Summary

Chapter Six begins: “Now, what can I say of myself that is only about me and not tied up with the others?” (63). Three women come to his mind: Amma, Malati, and Anita. All three are fierce. Anita finds the narrator lazy, but Amma seems to dislike Anita. Amma likes to cook foods that she knows Anita hates to eat. Words of insult exchanged cut like blades. The narrator uses Coffee House as a place for escape from his bickering household.

The narrator follows a daily routine. In the morning, he goes to Coffee House, and he does not return home until after the sun goes down. The narrator does have an office at Sona Masala, but he “didn’t work at all” (67). When the narrator was younger, he was told that he would have to work, but when he first began work at Sona...