The spice of life, with God’s blessing

Ever since I arrived here in Calicut, I’ve been trying out the local cuisine, enjoying every possible item of Kerala’s spicy mouth-watering recipes. After two months, as the spiciness of the recipes started creating havoc with my digestive system, the novelty of my experiments with Kerala’s cuisine started to wear off. I even complained on a couple of occasions about how dangerous it is to live continuously on such spicy food.

Last night, however, while dining out with a business associate, I relented and indulged in a previously-untried recipe of tamarind fish. Although delicious, it was so spicy that I imagined the Devil himself had cooked it for me. Soon, my mouth was on fire and I had to douse it quickly with a chilled strawberry milk shake. All through the night, my mouth and my stomach simmered, and I had a foreboding of what would happen in the morning.

I woke up this morning with a heavy head and a queasy feeling in my stomach. I expected it wasn’t going to be a good day for me. Everything was happening in slow motion and I decided to go to work – to my client’s office – an hour later. I reasoned, I’ve always been on time, at 10 a.m., even earlier, so one day’s aberration of reaching office late wouldn’t hurt anyone.

On the way, I encountered a lot of traffic. In some places the roads were blocked off, with masses of people gathered in groups or walking aimlessly. There was traffic police everywhere. Something was wrong, but, since I was unable to speak the local language, I decided to carry on unperturbed. Kerala being a Communist State with frequent strikes and political rallies, I didn’t give the situation another thought. I continued, along with thousands of others, on my journey to work.

After a few detours, I decided to get off my auto-rickshaw and walk down to my client’s office. As I approached my destination, I found more people, more police and thick black smoke billowing from a source right behind my client’s office. When I reached the office building, I found total pandemonium. There were people, police, fire engines and ambulances. Something was very wrong. I had a bad feeling that I had arrived at the site of some disaster.

In the crowd, an office colleague who sits two desks away from me, spotted me and came forward. He was in a disheveled state, sweat pouring from his body. He narrated what had happened, shaking off tiny pieces of glass from his hair and neck: At 10 a.m., a firecracker warehouse behind our office building had caught fire and exploded in every direction, destroying everything near it. Several people had died. No one knew how many. Part of our office building had been destroyed, injuring many of our colleagues. A few were in hospital. By God’s blessing, he said, he had been spared.

I stood there like an idiot, listening.