1001 Ways to Embarrass Yourself While Avoiding Injuries

It was a warm sunny Tuesday when my mother decided we should fly the Union Jack in public. And by public, she meant in front of our otherwise inconspicuous suburban house in Penang. Lucky was made to grab the rusty ladder we had in the backyard and climb it to fix the crisp, orange-y smelling flag above the house. Preparing for social stigma was something all the children in my family had learnt from a young age. Why even the dogs didn't bark when they saw people coming. Instead, they hid their faces in the failed apple garden. "Now, children," she declared imperiously, "we will do our fortnightly assembly on Friday. Mr and Mrs Mukherjee will be there, and so will their children. I expect you to be on your best behaviour." Mama stood on the gardening bench to make up for her lack of height, and squinted uncomfortably at us four children sitting on the verandah, for the Stupid Sun which was Not British At All was shining in her eyes. Papa nodded his head in a

She fingered the cross around her neck. Quinn Chan, the devout Christian, the most faithful, the good Protestant fundamentalist daughter- she it was who now had no faith. Looking at the bible on her table, she turned her face away and stared at herself in the mirror. Her once long, thick black hair had been cut short, close to her chin. It was now more fashionable, as Mr. Quentin said, her Geography teacher, longer at the back and short at the front. Like a horizontal upward sloping slash. She watched carefully the gap between her two front teeth, her pale almost purplish lips, her mole just above her chin that stuck out slightly. Where was He? She'd sat with Cosima, crying her eyes out. Her sallow hands clutching at darker ones, wringing them again and again. Where was He? Cosima shook her head, I don't know. I don't know. She'd always felt this inescapable sense of people leaving , always leaving her life. Johnny had left, and for months afterwards, she saw ch

The heretic alone stands, innocent, Condemned yet with no blood on her hands- Who is guilty and who is just? God will not ask who did not cut their hair? What is so hurtful and cruel about your words that seek to damn and scald and wound are not your words themselves but the fact that they are coming from you. You who this apostate loved, loved so deeply too much sometimes that she couldn't open her mouth for fear that tears would fall out. The world outside rages in war and conflict and pain but the apostate's beloved ones are too busy sentencing This apostate for her sins. You are not a proper not a whole not a true Sikh how Can You be if you do not, it's because you do Not! Goodnight, the apostate says, I am going to seek something deeper I love you still, dear ones, I cannot forsake you And I am apostate Like you have forsaken me.