Visitations (BH:D25)

August 28, 2011

I believe that I become a bit more stupider if I don't read a couple of pages of a good book on any given day. This is my favorite superstition. Yesterday I didnt read anything, so this morning I woke up feeling like a better idiot. To make up for it, I took up M.P. Veerendra Kumar's book in the morning itself. 

Amma and Tara went to the local Devi temple to sanctify the marital locket. This bit of gold is called the 'thaali' and is shaped euphemistically 'like a heart'. Before leaving, Amma had made another one of those Kerala specialities: Shrimp 'theeyal' with pearl onions. When I went to dispose the waste after breakfast, I noticed plenty of rice from yesterday dumped in the garbage can. The same Hindus in the house who had gone to sanctify the thaali are responsible for the wasted food which is super sacred according to Hinduism. There need not be religious discipline to prevent wastage of food. It is plain and simple common sense. I am deeply hurt when I see lots of food wasted. But it looks like I have to double down and bear it for the next few days. Affluent India seems to match US in wasted food, pound for pound!

I was reading about Aryabhatta being a Malayali and the Kerala-equivalent of Sisyphus called Naranathu Bhrantan (the mad man of Naranam) when astrologer uncle showed up in the morning. Looks like he enjoyed yesterday's session. We had hardly started talking when Amma's MSc class-mate and later RBI collegue aunty and family showed up. She had miraculously recovered from blood cancer 6 years ago. She had needed plenty of blood for transfusion. Her husband said that it was the volunteers of the communist party and its subsidiaries who had rushed to their help and provided blood. It was nice catching up with them after 16 years. 

The shamiana dudes continued working all day. The pvc type roofing was finished. The decorative bits will go up tomorrow. These workers have no care for the garden and the pots. The uncles who had assembled in the morning were happy to be supervisors with their Hindi bits. The Hindi regimen administered was so severe that the workers started asking for water in Malayalam: "Bellam" (for vellam=water).

We discussed with the second youngest uncle about the new Tamil Nadu tradition of someone going into trance right before the wedding. He reminisced a story from his village childhood. The local oracle would prance around with 'the god inside him'. The whole village was supposed to give him tender coconut as offering. His legitimate and illigetimate sons would assemble at the performance venue. The 'god' would miraculously always pick the oracle sons to receive the tender coconuts that devotees offer. The last act of the performance involves the oracle swinging from one of the roots that hang from the banyan tree. Tired of his partial treatment towards his sons, my late uncle, cut half way through this root one night before the performance. After he landed hard on his ass from the cut root, the oracle, rather the 'god inside', stopped the practise of handing out coconuts to the sons.

Uncles, aunts, cousins, nephews, nieces: steady stream all day. One of my 'technically' aunts, whom I consider as a cousin, came with her family. She had lived with us while she studied for her M.A in Malayalam. Now she is busy typing out her dissertation for a Phd due for submission in mid-September. Yesterday, when I was cleaning out one rack of a shelf with very old, tattered, dusty books, I recovered one of her notebooks on the "history of Malayalam literature". I moved it to one of the new shelves for reading later. She is doing her PhD under the director of Kerala manuscript library. The exciting doctoral work suggests that a hitherto un-credited work preserved in cadjan leaves is authored by Kunjan Nambiar, the creator of the art form called Ottamthullal. I hope to read it next month. She promised to lend me a few other Malayalam classics.

Jan lokpal, the temple treasure and astrology remained the most popular topics for the day. A cousin's husband, who is prone to arguments, insisted today that bears are herbivores. I told him about the documentary Grizzly Man. "That must have been just done for movie. In reality, the dont eat any meat," he continued. I head-bobbed. My cousin must be having a lot of arguments with this husband at home. Another niece whom I had likened to the actress Kajal Agarwal is now very shy around me. "She likes being compared the actress, but she wants to appear modest," her mom explained.

"This one looks like an actress?!", another nephew was incredulously dismissive. His dad had promised to come back to pick him at 7:30pm. I told him that we should impose of fine at the rate of 2 rupees for every minute his dad was late for the first hour and 5 rupees per minute after that. He got busy looking at his watch and the wall clock and calculating how much fine money he is bound to make. Someday he will work for Jan Lokpal. Turns out his dad was delayed waiting for his elder brother who was stuck in an 8am to 8pm entrance coaching special Sunday!

My youngest cousin (son of my youngest uncle) who is in 3rd grade gave me a new nickname: Dialog Bachchan. It is an innocent age. So I can be pretty sure, I overdid talking today!

State government has declared a holiday tomorrow for Ramzan. Central government offices and schools will be open. Less visitors are expected tomorrow. Which means I will have more time to read and hopefully return to the less stupid non-Dialog Bachchan existence.