Kishore Singh: Sleepless nights and days

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She came just like she'd gone "" all of a sudden and rudely, belching cigarette smoke all around, cackling wickedly at the less fortunate, supremely confident and childishly vulnerable. The eight-year hiatus seemed to have disappeared in a jiffy, even though our daughter had only a few memories of her. But then she came like Santa Claus in summer, hernia-inducing suitcases bulging with gifts, to become an instant favourite. Our daughter, who is at the age when all grown-ups seem like dinosaurs, took an instant shine to her, giggling at her jokes and for once clinging to rather than avoiding adult company.

In the eight years that she'd been away in Canada, getting herself an alien citizenship, our friend had put on a little more weight, had aged, but hadn't lost either her zest for life or gossip. She wanted the inside dope on everyone we knew, but surprised us with the salacious goings-on in Bollywood thanks to the NRI vibes Toronto pulses to. She disliked Canada but loved the food, was hurt by racism but swore she couldn't drive in Delhi again, had got her Canadian passport but insisted on coming back to India to settle down.

At first, when she couldn't sleep nights, we put it down to jet lag, but when she would rather sleep than talk, we said it was the peculiar loneliness first generation NRIs succumb to when they decide to migrate in their middle age to a country with which they have had no previous links. When she came off the flight and couldn't sleep, she put it down to excitement and wanted bhujia to eat.

The following night, she wanted to watch television, a movie, anything to keep her goggle-eyed when she'd exhausted our resources and it was the second time we were seeing dawn fan across the Delhi skyline before going to bed.

She wanted a chip for her mobile but, of course, the country systems didn't match so she had to do without one. A carnivore all her life, she wanted to eat "Indian" vegetables for all meals. She loved Delhi's polluted air, enjoyed thawing out in the heat when it turned humid, and smoked like a chimney through all the rooms and in the car. And she talked non-stop, almost as if she had been saving up all conversation for eight years.

She talked of her son, of the jobs she'd held, of the penny-pinching NRI community in Canada and its fabulous langar food, of the gargantuan meals she prepared and all the films she saw, of her friends back in Canada and family in India, of the Indian news channels to which she was glued, of our past acquaintances and current illnesses, of the supermarkets there and the availability of stale Indian produce in the stores, of Parle G biscuits and Bikano.

She spent three days with us before she went off to the hills where her brother and her parents were holidaying, and in those three days between my wife and I we chewed up a strip of analgesics because our heads ached with the constant jabber, and because we were deprived of sleep, and when she left, the acrid remains of her cigarette smoke clung to the upholstery so before I knew it, my throat choked up and I had an allergic reaction and was laid up in bed, and I was thankful that she had decided to spend the rest of her holiday keeping her parents awake and tormenting her brother with her smoking.

So, when she phoned to tell my wife she'd had a wonderful time with us and wouldn't dream of returning without coming back to spend a few days with us, she could hardly have believed she was already causing us sleepless nights.