From being “different” to making a difference...

Ruminating about the sparrow who was ‘different’ and could not fly with the rest of the flock made me draw a parallel with my own condition, writes gender-rights activist Santa Khurai in her memoir about her journey as a transgender woman in Manipur

From my younger years till the present, I have had to face events of a different nature and magnitude. Disappointment, despair, lies, mockery, and disrespect have been a constant part of my life. But I carried on living and tried to paint a happy face through it all. At the same time, I was aware that I could never live the happy life that men and women around me lived. Now, I reckon such obstacles were crucial moments of learning and resilience.

My father constantly expressed his displeasure at my feminine nature, while my mother felt humiliated in front of neighbours, relatives and friends. None of the hardships the three of us experienced were our fault, each of us was right in our own way. There were countless differences between my life and experience as a woman and society’s conception of a woman. This gap led people to condemn and isolate me, they could not accept me as part of their society. I have chronicled the pain and suffering I felt in the wake of such an indifferent gaze and hatred all about me. Since I was considered a person who was ‘different’ from others, not many people were interested in listening to my problems and frustrations. This suppressed pain and anger led to a feeling of relief and bliss the moment I started reliving those moments and writing my memoir. The feeling of lightness was akin to what one experiences when sharing one’s burdens with friends.

I have many happy memories too from my adolescent years, mostly the jokes and conversations I had with my Nupi Maanbi (transgender women) friends. For the longest time, I have been desirous of sharing these stories with the world. It has been my conviction that others will also feel the charm and warmth of these stories and anecdotes. But I could not share my treasured moments with others in earlier days, I was branded a ‘homo’ and I laboured under the fear that people would mock me rather than laugh with me. The only humble satisfaction was to record all those events in my personal diary, and thus relive those moments of happiness and friendship.

One day, after a bitter disagreement with my father, I wrote a narrative poem called The Yellow Sparrow. My mother tried to mediate between the two of us, but she could never stand up for me strongly enough owing to the social milieu that was purely hostile towards me. It was also true that my mother was completely alone in her efforts to defend me, this was her lonely suffering. 

Re-reading the poem brought back images of the mango tree in our courtyard. The day after the quarrel, I came out and sat despondently under the tree. My mother was sitting in the portico, with tears in her eyes. She murmured something inaudible to me. A few sparrows were eating the rice in a phoura placed in one corner of the courtyard. With the hem of her shawl, my mother scared the sparrows away. All except one sparrow flew away. I went near this odd sparrow and found that one of its wings was broken, hanging loose by its side. The sight of this helpless sparrow saddened me. I picked it up and put it in an earthen pot which I hung by a thread from one of the branches of the mango tree. Ruminating about the sparrow who was ‘different’ and could not fly with the rest of the flock, made me draw a parallel with my own condition. This particular incident, which followed the quarrel with my father, and my mother’s distress, inspired my poem, ‘The Yellow Sparrow’.

In the eaves of a thatched house
There was a nest of sparrows
The straw of the roof kept the
nest warm.
When the rays of the morning sun
Shone through the thatch,
The sparrows chirped merrily,
Welcoming the new day.
Among the sparrows, there was a mother sparrow
And one hatchling
Every day, the mother sparrow
Would pluck out the feathers
From her child’s tender body with her sharp beak.
The innocent young sparrow
cried out
Each time her beak pierced him
But he did not know why
His mother was causing him so much pain.
Like other sparrows, he wanted to fly out of the nest
To seek food and play with his friends
But the mother forbade him from playing
In the company of others
And his featherless body left him handicapped
He could not fly.
Each time the baby sparrow
Looked into his mother’s eyes
He saw her anxious heart filled with fear
And helplessness
She would be calm only when he was beside her.
The young sparrow never asked the reason
For her inexpressible pain
And the mother kept her worries buried.
His heart was filled with disappointment
As he saw other birds flying in their colourful flocks
His head was filled with countless queries
Why?
What defect of nature or accident
Has caged me inside the nest?
Why does my mother spread her wings over me
And keep me unseen and unheard from the world
Outside this nest?
With each new day
The mother plucked more feathers
1, 10, 20….
Until she finally reached the corner
Of the young sparrow’s eyes.
Unable to bear the pain,
The young sparrow finally voiced its protest.
But the apprehensive mother
Plucked more feathers
Thus new conflicts were born
Between the mother and the child
And grew intense, like a blazing wild fire.
One day
Through tears, the mother said:
You are different from the other sparrows,
Your innocent body is spewing a host of
Yellow feathers, incessantly, alarmingly.
Your yellow feathers are spreading
All over your body till the corner of your eyes.
I have lost the courage to pluck your feathers anymore.
Unlike any other sparrow, you are born with yellow feathers
My worries have come to nothing
They will ostracise you from the rest of the flock,
You will live friendless and lonely for the rest of your life.
Thus the mother wept as she related her sorrow
From that day onwards
The young sparrow came to know himself
Burdened with the tragedy of uniqueness,
He lived his life—lonely and isolated.
But the shining yellow hue of his feathers
Could not be kept hidden
As time went by.
He gazed at his own feathers
That Mother Nature had made unique.
The golden hue of the yellow feathers
Reflected clean and bright
Though drenched by the cold winter rain.

The yellow sparrow fell in love
With his own molten loveliness,
The yellow feathers that were shunned by the world
Golden and glorious
A breath of joy escaped from his beak,
And he broke into a happy song
My feathers are the Yellow Gold,
I am the Yellow Sparrow
Whoever saw him called ‘the Yellow Sparrow’,
The colour yellow became his identity.

(Excerpted with permission from Santa Khurai’s The Yellow Sparrow published by Speaking Tiger.)