“Don’t listen to them, Priya, Neelima is a nice girl,” Sowmya interjected. “And she is a Brahmin, ” she added for good measure.

“But not our type,” Ammamma argued. “She is a Maharashtrian Brahmin, not Telugu.”

And being Telugu was very, very essential. Telugu was the official language of my state, Andhra Pradesh, and we were called Telugu or Telugu people. Being of the same caste was not enough to sanctify a marriage. To marry someone, that someone had to also be from the same state. It was very simple: “they” were somehow lower because “they” were not Telugu.

At least “they” were Indian, I thought unhappily; my “they” was American and an un-devout Christian to boot.

“Neelima is a very good person,” Sowmya pointed out. “And her family has lived in Hyderabad for generations. She speaks Telugu fluently and cooks our food.”

Food was also very, very essential. But not as essential as the caste.

“But she brought no dowry,” Lata said calmly as she looked over the pile of mangoes my mother and I had bought today at Monda market. “Where will the money for your dowry come from?” she taunted softly, her eyes downcast as she arranged the pleats in her sari, and I saw all fight abandon Sowmya.

“I better get the knives and the chopping boards,” Sowmya said hastily, and disappeared into the kitchen.

Everyone squirmed a little after that. The subjects of dowry and marriage were a soft spot for Sowmya. She had been twenty-seven years old for the past three years and those “three years” made her feel a little less like an old maid. It also made a difference to the suitors Thatha managed to find for her. After all, a girl in her late twenties had a chance at making a better match than one who was thirty.

Objectively speaking, Sowmya would be considered plump; she wore thick glasses and had dark skin-even darker than mine. Her hair was curly and thin and she was not a beauty by anyone’s standards. But what no one saw was that Sowmya’s heart was as big as the pot she used to make payasam in during festivals.