Durga Puja 2018 - Festival Special #1

When Page Turns Post - 
(And Maybe Posts Turn Anthology?)  

(Originally titled Evening Pages -2 dated 26/9/16 - extracts from reader comments are incorporated in this version as Footnote)

Late September Sky In Kolkata - refreshed as the monsoon bows out

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 Durga Puja. It would be around 55 Pujas in my lifetime, maybe fewer 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 however, and that’s around how the growling stomach will be pacified and more so the dirty dishes and floor redeemed in a manner befitting an auspicious home, where a kalasha is installed to symbolize the Devi. Because, come the day and hour. 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 stays back to keep the city spinning 24x7 during those days, keep the streets spanking clean and all those growling stomachs filled, and where I could access some of these people/robots. 

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 will do my fair share). 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 the sky doesn’t come pouring down. 

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 (my trusted plumber-cum-all-rounder who repairs and fixes and does every kind of odd and even job in an emergency) will end up washing the dishes :)  Thankfully he doesn't have a home outside the city that attracts him.

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 at the cottage in Maine. It’s a scene that’s halfway between Navaratra 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(men and women) 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 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 the step-arrangement has any symbolism, but a mere vertical arrangement that saves space). Our steps were built out of boxes, trunks, suitcases - accessories to transit and travel. And we also gave it a symbolic twist of our own (Durga descending from her Himalayan Home to visit us) as the topmost tier usually had a model of a mountain-scape lovingly created by my older brother  out of clay and various natural materials, a practice mom and I continued on a smaller scale in later years. I will never forget how he engineered a waterfall one year. Our mountain models would attempt to evoke some of this.

  

Pictures taken at Birdsong & Beyond, mountain resort, in October 2017

Arranging the boxes was the most exciting part and we would all heave and haul. Some of those were used for storage of surplus linen and so on so we would quickly check if anything was needed before adding the box to the installation. (I remember a year or two when we forgot.)

As manpower became more scarce we would make somewhat smaller arrangements. And as I grew older(and into a more useful citizen) we went back to larger and more detailed displays. The last ever was in 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, of which more soon.

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 into dust. 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 sprawling house in Chennai was sadly disbanded, she salvaged the clay images she had 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 and memory 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 traditionally attired Brahmin. One whose personality conveyed that he really knew the scriptures and actually subsisted on Bhavati Bhiksham Dehi. Today I increasingly feel like his alter ego.

It is nightfall and writing draws to a close. Because the stomach calls as usual.

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*the word limit for Morning Pages
** The Book being the one I'm writing code-named "A Night's Tale"

I can't find a link to Kalighat Potuapara but this will give you an idea of what goes on. The post tells us about the larger and better know of the clay-modelers' abode in North Kolkata. 

Footnote:

Cherished comments from the original post - 

Sridevi: I love love jugaad. My sis-in-law also used to make steps out of boxes and suitcases. Although, now my brother with his new found passion for wood might have crafted steps. And now I can hear the Brahmin as well. His "Bhavati Bhiksham Dehi" rings in my soul. 

Kim: I am hoping you will open that trunk, and when you do, remember that good friends are standing by you. Inside those places where we have stored things, there is more than remembrance, there is wisdom

My Response to Kim: I was hoping you would open it with me but I don't think I can wait till '17 Diwali. Maybe one of the kids will be witness to the opening of the Pandora's box. I don't like too many people bearing witness to my tears, be they of joy or pain or a mingling of both.