Into that frozen silence entered Mei Hang’s mother, her eyes reddened with worry and sleeplessness.

‘Come to Liang’s room.’

A crowd stood waiting outside Yiu Yi’s room. Sounds of crying were coming from the room.

In Liang’s dormitory, Hong was seated on a charpoy in his old clothes. Mei Hang sat beside him in the same old cloth. The same faded look.

The elderly people sat around the couple, while Liang, Akong, Yao Sen, Lee Chang, Aman, Tung Chin, Ameng and Chun Fu Thien stood around. In the midst of the prevailing despair, Hong and Mei Hang were married. Each of the guests picked up a bit of fried flour mixed with sugar and biscuit as Hong and Mei Hang rose from their seats to kneel before Hong’s parents and offer them tea. Next came Mei Hang’s parents.

‘She is our eldest daughter. We had dreams of a grand marriage. We could not fulfil them. We are going far away. Don’t know whether we will be able to see you again. Take care of her, Hong.’ Mei Hang’s father said slowly.

Mei Hang embraced her mother.

By this time the wing commander had arrived.

‘Let us go to Yiu Yi,’ Siu said.

Yiu Yi’s family was praying at her grave. Siu and the others knelt beside them. They lit incense and prayed together.

They then began to form a line in the open space between the two blocks with their baggage.

‘Come on, get moving,’ the deputy commander began shouting. Mei Lin and her companions arrived with their baggage to join the line.

Once again, the armed guards and the buses. Once again, the train. This time the mob was absent. So was the half-cooked khichdi. The Sino-Indian war had become an old topic now. It had been replaced by new events.

After travelling for a few days, they reached Madras; it was afternoon. At a hotel near the port, people from various places had been waiting anxiously for their relatives from the camp. These people were not being chased out by the Indian government. They had come here willingly, to accompany their spouses and families to China. They were women from different Indian communities with different surnames.

Outside the hotel stood a crowd of curious people – apart from the locals, people of Chinese origin were also present, each one carrying bundles of different items like food and clothes. They had come from Assam and West Bengal to see off their relatives. Rope barricades had been put up on both sides of the road. Armed police and army men surrounded the hotel. Standing outside the barricade, people were looking at the gloomy and frazzled faces getting off from the buses with curiosity as well as sorrow and helplessness.

As soon as the convoy of buses arrived, the people waiting inside the hotel came running out. Immediately, they were pushed back by the armed guards.