Ramon's mom

Williamsons were a happy couple till their adopted son seven years old Ramon (he was Raman in the records of the adoption centre) from India asked the inevitable question. They knew this would be coming one day or the other. They tried to shield him from the past as much as possible bringing him up like a typical American. They provided him with all facilities like any well to do American family would do to their own children. He was given fancy toys like video games, remote controlled cars, innumerable board games, cycle, manual scooter that occupied a major portion of his room. He was put into Karate classes, swimming lessons and soccer. He was trained to play clarinet. Except for his colour and facial features, he was a full fledged American boy mingling with his friends without any inhibition.

Ramon wanted to know who his biological parents were and why he was given to the adoption centre. It was just curiosity to know his background. He had no intention of going back. He loved his adopted parents very much and made them proud by excelling in his studies, games and general behaviour.They were very pleased with their choice and would do anything to make the boy happy. Normally the adopted parents do not encourage any relationship with birth families for fear of stumbling upon unpalatable facts. But Williamsons decided to explore the background.
The adoption centre would not part with the details of biological parents as a policy. Their endeavour failed to elicit any information except the year and the name of the small town where they accepted the boy for adoption centre. Most do not push for information. But Williamsons would not accept defeat easily. They sought the assistance of a company which specialized in tracking and searching the families of adopted children for a hefty fee. These companies have a knack of ferreting out the information from the employees of adoption centres, police records, orphanage homes and visiting door to door in the neighbourhood.It would take time and enormous patience. But they succeeded in a few cases.
Williamson got a favourable reply after almost a year. The couple along with Ramon traveled to India for a face to face visit initially by them and subsequently along with the boy. They did not reveal their plan or of their effort to track his parents. The visit was ostensibly on a holiday to the country of Ramon’s birth place. The representative of the search company met them at the dining hall of the hotel where they were lodged. Ramon was not present. He was swimming in the pool. The information given was disconcerting.

They could track the mother with much difficulty. Ramon was an illegitimate child. The woman does not remember the father of the child as she sold her body for food. She remembered leaving the child at the adoption centre but suffered no remorse for the act. It was a good riddance for her as it was the wages of her sin. She is found begging at the entrance of the local temple. Not a pleasant sight with her long and haggard face, unkempt and matted hair that had not seen a wash, she was dressed in a torn and dirty red colour sari that was scanty to cover her body in full.

Williamsons made sure that the information given was authentic as the tracking company had a reputation. They just wished to see her from a distance before they left and had no intention to establish any contact. They felt it was best to hide the facts from Ramon as it would do no good to him.
When they visited the local temple in the evening along with boy taking pictures of the temple, the gopurams, the chariot car and the elephant, they clicked on the line of beggars at the entrance. She was unmistakably there with a well chiseled face that was ravaged by hunger and abuse. They dropped ten rupee notes into the bowls of the beggars who were sitting in a line. When they came opposite to her they lingered for a few moments longer and dropped quietly a five hundred rupee note into her bowl. Ramon was elsewhere busy watching with awe the elephant eating coconuts and taking coins from the passers by.