Last night after shift, daughter and I watched *La Haine* with the old TV nearly blocking the door. She asked why the boys were so angry — I told her about the curfew here, how we cannot just walk to the market if we feel like. French film hit closer than our own Meitei movies sometimes, but I wish they showed what happens a year later, when the news moves on and you still must buy rice.

At the DC office for my daughter's school permit, the clerk said come next week. I thought of the curfew checks on our street, and how papers never seem to be enough. So I came home, made extra singju for my girl, and reminded myself that patience, like a good recipe, takes time to get right.

My daughter saw that Adarsh Baal Vidyalaya news and asked, "Na, over there kids sit in proper desks?" I just looked at the singju I was mixing — here our tuition class after curfew is under a streetlight with a shared chalkboard. Told her: those parents fight for their children’s desk, and here I fight just to get the curfew timings right so she can reach home safe. But I say nothing of the real gap — my daughter learns her algebra while I count the day's earnings, and no committee will fix that faster than a mother who knows the market price of rice on a shutdown day.