‘We were born here. Even then we don’t have citizenship,’ Akong said. ‘We don’t know under what terms we are here. Papa has some old papers that the tea garden manager gave him. We have some papers as well. Papa used to go to the Foreigner’s Registration Office earlier. He doesn’t anymore. No one has asked anything regarding this. No police enquiries, no difficulties, nothing,’ said Akong.

‘You better apply for citizenship. You might get into trouble later.’

‘What trouble? We have married local girls. We came here years before the World War. We never went to China after that. We have almost forgotten about China,’ Akong’s father said.

‘Why didn’t you ever go back?’ Narayan asked.

‘You need money to go! We were very poor. My brother-in-law came to work here in the tea gardens. My sister had followed. And one day, I came as well. What could we have done staying in China? There was no work. There was no food. Only violence and bloodshed. It was much better here. Even though the freedom struggle was going on here, people had enough to eat.’

‘And then what happened?’ asked Pulok.

‘I came and stayed with my brother-in-law near Pabhoi tea garden in Tezpur. I searched for jobs, but was unable to get any. They didn’t want Chinese labourers. They wanted carpenters. I didn’t know much carpentry then. Besides, I was young. Who would want to employ me? My brother-in-law worked as a carpenter under a contractor for a pittance. With eight children of their own, they hardly had enough food. How could they feed another mouth? In spite of his hurtful abuses, I had to keep quiet. I had nowhere to go. My elder brother worked as a labourer under the contractor. He used to contribute a few bucks as well. Even then, my brother-in-law abused him. My brother finally became an opium addict and died. I realized that if I stayed there for very long I too would die. My sister also pleaded with me to leave. I came to Silghat. It was very difficult to survive. I suffered a lot. One day I came to Makum with a contractor. I was married and had two children at the time.’

‘The old man then had a long pigtail,’ the mother said with a chuckle.

‘Not pigtail! Plaits,’ said the younger son.

‘It’s the same thing. My friends used to tease me, “Hey Sukmati, you married a girl or a boy?”’

The room was filled with laughter.

‘Tell us about yourself, aunty,’ Rameswar said.