Vegetarian Vampire
By Nikhilesh Dholakia
Even though the air conditioner was whirring in the window, the hotel room felt hot and stuffy.
He reached out and touched Amita’s curly locks longingly, but she simply pulled the sheet tighter and shifted a few inches closer to her edge of the bed.
After a long five hour bus ride through nondescript countryside, the group had arrived back at the
So far, they had been underwhelmed by the post-conference group tour. The brochure had promised stops at idyllic
******
The air had a cool crispness the next morning as the bus rolled out of
After strolling the shops and cobblestone piazzas of
A few drinks, munching on some tasty breadsticks, and – like the light gray moonlit sky above – the mood started to lighten. Spencer edged his chair just an inch closer to Amita’s and spiked her Pepsi Max with a dash of the cheap Russian vodka. She looked at him in mock horror, gave him a pretend look of admonishment; and then smiled and took a sip.
The food started arriving: hot, fresh and aromatic. They must all have been quite hungry; there was very little conversation for the next ten minutes.
“Hey…Anil, what’s that… pieces of guts from Dracula’s last victim?” teased Tamer, pointing to the chewy pasta twists of spaetzle noodles on Anil’s plate.
“Yeah… I guess so,” Anil said, going along with the joke, “But these are tasty guts!”
By now, Spencer had slipped a generous peg of vodka in Amita’s glass and topped it off with frothy Pepsi Max. The waitress showed them the rich, layered chocolate pastry available for dessert. “Oohs” and “Aahs” emanated around the table. Everyone except Daniela and Amita said they would have one. Amita said she would take just a bite to taste from Anil’s plate, but ended up eating more than half of the pastry.
“Another liter of vodka,” Spencer gestured to the waitress.
Some hard cheese and bread arrived to cleanse the sweet, rich chocolate taste off the palate.
“Did you know that before she became a sociologist Daniela used to be a fabulous Belly dancer?” piped in
Daniela was the reason Anil and Amita were on this trip. They both taught in the communications program at
Daniela had insisted that Anil and Amita send a paper to this conference, being held for the first time in her native
Although with brunette curls cut short and rimless glasses, Fatima tried hard to project the serious sociologist and college principal look, Anil could imagine her as well gyrating to Belly dancing music in an Istanbul nightclub to the approving claps of men.
“C’mon… Daniela…” perked up Spencer, draining the vodka in his glass. “Let us see some of your Belly dancing moves…”
“Yeah… give us a private performance,” chimed in Tamer.
“Daniela… show us the talents you have hidden from us for years!” said Anil, grinning at Daniela and Amita. Daniela smiled faintly. Amita didn’t look amused as she sipped her by-now vodka-rich Pepsi Max.
“Time to hit the floor,” exclaimed Spencer, grabbing Amita by the arm. After a bit of protest, Amita was squarely on the floor.
Anil took another sip of the tasteless flat beer and looked at Spencer doing exaggerated disco moves. Amita had invented moves that were a cross between Belly dancing and Katthak. With the ethnic pink Chunni sliding gracefully across her smart beige Indo-Western two-piece outfit, Amita looked ravishing. Anil was sure every male eye in the restaurant courtyard was on Amita. East had collided with West in a sensuous explosion.
Anil looked at Daniela, the only other member of the group planted on a chair and not on the dance floor. She flashed back an understanding wan smile at him. He gestured to the waitress to get another beer.
When there was a break in the music, Amita came to Anil’s side and said “I am exhausted, dear. I am going back to the room.” She whispered a few good byes to Spencer and others and slipped away.
A haunted Hungarian melody started playing, and everyone settled down with refilled glasses. As happens on such evenings, the conversation flow bounced from philosophical musings to radical rhetoric to emotional disclosures. Finally, Daniela – feeling her responsibility as the national host – got up and said, “We have a long day ahead tomorrow…. We are visiting Bran, Dracula’s castle… let’s all get some sleep.”
As Anil latched the hotel room door shut behind him and adjusted his eyes to the dim light inside, he saw Amita. She had kicked off her shoes and sprawled face down, fully clothed, on her bed. This was an old fashioned room with two single beds separated by a bed stand. Anil pulled the blanket lightly over an oblivious Amita, and went into the bathroom to change.
******
Magnificent high whitewashed walls, dotted with occasional square gun turret holes, rose steeply from the valley. Conical and pyramid shaped red-tiled roofs capped a number of towers and escarpments. A dozen stone chimneys of varying lengths dotted the roof line. Inside the castle were delightful stairwells and narrow passageways, many looking into a courtyard resplendent with seasonal flowers.
“I know all of you are here to see the castle where Count Dracula lived,” said the cheerful young man we had hired as a guide. In his cultivated British accent, he went on “In this region, Count Dracula is known as Vlad Tepes, or Vlad the Impaler. Vlad in fact was a ruler revered by Romanians for standing up to the
Taking the group to the castle’s terrace, overlooking an undulating valley stretching for miles, the guide continued: “Just imagine a thousand heads of Turks killed and impaled on stakes, stretching into this valley, as far as the eye can see…”
“But, in reality....” added the guide, “there is very little archeological evidence that Vlad used this castle, except perhaps as an occasional overnight guest. But the legend of Dracula is associated with
******
Postmodern tourism and
Inside the club, in the antechamber, skulls and bones and coffins with creaking half-open lids completed the décor. Hidden light bulbs projected crimson red or purple lights that caste menacing bat shadows on ceilings and walls. A player-less piano, with automatically moving keys, was playing the distorted notes of Schnittke’s Concerto Grosso requiem – the archetypal Dracula music.
Further inside, the dining room was pretty much like a normal restaurant, with tastefully done Bat motifs on tablecloths, napkins, and the china.
Anil and Amita’s eyes lit up when the waiter pointed out that the menu had a whole vegetarian section.
“We get lots of international tourists,” said the waiter, by way of explanation.
On top of the pastas, breads, and couscous, Anil and Amita were thrilled to order garlic-grilled eggplant and a curried chick peas and vegetable stew. This was the last night of the group tour; a splurge was in order. Bottles of Romanian and Hungarian wines were ordered. While not as cheap as Russian vodka, these wines were still a bargain by Euro-American standards.
As dinner wound down, the tempo of the band picked up. The music was a nice mix of Sixties Oldies, Motown, and Contemporary Billboard Top-30. Tamer and Tricia were immediately on the floor, doing their trademark swing-cum-Paso Doble moves. Spencer was even more ebullient tonight. He grabbed both Amita and Fatima and pulled them to the floor. Looking at Spencer flaying his hands and gyrating, who would have thought that this was the world-famous semanticist from
Anil poured some more of the Hungarian cabernet into his empty glass and turned his chair slightly to get a better view. Even Daniela was up and dancing tonight. Amita and Daniela signaled to him furiously to join them on the dance floor. Anil simply smiled and waved back at them.
It was past
******
It was dark, cloudy and moonless that night.
There was a sharp sensation on his neck as Anil opened his eyes. Amita’s bare leg was already astraddle him as he found her doing a vampire bite on his neck. He smiled and kissed her.
The sun was not up yet, but there was enough light to silhouette the classic spires and rooftops of
With hair fanned carelessly across the pillow, Amita looked beautiful. He leaned over, and did his own vampire bite. As she smiled and half opened an eye, he did his guttural Dracula impression: “Vlad the Vegetarian will turn into a pumpkin with the first ray of sunlight. Come, fair damsel…. The impaler is waiting…” As Amita threw her arms around his neck and pulled him closer, Anil imagined a cartoon-style thought bubble floating over his head.
It said, “
September 2004
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