Short story selected for the 2013 New Asian Writing Short Story Anthology A real life story By Martine Olthof On 26th December, 2004, a huge tragedy hit South East Asia. At 07:58 local time Bangkok and Java) a Tsunami was…
Short story selected for the 2013 New Asian Writing Short Story Anthology The Collectors Conference was over at last. As the valedictory session ended, she heaved a sigh of relief. It had been difficult for her to keep her eyes…
Short story selected for the 2013 New Asian Writing Short Story Anthology Vendors flocked on the shadowed train station of Santragachi near Howrah city. There might have been an orange orchard tucked in some corner of the district as the…
I am very fair. When I was young, everyone thought, me included that I’d go into modelling. But as I grew older, my face was wrecked by pimples. Being too fair is not much of an advantage in a tropical…
Future was like yards and yards of plain-cloth in her imagination; new and uncut. It had the untouched feel and the seminal smell of starch. Present was a sewing machine that runs over the cloth, monotonously, for hours. Present stitches…
Biswanath Banerjee was up earlier than usual in the morning. He was flush with excitement, outwardly though he was the epitome of composure. He did not wish to let his wife Sucheta understand what was going on inside his mind.…
Dhananjoy was all of 13 years when he came to work for us at our maternal grandparents’ house in Kolkata. Gosaba, a village at the border of Sunderban was his home I was told by my grandmother. I had never…
Her eyes fluttered open. As her eyes received light after a long period of time, everything appeared quite a bit dazzling to her. She could not quite make out anything apart from the bright light that encompassed her. In the…
Spicy aroma of kari filled up the air of a summer starry night, that has spread out a black velvet blanket with small dots in the sky. Residents of a small Indian village were returning home, marry and flushed, after…
“You have child bearing hips,” said Amitabh, as he steadied me when I tripped and nearly fell on rain washed path outside my house, just after we had returned after performing my father’s terhvi, (the thirteenth day after his death)…
March 28, 1971, Kaptai, East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) Mrs Samad ran. She ran like she had never run before. Barefoot. In a kaftan. Missing her bra. Eyes bloodshot. Hair undone. Ruffled. Flailing her arms. Crying hysterically. She ran through a…
Once upon a time in a land far away, there lived a king and a queen. They lived in a beautiful castle. The king was very kind and humble. He was a healer. He liked to heal people from their…