Mischa Berlinski - Fieldwork

"How are your kids?" Martiya finally asked.

Khun Vinai seized on the topic gratefully. "They're fine," he said. "My little son, he loves elephants too much. The other day …" — and as Khun Vinai talked, Martiya grew increasingly agitated. She began to shift her weight from side to side and to nod her shaven head. The corners of her eyes narrowed. Then she interrupted him. She leaned forward and laid her pale hands on his forearm.

"Vinai, tell me — is Rice happy in Dan Loi village?" she said.

"Rice is happy in Dan Loi village," he said.

"And the people still make dyal ?"

"Yes," he said. "They still make dyal ."

She closed her eyes and exhaled. Her shoulders slumped. "Good," she said. She relaxed. She sat without moving. She didn't look at Vinai. They sat in silence for a few minutes. More than once, Khun Vinai started to speak — and then checked himself. Martiya didn't move.

Twice in my life I have seen a ghost.

The first time was in South India, in the holy city of Gokarna. Every morning I took my chai at a stall near the temple, where I exchanged smiles with the same gentleman, a gray-haired man in a loincloth. Once I mentioned this elderly figure to the chai-wallah . He asked me to describe him, and when I was done he roared with laughter. That man had been dead some twenty years. I thought that perhaps the chai-wallah was only teasing me, but others in the village confirmed what he had said.

The second time I have been in the presence of a ghost was that night on Khun Vinai's hammock.

Khun Vinai told me that he ended up spending several hours with Martiya in the visiting room of Chiang Mai Central Prison. The guards allowed them all the time they wanted, and Martiya spoke at length.

The night was so dark that I couldn't see Khun Vinai's face. But there were two voices beside me, and one of them was the voice of a dead woman.

"I didn't have a choice," she finally said. "Vinai, if I hadn't done something, they would have taken the dyal away. They wanted to take Hupasha away. What else could I have done?"

She looked at her hands.

"Hupasha came to me one night. I was in my hut, but I wasn't expecting him. I hadn't seen him in a week or two. He'd go away, and I'd miss him so much. That's when I knew he had my souls, because I missed him so badly. So when he came that night, I was very happy.

"But Hupasha wasn't himself, I knew right away. We always had a little game. He'd shout, ‘Tie up your dog!' when he came to my hut, and that made us laugh, because I didn't have a dog. But that night he came and he didn't say anything, he just came up to my hut and asked if he could come in. I asked him why he was talking to me like a stranger, and he didn't say anything. So I asked him if he was going to talk to me or if he was just going to sit there like a rock all night long. And he told me that he had decided to become an Adam-person.

" ‘You too?' I said. And I started to laugh, because, well, I had thought it was a big deal what he was going to tell me. I thought his daughter had died, but this just didn't seem to me a terribly big deal. People change, even Dyalo men, although I wish they wouldn't. But he was very interested always in what the Adam-people said, and he always liked to hear David Walker and the others preaching, talked to them about their ideas. Good for him, I always said. I mean, it would certainly be wrong if I was interested in the foreigners and he wasn't. He wants to read the Bible, that's fine. I never wanted to control him or tell him what to do. He was far too smart for that, far too strong for that. So I just said, ‘Congratulations. Don't scare me like that next time.'

"But I thought about things for a moment, and I asked him how was he going to keep Rice happy if he didn't make dyal . He said that he wouldn't keep Rice happy. And I said, ‘You aren't? What are you going to eat?' Because that's such a basic Dyalo idea, that you need to keep Rice happy. And he said that now he would ask Ye-su-tsi to make the fields grow. ‘What does Ye-su-tsi know about Rice?' I said. But he didn't say anything.

"I asked him why he was doing all this, and he said he no longer wanted to be a slave to Rice. That he wanted to be a free man.

"Then he said he wouldn't see me anymore in the fields because it would make Ye-su-tsi angry if he made dyal . He said that Adam-people don't make dyal . So I said, ‘Okay, we won't make dyal ,' but he said that it didn't matter, that I was still his gin-kai . That they only give honor to Ye-su-tsi, and sing Ye-su-tsi songs.

"I asked him who taught him this, and he said it was David Walker.

"So he went home and I went back to work, and I waited for him to come back to my hut again, because I figured this all would blow over, and one week went by, and then another. I started to feel a little worried, and then another week went by. I decided I would go up to Wild Pig and see him, and talk to him again.

"I found him in his rice fields. What beautiful fields we had made! He was so handsome working. It was a glorious day, with a clear, hot sun. He saw me and he stopped working, and I knew before he even said a word that he wanted me. And I wanted him too. He was a beautiful man, simply beautiful. Things would be fine. But he said, ‘Martiya, why are you in my rice fields?' I'll never forget his voice, it was so cold.

"He said that, and I got angry.

"I said, ‘I gave up my life to learn your language, so that I can talk to you. And then you came along, and I give up my man to be with you also, one good man, who had all my souls, who would have taken me away from here. This village was all I had, and I gave up this village for you, too, this village which I wanted. They came to me and said: It is either us or Rice . And I said, ‘Give me my man.' And now you say that the rice fields we made together are yours ?'

"He didn't have anything to say to that, there was nothing he could say. He walked away. I walked home through the fields. I had planted the rice, and now it was high.

"That night I was all alone in my hut, and I began to shiver. My teeth were chattering. My whole body was trembling, and the next thing I knew, Lai-Ma was there. She was frightened of Rice, but she came.

"She was stroking my head. She said that I was taken by the spirits in the night. And I said, ‘I was?' And she said, ‘The spirits caught you and you fell down, and you screamed.'

"I guess that's when I first knew how angry Rice was. How angry Rice could be."

"I wish I could say that I was very brave, but I wasn't. If Lai-Ma hadn't been there, I don't know how I would have eaten, how I would have got water, how I would have bathed myself. I spent most of those days sleeping. That little hut was so small. And I couldn't breathe. My chest ached. The only person I wanted to see was Lai-Ma. She was so kind. When I was with her, I calmed down, just a little. But she had things to do. She had her fields.

"And so I would sit there at that desk. I had these conversations with myself. I'd say, ‘Let's go. Let's go now. Don't wait.' And then this voice would be in my head, it was my voice, but dark, it would say, ‘Martiya, where would you go? How could you leave?'

"I didn't think I could live without Hupasha, without the rice fields. I thought about the dyal all the time. What a mistake he made, to give up Rice.

"The first time we made dyal , Hupasha came to my house. I didn't expect him. I hadn't seen him in a year, but I had thought about him. He took my breath away, he was so handsome. He shouted, ‘Tie up your dog!' and then he didn't say one more word. Took me to his rice field. It was a dark night, he led me on the path, up over Big Hill, in the direction of Wild Pig village. I couldn't see a thing, just held on to his hand, we walked for hours. Then the moon rose, just as we got to his rice fields. Just an empty field. I never felt so happy in my life. So this was the dyal , I thought. This was it.