When I heard this, I didn’t want to laugh any more, I felt terribly sad. How could they believe that it was disgusting if one of us held that package in his hands, even though the vadai had been wrapped first in a banana leaf, and then parcelled in paper? I felt so provoked and angry that I wanted to touch those wretched vadais myself straightaway. Why should we fetch and carry for these people, I wondered. Such an important elder of ours goes meekly to the shops to fetch snacks and hands them reverently, bowing and shrinking, to this fellow who just sits there and stiffs them into his mouth. The thought of it infuriated me.