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seven in the evening. Father had drunk his usual measure of spirits and was lying, as was his habit, in a hammock slung beneath the house. Dulled by the drink, he mumbled incoherently, under his breath. Mother and the children were in the house. The mother had some words she kept up her sleeve to mock the father under just such circumstances, to bring him back to sobriety. She would comment, "the sparrow is scrounging in another bird's nest" just loud enough for him to hear. In any other family, a comment like this wouldn't have mattered. However, on that fateful day, mother's comment didn't stop father's mumbling. She repeated it louder and this time the teasing touched on a sore spot in his inferiority complex. His feelings were stirred to anger like the snake with a scalded tail. He summoned the whole family to his presence and asked, "Kids! Am I really a sparrow scrounging in another bird's nest? Is this the way your mother insults me?" The children kept startled silence, but father demanded an answer to his question more and more loudly. At last Chandra couldn't stand the tension any longer. Not wanting her parents to argue and in order to protect her mother she said, "Father, that's not what mother meant!" Like petrol poured on a fire, father's anger turned on his children. "If none of you will admit to your mother's abuse, may you be born deaf for five-hundred lifetimes!" The curse struck fear into Chandra's heart. The parent's word was sacred. Parents should never curse their children. "I am the one responsible for his anger", she blamed herself, "I will surely be born deaf in my next life! What can I do? If I apologize to father now, he will only get angrier." She remembered