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On the way back from the airport, Margaret Kochamma
would sit in front with Chacko because she used to be his wife.
Sophie Mol would sit between them. Ammu would move to the
back.
There would be two flasks of water. Boiled water for
Margaret Kochamma and Sophie Mol, tap water for everybody
else.
The luggage would be in the boot.
Rahel thought that boot was a lovely word. A much better
word, at any rate, than sturdy . Sturdy was a terrible word. Like a
dwarf‟s name. Sturdy Kosby Oommen–a pleasant, middle-class,
God-fearing dwarf with low knees and a side parting.
On the Plymouth roof rack there was a four-sided, tin-lined,
plywood billboard that said, on all four sides, in elaborate writing,
Paradise Pickles & Preserves . Below the writing there were
painted bottles of mixed-fruit jam and hot-lime pickle in edible oil,
with labels that said, in elaborate writing, Paradise Pickles &
Preserves .
Next to the bottles there was a list of all the Paradise
products and a kathakali dancer with his face green and skirts
swirling. Along the bottom of the S-shaped swirl of his billowing
skirt, it said, in an S-shaped swirl, Emperors of the Realm of
Taste– which was Comrade K. N. M. Pillai‟s unsolicited
contribution. It was a literal translation of Ruchi lokatbinde Rayivu
, which sounded a little less ludicrous than Emperors of the Realm
of Taste . But since Comrade Pillai had already printed them, no
one had the heart to ask him to redo the whole print order. So,
unhappily, Emperors of the Realm of Taste became a permanent
feature on the Paradise Pickle labels.
Ammu said that the kathakali dancer was a Red Herring and
had nothing to do with anything. Chacko said that it gave the
products a Regional Flavor and would stand them in good
stead–when they entered the Overseas Market.