ROSA LUXUMBURG Str By Rajes Bala


Berlin 1991.
The child seems to be fast asleep. She has gone to sleep without drinking her milk properly. If you wake her up again and start feeding her milk, it would be late for work. The German boss wouldn’t like her going to work late.

If you leave work, the family won’t be able to bear it. Sumathy slowly removed the child from her breast. The child made sucking noises as if sucking the breast, and then went to sleep.

Now, the child would sleep for two to three hours, without getting up.

How peacefully the child of three months sleeps, without knowing any of the world’s woes?

Would I have been also like this?

When all three children were born girls, the mother was on the verge of death, it is said. The grandmother put the blame for this on Sumathy.

Without realising that the grandmother had cursed her, saying “the wretched one that, at its birth itself, has come to tear her mothers life away”, she herself might have been sucking her mother’s breasts at one time.

The elder girl Selvi was sleeping in the next bed peacefully. What sense of responsibility even at the age of ten!

Sumathy had prayed that there should be no child after Selvi. But, now, this child has been born.

When she was bearing the child, the way her mother-in-law looked at her?

“Do you want to spurt out another female child”?

The mother-in-law asked, without any mercy. Sumathy didn’t reply. If she started to answer all her mother-in-law’s questions, her brains would get upset.

In a bed in one corner of the room, the regular snoring of her husband could be heard.

Along with the snoring, the alcoholic odour also strikes at one’s nose.

Sumathy rose with a sigh.

She stepped slowly towards the bathroom. On the way, she looked out the window.

The world was sleeping very, very quietly. There were no stars in the sky. The sky, laden with dark clouds, could bring down rain at any moment.

In the distance, a plane was passing above, winking its eyes at the dark clouds.

Sumathy closed the window curtains, and then leaned on the wall for a moment. It was one o’clock in the morning. It is now she is getting ready to leave for work. Even back in her own village, she doesn’t know of anyone getting up before five o’clock in the morning to water the crops.

This is Berlin. West Berlin. The country where thousands of Sri Lanken refugees have arrived as refugees. If you didn’t work day and night, the family couldn’t run smoothly! If you looked to dignity, what would the mouth and the stomach do?

Among the Tamils who have come abroad, there are lots of grandmasters, thinkers, knowledgeable persons, and artists. But, that they would get jobs commensurate with their education, talent and skill, would only be a wild dream.

Any talent or skill of the third world people would not be taken for much, in the face of the deep-rooted racist policy of the western world. In their view, foreigners are those without brains, who have come to earn a living by doing menial work. It was a compulsion for one to earn a living by doing some work or other.

Sumathy had not studies beyond ‘A’ level in Sri Lanka. But, she was much more of a rationalist than her degree educated elder sisters. She realised life’s needs. She didn’t hesitate to work for a living. When she thought like this, Sumathy felt pity for herself. The look she had cast on the window went beyond the darkness in the outside world, and drew her thoughts to a village back in Sri Lanka.

The blue sky, the green meadow, the gentle wind, and the sound of the temple’s bell, all came surging back to her mind.

Would she have thought, twelve years back, that one day in the city of Berlin, she would get up at one o’clock in the night, and go delivering papers from house to house? Among the jobs you could get in Berlin, there is only the work in restaurants or cleaning work, or delivering either advertisements of big companies, or newspapers of big newspaper companies to houses. If the Tamils were attacked and evacuated, the Berlin city would stand still, and would stink. She heaved a sigh. When she drew her hair back to wash her face, a painful smile slid across her face, and passed away. For whose looks is she combing her hair? At this time of the night it was rare to see even one or two persons in the street. Even then, Sumathy finished combing her hair. It was very cold outside. She dressed accordingly. She was reminded of how back in her village, during the cold December, the ‘Thrumvembavai’ devotional songs would pierce the early morning silence and fall on one’s ears.

When she was going to take a second look at her children before closing he door, her eyes fell on her husband. Without even knowing that the sarong he was wearing had given way, Shanmuganathan was sleeping in drunken stupor. He was lying there without a care for the world. The spittle from his mouth has wetted the pillow. His snoring was annoying.

The alcoholic odour filled the room.

She felt like hiding her face in her hands, and crying.

Didn’t she come running to this city, even without caring about her two elder sisters, trusting only him?

Who made him into this? There was a difference of twelve years between him and her.

He was a class-mate of her eldest sister. She knew him from the time of her sister invite him to their house. He was handsome, educated and writes poems. She fell in love with him

What comfort has Sumathy found, eloping with him? She closed the door slowly.

The mother-in-law was sleeping in the front room. If she got up accidentally, seeing the tears in her eyes, she would scold her. She would start bellowing out,” Wretch! Have you started your moaning early in the morning”?

Sumathy pushed her cycle. She came down the steps in a hurry. Sumathy’s family was on the third floor. Furriness sounded in her steps down the street. Her mother-in-law didn’t like her. Would there be any justice holding in this world if one woman can scorn another woman like this? Sumathy was thinking on her way down.

You have to go up and down so many stairs like this, to deliver the papers.

First, you have to go and take a heavy bundle of papers. Then, by the time you deliver all these house by house, it would be past four o’clock early in the morning.

Most of the Germans would be sleeping. Before the 80’s, if she came across some German in the street, she would wish them good morning. Nowadays, they look down on foreigners. They indulge in malicious propaganda, saying that those refugees spread infectious diseases, and commit robberies and murders. When they see foreigners, they spit, and swear at them in filthy words.

Sumathy reached the street. In this street, how many Jews would the Germans have killed. The name of this street is Rosa Luxumburg. It is a big building on this street, her family residence.

This place was a few miles away from the Brandenburg Gate that linked East and West Berlin.

She got up on the cycle. Someone at a distance was wobbling along in a drunken state, uttering obscene words.

Before East Germany and West Germany were united, it was rare to hear such obscenity. Now, the East Germans who have all these years lived under communism, and had believed that after reunification their lives would be richer and bountiful, were walking the streets; poor and forlorn. Their anger and jealousy is vent upon those foreigners who have houses, and wealth. This has led even to murder.

The German racists, making use of the frustrated anger of the East Germans, have been indulging in racial killings of foreigners. Four Turkish women were burnt alive in a closed room. The generation that killed millions of Jews still appears to be in existence in Germany.

Her husband, who had escaped from being poured petrol and burnt alive by Sinhalese thugs, in the middle of the road, in 1983, having later fled here to Germany, has to live in fear all the time. Though she felt angry when she thought of her husband, it was really pity that she felt for him, for the greater part. He studied with her elder sister at the Sri Lankan University. Then, after finishing his studies, he was working in Colombo. In the early ‘80s, the Sri Lankan Government had unleashed a reign of terror throughout the country. In Colombo, though, it was not felt so much and he used to come to his village from Colombo frequently.

But, all this changed, when in 1983, thirteen Sri Lankan soldiers were killed in Jaffna.

The extremely violent repercussion from that incident shocked the whole world. Can such atrocities be possible against a minority? To suffer such ferocious violence, and face a dangerous situation like this, what did the Tamils do to the majority Sinhalese? The whole civilised world hung its head in shame at this blatant genocide. The Sinhalese racism hunted down the minorities. People like Shanmuganathan vowed not to step into Colombo ever again, and left abroad…. Sumathy went ahead in the darkness, with thoughts running in her mind.

Sumathy’s eyes hovered over the old woman’s house round the corner. The woman living in that house is now seventy. This Jewish woman, Isabel Goldberger, had lost her whole family in the Auschwitz torture camp set up to destroy the Jews. On her hands was branded identity number by the Germans, just like animals were branded. The Americans and the British who overcame the Germans were able to save some Jews. Among those saved was a young woman, Isabel Goldberger. She went to America as a destitute, having lost all her family. That old woman is now living in this house, because she had retuned from her life in America, wishing to die in the country of her birth. She would herself die in the country where her forefathers had lived, and died!

Shanmuganathan and the old lady were very good friends. Both of them had directly experienced racism. They would spend hours conversing in English. They would express the opinion that everybody should join hands to fight against racism.

Sumathy turned the corner of the street. Most of the time, there would be light burning in the old lady’s hall. It would be slightly visible that she was reading something.

What sleep at seventy years? Instead of tossing around in the bed with the mind going over incidents in youth, some book or other is better, the old woman would say.

Would I also go back to the country of my birth, one day? Chasing over the memories of free days, would I be appreciating the ‘Thruvembavai songs’? Sumathy’s mind is disturbed. It was rare for Tamil girls in Germany to so about like ghosts at two o-clock in the morning. One or two women like Sumathy are doing this work because of their family burden.

There was another cycle going in the distance. That must be Tharshini. Poor woman, after having separated from her drunken husband, being tired of his beatings, she is now living with her four children. There were plenty of workers who had malicious thoughts, regarding her loneliness. Those ‘chaste’ Tamil men who consider a woman separated from her husband as a call girl, look at Tamil women like Tharshini as dogs looking at bones.

Tharshini would say “Such type of Tamilian is not going to reform, even if he goes to every corner of the world. If a woman is living alone, they try to bed her, but refuse to feel any sympathy for her? Sumathy could understand the pain in Tharshini’s mind.

Even the well educated Shanmuganathan didn’t like her going out to work! He would blurt out a lot of things in a drunken state. Then, when the effects of the drink had subsided, he would embrace her and weep on her shoulder saying ‘please forgive me’. As both had loved and married, and they have got used to forget and forgive. She hated the situation in which a husband had to be thought of as a useless person.

In the distance could be seen a brothel. It was full of foreign girls. They sell their bodies to the white skinned. These wretched, rich western countries are turning the third world people into beggars and prostitutes. Coming over here from Sri Lanka seems like fleeing from the frying pan into the fire.

Sumathy cycled at a high speed. “Hey…. Hey… why are you running”. A white shouted out in drunkenness. He spoke English. He couldn’t be a German. He must be either an American or an Englishman. The unemployment situation in England had made the high-handed Englishman to work in Germany.

Asking her “what is the hurry”, that fellow blocked her cycle. She felt both angry and sad. One or two prostitutes at the entrance of the brothel with their painted faces, and with most of their breasts bared, involved in petting with their customers, didn’t pay any heed to either the shouting of the Englishman or the ‘Indian’ woman who went along scolding him.

Sumathy was now actually crying. She felt angry at the world. She felt angry with people unknown.

The Sinhalese racism that has made them migrants, the Tamil communism that provoked it, the cultural invasion that surrounded the Tamil woman who was sacrificed at the alter of marriage – Sumathy was perplexed. She pedalled her cycle fast. You could see the paper shop. Home to take the papers.

Tharshini was getting ready to leave. Poor Tharshini. She is having a difficult time with her four children. The children were aware of their mother’s hard work…. The eldest girl had won a first prize in her class. Sumathy used to cry into Tharshini “our times have been destroyed. Let us, at least, make honourable women and men out of our children “ Both women would say so frequently. Sumathy continued ….

“Hello”. She didn’t notice him turning around the corner. He was also a Tamilian who delivered papers in the night. He is into politics, and attends political meetings. But, when he sees busy women like Sumathy, he doesn’t hesitate to be eloquent. Why is that when good men achieve some status through politics, they try to treat women as if they are mere paper and pencils? That was a question that Sumathy couldn’t find any answer to.

His name was Nagarajah. He smiled at her. “Snakes would slide and slither” – she murmured in her mind. “Why are you always running so fast all the time?” Are some men snakes with moustache and beard? She was in a hurry to go. The world was fast asleep. The time was past three o’clock. In a short while, the child would wake up. Now …, her breasts were swelling with the heaviness of the milk in them. She began to push her cycle.

“There is a meeting on Saturday. Try to come, bringing Shanmuganathan also”. He grinned. Sumathy knew that he would be blabbering if she entered into a conversation with him. “I’ll tell him”, she said, without looking at him. She hurried away. Tamil, meeting…. what nonsense! Big story of tradition… about with Tholkappigar and Thiruvalluvar in their pockets. Some cranks trying to dupe the people with ancient lores. The golden Sangam period, the Tamilian who hoisted the flag on the mountain… – in these stories are the feverish mumblings of a sick man. While they talk like this, it is we that have to toil hard. Sumathy hurried on in anger. She could hear a train passing in the distance. And, a plane was flying over her head.

Sumathy never liked this country. The minute she dismounted from the plane, she felt as if entering into darkness. These Germans have talked millions of Jews. Has the wailing of those Jews frozen into silence? Is the blood that flowed still sticking onto their legs? Are the spirits of those Jews whispering along with the gentle early morning wind?

Her body shivered. She never liked the Germans, Shanmuganathan told her, “Rosa Luxumburg is supposed to have said in the same way as you have.”

“Who is that Rosa Luxemburg?” she asked her husband naively. Sumathy knew how to look after her family properly. But, she was a zero in world politics.

“You should know how the street we live on got its name”. Shanmuganathan was clever in studying world politics.

It was when she asked him a question innocently at the age of eighteen when she first met him.

He would come to her home now and then, as one who was known to her elder sister. She was a small girl then. Shanmuganathan used to play with her pony-tail. After the ’83 riots, he had come and settled down in the village.

Then, he started frequenting her home. She would be asking him lots of questions. Her liveliness, the questions showing in her eyes, these were to his liking.

Shanmuganathan’s mother had two sons. Both were in good jobs. But, after the riots, one went over to Canada. The mother was thinking of sending the other one to Germany.

“I want to marry Sumathy” When he told this, the mother couldn’t believe it. How could he say this, with two younger sisters waiting for marriage?

“I am now thirty years old”. Feeling the baldness starting in the front of his head with his hand, the son murmured.

“How could you marry Sumathy? There are two elder sisters to her”. The mother tormented with a laugh.

“Shanmuganathan didn’t reply to his mother. When he came to Colombo, he asked Sumathy, “Would you come with me?”

Eldest sister was of his age. At thirty, she is still waiting for the ‘right bridegroom’. The other elder sister has told that that she would marry no one else other than an engineer or doctor.

Sumathy was clever. She reminded herself of the saying that ‘it is better to marry a person who loves you rather than one whom you love”.

She didn’t want to stage a drama by informing her parents. So, she ran away. Even before tying the nuptial knot of ‘Thai’, she had become ‘his’. Instead of becoming a victim of racism in Sri Lanka, she eloped with the man of her liking. The world was shocked. The village mocked. The parents hung their heads in shame. The elder sisters have not been on speaking terms with her. The comfort of the embrace of the one with whom she had come in trust, clouded the disgrace of her family. Germany, racism, the cold, the loneliness, and these painful burdens were like dust, in the love of Shanmuganathan.

“Rose Luxumburg is a woman born in Poland, but had run away to Switzerland for political reasons, and then later to Germany. You also have run away and come here for political reasons. Rosa was a progressive. I like you also to be a progressive type of woman”. Shanmuganathan was a good man. One who said like this, how he had changed now.

Until the mother-in-law and the daughters arrived in Germany, Sumathy and Shanmuganathan were quite happy. Though they were afraid of the racist cruelties in Germany, they were happy and united as husband and wife. She felt sympathy for her husband. How hard he had worked to bring down his mother and sisters to Germany. Even Sumathy had to toil had. It took all they could by the time they could bargain and arrange bridegrooms for the sisters.

One of them is in Canada. One is in Norway. The mother in law doesn’t want to go to her daughters. She wants to live at her son’s home. Shanmuganathan couldn’t say anything.

Sumathy received her mother in law with love. But, the mother-in-law was angry with her. In the son’s absence, she would directly rip apart Sumathy with words accusing her of ensnaring her son at the age of eighteen.

Sumathy’s complaints, mother’s nagging, the hard work he does going out – after all, Shanmuganathan was also a human being. What he had started as a small drink, has now unbalanced him. He had lost his job also, due to his drinking. He would heave a huge sigh saying , “would peace come to the Tamils in Sri Lanka? When shall we return home?”

Sumathy is going towards the house. Rosa Luxemburg Street could be seen in the distance. The Germany government is believed to have killed Rosa and her lover Jokishe as revolutionaries. During the Second World War, Germany had killed six million Jews.

Rosa Luxumburg was a woman who had fought against capitilisism, it seems. Shanmuganathan said – without any talk of progressiveness, millions of Jews have become victims of racism. Sumathy didn’t know anything about capitalism, and communism. For her, it was her family that was the political forum. The mother-in- law was a tormentor, the husband a good for nothing, the children looking towards a fortune at their mother’s mercy. As Sumathy was turning the corner, somewhere could be heard a clock striking five o’clock. Back in the village, one could here the temple’s bell at this time. At the turn of the street, there was no light in the Jewish old lady’s house. She must be asleep now.

Unable to bear their heaviness, Sumathy’s breasts started to ooze with milk. Rosa died fighting against the world’s cruelties. Sumathy might die young toiling for her family. Who could prevent death?

“I will toil for my family, my husband, and my children until I die”. She vowed standing in the Rosa Luxumburg Street that was sleeping. It was the vow of a pitiful femininity.

Now, Shanmuganathan might be awake. She is busy the whole daytime. She couldn’t speak much with her husband or mother-in-law. In the evenings, it was studies with the children, cooking, or this and that, several things to do.

Now, the child would be crying.

Putting the cycle away to a side, she hurried into the room. The child has started to cry. While the child suckled her breast in front, and the husband embraced from behind. Sumathy fell asleep.

(ENDS)