Untold Story

“It is an untold story. Lines of women, veils pulled over their heads, seeking refuge at the shrine of Shiva in the holy city of Benares, walking round and round the sacred space, saying their secret prayers. Their burdens, their tragedies, their reasons for being here, lie hidden deep inside the layers of cloth that cover them—their orhnis, their dupattas and saris and cholis, the still fertile lines of belly exposed between subtle twists of diaphanous cloth. They are mainly rands, widows who have escaped the funeral pyre by means of the laws forbidding sati laid down by British administrators in 1829. With no husbands to support them, many of these women face destitution. Those who have not given birth to sons are particularly vulnerable to abandonment by their in-laws. These unfortunates have swelled the ranks of women who sing in groups at street corners, in marketplaces, gardens, and at weddings, many of them belonging to the sect known as Vaishnavites, followers of Vishnu. The records of indentureship to the Caribbean show that Brahmin widows formed an inordinate number of the females who migrated.

The year is 1879, and the women have been brought by train from Benares to the port city of Calcutta. Small boats ferry them to a ship, the Artist, anchored in the mighty Hooghly River. The gangplank clacks and swings precariously as the women scramble up onto the deck. Once aboard, those who are unattached keep their heads cast down as their names are checked. Those who are married, some of them quickly in the immigration depots as a means of finding male protection, stay one step behind their husbands. There are bold ones among them, proud women with fierce eyes, but many are insecure and frightened. At the Garden Reach Depot they have been registered as indentured immigrants and have been assured safekeeping until they arrive in Trinidad—Chinidad, land of sugar. They will make plenty of money and the work will be easy because they will chinny chalay, sift sugar, all day long.

It takes a day to load the ship: whole families, single men, and this crowd of women who cling together. On the Artist in 1879 there are 285 women and 159 men—unusual on these early voyages of lonely labouring men. Single men sleep in one large area near the prow if the ship, families occupy the middle area, and the single women are consigned to the far end. Finally, once they are all on board—men, women, a few children, some topazes for cleaning the decks, sirdars, cooks, some of them Madrassis who travel with the ships and speak both Hindi and English, a doctor and two nurses, one of them Indian—the rickety bridge swings up and the ship is on its way, towed by tugboat down a treacherous channel to the island of Saugor. Dockside voices grow faint and then cease altogether. The evening darkens as they head out of the Bay of Bengal, India receding before the immensity of ocean billows, and now there is no horizon but water, nothing but pani, pani, pani . . . My foremothers, my own great-grandmother Gainder, crossing the unknown of the kala pani, the black waters that lie between India and the Caribbean.”

~ Ramabai Espinet, The Swinging Bridge
“Ramabai Espinet is an Indo-Caribbean writer from Trinidad and Tobago who received a Ph.D. and is now a professor at Seneca College.  Perhaps the most important web presence of Espinet is the University of Minnesota’s “Voices from the Gaps” page dedicated to her.  This source offers a more detailed summary of Espinet’s life and writings.  The YouTube videos, produced by Frances Anne Solomon, of her readings and interviews are also significant because they portray her voice.  In “Ramabai Espinet on the Swinging Bridge,” we can hear Espinet’s voice, as well as the voice of her readers who relate to her writing.  There are also videos on her speaking about Indian indenture and reading The Swinging Bridge.”
~ cmgcsencsitz