A Family Heirloom
My mom looked at us in amusement, as my dad and I made our world-famous-only-in-the-Arukil-household kebabs. I was sitting on the kitchen counter, my short legs flailing beneath me, as I fantasized about them. We would bring the kebabs straight from the stove, and sit down at our makeshift cardboard box dining table. My mom, eating leftovers, would look at me as I enjoyed the one meal that guaranteed both comfort and adventure. It was then, when I was five, my parents practically broke, and living somewhere in the midst of the wild streets of LA, that I felt safest.
Despite the years I’ve spent trying to dissect the mystique of my father’s kebabs, I continue to be incredibly fascinated by them. The hundreds of flavors, each with a distinct, distinguishable character, always coalesced into a masterful culmination of tradition and innovation. The dish would melt in my mouth, transforming into a thrilling, devastating, messy delicacy of nostalgia. As I chewed, images of the bumpy road I would take with my friends to the Shiva Temple somewhere in Bangalore would flash before my eyes. And as I swallowed, I gulped with guilt thinking of all the relationships I walked past when I moved back to the United States.
Originally from the distant memory of LA, the world-famous-in-the-Arukil-household kebabs took on different meanings, as my mind would unravel the many ciphers life had to provide. Questions filled my mind, and the flavors would only answer them with more questions.
For instance, as I watched cheesy romantic comedies, typically with a cynical bad boy and a nerdy girl with a habit of over-romanticizing, I wondered how the two leads could ever be in a relationship: they were on opposite sides of a very broad spectrum. Likewise, honey and garlic were never supposed to go together, until they did. It was only after much thought that I realized that honey and garlic were perfect for each other. Each of the flavors was equally polarizing and strong, boldly demanding and fighting for its place in the meal.
The kebabs accompanied me on my journeys through my favorite movies, my favorite books, my greatest successes, my greatest failures, and the epiphanies I had as a result. When I coughed violently from pneumonia at twelve, the only solace I had was a copy of The Great Gatsby, my mother’s presence beside me, and a handful of the kebabs my dad skipped an important meeting to make. As my mom fed me, I wondered whether the gap between Jay and Daisy was an endearing amount of naivete or an incredible amount of wisdom. I wondered what the difference was.
I wondered what the harrowingly beautiful illusion of the American Dream meant to someone like Jay. After all, the stabbing sting of the Kashmiri Chili Powder taught me that passion is not a crossroads: it is not “this” or “that.” It’s a cliff: a choice to immerse oneself into something and never look back, a leap of faith. Instead of distracting me, the kebabs added to my undiverted focus. I was Jay, diving headfirst into the abyss of reaching the indefinable and unattainable green light. As I wrote cheesy blog posts about matters I felt strongly about or watched Marvel movies without blinking my eyes once, I felt myself falling more and more. And the more I fell, the farther away I felt from the green light. So I just opened my arms and felt the rush that was consuming the world around me, and took comfort in knowing that the green light never existed; if it did, it was irrelevant.
Over those years, I understood that like kebabs, the nuanced complexities of human nature go far beyond anyone’s articulation. Humans have spent the greater part of our history trying to learn these complexities, categorizing them over and over in an attempt to objectively comprehend such a magnificent phenomenon. We haven’t scratched the surface of deeply understanding human nature or the brain, and we honestly never will. Because, like kebabs, our brains are intricate pieces of art, and even though we can try to analyze them, no one, not even the artists themselves, can ever fully understand them or how they came to be. That was the motto my Dad always used when he made kebabs: he put intuition before reason, and as a result, every kebab tasted a little different and a little more beautiful than the last.
My Sherlock-Holmes-like quest for the answers to life’s many mysteries is, and always will be, fueled by the clues found in every bite of a family heirloom. It’s not just about the honey and the garlic and the Kashmiri Chili Powder. This is about knowledge, tradition, and a connection that I will always have to my father wherever I go. This is about the memories we made, the safe space that was the kitchen, and the frustration I felt when some encouraged me to be in the kitchen only because I am a woman. This is my family’s key to assimilating, or not for that matter, in their own way. Kebabs can define me only because they are undefinable, unrestricted to the convenient perceptions that people often have of us. So, every time I feel angry, detached, helpless, or sad, I’ll make myself some kebabs. One day, when I have kids whose questions are too big and brilliant for my intellect, I’ll feed them some kebabs. I don’t have the answers to every question, but something about the ciphers found within this meal tells me that the generations of virtuosity that came before me just might.
This post was written by Shreya Arukil
