MAMI'S PALLU
It was the hour before the rise of sun.
The time of the day when the colours in the sky play a brash melody.
A bluish canvas, sprayed with an orange brush with a tinge of pinkish hue.
Birds could be seen flocking away in a neat 'V' formations,
their wings flapped in synchrony in the skies above.
The mercury had yet to rise on that late autumn evening.
The ST bus had bypassed Chiplun and we were on our way to Ratnagiri. Most of the passengers were repossessing their dreams.
The driver representing the bus company, whilst me and my Sethji representing the passengers, the only three awake owls at that time of the day.
He swirved off the main road and entered a bylane, stopping next to a small tin house.
He jumped out of his seat carrying his plastic bottle and his towel.
Me and Sethji , too, followed suit.
From behind the tin shed I could hear him gargling his mouth and clearing his throat with water. The loud spitting noise of the water hitting the muddy soil, was soon followed by the man himself responsible for those early morning rituals.
"Basaa rav! ", he said to me pointing at a charpoy bed outside the tin house.
Sethji plonked himself down, as I wondered whether those ropes of coirs from coconut husk that criss-crossed the wooden frame and balanced the 4 legs , would also support 120 kilograms, nurtured on pure desi ghee.
I sat at its other end.
"3 chai, elaichi special", he barked without even looking at anyone in particular and took out a bundle of camel beedi from his shirt pocket, handing one to me.
As he was lighting my beedi, I could see the home/ restaurant owner step out of the tin house.
There was a make shift kitchen in the verandah. She placed her 2 year old on the floor, covered him with a blanket which was darned with multicoloured rafoo pieces and went on to pump the greasy black sooted stove.
As the milk boiled and started to vapour up, she puffed it down with a few mouth blows and lifted the aluminium utensil with the edge of her saree pallu to pour the milk into the glass cups.
The elaichi chai was very refreshing.
We dunked and gobbled a couple of Parle Gs and were soon on our way.
Though our bus had travelled 25 kilometers beyond Chiplun, I still lingered 25 kilometers back.
My thoughts still twined around the sight of the gruhadevta blowing the milk and lifting the utensil with her pallu.
As the bus hurdled forward towards Ratnagiri, my eyes gazed at the the sleepy villages of Chiplun taluka running fast behind,
at the herd of cows standing in field grazing nonchalantly,
at the occasional man on his cycle hurriedly getting out of the path of the oncoming bus.
Yet, my thoughts constantly went back to that pallu and the milk utensil.
The story, of course, doesn't start or end here.
The day I first saw my Mami, is etched in my deep consciousness.
As was customary in the 70s, five grown ups were to go and 'inspect' Mama's bride to decide suitability.
It was also customary to take a litlle girl to lighten up the atmosphere. As there wasn't any feminine gender of the right age to chose from, I was voted to go along.
It was all a bit overwhelming for a 5 year old. The grownups from the other side were plucking at my cheeks and ruffling my hair, as if I was a Bernard poodle!
I was getting restless, the talks were getting to me and there wasn't anyone to talk or play with.
Until Mami came into the room.
As seen in many Bollywood movies
She carried a tray of tea for all.
Everyone got a cup, but me.
She must have noticed. Soon she got up, took me by her hand and offered me the round Marie biscuits and her tea cup to dunk them in.
She didn't pinch my cheeks or run her hand through my hair .
At 5, i was still struggling to tie my shoe laces. My motor development, like my intellectual growth, lagged by many years.
When we were about to leave, she bend down to tie my shoe laces. She simplified the steps so i could understand them. In fact , she was my guru since this shoe lace tying episode. That technique, I have since passed on to my children.
After that day, on some pretext or the other, I visited Mamis home on many occasions, before her marriage to Mama.
She would take me to their back garden. There was a swing rope attached on a banyan tree. They had a make shift seesaw of a wooden plank on a trap branch.
"Sachin, this is my favourite past time, to swing and seesaw.
All that goes up has to come down. And all that goes down, has to come up,
You just need to apply the right amount of energy to lift it",
She always called me by my maternal name, Sachin. It was customary to have 2 names. Paternal and official and maternal and unofficial.
SSC was a big mile stone in mid 1980s. Preparations started very early, possibly in 9th standard itself.
School used to finish early on Saturday and I would then take the 1.45 pm slow local train from Goregaon to Santacruz.
Ghaskadvi kaka stayed in Reserve bank quarters behind linking road, Santacruz. He taught me English.
Not from any text book, but from his heart.
"What goes in Frost's mind when he says", he would ask me,
'Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth', .
He never dissected a poem.
In his own words, describing the adjectives, understanding the rhymes and meters was like conducting a postmortem of a poem.
"Think like a poet and breathe the site as he would have, then and only then, can you relive it through the poets eyes!".
Little did kaka know that this student of his, was going to merely stutter past his English exam. Poetry was going to be a closed chapter in his life, as he would be weighing 2 kilo Tur dal and 1 kilo besan for the rest of his life, at the corner shop which Sethji owned.
But then, if Ghaskadvi kaka hadn't taught me, I wouldn't have been spending my weekends in Khar, with my Mama and Mami.
After finishing with kaka, I would catch the 5.30 pm 201 bus from link road to Khar every Saturday evening and stayed with Mama Mami. The next morning, Kaka would again teach me at 8 am.
After the first 2 months the 201 bus conductor and driver knew me by sight.
The driver would stop the bus a few meters beyond the stop, so I could avoid the mad rush at the stop and climb in.
Aai had made besan laddoos for them on my last day of travel.
Like many good things, the waves of time snatched Ghaskadvi kaka, the 5.30 pm 201 bus conductor and the driver away.
Memories, though, like moss on the lake side lingered on...
Mama was the youngest amongst 6 siblings. 5 sisters and the ladlaa youngest.
His home was just near Khar danda, a good 30 minute walk from linking road. He worked long hours in a nut bolt factory.
When I reached their home, Mami would have my snack ready. It usually was chivda and chakli. Once a month we would walk down Carter road and have corn cob during the shravan month or khare sing after our evening meal.
Weekend was a time to
relax after a gruelling week.
But Mama Mami never watched TV.
To avoid any distraction for me, so I could concentrate on my SSCs..
She would clean rice and dal, or pop the pea pods or peel away the garlic buds just to keep me company, late in the evening, whilst i studied.
I have always seen her in a saree.
The pallu stretched from the left shoulder over her right behind her back. Her hair was tied in a single pleat, thick black and neatly partitioned in the middle of her forehead. A large round bindi adorned the root of her nose and a band of sindoor in her forehead hair partition.
She wore silver anklets and a toe rings in her feet. I used to notice them every morning and at bedtime, when I used to touch her feet to seek
her blessings.
Sunday is a day to rest for most working families.
But not for Mama and Mami.
Even at 14 years of age, I am ashamed to say , that i needed waking up. Mami used to wake me up at 6.30.
The hot water bucket and my towel would be ready for me in the bathroom.
As I would walk out of the bathroom I would hear Mami's voice resonating from the Dev ghar, gentle and soothing, just like her demenour, not a wave of tremulousness ever affected her.
" Jyaa jyaa thikani man jay maaje
Tyaa tyaa thikani Nij rup tujhe,
Me thevito mastak jyaa thikani
Tethe tuje sadguru paay donhi".
In those early morning hours, those words sounded like hymns from a monastery.
These haunting memories still bring goose bumps 30 years on.
As I would dress up, I would hear the
ringing of the tiny bell in front of Ganpati Bappa, a sign that her pooja had finished and she was offering the prasadam.
Stepping into the kitchen, i would witness a familiar sight.
2 yellow chapha flowers were placed on top of a steel plate which covered the milk utensil.
Mami would offer one at the Lords feet and the other one would find its place behind Mami's ear, attached to her pleat with a hairpin.
Much later I gathered that it was Mamas habit to pick those flowers, Early morning,
Every morning...
My omlette would be ready by the time I settled at the table.
And as I finished the last mouthful, Mami had her pallu wrapped around the milk utensil, gripping it with two hands and blowing the steaming vaporising milk, as she poured it into my mug of bournvita.
The onion - tomato- coriander enriched egg omelette and Bournvita has never tasted as delicious in later life.
Mama would them take me on his Lambretta to Ghaskadvi kakas house by 7.30 am.
He would wait till the end and then drive me to Santacruz station. On the way, we would stop at a road side stall and buy 3 large fafdas, one for me and two to take back with him.
This was their Saturday Sunday sacrifice towards me.
The tin hut gruha devtaa had flooded back those yesteryears and unknowingly, I pulled out my kerchief to wipe the moisture that had developed at the corner of my eyes.
I got down from the ST bus as it reached Kasbe, bid my farewell to Sethji, gathered my bag and made my way to Mama's house. He had settled here after retirement.
It was nearing 7 am when I opened the gate of their bungalow. A few chicken scattered and fluttered amok at my footsteps.
The path towards the front door was littered with gulmohar flowers.
As I stepped in, I could see Mama walking through into the kitchen.
He kept 2 yellow chapha flowers on the kitchen top.
My eyes were eager to find the rightful owner of those flowers.
After what felt like eternity, Mami's voice echoed from the Dev ghar.
"'Sada sarvada
Yog tujha ghadaavaa
Tuje karni
Deh maajaa padaavaa
Upekshu nako
Gunvantaa Anantaa
Raghu Nayakaa
Magney hey chi aataa "
So many moonrises and So many moonsets have witnessed that,
Mama doesn't forget his chapha offering to Mami.
As I finished my omelette, I could see Mami holding the milk utensil with her pallu and filling my bournvita mug, blowing away the cream and vapours back.
To win over someone, one don't need a sword, or power or wealth,
Mami's pallu and Mama's chapha flowers are more than enough.....