Bibi Rani

After the neighbour boy left, my mother found another washer lady. She was a cheerful Indian lady. Bibi Rani was very dark, very round and very nice. She helped my mother to lift father when he was completely paralyzed. When my father was beginning to recover, she became a physiotherapist and helped him walked up and down the house. Bibi Rani liked to chew betel leaves and tobacco. She carried around a tin can to spit into. She let me try some betel leaves with a little lime. I can’t remember the taste but it was not unpleasant. Bibi Rani has a sister-in-law called Bibi Anggema. She also chewed betel leaves and tobacco and I think she was addicted to lotto. The ladies spent long afternoons discussing what numbers would turn up next. They analyzed their dreams or their relative’s dreams or anybody's dreams and then tried to interpret the dreams into numbers. It was an elaborate and complicated process. Every once in a blue moon they won a bit of money and they would brag about it to us.