25/06/2026
SHAVAVANDI...
It was a night of heavy rain and strong winds. I was sitting on the upstairs balcony.
As the wind blew, tiny droplets of rain drifted towards where I sat. I moved my chair a little further back and settled down again. In the courtyard, the force of the wind was knocking ripe rambutans off the rambutan tree.
New tenants had moved into the house next door. Their dog, perhaps distressed by the unfamiliar surroundings, kept barking incessantly. Its mournful cries disturbed me greatly. Yet, in the cool embrace of the rain, I continued scribbling down my thoughts. Occasionally, I sipped the black coffee my wife had brought earlier.
It was now half past eleven at night.
The lights in all the neighboring houses had gone out. On most nights, I spend some time on the upstairs balcony, either writing or drawing.
As the rain eased a little, an ambulance sped along the road from east to west, its siren piercing the silence.
Suddenly, my mind drifted back to the first time I had ever seen an ambulance—about forty-five years ago.
Sonu was walking alone to school.
She wore a small skirt and shirt. Her hair was tied into two pigtails with ribbons, though loose strands fluttered wildly in the breeze. Her clothes were wrinkled and unironed. She carried one or two books in her hands and walked hurriedly.
When she reached the shade of the old coralwood tree by the roadside, she stopped to gather a handful of bright red coralwood seeds scattered on the ground.
Barefoot, she walked on, feeling the earth beneath her tiny feet. Anyone who watched her would know that she was not the kind of child who could ever stay still.
Along the way, she noticed a colony of ants digging into the soil and building their home. Immediately, she placed her books on the ground and crouched beside them, chatting away as though they were her friends. Using twigs and leaves, she made a little shelter so that the harsh sunlight would not fall directly on them.
From time to time, she wiped her runny nose with the fold of her left arm and then rubbed it against her skirt. She kept sniffing as she walked.
Sunlight filtered through the leaves and danced upon her face.
"Oh God... the bell must have rung already!"
she exclaimed, looking up.
Then she hurried on toward the school.
Suddenly, a large white vehicle roared past her.
Startled, she turned around and stared at it.
"Shavavandi is passing. I wonder who died."
She overheard travelers saying to one another as they walked by.
"Shavavandi..."
she repeated softly.
Her little mind remembered what her mother had once told her that when her father died of a heart attack, he had been brought home in a Shavavandi.
For a moment, she stood still.
The memory of her father held her there.
Then she began running toward the school, eager to tell her best friend, Seenu, about the Shavavandi she had seen.
By the time she reached the school, the bell had already rung. Breathless, she arrived at the classroom door.
"Luckily, sir hasn't come yet,"
she muttered between gasps.
As she stepped inside, all the children were staring at her.
"Where is Seenu?"
she asked immediately.
No one answered.
The children looked at one another in silence.
As her eyes searched the classroom for her friend, a voice echoed through the school's loudspeaker:
"...who left us after a snake bite..."
Those were the only words she managed to hear.
She let out a heart-rending cry and burst into tears.
The coralwood seeds she had carefully gathered for her friend slipped from her hands and fell one by one onto the floor.
In the overwhelming silence, the sound of each tiny seed hitting the ground seemed deafening to her.
Asokan Madavoor
