Lamp to Lamp to Lamp - and a beautiful angel came to light the last one

Update:
On Deepavali someone special turned up and helped us complete this target. May these lamps glow bright and continue to light those whose glow has dimmed. The festival is just the beginning of something far reaching that we are all embracing and becoming a part of. One little circle came alight and shone - more such circles of lamps will link themselves and girdle the world in a circle of light.

Lakshmi and Dipannita Kali be praised!
We made the full amount of 45000 INR!

Thanks to FB's anti-notes policy that they finally implemented  I can't update the last note with the latest figure so I have put  this up as a temporary post here to be deleted once we make the target.

A tiny little amount of 3000 INR remains to meet the collection target of 45000 INR. We are almost there thanks to the enormous generosity of friends. Now a few(or several) tiny diyas can come alight together to bring this to life in the spirit  of Deepavali. You can read the history of this fundraiser on this link

The Sailesh Vision Project - 2020 which has been archived. 

From the 9 November Update - after posting this the amount remaining fell to 3000 INR.

Most of you would have read the details of the case of Plumber/Craftsman Extraordinaire Sailesh. Thanks to an outpouring of love and support we were able to raise enough for his initial injection and funds have been steadily flowing in. His second injection has also been administered and there will be a few weeks of followup treatment. He is feeling better and is deeply grateful to all those who came forward with monetary contribution, healing thoughts and in numerous other ways. All we need now is 5000 INR to meet the total 45000 INR targeted amount and I know it will come in. Join me in wishing him Godspeed on his journey back to active life. I know many people want to be part of this and are wondering if there is any minimum amount of contribution. No there isn’t. We are grateful for amounts like 50 and 100 because we know how drops of water add up to the whole. We are grateful for every little act of love that added tremendous energy to the mission and actually helped with healing. And I also take this chance to thank all you wonderful people for helping somebody somewhere in these distressing times. I know the tireless work so many have done. My wishes and also Sailesh’s to all those givers and those blessed to receive.

PS - the note probably won't be accessible so here are the contents.

Sailesh, 65, a plumber and mistri by profession has been my friend and a pillar of unwavering support through thick and thin, including COVID and Amphan. My flat is in a 95 year old building riddled with problems created by irresponsible neighbors, chief among these being the man-made leaks that the ceiling and walls periodically sprout. The power of his wizardry in fixing these leaks as well as his ability to handle the harassers, in addition to his huge heart and readiness to rush to the rescue, sometimes several times a day, cemented our friendship. He was in pretty good shape despite having a slight problem with an eye that had been operated on for a cataract. That eye subsequently lost vision and he was managing pretty well on one. A traumatic episode in which he suddenly lost vision completely in his other eye in 2019 ended well thanks to the eye department of Calcutta Medical College that restored the vision through a series of procedures over a couple of months. Now his vision is failing him a second time and it breaks my heart as his eye hospital has been converted into a Covid ward since the past seven months and he has been denied the follow up treatments that were to continue for a year.
Sailesh is passionate about heritage and loves a chance to do restoration work. Though a plumber by profession, he is a man of many talents. In the cover picture he can be seen working his magic in a section of my flat that was being inundated by leaks. The photo below shows him holding up a copper Lakshmi he is in the process of polishing. Many of my friends have heard of him and some have met him in person and interacted with him at length. Someone who was so full of energy, not to speak of talent, now fumbles to walk a short distance and it hurts to see him grope his way around.

While out on a chore near his home, he had a chance encounter with an old customer of his who was startled to see him groping his way down the street. He promptly took him to an eye specialist in the area and has been taking care of the consultation and testing fees. That specialist has concluded (rightly IMO, going by what I know of his history in the Medical College Eye Dept) that Sailesh needs a couple of injections in an operation to restore his vision, and the cost of administering these is 45,000 INR.

Sailesh is not supported by his son and his wife is encumbered by mental health issues, a sorrowful reality among the families of many such friends who help us in our day to day lives as him. Being a freelancer in my sixties staying alone in Kolkata, I feel helpless as I am unable to support and rescue him from his plight, whereas he saved me and my home from several disasters including the aftermath of Amphan. I will be extremely grateful to one and all Good Samaritans who can come forward in extending their monetary help and sharing this post to help him see again.

Mayalakshmi Rao/Chakra Incognita

Bank details:

Bank details: IFSC Code: CNRB0000153

Canara Bank, L C Road Branch, Kolkata

A/C No 0153101005143 (savings account)

Name: Mayalakshmi Rao

Are These Questions Starting To Be Answered?

I dream of  Mahalaya dawn at such a water body, the air pristine

Photo from 2023 - retrofitted(!)

29th September 2016 

Wow! The fifth day of this exercise. I do hope portals are opening and the first roots are being wound to form bridges to the chapters of the book.

But I digress. I am confused, tired and sneezy this morning. My hands are sore. The weather was cool at dawn and Canopus winked at me all the while that I listened to Mahishaduramardini. But the air was also stifling as the dawn slowly faded in. It was an oppressive feeling. The air smelt most unfresh. And this saddened.
A strange feeling on a morning that starts a new and special fortnight and welcomes a powerful and benevolent force that flows down a mountain into our homes and hearts as a clear, cleansing … well I can’t find the word so I will let cleansing play its role as noun.
It’s just that Devi and her essence this time seem to defy description. As the last hymn was playing, there was a familiar smell in the air. But it was not the usual smoking guns. I felt like I had been transported to the burning pyres. Yes I know that uneasy jolt to the senses. And I am taken back from the goddess to the Pitrus and the (not so) hallowed place where they all take leave of us. I did not welcome that scent for it was not the scent of welcome.
I tried for more sleep. Where was the awakening? I realize I am starting to find the Mahalaya experience, the dawn waking to listen to something that is no longer rare or special thanks to the ubiquitous Utube, strained. The art and craft of recording, of replicating and of holding on to and imprisoning what ought to be ephemeral, have changed the power of that ephemeral for ever. Reduced. altered, weakened, For the power of the fleeting is in its impermanence.
It is now bottled and marketed and we hold on to the shell and focus on all the trivia. It has to be four a.m. We have to feel autumn in the air. And so on. But what are we doing to bring the feel of autumn to that air? Rather we are vitiating every aspect of the divine and healthful in our air. Deliberately, carelessly, callously, mindlessly … I could go on.
I await a lesson from the goddess on how to let go and give HER a chance to approach us and find her favorite window or door or crack in our armor. I await lessons on a paradigm shift and the end of God For Sale!
Meanwhile the Pitrus have struck back. Late last night a friend posted the most incredible picture depicting the Pitrus and a hand stretched out with offerings for them. The Pitrus are inscrutable and they are beyond an unbridgeable gap. I will leave you with the profound image to express your own feelings. The image overpowered me and made me ponder the pitrus and their needs (or were they our needs?) for the best part of the night. I was restless, uncomfortable, anxious that a sleepless night would take away the pleasures of the dawn concert.
I have always associated that beautiful star low in the southern horizon with my dad. From the day of his passing, the star would twinkle at us through his favorite window and that star gave me company this dawn. It is a star of hope and the continuance of the cycle of life. A star has to rise and set and rise again. Even a long dead star whose light took all these years to reach us and which will continue its periodic reassurance through our own lifetime. Perhaps it is this assurance we think we are bottling in our recordings? There was a time when the ancestors were precious and we reached them just on that one morning and drew the year’s energy. I have a story of a precious perfume gifted to me that mysteriously escaped from a bottle. You can’t hold down what is meant to fly its own path beyond your ken.
Perhaps that is the meaning of an ancestor’s day and the old folks’ belief that you don’t disturb them at other times. While I may not agree on the details, I realized from Vidya’s painting shared below, that there were some deep yearnings within us which we reflect as the yearnings of the ancestors. In feeding them it is our own confined, bottled, trapped soul we are feeding.
I leave you with the power of the image

Vidya Murali's capture of the essence of Pitru's Mahalaya

I will talk about the two Mahalayas of Bengal another time and of the one time my parents rightly muddled things up <smile>
signed off 9 a.m.

Coffee calls!

Edit - the link to her image was removed alas so you see a blank you can fill with your imagination

Opening That Trunk

27th September 2016 

Welcome to the book. I have finally opened a portal to the seashore cottage in Maine. My mind is now split between two locales. One is the site of the unfolding fireside drama in Maine and the other a metaphorical place that straddles my home, the pandals and homes of Kolkata and the “para” or the location of my accustomed Puja. It would be around 55 times in all, maybe a little less if you count all those years that we went someplace either for fun or out of compulsion. While the scenario of those nine nights and ten days unfolds in that imaginary-cum-real space, the Maine work of the day will find coexistence and co-celebration with it.

There is a big unsolved riddle and that’s around how the growling stomach will be pacified and more so the dirty dishes and floor will be redeemed in manner befitting an auspicious home where a kalasha is installed to symbolize the Devi. Because come the day and hour and we will have an exodus from here that the old Israelites could never have matched. An exodus of all those who serve me. It remains a mystery to me who remains to keep the city spinning 24x7 during those days, keep the streets spanking clean and all those growling stomachs filled. Why does this have to be my lot in life – year after year after year? A passing thought comes to me. Why were the forefathers of these gentle folk not hurtling back to their villages like maniacs for every celebration? While it is cool that everything is now celebrated everywhere, we need to find a way that sprites and spooks can take over these dreadful chores.

I turn my mind away from negative thoughts. Let God scrub and clean during that festive week if she will. I am mentally prepared to eat four junk meals a day outside and just hope it doesn’t come pouring. From the banal that always tends to take hold like a monster lurking for revenge, I push my thoughts back to the delightful escape that writing offers me. And I think about my fellow writers who must be struggling with similar problems and still managing to actually write. They are all ahead of me. I am perhaps the least prolific writer I know.

The puja week will be packed. There will be a line up of outings, and a line up of home celebrations. Perhaps Sailesh will end up washing the dishes ☺.

:)I find it remarkably easy to run up 750 words when I type. And these pages are becoming kind of bloated as the days go by. Perhaps there are more thoughts than I can hold on to and it’s a good idea to throw some of them out into a safe place where they can vent and ventilate.

I think about how the first guests are arriving. It’s a scene that’s halfway between Navaratri and Onam. Because we welcome them with an Onam arrangement – that’s created by none other than Kim. And we have a lamp lighting ceremony. Because these kids have read about all these practices and they are going to be living several of them in the story. Kim and I need to discuss what else we welcome them with. I recall the way we had our celebrations in my childhood. The focus was on the home and not on the pandal.

Our home was special because we had people from all over visiting to enjoy our kolu – the tiered display of dolls and figurines and all kinds of art work. While other homes had ready made steps we were always the kings and queens of jugaad. This house has been like a camping site since its very inception and today it’s more like a Howrah station from which the passengers have mysteriously disappeared leaving their luggage.

Well our navaratri steps also wore a different kind of transitory aspect from that which steps convey(I don’t think that is the intention but more a vertical arrangement that saves space). Our steps were built out of boxes, trunks, suitcases. Arranging those was the most exciting part and we would all heave and haul. As manpower became more scarce we would make somewhat smaller arrangements. And as I grew older we went back to more extravagant displays. The last ever was 1979. Its hard to believe what a sudden and abrupt end the whole beautifully creative celebration encountered. It was that house, that other house of heritage.

Till date I plan that the coming year will see this exhibition restored to its former glory. We have twice the number of suitcases and all the original artifacts have remained in their own trunk, unopened since – yes since 1979 when they were put away. I have no clue whether they still exist or they have had their own form of visarjan. I almost don’t have the courage to open the trunk and I was hoping a good friend would be around to hold me up through whatever would happen. I remember all the clay models that were lovingly sourced from Kalighat’s potuapara. The very last entrant was a miniature Durga who came in much later from a fair or an emporium.

Last year I visited Potuapara and posted pictures and videos.

Ganesh in the making

You can order your own stuff as well when it’s off season. When mom’s house was disbanded she salvaged the clay images she has used in her younger days. They were in a different style and very evocative. And she had to give many away but had salvaged some special pieces for me that made their way into history when sad times took over. A friend had held on to many treasures for my mum, but tragedy affected her life as well. It’s so hard to go back to her and ask for my clay dolls. I remember one particular model – a very realistic portrayal of a traditional Brahmin. One who really knew the scriptures and actually subsisted on Bhavati Bhikshaam Dehi. Today I increasingly feel like his alter ego. It is nightfall and evening pages draw to a close. The stomach calls as usual.