Summary

In Chapter 1, the Indian Consulate building “rumbled” as Uma Sinha waited impatiently for her 9 a.m. appointment to renew her visa (1). Morning turned to afternoon, and she struggled to focus on her studies. Instead, she observed the other people in the waiting room. She invented stories for each person she saw, the customer service woman, the visa officer, an old Chinese woman “accompanied by a fidgety, sullen girl of thirteen or fourteen,” “a Caucasian couple,” “a young man of about twenty-five,” and a “lanky African American” (3,4). Uma wondered “whatever were all these people planning to do in India” (5)?

Uma reflected on her own reasons for visiting India, to visit her mother and father who left America to return to their hometown of Kolkata for an easier life. The building rumbled a second time, and a moment later a third time, and “the ceiling...