The weary hours they spent on the journey to Ulhitiya was found to be more tiresome for Nandana Menike than Koinmenika. It was the first time Nandana Menike travelled on a dusty road of that nature. Nandana Menike didn't feel comfortable at all. After passing a few miles along that bendy dusty road Nandana Menike started vomiting. The truck was moving off jerkily making almost all passengers rather helpless in a world of dust. If Kapilasena had not been beside her, she would have been thrown out of the truck.
They broke the journey at the Mahiyangana Degaba to get a small rest. It was an opportunity for Koinmenika to join others to worship the historically important Mahiyangana temple. Nandana Menike sat down under a shady tree to relax as she felt fully exhausted. Kapilasena was close by keeping an eye on her. Some young boys who were on the truck looked at Nandana Menike several times for whom Nandana Menike paid no attention at all. She felt too tired and weak even to open her eyes to look around.
The truck started moving fast along the new road which had not yet been tarred. Again, the wind stirred up the dust and people in the back side of the truck were covered with layers of dust. Their clothes, hair, almost everything had turned coppery.
"Menike looks serious…" Koinmenika told Kapilasena gazing at Nandana Menike as she was lying down on the truck.
"Punchi Amma you also lie down here…" Kapilasena requested seeing Koinmenika's weary face.
"Oh..! What a dusty road…! When, I saw the passengers of the truck in front of us. I could imagine the state of Nandana Menike behind me… I know that it was not easy for her. All her hair had turned brownish."
Koinmenika heaved a deep sigh looking at Nandana Menike's disarranged hair with dust. Koinmenika was however not affected as she got the front seat next to the driver.
"Have to wait till tomorrow to get a bath…"
"Better if I could have a body wash…" surveying her sweaty body Koinmenika said.
"I think there's enough water for one person…"
Every morning water bowsers filled the water tanks placed at each junction, from which the people had to take water form their buckets or pots for domestic purposes. Kapilasena found that the tank was empty and he had to ask for some water from a few houses around. Yet, he could fill only half of the barrel he had.
"Oh… what a difficult and chaotic life here…!" Koinmenika got up slowly thinking of preparing something for dinner.
"Now it is better… at the beginning, oh my god…! Terrible…, I think within a couple of months electricity will be provided as the electricity board people are busy with cabling now…"
The memories of the hard times Kapilasena had in a wooden hut at the initial stage of the resettlement process crept into his mind. It was really a plight he had to undergo with no facilities at all. There was a kind of tiny black colour insect, when it stung, the pain was unbearable. There were patches all over his body. That insect was more poisonous than mosquitoes. Most of the people in Ulhitiya who stayed there for months building their houses, suffered from a kind of high fever. All the patients drastically lost their weight due to loss of appetite and became very weak.
"Without electricity… somehow it can be managed… but without water nothing can be done…"
"The canal is being built. Until then, water is supplied to the tanks…" There was an indication of the delay in water supply, in his words.
"How can we manage with a little bit of water...?"
"For bathing, you have to go to the tank… you need to walk about three kilo meters for that…"
"Oh…! When you come back, you need to have a bath again...!" Koinmenika released a long deep breath expressing the severity of life there.
For dinner, Nandana Menike didn't wake up. With the onion sambol they had brought, they eked out the dinner preparing some Roti. A woman from the neighborhood gave them a curry with which finally they had dinner.
The cry of the peacocks early morning was an unfamiliar voice for Koinmneika. The temperature of Nandana Menike was a bit high.
"Whose cry is it Grandma…?"
"That's what I am also thinking…"
Overhearing the voices of the two ladies, Kapilasena removed the plank of the door, which was used as a temporary door.
"You had a sound sleep…?"
Only two rooms of the house had been cemented. The living room was half finished. The doors and windows had not been finished and piled up in one of the rooms. Therefore, Kapilasena had to sleep in the living room.
"Oh… mosquitoes…! A real nuisance…!"
"For me of course had no problem, slept at a stretch… Hmm… still my body is painful…" Nandana Menike sat on the wooden bed made of planks.
Without even thinking of getting a wash, Nandana Menike had gone to bed as she was exhausted because of the weary journey. She looked at herself and felt how unclean she was with dust all over her body.
"Whose cry is it son…?" Koinmenika inquired about the unfamiliar voice.
"Peacocks..."
"Peacocks…? Are they living close by…?" Nandana Menike glanced at Kapilasena with her eye brows raised.
"They are a real menace… can't keep anything…"
Nandana Menike didn't try to ask Kapilasena as why they behaved like that. She went out to see the peacocks.
"You see… I filled both barrels… if not enough, there's another water tank in the next door as well…"
The main problem Ulhitiya faced with was the scarcity of water. Kapilasena already mentioned what they had to do to get a bath. Koinmenika just surveyed the outside of the house. Most of the plants brought from Dumbara had been planted in the half acre land. The foundation of the house had been laid which was larger than she expected. The living room and two rooms had been thatched with galvanized sheets. She couldn't imagine how Kapilasena had done all those alone.
"How did you find money for all these son…?"
A smile appeared on his face.
"Actually, from where son…?" Koinmenika wanted to know how he found money for the house.
"Who else, except Bernard Hamu…! A considerable amount was given from the money earned from felling trees. He often looked into the expenses matters. He sent me a mason also for the construction work of the house…"
She got the correct answer as she thought much of work couldn't have been done without somebody's helping hand.
"You didn't utter a single word of this…"
"How can I tell you this...? He asked me not to reveal anything of what is offered…"
Koinmenika was surprised to hear that at a moment of financial crisis, he was grumbling about the insufficiency of the compensation he got and fighting with the valuation officers. Yet, he was spending lavishly to build the house in Ulhitiya for Kapilasena.
"Grandma… you see… like in photos, their feathers are not spread… it is just like a small tail…"
That was a puzzle for Nandana Menike.
"Usually they are dancing with their feathers spread in the morning… you see… under that tree… there's a peacock… The two over there near that fence are pea hens… peacocks are the ones who are dancing beautifully spreading their feathers…" Kapilasena went on explaining as he knew Nandana Menike had no knowledge of peacocks.
"Punchi Amma, you can have a body wash from the tank of the next door… At this time nobody is there… all have gone to the paddy field…!"
"I'll have a bath from the barrel here…" Nandana Menike got ready to have a bath.
"Throughout last night, you were grumbling about your body pain. Why don't you get a body wash…?" Koinmenika spoke against her niece's idea.
Without listening to her grandma's advice Nandana Menike had a bath. It didn't take that much time for her to experience the result of it. First, she got signs of a cold and then developed that into a high fever.
"See…, like a hot plate…! Have to get some medicine quickly…."
"Have to go up to the Madagama Camp to get some medicine… Will see if someone going that way…" Kapilasena walked towards the junction to see if a vehicle was going that direction.