A Stranger at My Table by Ivo de Figueiredo

Author:Ivo de Figueiredo
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: DoppelHouse Press
Published: 2019-02-27T16:00:00+00:00

It is too dark for the home movie camera in the little wooden dragon-style church, so I have to create the images for myself: The walls melting into the shadows, the rows of faces lit up by the chandeliers that hung over the aisle. Familiar and unfamiliar faces, Sister Irene, Grandpa, Grandma, uncles and aunts. The pastor waiting at the altar. There is nobody from Dad’s side, but the residents of Bamble fill the other side of the church, their pale necks bowed, and among them Grandpa standing with his hands folded, just as he has done countless times in the Prayer House. Yet this must all seem strange to him; the incense in the air, the saints gazing down on him, the figure of the bleeding Christ hanging over the altar with the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene on either side, all framed by a long, twisting dragon with fire-breathing heads at both ends; Catholic gothic in true Norwegian style. And now Grandpa lifts his head and sees his firstborn walking up the aisle, dressed as he could never have imagined: the white sari with its glittering silver borders lighting up the church.

Do they look happy? Of course, all couples look happy on their wedding day. As they walk out of the church, the camera is ready to capture them, Mum carrying a bouquet of white lilies, Dad with a white rose in his buttonhole. Hats and pipes under the chestnut trees. Grandpa with his shiny greased hair, standing tall in his dark suit. Dad’s white teeth, Mum’s pink cheeks. She had wanted to bring the world and freedom back home. He had begged her to rescue him. And she had. He’d found a new home in the land where nothing happened. A new life that would contrast sharply with the lives of the family he had left behind in East Africa.

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