Free Duty Free by Moni Mohsin

families.”
    “Oh for God’s sake! Is this tantrum because I expressed some sympathy for—”
    “It’s
not
a tantrum, okay? And just because I’m not an Oxen doesn’t mean you can speak to me as if I was three years old. Tantrum, my shoe.”
    “If I’d known that this was what was awaiting me in Lahore, I wouldn’t have bothered to drive three hours through horrendous traffic—”
    “So who asked you to come? You should have stayed in your stinky, bore village. That’s where you are happiest anyways.Why bother coming here at all? It’s hardly as if you come for my company. The second you come here you switch on the TV and that also to bore BBC. Do you ever ask me what I want to see? Or ask me about where-all I’ve gone, who-all I’ve met, what-all I’ve done? Never. Not for one second. And why? Because you don’t give two hoops about me. That’s why. You care more about the servants’ wellfear than you do about your wife’s. Admit it.”
    “God almighty! I really don’t think I deserve this barrage of criticism—”
    “No no, you can criticize me all day and all night and that’s fine. I don’t read newspapers, I don’t do work, I don’t know politics, I don’t know econmics, I buy too much jewellery, I do kittys, I am total time-waste. But I can’t say
one
word against you. If I’m such a time-waste why did you marry me then,
haan
?”
    “It’s a question I’ve often asked myself.”
    “You think I am happy with
you
? With your bore lectures and your stuppid village and the embarrassing fights you have with everyone everywhere. And over what? Iraq. Obama. Osama. America. Stuppid time-waste. As if you can change anything. A dead body is more fun than you.”
    “All I want is to watch a bit of TV and then have a bite and go to sleep. Is that too much to ask?”
    “No. No. Nothing is too much for you. It’s me who can’t do this and can’t do that. Can’t go to coffee parties, can’t find brides for Jonkers. But you’re right. I shouldn’t find brides for Jonkers. Because what do I know about happy marriages,
haan
?”

20 October
    I’m so depress, so depress, that don’t even ask. I have no maid to take my clothes out of my wardrope and lay them out in the morning. No maid to pick them off the floor at night and take them away for washing. No maid to straighten my shoes in lovely long lines in my dressing room. No maid to sort up my underwears drawer. No maid to bring my tea in the morning. To pull the curtains. To plumb up my cushions. To hand me my bag as I leave the house. To take my bag as I re-enter the house. To press my legs and massage my head. To get my shawl when I feel cold. To switch on the AC when I feel hot. To tell me who-all is doing what-all in Kulchoo’s room upstairs when his friends come. To always tell my mother-in-law I’m out whenever she calls. To give me goss about Sunny, Mulloo, and all that she’s heard from their maids. Never to tell my goss to anyone. Ever.
    On top, I’m not speaking to Janoo. Because of our fight,
na. Hai
, I’m so depress, so depress that don’t even ask.
    Sunny says
desi
maids are all back-stabbers like this only and that I should get a Filipina. They cost as much as a middle manager-type in a small business but they don’t say please get my husband a job, and my son admission in school and myfather out of jail and my mother into hospital. They just do their work and after two years they go. Done. You never even know how many brothers and sisters they have. Locals
tau
eat you alive with their demands, demands, demands. Unlike locals, Filipinas also know English and can help your children with their homework and because everyone knows how much they cost, they make you look rich. They also call you Madam which sounds more modern and classy than
Baji
.
    I also used to have one. She was called Maria and she was from Vanilla, Filipines. She was always smiling but when the tsunami came in Vanilla she cried and wept and howled and