NAVARATHRI IN NEWPORT

It is Diwali this weekend - and nothing outside the home to show for it. But so it was for Navarathri.

I was missing all the Navarathri fun, I felt, and I did miss the seeing the kolus of Madras.

So I was pleasantly surprised when my nephew and his wife invited me over for kolu. We went expecting an artistic arrangement of mementoes and cute toys.


Imagine my delight when I saw a display on five steps (made with stuff bought from Home Depot - the famous do it yourself chain store) and lovely kolu bommai's on them in glorious bright colours. Shalini told me that they had brought the dolls over from Madras over various trips. I admired her - with a toddler and a five year old, and going to work, she had done a wonderful job - and asking people over too to visit the displays and feeding them ‘sundal’ and coffee! Shalini told me that some of her friends also had kolu displays.

This part of Jersey city where we live, called Newport, does have quite a few South Indians. There are many like us, parents who have come to be with their children and grandchildren for a while. And they have formed a kind of informal group who meet in the evenings regularly. Being a sedentary kind of character, I prefer to be at home and play with Samyukta.

Meanwhile I learnt from Jago,a lady who assists us with the cooking,that in another part of Jersey city there was a different kind of celebration on the Friday night of Navrathri.

We decided to check it out - and when we went there, I could not believe I was in the USA, and that this was not India. Such was the atmosphere that night. The main street had been closed to traffic by 9 pm, and there were police cars on either side to keep it blocked. We left home - Vandana’s parents and I,leaving a sleeping Samyukta with her father and grandfather. A stage had been constructed on the side of the road on which a lady and her group were singing popular dandiya numbers, to which everyone was dancing. There were young and old, men and women, some carrying babies in their arms,traditionally and colourfully dressed, all dancing away to the hypnotic rhythm.

(Click on collage for an enlarged view)

I watched open mouthed, amazed at this show of a part of India – I am told most of the Indian population in this area is from the North. Those present there on that day were mostly second and third generation immigrants, keeping the tradition of their country of origin alive. We watched for nearly an hour, the tempo never slowed nor the mood fade.

Funnily I have never seen a dandiya dance at home – Navarathri in Madras is mostly about kolu!

Let me see now what is in store for Diwali - the twinkling illuminations across the river are a part of every night. “Just wait till Thanksgiving and the Christmas season,” says Sriram.


For Diwali at home, we have planned on celebrating as usual – new clothes, sweets and the other trappings minus the fireworks.

HAPPY DEEPAVALI

The rainy season in Chennai is sandwiched in the three weeks or four between the two main festivals - Navarathri and Deepavali. Old timers in Chennai often point out how it will definitely rain on the last day of Navarathri, and last till beyond Deepavali.

One would think it was enough to dampen (literally) people’s spirits. But no! Deepavali, which literally means row of lamps, (though we never have that in the south) is the one festival when people really go berserk – new clothes, fireworks and crackers, sweets galore and that phenomenon - Diwali movie releases. The reason for the festival is often forgotten, but the
celebrations never diminished.

This year too, the rains came on schedule – thank goodness, otherwise we would have had to face a drought in the summer. For the last two weeks it has been raining constantly, with heavy downpours off and on, telling us that the north west monsoon is doing its business thoroughly.

The festive spirit rules and one can see the enthusiasm of the people, especially when it comes to shopping. Newspapers, magazines and the television are blazing with colourful advertisements for clothes, sweets and snacks, and firecrackers. Along with these are ads for refrigerators, microwaves, pressure cookers, mixies and so on – because many companies give festival bonuses to their staff now, and they have to be helped to spend it.

To us, the festival is rather low key, since there are no youngsters at home to bring that exuberance in. But we follow tradition and have bought the required new clothes, a few firecrackers
and made some sweets. Since my mother is here we decided to make her specialty - laddoos, all the while reminiscing on earlier occasions when she made them. My nephew as a little fellow used to refer to them as 'round, round, yellow things'.

When my boys were young children, they would start talking about Deepavali from weeks ahead. The lead up to the festival was the most fun. Their main concern was fireworks and crackers, and to buy them early enough so they could be dried and made crisp in the sun, when it shone between rains. My father-in-law would give them and their cousins a rupee (a rupee went a long way then) each everyday from a month before, to buy
crackers. And they had to spend it the same day, which meant they got to burst crackers everyday. The major share had to be purchased by their father. One year, my son, fed up of reminding him, left a message for him on the cassette recorder, “‘Appa dappaskku thuttu tha’ (Father, give us money for the crackers).” Repeating it faster and faster till it reached a crescendo. And played it constantly.

Clothes were not very high on their list of priorities, and they were all right with
whatever we got, even if it was tailored by me. But sweets and savouries were another matter. They used to love sweets, and would request their favourites to be made – some of which can be made only by professionals, or at least, not by me. And the kitchen would be a scene of active preparation for up to a week ahead. (Sweet shops and professional caterers were not so much on the scene then). The finished products, whether hit or miss, were consumed happily - along with the goodies brought by our neighbours and relatives, with whom we exchanged ours.

On the day, after the mandatory oil-massage and baths
early in the morning, and wearing the new clothes, they would light
fireworks and crackers, and eat sweets first thing, with no one telling
them off. Later on with visiting friends and cousins and return visits,
it would be one long day of merrymaking for them. When television
arrived, there were special programmes on Deepavali, and the interest in seeing movies in theatres waned. In recent years I have seen it pick up, however.

That frenzy of activity is missing now in our pre-festival days.

But when friends and relatives with young children visit on the day, we once again get a whiff of that innocent happiness of childhood.

Swarna sent me this link. Listen to the joyous melody of Deepavali. http://psuseela.tripod.com/sus13.ram.

P. S. If you can't open it, try this
- (courtesy blogeswari)

'BELLS ON HER TOES'

I have just got myself a new pair of metti - or toe rings - my favourite item of jewellery. The ones I bought now are a largish, heavy pair, which will reverberate with gentle clunks whenever my feet touch the ground. Sheer indulgence.

Traditionally toe rings come in sets of pairs, two to each toe. Married women wear these silver rings on the second toe of both feet to proclaim their matrimonial status - rather like the mangalasutra. It is said to have the additional virtue of absorbing any transgression (paap/paavam) on the part of the wife, if her foot falls on the husband unintentionally at any time ( am not giving any ideas to angry wives). Today the toe ring has become a fashion accessory.

One of the sweetest stories about toe rings I have read is one from the Ramayana. Rama and Lakshmana are wandering around in the forests looking for Sita, who has been abducted by Ravana. A vanara comes to them carrying some jewels and asks them if they belong to Sita. Rama asks Lakshmana if he can recognize them. Lakshmana answers he can recognize only the toe rings, he has never raised his eyes to look beyond Sita’s feet!

I have worn my way through several pairs of toe rings. My first set was obviously worn on my wedding day. It was a pretty pair with the rings not smooth, but twisted in a plait, and had three little bells on each pair, which tinkled sweetly each time I took a step. Very, very bridal. But the toe rings had this habit of slipping off my toes when I wore them with sandals, and getting catapulted two feet away, possibly because of the straps of the sandals. One evening when we went out this happened once too often, and I pulled them off, and as I wasn’t carrying a handbag, asked my husband to put them in his pocket. He promptly refused, saying he could not possibly put in his pocket anything I had worn on my feet. “You will be asking me to put your slippers in my pocket, next!” he grumbled.

Soon the bells fell off, one by one, and I did not like to wear the toe rings with just the vacant little loop. So I exchanged them for a plain pair. I cannot remember a time when I have not worn them - except maybe for the couple of years we were in Manchester in the early 1970s – they did not fit comfortably under the shoes I had to wear. Over the years, the toe rings did wear out, and I kept exchanging them. After all, wearing toe rings is said to be good for the wearer's heart.

On one occasion, I had decided to get them replaced just before Diwali, 1975. I chose the traditional pattern of plain pairs of rings, and tried them on in the shop. They seemed a tight fit, but the assistant assured me that it would get looser and so I walked away with the pair. I wore them the day before Diwali, and they did feel a bit tight, but I did not think much of it.

By evening my toes had started to swell and hurt quite a bit, and I decided to take them off. I had to attend my friend Nalini’s dance performance that evening, and I did not fancy enduring pain instead of enjoying the performance. But when I tried to pull them off, they wouldn’t budge! I could rotate them gently bit by bit on my toes, but pull them out I could not. I decided that I would wear them - and bear the pain. And so I limped my way to the event, and while Nalini danced on her henna painted toes on the stage, I went through a series of toe tapping all my own in the audience.

Back home, we had another session of let-us-remove-Raji’s-metti. It was my niece’s first Diwali after her wedding, and there was quite a motley group at home. Everyone was helpful and free with suggestions. Maybe a couple of them grumbled – why did she have to change her mettis NOW? But mostly there were positive ideas – one said use soap - we had already tried this basic method and it had not worked. Another said pull them out by force. My husband had a brainwave - run some twine under the rings and then pull. It took some time to coax the twine under the rings, but after about 10 minutes of manouevering it was done. He pulled it out and grabbing both ends pulled hard. The toe rings came with the twine, to me it seemed my toes too had, so agonizing was the pain. But the relief after it came out! Now we had to pull out the other pair. But no amount of manipulating allowed the twine to go under the rings. The rings were simply too tight on this toe.

“Let us continue tomorrow, it is too late today,” said my husband, as though it was a cricket match. So the next day, after the ritual oil - bath and sweet eating of Diwali, we tried to work on the toe rings again. I did not dare complain of the pain, which was quite bad. The toe had itself turned a kind of deep blue, and the general opinion was that I should go to a doctor now. And so I limped, and my husband walked, to the nearest doctor who was open on Diwali morning – Dr. Ravindra Padmanabhan. I had been to him a couple of times when the children had minor ailments. I was extremely embarrassed to tell him the problem – alas! what pains we women subject ourselves to just for the sake of adornment.

He looked at my toe, and tried to prise open the rings – the toe rings are left unsealed and can always be forced open or closed, to adjust the size, but preferably without the toe inside – but that did not work. He then told us to come to his house in an hour when he would be back there. “My father’s tools would be a better bet,” he said. “He is an engineer.” I trembled – what ‘tools’? An hour later while I sat in trepidation at his place, he sterilized a pair of pliers borrowed from his father’s toolbox, anaesthetized my toe, and after a brief struggle broke off the toe rings, and pulled them off. The relief was so great, I nearly fainted.

The experience did not stop me from wearing metti. I waited for everyone to forget the incident, and went to the jewellers’ to get another pair. This time I made sure they were of the proper size.

And now I am looking at anklets, which I have never worn before.