thar

What I imagine about their lives: moustache oil, camel rearing tricks, rupees, dhal, chapatis, old mattresses, wives, sun, sand, shrub, dunes, folk songs, village friends, tobacco

And now, strangely or not, their photos are on the internet, a medium they may not have seen or understand.

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Umed always said 'Velcome, Velcome' in a singsong way after we said thank yous for the meals they made from scratch. And Babu would say in jest, in response to thank you, 'Yes, thank you sir, thank you madam, thank you, thank you.' I tried watching them cook but they seemed to want to be alone, speaking in their dialect. Maybe they were catching up with one another; we were the first customers of the season. And we slept by ourselves on one part of the sand dunes while they slept somewhere near; we spoke about country-boys/city-boys and heard them talk very late into the night. I wonder what they were talking about for hours. And we were all under a big salty blanket of stars. They were 27 and 29 but looked 40, with weathered dark faces, deep rugged lines (the kind that run in some of the older men on my paternal side. it is most enchanting, like rough leather), old twinkling eyes, flower earrings, curly moustaches.

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So happy and sorrowful.