd guesswork. All the same, it was as much
an honest man’s labor as any other, and he deserved the wages he carried home at the end
of a day.

He had left his village without any previous thought or plan. If he had continued there he
would have carried on the work of his forefathers—namely, tilling the land, living, marrying,
and ripening in his cornfield and ancestral home. But that was not to be. He had to leave
home without telling anyone, and he could not rest till he left it behind a couple of hundred
miles. To a villager it is a great deal, as if an ocean flowed between.

He had a working analysis of mankind’s troubles: marriage, money, and the tangles of
human ties. Long practice had sharpened his perception. Within five minutes he understood
what was wrong. He charged three paise per question, never opened his mouth till the other
had spoken for at least ten minutes, which provided him enough stuff for a dozen answers
and advices. When he told the person before him, gazing at his palm, “In many ways you are
not getting the results for your efforts,” nine out of ten were disposed to agree with him. Or
he questioned: “Is there any woman in your family, maybe even a distant relative, who is not
well disposed towards you?” Or he gave an analysis of character: “Most of your troubles are
due to your nature. How can you be otherwise with Saturn where he is? You have an
impetuous nature and a rough exterior.” This endeared him to their hearts immediately, for
even the mildest of us loves to think that he has a forbidding exterior.
The nuts vendor blew out his flare and rose to go home. This was a signal for the astrologer
to bundle up too, since it left him in darkness except for a little shaft of green light which
strayed in from somewhere and touched the ground before him. He picked up his cowrie
shells and paraphernalia and was putting them back into his bag when the green shaft of
light was blotted out; he looked up and saw a man standing before him. He sensed a
possible client and said, “You look so careworn. It will do you good to sit down for a while
and chat with me.” The other grumbled some reply vaguely. The astrologer pressed his
invitation; whereupon the other thrust his palm under his nose, saying, “You call yourself an
astrologer?” The astrologer felt challenged and said, tilting the other’s palm towards the
green shaft of light, “Yours is a nature …” “Oh, stop that,” the other said. “Tell me something
worthwhile….”

Our friend felt piqued. “I charge only three paise per question, and what you get ought to be
good enough for your money….” At this the other withdrew his arm, took out an anna, and
flung it out to him, saying, “I have some questions to ask. If I prove you are bluffing, you
must return that anna to me with interest.”

“If you find my answers satisfactory, will you give me five rupees?”

“No.”

“Or will you give me eight annas?”

“All right, provided you give me twice as much if you are wrong,” said the stranger. This pact
was accepted after a little further argument. The astrologer sent up a prayer to heaven as
the other lit a cheroot. The astrologer caught a glimpse of his face by the match light. There
was a pause as cars hooted on the road, jutka drivers swore at their horses, and the babble
of the crowd agitated the semidarkness of the park. The other sat down, sucking his cheroot,
puffing out, sat there ruthlessly. The astrologer felt very uncomfortable. “Here, take your
anna back. I am not used to such challenges. It is late for me today….” He made
preparations to bundle up. The other held his wrist and said, “You can’t get out of it now. You
dragged me in while I was passing.” The astrologer shivered in his grip; and his voice shook
and became faint. “Leave me today. I will speak to you tomorrow.” The other thrust his palm
in his face and said, “Challenge is challenge. Go on.” The astrologer proceeded with his
throat drying up, “There is a woman …”

“Stop,” said the other “I don’t want all that. Shall I succeed in my present search or not?
Answer this and go. Otherwise I will not let you go till you disgorge all your coins.” The
astrologer muttered a few incantations and replied, “All right. I will speak. But will you give
me a rupee if what I say is convincing? Otherwise I will not open my mouth, and you may do
what you like.” After a good deal of haggling the other agreed. The astrologer said, “You
were left for dead. Am I right?”

“Ah, tell me more.”

“A knife has passed through you once?” said the astrologer.

“Good fellow!” He bared his chest to show the scar. “What else?”

“And then you were pushed into a well nearby in the field. You were left for dead.”

“I should have been dead if some passerby had not chanced to peep into the well,”
exclaimed the other, overwhelmed by enthusiasm. “When shall I get at him?” he asked,
clenching his fist.
“In the next world,” answered the astrologer. “He died four months ago in a far-off town. You
will never see any more of him.” The other groaned on hearing it. The astrologer proceeded:

“Guru Nayak—”

“You know my name!” the other said, taken aback.

“As I know all other things. Guru Nayak, listen carefully to what I have to say. Your village is
two days’ journey due north of this town. Take the next train and be gone. I see once again
great danger to your life if you go from home.” He took out a pinch of sacred ash and held it
to him. “Rub it on your forehead and go home. Never travel southward again, and you will
live to be a hundred.”

“Why should I leave home again?” the other said reflectively. “I was only going away now
and then to look for him and to choke out his life if I met him.” He shook his head regretfully.
“He has escaped my hands. I hope at least he died as he deserved.” “Yes,” said the
astrologer. “He was crushed under a lorry.” The other looked gratified to hear it.

The place was deserted by the time the astrologer picked up his articles and put them into
his bag. The green shaft was also gone, leaving the place in darkness and silence. The
stranger had gone off into the night, after giving the astrologer a handful of coins.

It was nearly midnight when the astrologer reached home. His wife was waiting for him at the
door and demanded an explanation. He flung the coins at her and said, “Count them. One
man gave all that.”

“Twelve and a half annas,” she said, counting. She was overjoyed. “I can buy some jaggery
and coconut tomorrow. The child has been asking for sweets for so many days now. I will
prepare some nice stuff for her.” “The swine has cheated me! He promised me a rupee,”
said the astrologer. She looked up at him. “You look worried. What is wrong?”

“Nothing.”

After dinner, sitting on the pyol, he told her, “Do you know a great load is gone from me
today? I thought I had the blood of a man on my hands all these years. That was the reason
why I ran away from home, settled here, and married you. He is alive.”

She gasped. “You tried to kill!”

“Yes, in our village, when I was a silly youngster. We drank, gambled, and quarreled badly
one day—why think of it now? Time to sleep,” he said, yawning, and stretched himself on the
pyol.
The Easter Hat

by Nancy Chong

I went to Sunday school with my sisters and brothers at the Chinese United Church on
Chestnut Street until, at the age of ten, I refused to go. For years, Sundays meant Sunday
school and cold wet laundry. Mr Lee, the minister, drove us to church every Sunday in his
station wagon. My mother stayed home to do the weekly wash in a wringer washer that she
dragged over to the sink in the kitchen. She attended church services infrequently except for
special occasions like Christmas and Easter.
My sister E and I sang in the church choir after Sunday school finished. The choir practised
the hymns before the service started and had cake and cookies after the church service
finished.
E and I usually came home to find baskets of cold wet laundry, squeezed flat by the rollers of
the wringer washer, waiting for us to hang out on the clotheslines stretched across the
backyard. In the winter, we hung the laundry on clotheslines stretched across the kitchen
and in the cold, dark cellar.
Palm Sunday signalled the coming of Easter. On Palm Sunday the older kids at Sunday
school got long stalks of dry, yellow grass to take home. I knew that the following Sunday we
would each get an Easter basket with chocolate and candy eggs tucked into a nest of
crumpled strips of green paper.
Palm Sunday also signalled my mother’s annual shopping trip to Eaton’s for an Easter hat. I
went on one of those shopping trips with her. We took the streetcar on Queen Street from
Spadina to the Eaton’s store across from the City Hall at Queen and Bay. My mother usually
shopped at the cheaper Eaton’s Annex on Albert Street, but this time we went through the
wood-and-glass revolving doors into the main store on Queen Street.
I walked through the store aisles with my mother, staring at the dark wood-and-glass display
cases filled with gloves, scarves, stockings, perfumes. I looked up and saw a single plaster
leg wearing a nylon stocking. The leg stood by itself on top of a display case. Hands wearing
white gloves reached up from the top of another display case.
We stopped in front of the wood-and-glass case displaying rows of hats, clusters of flowers,
yellow, pink and white, surrounded by lace. My mother pointed at a pink hat.
‘Do you want to see that?” asked a saleswoman.
‘How much?’ my mother asked. She fingered the lace flowers on the pink hat.
‘Do you want to try it on?’ The saleswoman smiled and held out the hat. She turned the
mirror to face my mother. My mother picked up the hat and placed it gently on top of her
head. The saleswoman leaned over and carefully stuck a pearl-tipped hatpin into the hat,
securing the cluster of lace flowers to my mother’s hair. My mother turned her head from
side to side, looking in the mirror to check her profile.
‘Too much money,’ my mother said to the saleswoman. My mother waited for a reply. The
saleswoman shook her head.
‘Five dollar off?’ my mother asked. The saleswoman held out her hands for the hat.
‘I’m afraid I can’t do that.’ The saleswoman frowned.
‘Two dollar off?’ my mother asked again. The saleswoman opened the wood-and-glass case
to return the hat to the display. ‘How much?’ My mother sighed as she opened her purse.
She counted out her money. The saleswoman took the pink hat and wrapped it in layers of
tissue and carefully placed it in an Eaton’s hat box. She covered the hat with more tissue
and then dropped the lid on the hat box. Lifting the hat box by the carrying strap, the
saleswoman handed it to my mother. My mother took the hat box, conscious of its fine
contents.
At home, my mother put the Eaton’s hat box away. She placed it carefully on the mantel over
the cemented-in fireplace in her bedroom. When she wasn’t looking, I crept into the bedroom
to look at the hat. I climbed up on a chair and lifted the lid on the hat box. I pushed aside
layers of tissue to reveal the precious hat. In the darkness of the room, the hat seemed even
more delicate. I put the hat back into the box, careful not to make too much noise with the
crinkling tissue.
My mother took the hat out of the hat box on Easter Sunday, unpacking it from the layers of
tissue. She put the hat on her head, securing it with the pearl-tipped hatpin, just as the
saleswoman at Eaton’s had. She attended Easter services at the Chinese United Church
with the Easter hat from Eaton’s on her head. She sat in the church pew among rows of
many more fine Easter hats.
After my mother got home from church, she returned the hat to the Eaton’s hat box. she
replaced the layers of tissue and dropped the lid into place. Lifting the hat box by the
carrying strap, she put it back on the mantel over the fireplace in her bedroom.
The next shopping day, my mother dressed to go out. She took the Eaton’s hat box down
from the mantel and checked her purse for the sales slip. She picked up the hat box by the
carrying strap along with her purse.
My mother went back to the Eaton’s store on Queen Street. Eaton’s guaranteed ‘Goods
Satisfactory Or Money Refunded’ on purchases returned with a sales slip within seven days.
My mother returned the hat and got her money back, just as she did every Easter.
Kill to Eat

by Oodgeroo Nunukul

My father worked for the Government, as ganger of an Aboriginal workforce which helped to
build roads, load and unload the supply ships, and carry out all the menial tasks around the
island. For this work he received a small wage and rations to feed his seven children. (I was
the third-eldest daughter.) We hated the white man’s rations – besides, they were so meagre
that even a bandicoot would have had difficulty in existing on them. They used to include
meat, rice, sago, tapioca, and on special occasions, such as the Queen’s Birthday festival,
one plum pudding.

Of course, we never depended upon the rations to keep ourselves alive. Dad taught us how
to catch our food Aboriginal-style, using discarded materials from the white man’s rubbish
dumps. We each had our own sling-shots to bring down the blueys and greenies – the
parrots and lorikeets that haunted the flowering gums. And he showed us how to make
bandicoot traps; a wooden box, a bit of wire, a lever on top and a piece of burnt toast were
all that was needed. Bandicoots cannot resist burnt toast. We would set our traps at dusk,
and always next day there was a trapped bandicoot to take proudly home for mother to
roast. Dad also showed us how to flatten a square piece of tin and sharpen it. This was very
valuable for slicing through the shallow waters; many a mullet met its doom from the
accurate aim of one of my brothers wielding the sharpened tin. Dad made long iron crab
hooks, too, and we each had a hand fishing-line of our own.

One rule he told us we must strictly obey. when we went hunting, we must understand that
our weapons were to be used only for the gathering of food. We must never use them for the
sake of killing. This is in fact one of the strictest laws of the Aborigine, and no excuse is
accepted for abusing it.

One day we five older children two boys and three girls, decided to follow the noise of the
blueys and greenies screeching from the flowering gums. We armed ourselves with our
sling-shots and made our way towards the trees.

My sisters and I always shot at our quarry from the ground. The boys would climb on to the
branches of the gum-trees, stand quite still, and pick out the choicest and healthiest birds in
the flock. My elder brother was by far the best shot of all of us. He was always boasting
about it, too. But never in front of our mother and father, because he would have been
punished for his vanity. He only boasted in front of us, knowing that we wouldn’t complain
about him to our parents.

The boys ordered us to take up our positions under the trees as quietly as possible. ‘Don’t
make so much noise!’ they told us. In spite of the disgust we felt for our boastful brother, we
always let him start the shooting. He was a dead shot, and we all knew it. Now we watched
as he drew a bead on the large bluey straight across from him. The bird seemed intent on its
honey-gathering from the gum-tree. We held our breath and our brother fired.

Suddenly there was a screeching from the birds and away they flew, leaving my brother as
astonished as we were ourselves. He had been so close to his victim that it seemed
impossible he should have missed… but he had. We looked at him, and his face of blank
disbelief was just too much for us. We roared with laughter. My other brother jumped to the
ground and rolled over and over, laughing his head off. But the more we laughed, the angrier
my elder brother became.
Then, seeming to join in the fun, a kookaburra in a nearby tree started his raucous chuckle,
which rose to full pitch just as though he, too, saw the joke.

In anger my elder brother brought up his sling-shot and fired blindly at the sound. ‘Laugh at
me, would you!’ he called out. He hadn’t even taken time to aim.

Our laughter was cut short by the fall of the kookaburra to the ground. My brother, horrified,
his anger gone, climbed down and we gathered silently around the stricken bird. That wild
aim had broken the bird’s wing beyond repair. We looked at each other in frightened silence,
knowing full well what we had done. We had broken that strict rule of the Aboriginal law. We
had killed for the sake of killing – and we had destroyed a bird we were forbidden to destroy.
The Aborigine does not eat the kookaburra. His merry laughter is allowed to go unchecked,
for he brings happiness to the tribes. We call him our brother and friennd.

We did not see our father coming towards us. He must have been looking for firewood. when
he came upon us, we parted to allow him to see what had happened. He checked his anger
by remaining silent and picking up a fallen branch. Mercifully he put the stricken bird out of
its misery. Then he ordered us home.

On the way back we talked with awesome foreboding of the punishment we knew would
come. I wished our father would beat us, but we all knew it would not be a quick punishment.
Besides, Dad never beat us. No, we knew the punishment would be carefully weighed to fit
the crime. When we got home, our mother was told to give us our meal. Nothing was said of
the dead kookaburra, but we knew Dad would broach the subject after we had eaten. None
of us felt hungry, and our mother only played wuth her food. We knew that Dad had decided
upon the punishment, and that Mother had agreed to it, even if she felt unhappy about it.

It was our mother who ordered us to bring into the backyard our bandicoot traps, our sling-
shots, and every other weapon we had. We had to place them in a heap in the yard, while
our father carefully checked every item. Our big black dog stood with us. He always did that
when there was trouble in the family. Although he could not possibly understand the ways of
human beings, he could nevertheless interpret an atmosphere of trouble when it came.

Father spoke for the first time since we had killed the kookaburra. He asked for no excuses
for what we had done, and we did not offer any. We must all take the blame. That is the way
of the Aborigine. Since we had killed for the sake of killing, the punishment was that for three
months we should not hunt or use our weapons. For three months we would eat only the
white man’s rations.

During those three months our stomachs growled, and our puzzled dog would question with
his eyes and wagging tail why we sat around wasting our time when there was hunting to be
done.

It happened a long time ago. Yet in my dreams, the sad, suffering eyes of the kookaburra,
our brother and friend, still haunt me.