Level III Winner - Amol Agarwal
Valley High School, West Des Moines
"Clothes" by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Dear Ms. Divakaruni,
I write this letter to you during one of the busiest times of the
year for me. Concerts, assignments, rehearsals, games,
and tests pack my schedule in the month before winter
break. Yet I feel I owe it to you to write you this
letter about a story very close to me. Rarely will a
story cause me to remain frozen in shock, or rock me so much that
I can't help but be sincerely thankful for life, or cause me to
momentarily forget all of my worries and problems. Your
story "Clothes" has made me do all of these
things, and I thank you for that.
One of the reasons why this story appealed to me so much is that
I, too, am Indian. I come from the same background as
Sumita, so I can vicariously experience her pain almost to the
same degree. And though I can't say I know how it feels
when someone close to me dies, I do know how Sumita must have
felt when she came for the first time to America. My
parents were immigrants to this country, and they have told me
several stories about when they first arrived. The
plots of those stories do differ with
"Clothes," but the experiences and feelings are
much the same.
Though your story is relatively short, it is literally packed
with dozens of lines and quotes that reverberated within
me. You put life into perspective when you wrote:
"That's when I know I cannot go back. I don't know yet
how I'll manage, here in this new, dangerous land. I only
know I must. Because all over India, at this very moment,
widows in white saris are bowing their veiled heads, serving tea
to in-laws. Doves with cut-off wings."
Sumita's growing determination really glows in that passage, and
it proved contagious for me.
Perhaps the most important thing I gleaned from this story is how
simply the status quo can change. One night, Sumita
goes to bed with the knowledge that she will see her husband in
the morning. When she wakes up, Somesh is
gone. It always surprises me how quickly things can
change, but, as I've learned from this book, that's just the way
life is.
Throughout my life, a single principle has always guided
me: hope. In my opinion, hope always
prevails, because nothing can defeat hope. I am
thrilled to see that a story of such caliber as
"Clothes" reinforces this idea. In
the last two sentences of the story, when you write "In
the mirror a woman holds my gaze, her eyes apprehensive yet
steady. She wears a blouse and skirt the color of
almonds," I get a sense of hope for Sumita's future, and
for my own as well. This theme of hope runs throughout
the story, like when Somesh keeps reminding Sumita that they will
move out as soon as they have enough money, or when, on the plane
to America, Sumita realizes that her clothes from home are only a
few feet below her in the luggage holds-and it rings true with
me, as I am sure it does with many others who have read it.
I have changed since reading this story. Of course, no
single story can alone change my life so drastically, but this is
definitely a good first step. I know that I can learn
from the stories of others, even if those others do not
exist. People of the imagination should not be taken
any more lightly than real people themselves. It seems
that sometimes, imagined people prove more genuine than people I
meet on the street. And such is the case with
"Clothes." I know I can rely on
characters much like Sumita to teach me more about myself, and I
find great comfort in that.
Sincerely,
Amol Agarwal