November 9, 2011
Dr. Shaji has written a few articles on the freshwater fish of Kerala in the education supplement of today's Malayala Manorama newspaper. There are hundreds of species indigenous to the 44 rivers, numerous lakes and lagoons. There are a handful who dwell exclusively in the wells. The scientific names of some of these were listed. Since the discoverers are sometimes credited in the names, the list had fishes with surnames Menoni, Pillai and even one Shaji named after the author of the article. 'A fish called Shaji' would have made a good movie titled if only Priyadarshan and other plagiarism experts of Malayalam film industry hadn't already butchered the brilliant original.
Spent the day rereading K.M.Panikker's essay. Plenty of interesting trivia about Nair life in Kerala from the early 20th century. There is a tradition of "Ashtamangalyam" during Nair weddings even now. It involves eight women and girls of the family carrying trays with lamps to welcome the bride groom. This modern version has evolved from two separate traditions that continued to exist till a hundred years ago.
Ashtamangalyam in the past represented eight (ashta) auspicious objects. These were a measure of paddy, grain, coconut flower bunch, a mirror, a cheppu (small box), a lamp, a white cloth and an arrow. The arrow was supposed to stand for the warrior inclinations of the caste. Please note that the 'Warriers' from Kerala are not warriors. They belong to a group called "Ambalavasis" who are related to the activities in the temple.
Though the current tradition borrows the name from the old one, I have never seen mirror, cheppu and certainly not an arrow anywhere near a Nair wedding these days. The tradition of making eight women welcome the groom is a throwback to another tradition called 'Thalikettu Kalyanam". All the girls in the joint family household (i.e the matriarchal 'tharavadu') were symbolically married off through this ceremony before they attained puberty. The local Kshatriya ruler or Brahmin priest was the solitary groom. The feasting after this ceremony lasted for four days. So clearly no family could afford it frequently. Usually it happened once in 12 years and every girl in the family ranging from the 6 month old baby to the 12 year old took part.
The groom tied a 'thali' (sacred marital thread) to all of them. Panikker says that by 19th century, the conjugal rights, if at all there were ever any, associated with this symbolic wedding, had disappeared.
The conjugal kind of wedding was called 'Sambandham' and Nair women were allowed to have Sambadhams with not only Nairs but also Nambuthiris (Brahmins) and Kshatriyas. Polyandry was practically non-existent but since all it took for a divorce was an oral declaration, Nair women ended up having many husbands in their life-time. Panikkar states that though Nair Marriage Act was announced in 1912, its provisions of 6 months notice and 12 years of child support were rarely enacted because 99% never bothered to register their marriages. He also discusses the matrilineal transfer of property and the extrordinary closeness of the relationship between uncles and nephews among Nairs.
Panikker specifically states that the rather lose and easy marriage and divorce system prevalent among the Nairs shouldn't be treated as a sign of immorality or promiscuity. He goes to great lengths to show that Nair life was, at its core, deeply concerned about the standing in the society, so the story of lax behavior is an illusion perpetuated by writers who never got a chance to get anywhere closer than 60 yards to the Nair household because of the strict caste pollution traditions.
"Njan oru vaalu vangichondu angottu varam" (I will buy a sword and come there) I told my sister, Tara, when I saw her online.
"Vaalo?" (Tail?) she asked confused.
The sharper 'ill' sound and the hollower 'ull' (like hull) sounds get frequently confused when Malayalam is written in English. I explained to her the tradition of 'Pulikudi' (tamarind juice-drinking) associated with pregnancy. The brother of the pregnant woman (the baby's uncle that is, and in this specific case, me) stands with a sword inclined towards her open mouth. Her aunt then drips tamarind juice onto the sword so that it goes to her mouth, drop by drop. This ceremony is supposed to make the baby brave and valiant.
After the juice dripping, the pregnant woman selects a particular grain from an assembly of grains arranged before her and her choice reveals the sex of the unborn. When I had read this out from the essay earlier in the day to Achan, he said we are going back to such nonsense now that sex determination of unborn child is illegal in India. He said that the shape of the first unniyappam that is made for the pregnant woman is used to predict the sex of the baby these days!
We have both yellow and red ixora plants in the garden. Today we noticed some flowers that were half way between red and yellow. I wonder if natural cross pollination can have such wonderful effects. The button roses that we bought from Munnar have all bloomed. The alternating days of rain and shine must be doing them good.
Like the earlier Munnar weekend and Mumbai weekend, these notes will take another break from tomorrow for a hospital weekend. I hope to be back online early next week. It's mathematically cool that I am undergoing the surgery on the 100th day of my stay in India on 11.11.11.
"I will take the day off on Friday and be at the hospital," my youngest uncle said on phone. He is the universal blood donor in the family. I protest. "I will be there" he says decisively.
K.M. Pannikar, in the concluding section of his wonderful essay, prophesies that the matrilineal transfer of property and matriarchy will stay with the Nairs for a very long time because nothing short of a revolution can upset this efficient arrangement. However, in less than nine decades of his writing so, not only have joint families completely disappeared but the society here has also swung towards unabashed patriarchy.
The equality and reverence for women that he proudly noted are sadly interred deeper daily under the tales of rape, assault, molesting and forced prostitution.
But the fondness of uncles for their nephews and nieces, both unborn and those undergoing surgery, continues undiminished
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