Tsering Norbu Prof.

David Bain ENAM170 A

Autumn Kites

It is the time to fly kites in the mellow autumn of Benares. Flying kites

used to be one of my favorite things to do. I could stare at that piece of

paper and split bamboo contraption for hours, guiding it nowhere in the

sky until I could not separate it from the purple and bluish haze of the

dusk. The haze could engulf any color, so you did not see the kites. After

a few hours I used to return into the warmth and light of home. Ama would

shout at me for staying out late and we would have dinner at the table. We

used to have dinner in silence like we did at every meal. Pala would tell

her how good the food tasted and, it was always true.

I always had a thing for kites. I could just fly one for hours.

Tugging at the string and guiding it nowhere in the wide open sky. Looking

back at it, I think maybe I liked it because you just looked at the kite

and thought about it. Nothing else mattered. You noticed the kite for what

it was. The kite flew and when it vanished in the haze of the dusk, the

only thing to remind you of its distant existence was the tug of the

string against the wind. You tried to guide the kite in new directions.

Into the safer patches of the sky where the wind was not too strong and

where your kite did not spin out of control. I faintly remember the

shimmering sound of the foliage in the wind and that warm and earthy smell

of roasting peanuts. Time used to just glide by because you had all the

time in the world.

The blue smoke rising from behind the walls that surrounded our

university campus meant it was time to go home.

Tsering Norbu Prof. David Bain ENAM170 A

The first time I learnt to fly kites, autumn was setting in when the

leaves were making a shimmering sound in the wind. I was with my friend

Kalsang and we were thought to be too young to fly kites. We were really

close, partly because we grew up together and partly because we were the

only ones around. We were both born in 1986, went to the same school and

were classmates. Our fathers worked for the university; it was a small one

where everybody knew us. He was quiet while I was mischievous. But

everybody loved us.

I always got us into trouble - breaking windows while playing

cricket or getting into fights at school. I used to steal lunch from my

classmates. And all the Indian kids in our grade were scared of us because

they thought we were Chinese and knew karate.

It was a Sunday and like every Sunday I was let out by my mother at

ten in the morning only after Kalsang came to request her to let us play.

Somehow my mother was quite strict about letting me go outside. Now I

realize that it was because we always returned very dirty, and in the days

before washing machines, my mother did all the laundry by hand. I always

promised that I would return back in good condition. Kalsang also promised

that he will keep a watch over me.

That Sunday we wanted to fly a kite after eating some slightly

unripe guavas we got off the neighbor’s backyard by throwing stones at

them. You never wanted to eat the ripe ones because they were too sweet

and their insides had a thick yogurt-like consistency. The slightly unripe

ones were a bit sour but gave a sweet-leafy, light after-taste. Plus they

were juicy.
Tsering Norbu Prof. David Bain ENAM170 A

We did not have a kite and could not buy them in our neighborhood

because the season had not started yet. So we went up to an elderly

Tibetan monk who was a professor at the university; his apartment was on

the same floor as Kalsang’s. We never called him by his name because he

did not mind being called by his nickname; Abo Lulu – The Goofy Guy. I

still remember him in his orange robes. He wore wooden sandals and big,

brown horn-rimmed glasses that covered a third of his face. He knew how to

make kites. After welcoming us, he gave us some candy and listened

seriously to our problems.

Abo Lulu, can you make us a patang? Kuchi, kuchi - please make us a

kite. Our parents will not say anything. They don’t think we are

disturbing you. Please.

We got some old newspapers and some sticks of palm leaf broom; he

had some rice-glue, and I managed to get a reel of string from my mother.

Even though I don’t remember how he made it, I remember kneeling around

the kite and watching him make it.

In that early autumn sky the newspaper-kite was trying to fly. We

were taking turns at running the kite into the wind, our heads turned

around watching the kite soar and then slump down, again and again, into

the grass. Now it seems that it was the excitement for flying a kite the

first time that kept us running well into the afternoon.

Eventually the kite did fly. The newspaper-kite flew high up above

everything else. Bobbing up and down, as if it was riding waves of winds.

Winds that took it everywhere in the sky. The tail always knew the

direction of the wind. Following the wind kept us high; up there. We kept

staring at it for a long time.

Tsering Norbu Prof. David Bain ENAM170 A

Tsering! Kalsang! Come home now!

Taking turns at guiding the kite, each of us did what we wanted to

do. Go against the wind, take it high, go with the wind, then bring it

down low. We did all sorts of things, but making the kite go round and

round was one of the hardest things to master. Useful to bring down other

kites; this requires the ability to feel where your kite is going and how

it plays to the wind. The string tells you everything and only the gurus

at flying feel the secrets of the string.

One such guru was Raju. He was our hero and our teacher, a tall and

thin Indian kid who was much older. His father worked at the university as

a janitor and had twelve kids. Being poor, Raju had rarely any money for

kites, so he was happy to teach us how to fly. He could fly a kite without

any wind; his moving hands pulled at the string, and stopped. After giving

it some slack, he pulled it back again. Watching the guru at work, playing

with the kite and disregarding the dictates of the wind, inspired us to be

like him.

Our parents were not very happy with us learning from him.

Be careful when you are near him.

Tsering, don’t let him fly your kite all the time.

You should not play with those kids.

But he was the guru and we, his pupils. We had to learn how to fly a kite.

The reel of strings especially made for flying kites is called a

Paraetaa, on which you reeled in your dori. The triangular hold that you

gave the kites is called a kanni. The fate of your kite depended on how
Tsering Norbu Prof. David Bain ENAM170 A

well the kanni was done. You had to bend the spine of the kite towards the

wind facing side – almost like a sail in reverse, so the kite glides over

the wind.

There were kite-poems that you would say to tease a girl.

Patang bahut duur hai, The kite is very far away,

magar dori mere paas hai. But the string is with me.

Ladki bahut duur hai, The girl is very far away,

lekin, dil mere paas hai. But her heart is with me.

We were the Masters of the skies and winds, Champions of the strings and

the Lords of the Kites that fly against the winds.

But things move on.

You think of going back to the same old places and do the same old things

with your same old friends, but somewhere there is a fear that it might

not be the same. It feels like looking at yourself in a picture; you are

there but in a distant detached way. Nothing has changed and yet it does

not feel like what it used to be.

Gradually with time you start to go against the dictates of the wind

just like the gurus. But you never quite make it because only they know

the secret of the strings. I don’t know what has happened to Raju. Maybe

he has become a janitor like his father, but he must be still teaching

kids how to fly.

I have not flown kites in a long time now and have not seen Kalsang

in six years. He is going to college in India and I in Vermont. The skies

Tsering Norbu Prof. David Bain ENAM170 A

here are clear in the fall but there are no kites. The winds here change

all the time, bringing down with them the yellowed leaves and flowers of

the summer, to be buried in the winter’s cold.