"THEY'VE come, Aaji-Bai,” Alka-akka's yell welcomed us. We had reached our 'ancestral house' in our 'native place', Palolem, Canacona, mid-1960s.
Aaji was my maternal grandmother. Bai was my grandfather's sister, married at the age of six, maybe, widowed soon after, and subsequently banished to her parental home; she had spent her life wearing the inauspicious scarlet kaapad, unadorned, devoted to slogging. They shared an identity: Aaji-Bai. They had grown together, shared joys, suffered grief, and were now bedridden together. Thin necks, drooping shoulders, hunched backs, hollow chests. Wrapped in nau-vari (nine-yard) saris, no blouse. The loose padar covered their bosoms and midriffs. If they itched, young Alka-akka scratched for them, guided by their instructions. She fed them pez-kodi (rice gruel and curry), bathed them. I don't remember any foul smells, which means Alka-akka looked after them well. Their sparse hair was tightly tied into little knots behind their heads. We cousins did the customary feet-touching namaskar to Aaji-Bai. No hugging or kissing. Bai lay in a corner, upon neatly folded layers of clean sheets, her frail frame, possibly arthritic, curled up like a shrivelled, shelled prawn. Aaji sat upon a bed, legs dangling lifelessly post-stroke, resting against a thin pillow propped against the wall behind her. Bald gums. Incessantly moving chins. Drooling. Incomprehensibly lisping. "Ayka, aaa the children afyaid? We yook ugly, yike wisches." "Afraid nothing. They are your grandchildren; see you every year." Bai: "My eyes aaa yed and hoyyible." Aaji: "Oyd peop'ye look sca'y." "I shouldn't have held the mirror for you," Alka-akka sounded exasperated as she scurried to help with our luggage, wiping her hands on the back of her frayed, once-colourful parkar. My maternal uncle, Sudan-mama, the only offspring who did not 'settle' outside Goa, lived in Vasco and monitored their care. He had fetched us from the harbour at Panaji five hours away by bus-ferry-taxi. We'd had a long journey. My parents had shifted to Bombay in the 'fifties, for education or earning a living. The longing to keep 'in touch with one's roots' was strong. My summer or Christmas vacations began and ended on a Chowgule steamship. We took a best-bus from Shivaji Park to the docks at dawn, with our 'hold-alls' and packed 'chapati-bhaji'. Glass bottles covered with damp cloths kept the drinking-water cool. Luggage included Bata shoes, Champion oats, Brown and Polson's custard powder, Horlicks, even peas, carrots and apples and for the travel-sickness prone, an empty tin of Dalda... just in case. On board, we spotted faces from the previous year who, like us, were doing a temporary migration, flats locked, school-books in tow, to villages along the Konkan coast. On the return, we carried dried fish, jackfruits, clusters of coconuts, sacks of rice, dabbas of homemade laddoos and chivdas, sun-dried saaths and saanndges. No wine. We middle-decker children ran up and down the steps from the swank, uninteresting cabin-area to the crowded, exciting lower-deck which had fowl, pressure-cookers, furniture, cages, plastic buckets, etc. By day, mats and sheets were moved on the deck, to keep in the shade. At night, off Ratnagiri, a dangerously swaying rope ladder was lowered to a bobbing row-boat. Children went first, then the baggage, then adults, by the light of a lantern; efficiently, but with much yelling. Strong hands and a sense of balance were the safety measures. And an old truck tyre. None feared accidents. No lights twinkled on-shore. Undiluted darkness, salty smells, strong breezes. Everybody spoke in Konkani. Even the Catholics who normally spoke English and the Hindus who preferred Marathi at home. There were unexpected treats, like the passing by of a huge naval ship or the lunar eclipse we saw once. Ferry rides across the Mandovi and the Zuari were hot and sweaty. By the time we reached Chaudi, by a carreira (old-style bus) from the jetty, and then home in a taxi, we de-urbanised. The bulb-less rooms, the giant sentinel banyan in the aangan (courtyard), the high tiled roof and Aaji-Bai did the trick. On the beach, there were times when ours were the only footprints on the sand. A million-shell carpet-on-sand, the rapponn to choose the next meal from, the coir smouldering 'neath our bathwater and the buffaloes in the yard. Forays to the toilet were with escort, lest a snorting pig chomp off a slice of our bums. The slide upon which excreta fell still exists. The tin-shed that stood above it has collapsed into ruin. The pigs are gone, gone. As taught, we kept the tulshi-vrindavan to our right and our vaans (footwear) outside when we entered or exited the aangann. We learnt from the servants how to weave, with our fingers, toes, and some banana fibres, fresh aboli blossoms into fatyo. Food memories: home-grown and -processed coconut-oil, wood-fires, low windows, smoke-blackened walls. No chef today can make a decent mooga shaak or a sukbaangdya kismor. The pearly oysters, motiyan kalwan, like kalleraan khaapan, have probably become extinct. As teflahn (Indian Sichuan Pepper Corns) soon might be. We cousins competed in village races: drive-a-bicycle-as-slow-as-you-can, coconut-breaking and langdee (a game like tag or hopscotch). My eldest mama (uncle), a surgeon, had married a Portuguese woman. She lived in that house for some years, causing distress to some in the community. Remarkably, the family's womenfolk accepted her with ease and affection. (Now 98, she's still a valued Maami to four generations.) Village neighbours patted the taxi and gaped at us: "Look, shoes. City-paklos." One fellow spat that he had, actually, sat in a car once. He knew, he had seen, the trees running alongside the road. We mimicked him. The sound reached Bai's ears. Her vision was blurred, but she could hear clearly. Aaji couldn't hear well. But she didn't have cataracts. She remarked to Bai: "They are fair, plump, get someone to keep away the Evil Eye." She spoke with authority, though her voice wasn't strong. "They must be hungry. Alka, put the rice on the stove." "The luggage first," Alka-akka retorted, balancing a bag on her head, hugging another to her chest. "Have you washed the rice thoroughly?" Bai asked. "Your grandchildren won't get a single weevil or stone. I've ruined my eyes cleaning the grains." Alka-akka swung the luggage down and scurried into the kitchen. Sudan-mama's voice boomed through the thick, mud walls. "Everybody, washed your feet? Hands? Go in, then." "Start frying the fish," Bai ordered. Aaji: "Before lunch, get rid of the Evil Eye. Throw red chillies and mustard seeds into the fire. Make sure they splutter." We smirked: "Superstition." Aaji-Bai: "You aren't afraid of the Evil Eye?" "No." "The Evil Eye doesn't affect the brave. Alka... lunch." "I won't keep anyone starving," the Alka-akka mumbled. "They've only just arrived and you've begun fussing already." We children bowed before the family deities, then sat upon paats not far from the chulas. Curries bubbled in shallow copper or brass vessels on squat stoves; fish-slices sizzled alongside them on a griddle. Aromatic smoke added micro-thickness to the blackened walls. Alka-akka blew through a phuknni (blow-pipe) to rouse the fire. Aaji-Bai were proud that we spoke English. We were their window to another century, another world. Unpacking. The 'hold-all', a large, rectangular green canvas sheet with pillow-sized pockets at either ends, held our clothes, some for Alka, new saris for Aaji-Bai, steel utensils, an umbrella, books, underwear, footwear, talcum-powder, soap, even one bedpan. "So useful," was Aaji-Bai's appreciative comment when the last item was shown off. Prices were discussed. We had brought along a toy phone to show them what a phone looked like. Each dawn, we chewed mango-leaves to cleanse our teeth. After every meal, the kitchen floor was smeared with cow-dung. Alka-akka spread the sludge with her fingers to make circular designs. It took a couple of minutes to dry. We described to Aaji-Bai what floor-tiles in Bombay were like. Glazed, smooth, that could be wiped so they'd look like new. No one used dung anywhere, anymore, we said. Another fascination was for the rapponnkars, the fisherfolk who dragged in the fish-catch from the sea. In the 1950s, Palolem was sparsely populated, a sleepy little village, unchanged through several centuries. In the mornings, the gentle sun sprayed through the wide-armed coconut leaves playing hide and seek with the grass below. Beyond the playful, frothy waves, was a dark dot against the shimmering blue. The dot grew bigger as it approached the shore. No guesses there: it was a fishing boat, returning after a hard night's work, loaded with fish, the staple food of the dwellers of the coast. Before it came within a couple of yards of the shoreline, a group of young fishermen from the village sprinted towards it. Wordlessly, rapidly, they stood in two lines, side by side, in pairs, ready to drag in the heavy net. They pulled together, swaying in unison, back and forth, then steadying themselves again. There was a rhythm in their limbs and a song in every breath. Even in my childhood, in the 'seventies, I remember, the nets were alive with silver grey fish that flailed up and down, gasping, trapped, fluttering in panic. Ajo, my grandfather, hurried up with a gang of grandchildren in tow: "See that!" he bellowed. "That's the rapponn." The ingredients for our lunch, the fresh fish, were bought there, and taken home to be cooked. We cheered the fishermen, who pulled, relaxed, pulled, heaved, in rhyme and rhythm, as their ancestors had done since time immemorial. Choosing fish for meals was serious business. Would the family enjoy the delicate slender, translucent lady-fish muddashi, the flat, scaly sole-like lepem, the triangular, perfectly edged white meaty pamplate, or maybe the strongly flavoured bony sardines or tarley which closely resembled the plump mackerels or bangde? Each species had its own distinct flavour and a method of cooking that would enhance its taste and texture. The buyer had to bear in mind which member of the family was fond of which kind, and how often that had been cooked in gravy or fried in the last many days. Post-monsoon until just before Holi was the time to enjoy the bounty of the Arabian Sea. Through the dramatic rainy season, they had to depend on vegetables, pulses or dried marine life. So many motifs in rangoli were derived from that 'scape. Ajo was a brisk walker. A black umbrella sheltered his turbaned head, under the hot April/October sun. A stream of sweat trickled down the side of his forehead. He lifted the edge of his dhoti with his fingers as he jumped over the small stones which paved a route over a stream. Another stretch of the red mud lane and after that stretched the sandy shore. His coconut baug flourished by the salty coast, fronds of palms densely bordering the white sands and the azure waters with frothy waves. The coconut tree-climbers, specialists known as rendhers, waited for him, sitting on their haunches, inhaling long drags of smoke from their bidis. They were rugged men, with thick, tanned skins; naked, except for the loin-cloth into whose string was tucked their solitary implement — the sharp-edged, curved koyti (sickle). "Bhatkar-baab ailo, the landlord has come. Let's begin," they chorused. The counting and felling of coconuts took them the whole day, and they had to finish the job before the sun set. Then they took their share of coconuts or rice or the fermented toddy. Indeed, unless they completed the task, they wouldn't be allowed to tap the sap to make their soro or toddy. The palm gave the family food, fuel, framework for their houses (the trunk), roofing material (from the woven dried frond) and coir rope. It was no wonder the tree and its fruit, was found worthy of offering to the gods. Artists couldn't resist drawing its circular crown; its latticework of leaves casting cool shadows below. They couldn't resist either the long, slender, scarred trunk that wove skywards; so aesthetic, so functional, so pretty. It showed in many rangolis. Until the 1980s, grandchildren who lived in the big cities came 'home' to the villages during the vacations. (In our Mumbai flats, where there was no cow-dung, no mud, and little space, we often made rangolis on mica-sheet-topped dining-tables.) Immediately after sunset, we said a brief prayer and had dinner. Then, on a santri on the aangan floor, we lay on our backs, watch the stars, the passing clouds, the moon. There were no streetlights, it was pitch dark all around, and silent but for us, insects and frogs. Ajo pointed out the constellations and told us stories about them. Occasionally, he told us about his aunts and mother, their talent at making rangolis. One day, the rendher was at a loss: how was he to convince young Saurabhbaab to not climb a coconut tree with him? Saurabh had seen a nest on the branches of one particular tree and heard fledglings crying for food. He knew the mother bird would feed them worms, and he wanted to see that. At last, the rendher picked up Saurabh and held him high so he could look at the babies! As soon as Saurabh was put down he pestered the old rendher to show him the kittens in the store room, and then he wanted to see the cow and her calf, and afterwards... the chicks. It was mid-afternoon by the time they finished, having circled the house and the surrounding baug, the gardens, three times. The poor rendher was craving his afternoon siesta. As he lay down under the tree, came a volley of questions: What about the tiger? Does he come here? From where? Have you seen him? When? The rendher told him, yet again, the story about the tiger with a kind heart, about the buffalo who died, the dog who lived down the road, and more. Finally, he gave Saurabh a packet of coloured powders and told him to draw rangoli animals right next to him, whilst he, the render, slept for a while. 'Native places' like Palolem were a world far removed from theirs, with no electricity and no running water. A world of plenty; of living close to Mother Earth, devoid of some comforts, rich in others. The 24-hour steamboat ride was followed by a rattling drive in a crowded, dilapidated bus from Madgaon -- the closest large town two hours away -- where the family gathered for the summer. Pickles, preserves and the precious dried fish were carefully stored for the wet months. The change of weather was welcome, and there was great rejoicing at the first downpour. Even today, the celebration of the rains continues. A typical scene from those vacations: a cousin sat on the balcão, sucking a mango, squeezing the juice, concentrating on not spilling any flesh, inhaling sharply to savour every drop of juice. Nevertheless, it escaped from his fingers, his mouth, until his cheeks and shirt were smeared with it. It trickled down to his elbow; he wiped it with his shirt. One mango down. There were so many mangoes in the basket. A roomful of such baskets, just waiting to be eaten by hungry young adolescents. The mango has a shape better known abroad as the paisley. Local motifs, carvings and jewellery have plenty of mangoes, pineapples and bananas in them; those motifs make their way into sari-border-weaves, woodcarvings and, you guessed it, rangolis. Tropical fruits, tropical imaginations, Goan skills. Every flower, every shrub has a role to play in worship. The curly-petalled, red hibuscus is offered to Lord Ganesh. The fragrant, long leaves of the kevda; the strong smelling, tiny vovlan; the white, elegant shevanti and the exceptionally pretty aboli are local Goddess Shantadurga's flowers of choice. Universally loved Krishna gets the tiny white, flame-centred parijat (night jasmine). The regal, sturdy champa gets a place beside the mighty Shiva. The jackfruit and the cashew are steadfast in the role of honour. The latter, more so, along with pepper, nutmeg and other spices, it attracted raiding armies that sailed to India from across the seas with plunder as their motive. I remember the roasted cashew and jackfruit seeds... roasted over wood fires, cracked and consumed immediately. Varied shapes, interesting hues, all found their way into floor art. Velvet afternoons were times for handwork. It gave respite from the gloom of the monsoons when one was restricted to the indoors for days, often weeks at a stretch. Needlework. Once, Aji took a week to make a rag doll. A girl cousin wanted the doll to look like the peasant gawdi woman who sold vegetables in the market, the one with the red checked sari, who wore a necklace of coins and beads. Aji had made the doll from the pieces of fabric she had collected from her trip to Bombay. She had tried to copy the dolls she had seen in the market there. And this grandchild, she wanted a gawdi doll? We city-bred grandchildren were happy making things with our hands. "How about weaving a mat out of the dried coconut fronds?" we asked. "Or making a garland of flowers with the sunset-orange aboli?" We were little, our fingers nimble, and our imagination soared with every craft we learned. Stories were woven around crude wooden dolls bought at the local weekly market. Myths and legends found their way into these stories, later to be translated into designs either in the embroideries or the rangolis we did. Some designs, like legends, lived on: like the two bright green parrots painted on diagonally opposite corners on the wooden platform paats placed on the floor and sat upon for meals. The red and yellow, brightly coloured background of these paats helped the parrots look more conspicuous. They cheered up the dank interiors of these old ancestral village homes and were brought out at weddings, poojas, births and other auspicious occasions. None tired of hearing the story of the parrots, particularly about the prince who was turned into one because of a spell. Like on the quilts, even in rangolis, the motif of the parrot lives on. I remember, once, I ran down the stairs into the courtyard, my parkar (long skirt) lifted above my feet so I wouldn't trip. I swung around, spinning on my toes, so I could billow the parkar like an umbrella around me. The soft silk floated in the air, making momentary, fragile waves. My cousin, Raina, followed suit, but she kept tripping. "How lovely the girls look," someone commented, "in those bright colours." (Someone threw mustard seeds and red-chillies in the wood-fired stove to ward off the Evil Eye.) Bai had made those long skirts from old silk saris taking care to stitch together fabrics of different colours, matching them, joining them up to make pleasing patterns. Aubergine purple, mustard yellow, vermillion red, sky-blue, henna green, rose pink... the same colours that were reflected in the rangolis. No black. Never. Aji was in the courtyard, giving finishing touches to her rangoli. She had filled in the gaps between the dots with red, yellow and bright blue rangoli powders, converting a simple skill into a craft. Colours meant happiness, cheer, goodwill. That Diwali, every corner of the house reflected joy. There were laddoo, chaklyo, neuryo, chivdo to eat, lights, scents, new utensils, and the bounty from the recent harvest: rice and coconuts, mainly. That laughter, those days, are still tucked away in many a memory today, in different corners of the planet. We all agree that the rangolis played a significant but unsung role in those memories. Much oral history was passed to us in the balcão. Either post-lunch or before sleep-time. In the veranda, there were two easy chairs. There was always a tussle to sit on them. Ajo sat on the bigger one. The smaller one was often occupied by two or three cousins. Mornings: the gentle warmth of the rising sun, cows and calves going past the gate, the soft sound of bells jingling around their neck. We pulled a small mirror out from our city-kit and bounced a ray of sunlight on the trunk of the banyan that stood sentinel nearby, on the windows and the ceiling. As teenagers, we learned that broken bits coloured glass bangles and chips of mirrors made rangolis attractive. Immediately after sunset, we said a brief prayer and had dinner. Then, on a santri on the aangan floor, we lay on our backs, watch the stars, the passing clouds, the moon. There were no streetlights, it was pitch dark all around, and silent but for us, insects and frogs. Ajo pointed out the constellations and told us stories about them. Occasionally, he told us about his aunts and mother, their talent at making rangolis. We talked about our lives. Aaji-Bai nodded cheerfully: "Living in Bombay is something else. We're bumpkins." Aaji-Bai were as interested in feeding us as they were in knowing about our schools, friends. games, teachers and neighbours. They could only imagine our lives. Savita had flown in a plane. The grannies didn't quite understand what it felt like to be in the sky. They were in awe that she had experienced something they never would. How could something that was not a bird fly? We annual guests were their link to a world beyond the 24x7 fear of death. Once, Raina asked what would happen if one of them died; "stupid', we hissed awkwardly. Aaji pragmatically replied: "The other will live on." We said: "Aaji-Bai, in our flats, water flows out from taps. We have electric geysers and proper bathrooms and a flush". It took an hour to explain how they worked. Every flat had two toilets. Aaji-Bai couldn't imagine why. Here, for a family of twenty, one toilet sufficed. Trilok, the most talkative, said: "There are two or maybe four flats per floor in buildings. And four, or even ten floors in a building." The girls drew a sketch to describe what a building, a street, looked like. Said Bai wonderingly: "These girls have our genes, our blood, and they can read, write, draw." "You are confusing illiteracy with intelligence, Aaji-Bai," said Geeta, comfortingly. "You forget, you calculated and stocked provisions needed for an entire year. You supervised the harvesting of the coconuts and the threshing of the rice. Without stepping out of the house. You made preserves. That skill we don't have." Long forgotten pride fibrillated in the aged hearts. They blushed. They had once learnt to write on a slate, with a chalk, but the memory of it was erased by time. Geeta gave them pencils and helped each write her name on paper. Bai tremulously sang a song. Tunelessly at the start. Aaji said, "Her song, her words." "You wrote it?" we asked. "Can't write," said Bai. "When did you make it up?" "I was about your age." "You still remember it?" "There are more, mostly forgotten." Geeta began to note down whatever Bai did recall. Aaji-Bai were embarrassed by this attention they were not used to. "Tradition says elders are wiser and better. Here," thought Aaji-Bai aloud, "these children are our gurus." The house, with its load-bearing walls, had few and small windows and no coat of paint. The pyramid-shaped tiled roof rose above wooden beams that rested on a central tree trunk, the main pillar of the house. A thin cloud of cobwebs dispersed the sunlight that entered through the glass pieces on the roof. At night, diyas, were lit to dispel the darkness. The children tried to explain to Aaji-Bai what electricity was. But for Aaji-Bai, who hadn't stepped out in many years, never without an escort and a good reason... it was fantasy. We asked, "You don't know what a switch is? It's on the wall. You press it, it makes a "pit" sound, and the bulbs come on. Know what a bulb is? Wires?" The children laughed at their ignorance, exasperated. The grannies joined in, not considering it ridicule but fun. Aaji-Bai had no friends. Only menfolk had friends. Women had sisters, sisters-in-law, neighbours... no friends. In the evenings, Aaji-Bai were carried out, bundled in sheets, to the balcão. The rustling trees, the singing insects, the starry sky, were unchanging. They tried to imagine bustling streets with cars, people, brightness. They were curious. In turn, they told us stories about other members of the family, characters that lived in the village, the days of their youth. Untouched by 'civilisation' it was a life of routine, little drama, robust struggle. Rupees were scarce. Bartering still happened. Music, dance, drama, was seldom witnessed. They were hungry to know about the lives of their progeny. Films? Plays? Tell us, they pleaded, tell us everything. It wasn't just the big things that impressed them. Blackboards in schools, women teachers — wearing skirts, girls in trousers, swimming in large pools, cycling, travelling alone by train — incredible. Under the Portuguese, the information they had got was by word of mouth. Newspapers weren't available. They had known no personal, social or economic freedom. Liberation, governments, had made no difference to their lives. They were 'destined' to cook, clean, tidy, chop, peel, do endless tasks, serve large and extended families. Although they were home-tutored and literate, their leisure hours had to be used to grind flour, make preserves, manage the fields. Age-related immobility hadn't dented their spirit. They were still 'managing', somehow. When we told them about our friends: 'she said this'; 'he always does that', they were amazed at how human nature, no matter where, no matter how well exposed, didn't change. ***** It was time to leave. The taxi from Vasco had come to drive us away. Beyond the river, we would take a bus to Panaji to board the ship to Bombay. I can imagine what happened after we'd left: "Alka, we can hear the sounds of the children. Have they really gone?" "Did they eat the snacks?" "Do you remember the cinema they talked about? Something about photographs moving, talking, on walls?" "There are little machines that do the grinding... this electirissitee... what could that be?" "Next year they are going to get us spectacles." And the wait for the next visit, the countdown of 11 months began. ### Born and educated in Bombay (now Mumbai), Sheela Jaywant set up homes in remote corners of India as a military nomad. Having little else to do in the pre-television era, she took to writing as a hobby. She has been writing since 1983. Her work has been published in national newspapers and periodicals. She wrote a twenty-year long humour column for the local papers in Goa. Her books are: Quilted: Stories of Middle-Class India, Melting Moments: a collection of middles, The Liftman and Other Stories, More Than an Upset Stomach: experiences of patients with Ulcerative Colitis, Rangoli: floor-art. Her stories have been anthologised in Indian Voices, Vanilla Desires, City of the Gods, She Writes, Shell Windows, Inside Out, Outside In, Carnival, Bomoicar, Railonama, Coconut Fronds, The Brave New World of Goan Writing, When They Spoke, The Best Goan Stories Ever Told and Still Waters. Her Marathi-English translations include: Ward No 5, kem, The Story of a Marwari Man, From Opa to America, Dr Suraj Pawar: a cancer surgeon. Samarpan: a hospital's story and Sangit Bari. She edited From Mind to Keyboard, is featured in Trailblazers: Women Achievers of Goa, won the Desi Writers' Lounge, second prize, 2017, for a short story, and Pallium India's Best in Print Writing Award, 2019. She was invited to the Mussoorie Woodstock Mountain Writing Festival, 2010. Her The First Book of Indlish Poems was published in 2022. This is an excerpt from All Those Tales (Nellie Velho Pereira & FN, Eds). Goa,1556 ISBN 978-93-95795-65-4. 2024. Pp242. Rs500 (in Goa). See cover here: https://groups.google.com/g/goa-book-club/c/wkYAQ4D2VA0 or http://t.ly/kan08 If you'd like to join the Tell Your Story group that offers mentoring in writing, click on the WhatsApp link below https://chat.whatsapp.com/C5ge87N4WeJAW54oUXqnBO *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*- Join a discussion on Goa-related issues by posting your comments on this or other issues via email to goa...@goanet.org See archives at http://lists.goanet.org/pipermail/goanet-goanet.org/ *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-