Class 8 English Chapter 12: Waiting for the Rain

The first line of the story

The story opens inside Velu’s head, with a hope rather than a fact: he wakes up wishing that today, at last, it will rain. Then he looks at the sky and finds it empty. A reader who starts here knows two things at once. The rain matters more than anything else, and it has not come.

A red sun, and no cloud

The sun comes up glowing a deep crimson, like fire, which is a beautiful sentence and very bad news. Velu scans the sky and finds nothing in it at all. It doesn’t look encouraging, he mutters, which for a man in his situation is a remarkably mild thing to say.

How Velu farmed

Rain or no rain, the story says, a farmer wakes up early. Velu worked hard and his piece of land never failed him. He took jowar off it in one season and dhal in the next, and he kept that going right through every year, never thinking about rest or about a holiday.

Six years of his own

That pattern had held for nearly six years, ever since he got his own piece of land. The detail matters twice over. It tells us the land is new to him and precious. It also sets up the shock, because nothing in those six years prepared him for a season without work.

The year that was different

At the end of summer the rains simply did not arrive. Velu and his neighbours waited, and the waiting did not end. The story measures it in three steps, days and then weeks and then months, which is how a delay turns into a drought while nobody is quite able to say when it happened.

What the drought did to the land

The fields were left untended. The earth hardened, formed a crust and then cracked open. The barren land is described as looking forlorn, which means sad and neglected, and the word is used of the field rather than of the people standing in it.

Living on hope

The farmers lived entirely on hope, and the story is honest about how thin that is. Every single day they hoped the rains would come, and every day they were wrong. Hope here is not comfort; it is the only thing left when work has become impossible.

The suggestion about astrologers

Somebody in the village proposes a plan. They ought to talk to some astrologers, who can say what would please the heavens, and then the heavens will send rain. It is a reasonable idea in a village with no other options, and it is offered kindly.

Why Velu refused

His answer is one sentence of plain logic. The rains had always arrived with nobody consulting an astrologer, so he cannot see how talking to astrologers will bring them now. He is not mocking anybody. He is simply pointing out that the new idea does not explain the old pattern.

What that tells us about him

Velu wants a cause, not a comfort. He is willing to walk to a city to find one, and unwilling to accept an answer he cannot test. That is the most important thing to know about him before the old woman appears, because she will have to persuade a man who argues.

The weather office

So he decides to walk into the city, to the weather office, and ask somebody there. It is a sensible choice: if anybody can say when rain will come, it should be the office whose whole job is weather. The journey is not described, which keeps the focus on what he finds.

What they told him

They could not say when the sky would gather its clouds. We are at a loss ourselves, they told him, and to be at a loss is to be confused and unsure what to do. There were so many favourable conditions, and still no rain. Very odd, they called it.

Why that scene matters

It is the turning point, and it works by taking something away. Velu has refused the astrologers, and now the experts have failed him too. Neither belief nor science can say why the rain has not come. That is exactly the state a reader has to be in before a third kind of answer will be heard.

The walk back

He goes home tired and dejected, which means sad and disappointed. He is thirsty, and the dust on the road makes him cough and sneeze. Three small physical details do more than a paragraph would. Each one is a thing the drought has caused.

The tree, and the woman under it

He sees a large tree whose shade is cool and inviting, and decides to rest a while. As he sits down he notices an old woman already there, sheltering from the sun. That is where the first half leaves him. Out of ideas, in the shade, beside a stranger.

Scenario:

A Class 8 student had headaches every afternoon for three weeks. A neighbour said the cause was certainly the new mobile tower and advised her to keep away from the window. A doctor at the clinic examined her, asked about her reading and her water intake, and said she could not be sure yet. She suggested a week of noting the time of each headache and how much water had been drunk that day. The notes showed every headache on a day with less than two glasses of water. The neighbour said the doctor had been useless because she had not given an answer.

Analysis:

The neighbour and the doctor are the astrologers and the weather office of this story, and the student is Velu. Velu refuses the astrologers for exactly the reason the student should doubt the mobile tower: the explanation cannot be tested against what already happened. The weather office then tells him nothing useful and admits it, which looks like failure and is actually honesty. Notice what honesty bought here. Because the doctor said she did not know, a week of notes was taken, and the notes found the cause. An answer given too early would have stopped the search.

Activity:

Write four lines about a time you were given a confident answer that turned out to be untestable.

Title:

A drought diary

Safety:

No safety concerns.

What You Notice:

The field changes faster than the plans do, which is why the story spends so little time on the journey to the city.

Jowar is sorghum and dhal is a pulse crop, and alternating the two is a simple form of crop rotation. Velu was already doing something to look after his soil without calling it that.

A weather office can forecast a few days ahead with fair accuracy but cannot promise a monsoon, which is exactly the limit the staff in this story admit to.

Soil that has dried into a crust sheds water instead of soaking it up, so the first rain on a cracked field often runs away before it helps anything.

Velu’s two crops — Jowar, then dhal — One season each, turn and turn about.

The two places he asked — Astrologers, then the weather office — He refused the first and was failed by the second.

The woman under the tree

The story describes her in one line and tells us a great deal: her skin is wrinkled, but her eyes sparkle when she smiles. Then the smile widens as she looks at Velu, and the wrinkles go deeper with it. She is old, she is amused, and she has noticed him before he has noticed her.

Velu’s first question

What are you smiling at, Amma, he asks. There is nothing to smile about, he adds, without the rains. Amma means mother, and it is the polite word for an older woman, so even an irritable question is respectful. She agrees with him at once, and the smile leaves her lips.

Why that agreement matters

She could have argued immediately and did not. She says he is right and stops smiling, which costs her nothing and earns her a hearing. Everything she says afterwards is heard by a man who has already been agreed with once, and the story is quietly showing how persuasion works.

The complaint

Velu then opens up. He wonders what he has done to deserve this. He has worked hard and honestly, he says, and is being punished anyway. Without the rains he cannot till the land, and untilled land grows nothing. What will happen to him? How is he to feed his family?

Spoken bitterly, and to nobody

The story adds two details that change the scene. He asks the last question somewhat bitterly, which means hurtfully, and he is not speaking to anyone in particular. The old lady simply decides that he is opening his heart to her, and answers as though he were.

Perhaps you have worked too hard

That is her whole reply, and it sounds at first like nonsense. Velu takes it that way: what do you mean, can anyone work too hard? He has only done what any hard-working farmer would do, and he intends to go on working until he is too old for it.

Velu’s real grievance

His protest gives the game away. This is the first season in five, no, six years that he has neither sown nor ploughed, and it is hard, he says, not to be able to work. He corrects his own count mid-sentence, which is the mark of a man who has been keeping track.

Her argument begins

But that is exactly what she is talking about. He has strength now and can work without a break. Has he thought about the land? The earth works as well, she says, whenever he ploughs and sows and plants, and it has been working for years, for centuries, for thousands of years.

Shouldn’t someone let the land rest?

That is the question she ends on, and she asks it softly, still smiling. It is phrased as a question rather than as advice, which leaves Velu free to answer it. Rest, let the land rest, he says, puzzled, and admits that he does not understand.

The difficulty

Yes, she says, that is the difficulty: he does not realise that the earth is old. The word difficulty is doing careful work here. She is not calling him foolish. She is naming the one piece of information he is missing, which is a far easier thing to forgive.

Nature as a mother

Then comes the heart of it. Nature is a mother to all of us, she says: to him, to her, and to the trees and the water and the soil as well. She takes care that her children get the rest they need. The drought stops being a punishment in that sentence and becomes a kind of care.

The turn she makes

Her last move is the cleverest. When the rains fail you are dejected, she grants, picking up Velu’s own word from earlier. And that, she says, is exactly how the land gets left alone. It lies undisturbed, staring at the sky, resting. She takes his misery and shows him the other side of it.

And when the rains come

The promise at the end is practical rather than mystical. When the rains come, the land will spring back into activity, fresh and ready for his crop. Go home, my son, she says: Nature knows a thing or two. Then she gets up and walks away, without waiting to be thanked.

The walk home

After a while Velu gets up and walks homeward too, and the story follows his thoughts. He thinks about the land, his beloved piece of land, which, if the old woman is right, is perhaps breathing peacefully and taking a break from constant, ceaseless year-round cultivation. Perhaps she is right, he decides.

The order of the ending

He is already convinced before anything changes, and that is the point. Only then does the weather turn. A cool breeze on his back, a tiny drop on his shoulder, clouds gathering in the distance, the light going. Then lightning, thunder and sweet fragrant rain. Velu runs home laughing and happy.

Why the order matters

If the rain had come first, the story would be about luck. Velu changes his mind on an empty road under a clear sky. So the rain arrives as a reward for understanding rather than as proof of it. The old woman never promised rain at all. She only told him to go home.

Scenario:

A school kabaddi team trained every single evening for two months before the district meet, with no rest day at all. Three players picked up ankle injuries in the last fortnight and the team lost in the first round. The following year the coach fixed two rest days a week and kept the same total number of sessions by making each one longer. Nobody was injured, and the team reached the semi-final. One player complained all season that the rest days felt like wasted time.

Analysis:

The player who complained is Velu, and the coach is the old woman. Velu cannot see the point of a season without sowing, because in his experience work is the only thing that produces anything, and resting feels like loss. The old woman does not argue with his love of work. She points out that something else in the system has also been working: the earth, whenever he ploughs and sows and plants. The coach made the same move by counting the players’ bodies as part of the training and not just the hours. Rest is not the absence of work in either case. It is the part of the work that makes the rest of it possible.

Activity:

Write four lines on something you do better after a break, and say why.

Title:

Two columns of an argument

Safety:

No safety concerns.

What You Notice:

She answers only one of his complaints directly, and still wins, because the one she answers is the one underneath the others.

Leaving a field unsown for a season is called letting it lie fallow, and farmers have done it for thousands of years. The old woman is describing ordinary practice in the language of kindness.

Soil recovers nitrogen and organic matter during a rest, which is why fallow land often gives a better crop afterwards. Her promise that the land will spring back is literally true.

Velu’s own habit of alternating jowar and dhal was already helping his soil, since pulses return nitrogen to it. He had been looking after the land without knowing he was.

The old woman’s argument — You work; the earth works too — And the earth is thousands of years older.

The order of the ending — Breeze, drop, clouds, rain — He is convinced before any of it arrives.

Three ways of saying now

English has three present tenses and this story uses all of them in dialogue, which is a good place to meet them. The choice is never about politeness or style. It is about whether something is a standing fact, something happening at this instant, or something that started earlier and still counts.

The simple present

This is the form for a fact, a habit or a general truth. Oh, it is hard not to be able to work, says Velu. I am too old, he says elsewhere. Neither sentence is about one moment; both describe how things stand, which is exactly what the simple present is for.

The present progressive

Am, is or are plus the -ing form. What are you smiling at, Amma, Velu asks, and the smiling is happening while he asks. But my son, that is what I am talking about, the old woman replies, and the talking is happening too. The progressive pins an action to this instant.

The present perfect

Have or has plus the past participle. The earth has worked for years, centuries in fact, she tells him. I have worked hard and honestly, he had said earlier. Both actions began in the past, and both are still true now, which is the whole point of the form.

Why the perfect is the heart of the argument

Notice which tense the old woman chooses for her best line. The earth has worked, not the earth worked. The perfect keeps the work running right up to the present, so the land is not a thing that laboured once long ago but something still owed a rest today.

Choosing between the three

Ask two questions. Is it happening at this moment? Then use the progressive. Did it begin earlier and still count? Then use the perfect. If neither, the simple present will do, and it usually does, because most of what we say is about how things generally are.

A worked paragraph

Ravi is a farmer who practises crop rotation. Each season he plants different crops to keep the soil healthy. This year he is growing legumes, which restore nutrients. Over the years Ravi has learnt that planting one crop repeatedly depletes the soil. Now he is sharing what he knows with other farmers.

What a determiner is

The chapter picks out words like such, many, this, any, only, a little and some from the story’s own sentences. They all come before a noun, and none of them describes it. A determiner tells you which one, whose, or how many, while an adjective tells you what kind.

Articles and demonstratives

The articles are a, an and the, and they introduce a noun. The demonstratives are this, that, these and those, and they point out a particular item. This year turned out to be different uses one of them, and the word is doing the work of a pointing finger.

Possessives and numerals

The possessive determiners are my, our, your, his, her, its, their and one’s, and they show ownership or relationship. Definite numeral determiners are the plain numbers: one, two, three. Both kinds answer a question about the noun without saying anything about its nature.

Some, any and no

Some belongs in affirmative sentences, while any and no belong in negatives and questions. There is some water in the tank. There isn’t any water in the tank. Is there any water at all? The story uses this rule when Velu says the rains came without any such consultations.

Much, many, little and few

Much goes with uncountable nouns and many with countable ones, so much rain but many fields. Few means not many and little means not much. Add the article and the mood changes: a few and a little both sound positive, where few and little alone sound like a complaint.

All and several

All refers to the entirety of a group, as in all these years. Several means more than two but not many, which makes it the vaguest word in the set and a useful one when a writer does not want to count.

Each, every, either and neither

These are the distributive determiners. Each refers to items one by one, while every refers to them all together, which is why with each jump sounds different from every jump. Either picks one of two options, and neither rules both of them out.

Homophones in this story

The chapter finds four of its own words with twins. Piece has peace, weather has whether, son has sun and rain has reign. Each pair sounds identical, so the ear cannot choose between them, and only the meaning can.

Three more pairs

Plain and plane. Sell and cell. Seam and seem. The plain fields stretched endlessly, a farmer might sell his last sack of grain, and without rain it did not seem possible to grow another crop. All three sentences come out of this chapter’s own exercise.

Four words from the story

Muttered means spoke in a low voice, which is what Velu does when he looks at the empty sky. Forlorn means sad and neglected. To be at a loss is to be confused and not know what to do. And when eyes sparkled, they showed joy.

Collocation

Some words simply go together, and the pairing cannot be argued into being correct. The story gives six: favourable weather, wrinkled skin, a dejected expression, a fragrant garden, ceaseless activity and a beloved country. Swap any adjective for a close synonym and the phrase sounds wrong at once.

Scenario:

A school library printed a reading-survey form with two questions on it. The first read: Do you read some books outside school? The second read: How much books do you read in a month? Of the ninety forms returned, fourteen had the second question left blank and six had it answered with a word rather than a number. A Class 8 student reprinted the form with two words changed. The next round came back with eighty-nine of ninety answered, all of them in numbers.

Analysis:

Both questions broke a rule from this chapter. The first used some in what is really an interrogative sentence, where any belongs: do you read any books outside school. The second used much with a countable noun, where many belongs: how many books do you read. The second mistake is the one that cost the library its data. Much asks about a quantity you cannot count, so a reader who meets it beside the word books is quietly invited to answer with a lot or not many instead of with a number. Changing two words changed what the form could measure, which is a fair demonstration that determiners carry meaning rather than decoration.

Activity:

Write two survey questions of your own, one with any and one with many, and test them on five people.

Title:

Hunt the determiners

Safety:

No safety concerns.

What You Notice:

Articles outnumber everything else by a long way, which is why they are the easiest determiners to stop noticing.

A determiner is not an adjective, even though both come before a noun. An adjective says what kind of thing it is, while a determiner says which one or how many.

English is unusually rich in homophones because its spelling was fixed in print while the pronunciation kept changing for another four hundred years.

Collocation is the habit words have of appearing together. Nobody decided that weather should be favourable rather than kind, but every English speaker expects it.

The three present tenses — Does, is doing, has done — A habit, something happening now, and something that still counts.

Much against many — Much for one mass, many for many things — Much water, and many fields.