 Hi, my name is Grace Singh Smith. I was born and raised in rural northeast India in a village on the banks of the river Barak in the state of Assam. Politically speaking, I am of Indian origin, some Indian American. But my people, the ethnic group I belong to historically came from the kingdom of Manipur, a princely kingdom, which only became part of India after India gained its independence from the British. I have been living in the United States since 2007. And I primarily write literary fiction and nonfiction. Today I will read a short excerpt from a short story called the resurrection of dog, the resurrection of dog. Baba liked big words, peculiar and historic, for example, he must have learned them from the Americans. A historic journey. Remember, he said, my toes did not quite reach the Tata sumo's rubber floor mat. I was eight. Riksha pullers, goats and not properly dressed children flew by boxed into the green haze of the tinted windows, eyes all big as a sumo bore down over the leprous potholes of the rural northeast Indian roads, a mighty beast that said without speaking, get out of my way. Baba and I were going from our village in Assam to a village in the neighboring state of Tripura. According to Baba, Tripura's main claim to fame was that Bangladesh almost ate up its borders. But there was something extra extra about our destination said Baba, something very few people knew about. The Tripura village had sanitary toilets and clean pukka footpaths. We did not even have a paved road, much less a footpath. Just like America, Baba said, even though he had never been. When Baba told me the story of how the Lord had led the children of Israel to Canaan, I asked, why did he not take them to America? This he was not able to answer. Mama had stayed back because of hemorrhoids. I felt lucky, blessed, my parents always corrected me to be Baba's sole companion on this historic journey. It was my first such long journey in the sumo. The Christian villagers brought 10% of their crops and earnings to a church with a steeple, Baba said. I had never seen a steeple, but I knew what it was from the magazines that were mailed to us. The appearance of each issue a miracle from the regular Presbyterian mission in USA. Yiraka, Baba would say, Yiraka, Yiraka. The villagers with the majestic church were Darlong, we Manipuri. The only thing that linked us was faith in the Christian God, capital G. Baba had helped translate the Holy Bible into Darlong, even though he didn't know their language. How this was done, I did not understand and still don't, except that it involved Baba, who had studied Greek and Hebrew in seminary, acting as some sort of middleman between the Darlong translators and the Americans, doctor this and doctor that, who, as I understood it, were the bosses. Imagine, Baba said, drooping over the steering wheel. Imagine another of his favorite words, which he pronounced, imagine. I helping to translate this Darlong Bible all the way from creation to resurrection, Genesis to Revelation, A to Z started many, many years before you, my baby was born. I felt like the descendant of an Israelite. The July sun had no mercy, but through slitted, slitted tiny windows, the sumo breathe cool air, the seat fuzzy and a little ticklish and the crook behind my knees was even more comforting than my mother's lap. Outside the paddy fields, the huts, the water pipes, tried to run somewhere rippling my face hurt from having slept with clenched jaws, the night prior. As you see, in our village by the Great River Barak, we were the only Christians. When I tried to join the other children in robbers and police, they yelled pig eater. Mama and Baba said that we were called to live a separate life, but it was not easy to play house house by myself. And if I ran fast, who was there to catch me. I wanted to join the neighborhood children in their games, and did the year before our historic journey during the Yausang Festival. Even though I had been told Yausang was a pagan festival. I desperately wanted to do, not a thing to beg for arms while holding a lantern made out of a split coconut shell. The vendor cried, Haribola, I wanted to add my voice to the chorus. Hey, Harry, even though I suspected Harry was part of a God's name, small letter G. That Yausang mama was not home. She was visiting her parents in in fall, Baba was taking get another nap. I couldn't have asked him to split a coconut shell anyway. I made an old Amul milk powder canister behind the guava tree out back. The rest was easy. A piece of wire stolen from Baba's desk drawer, where he stored cassette tapes without intestines, chip gospel tracks, and other such odds and ends. The fire and a little candle placed inside the Amul canister. My lantern was done. The sky started to emitted my back when Baba had scratched my prickly heat, and a roasting smell made me hungry. The ceremonial straw hut was burning. I waited behind our gate post. Soon, the village children marched down the lane from the direction of the patty fields. The boy with the face like an unripe bottle gourd was the leader. When they had passed the fork that led to our gate, I came out of hiding. At first they didn't notice or acted like they didn't. Nakatang was not a time for noticing unimportant things.