Shantaram Chapter 4 Summary

  • Didier and Lin discuss how to test Borsalino rabbit-fur hats for authenticity. Didier claims that Prabaker's tour was a way of testing Lin's authenticity.
  • Lin reveals that Prabaker has invited him to visit his family in his village in the north of the state for a couple of months.
  • Letitia joins them, followed by Ulla and Modena, and they discuss the loss of their friend Federico to a newfound religion.
  • Karla, Maurizio, and an Indian man named Vikram Patel show up next. He talks about how he's back from Denmark and how cool everyone is in Europe with nudity and sexuality. Then Kavita Singh, a modern Indian woman, gives her two cents about how Indian men control Indian women.
  • Karla asks Lin if he'd prefer to have happiness, knowing it would end in pain, or just avoid the happiness and the pain altogether. He chooses the happiness. (Um, foreshadowing, anyone?)
  • Maurizio and Modena start to leave Leopold's, and those left behind discuss whether Maurizio is evil or good.
  • Lettie and Vikram leave, followed by Ulla and Kavita, and Didier advises Lin to go with Prabaker to his village. Then he leaves, so Karla and Lin are all by themselves.
  • They talk about Prabaker's invitation and Bombay then head home. She tells him that she's angry with Maurizio for using her friend, Lettie, and dumping her once she hooked him up with a visa renewal.
  • Karla advises Lin to just go with the flow on his trip to Prabaker's village, and he walks back to his hotel.