Saket Soni - The Great Escape: A True Story of Forced Labor and Immigrant Dreams in America

The Great

Escape

A True Story of Forced Labor and Immigrant Dreams in America

Saket Soni

For my family

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

J alal al -D in M uhammad B alkhi (R umi )

Spring 2006

Kerala, India

The night flight crossed the Arabian Sea. At dawn the plane glinted above the Malabar Coast. It descended into March rain, tilted over a forest braided with rivers, traced a nautilus over Kochi. Wet roofs shone. The back wheels hit the tarmac, unlocking a shudder of applause.

The passengers were Indian laborers and nurses returning from jobs in Bahrain. Most of them came home to see their families every six months. But not Aby Raju, the lanky young man folded into a window seat behind the wings. He unbuckled, clambered over his neighbors, and reached for his bags while the plane was still taxiing. Aby hadnt been home for five years.

He bounded out of the airplane, heaved his luggage off the belt, bribed a customs agent to rescue excess duty-free whiskey. Finally he found his parents. His mother cried. His father commandeered the trolley.

Following them out to the curb, Aby was unsettled. His parents were smaller. His mothers gait was more cautious than before, and his father no longer filled his half-sleeved shirt. The taxi driver, a childhood friend, bowed slightly, as if he were picking up a dignitary.

They set off into the drumming downpour, through okra farms and chili fields. Abys eyes, parched from the desert, were peeled open through it all. From the back seat, his mother dispensed news. There were five years to catch up on! She described the state of his fathers bronchioles. Recited an inventory of her own ailments. Reported on the home remodeling project Aby had sponsored with money wired from Bahrain. His father maintained a stoic, wheezy reserve.

By the time the taxi trundled into the Rajus town of Meenadom, there was only one salient news item that his mother hadnt shared. Last week, Abys parents had put an ad in the matrimonial pages of Keralas major paper, the Manorama, announcing they were looking for a wife for their only son. He was twenty-seven now and had some cachet as a worker returned from overseas. But an ad is just an ad, not a marriage proposal, so she didnt mention it.

The Raju house approached like an old friend wearing a low hat. Abys father had bought this land and built this place. It was an improbable accomplishment for a lowly army private. He came into a little money when the army sent him out to Sri Lanka to help quell the Tamil Tigers. He came home with enough hardship pay to start building a house, but not quite enough to complete it. Six-year-old Aby didnt know the difference. The raw cement floor was all the better for cooling his feet. He thought inside doors were a curious extravagance of the superrich. Then he grew up, became a builder, reached Bahrain, and started wiring money home so his father could finish what hed started.

At the front gate, Abys mother took his hand in hers and threw open the door. There were white tiles on the floor, a finished ceiling, Western toilets, doors for every room. Aby looked for his father to share his approval, but couldnt find him. Maybe hed stepped out to smoke.

Suppertime brought a gaggle of uncles, aunts, nieces, nephews, neighbors. Children climbed all over Aby. His mother served up bright green parcels: roasted fish wrapped in banana leaves, Abys favorite. He unwrapped one, inhaled the fishy steam, but the distinct feeling that he was breaking a rule stopped him from touching it. The men ate first in the Raju house. When he lived here last, he had to wait for them to finish before he had a bite, even on the nights he caught the fish. But when he looked around the table, nobody seemed to think Aby was out of place. And, oddly, his father, the biggest eater of them all, was missing from dinner. Aby wolfed down his fish.

After dinner, Aby handed out saris. Cologne. Watches. Jeans and pretty dresses for the kids. He saved the best for last: surround-sound speakers for his parents, with triangular stands that hed had a friend weld. His dad loved film songs.

Where is he? Aby asked his mother.

On duty, she said. Aby didnt understand. What happened to retirement?

He took a job at the Manorama. His dad was a current affairs buff, but had he become a journalist? He works the night shift, delivering papers. Youll see him in the morning. Come with me. We got you something too.

She took him out back, held out a set of keys. A beat-up motorcycle was parked on the backstreet. The children squealed. Rides all summer! Aby hugged his mother.

We dont know much about bikes, but they said this was a good one, she said.

Its a Hero Honda. The best, said Aby.

So shall we call it even? his mother asked. Aby was confused. The loan you gave us. Youll consider this a repayment?

A few months ago, his mother had asked Aby for a loan to run the house. Hed sent most of his savingsall but the money for presents. The Hero Honda was pure love, but there was no way it cost even half that amount.

Of course, Aby said.

Good boy. Now come inside. You are tired.

Amorous parakeets woke Aby in the morning, the way they always had. His room faced a grassy hillside, and his gaze landed on a familiar shape: his father walking home from the bus stop on the summit. It hurt to look at him. His father had been up all night, piling stacks of fresh newspapers into a truck, driving around to places like the railway station to stock kiosks. At his age. With his lungs.

Abys pride over funding the home renovations evaporated. His parents were desperate, and he hadnt seen it. He needed to get right back out there. Find a recruiter to throw him like a dart at the oil economy, into Bahrain, Dubai, Qatar, Abu Dhabi, wherever, for another welding job. It would take him at least two weeks to find a placement, a month to ship out. He had to start looking today.

In the kitchen he ripped the Manorama open to the job listings. All the labor recruiters printed ads aimed at men and women in Kerala eager to go where the jobs were overseas. Aby scanned the ads, knowing he faced a tough market. Five years ago, when he first left home, companies in the Middle East were desperate for skilled workers. He had been a hot commodity: at twenty-two, a first-class welder. Recruiters were falling over each other for him. But now he was competing with a glut of young hopefuls willing to work for less. Recruiters were offering wages as low as his starting salary five years ago.

Abys father came in and collapsed into a seat for breakfast. His mother served plates of steaming appam and poured coffee. But Aby didnt touch either. His eyes were fixed on an ad.

Migrate To Usa

On green card/permanent residence visa

In California/New Orleans

Welders. Structural fitters. Fabricators. Marine engine fitters.

Job guarantee provided for 2 to 3 years.

Earn from 4,000 to 5,000 $ per month.

Permanent lifetime settlement in USA for self and family.

Aby had seen many fraudulent recruitment schemes aimed at Keralas young and jobless, but this one, he thought, was admirably bold. Green cards! Any seasoned migrant worker knew that America let in only those with elite educations.

But curiosity overcame him. The landline lived in Abys bedroom. He went and dialed the number listed on the ad.