METHI BHAAJI

Ingredients: methi or fenugreek leaves, potatoes, onions, garlic, oil, red chilli powder, coconut, salt

Method: Take two fresh bouquets of methi, cut root ends, pluck leaves, wash well and soak in a large bowl of water, changing water frequently to get rid of residue. When washed clean, drain methi leaves and keep aside.

Slice three onions, chop six cloves garlic and fry till golden brown in two tablespoons oil. Add one large potato peeled and cubed. When potato is almost done, mix well with methi leaves, chilli powder and salt. Cover the pan and cook on slow fire in its own liquid till cooked. Add a heaped tablespoon of freshly grated coconut.

Methi is a bitter herb and coconut helps reduce the bitterness.

Cook on slow fire, till the vegetable absorbs the oil. Serve hot with chapattis.

Optional: Use jaggery instead of grated coconut.

Variation: Vegetables like gavar or cluster beans, french beans, snake gourd, dudhi or marrow, tindla and padval can be cooked in the same way.

A sprig of fenugreek is used as karpas or the bitter herb in the Pessach platter if parsley is not available.

Methi has medicinal values and is known to cure constipation. A plain bitter soup made with methi leaves is supposed to have medicinal value when taken early in the morning on an empty stomach. A few methi seeds, soaked and swallowed whole, are also known to cure many ailments.

Whenever Rachel made methi, she missed Jacob. He loved methi and when he was in India he lived on it. Rachel called him methi-mad. And, just for him, she had a patch of methi growing in her backyard. Rachel never understood how Jacob had developed a taste for this bitter herb, which was disliked by the rest of the family. She wondered whether it had anything to do with his thumb-sucking habit as a child.

Soon after Rachel had weaned Jacob from her breast to the milk bottle, he had taken to sucking his thumb. This continued and Rachel was worried when he was four years old and still sucking his thumb. She was ashamed. His habit made her miserable, especially when they went to the synagogue. For no reason at all she felt all eyes were on Jacob. Even if they did not say anything, she felt the women were laughing at her. Rachel would nudge Jacob, whisper veiled threats, scold him and even bandage his hand. Jacob would sulk as they walked to the synagogue, watching his mother with big watery eyes, ready to burst into tears.

Jacob would sit next to his mother in the synagogue, hiding his bandaged hand in the folds of her sari. He felt insulted but suffered till he could bear it no longer. The prayers were long and his mother kept her eyes averted. Besides, she had not hugged him even once. The sobs collected in his chest and he needed his thumb.

Rachel smiled as she remembered that once during a particular lull in the prayers Jacob had let out a wail so loud and long that the men looked up at the women’s gallery. Aaron also looked up at Rachel, his brow darkened with anger that a child of his was making a scene at the synagogue.

The women collected around Jacob and made every possible effort to soothe him, but he would not stop crying because his mother sat next to him, still as a statue, ignoring him. It was then that Rubybai, sitting next to Rachel, saw the bandaged hand. Rachel had often told her how perturbed she was about Jacob’s thumb-sucking habit. Squatting on the floor, she held Jacob in her arms and asked Rachel if she could take off the bandage, as the child was suffering.

Cornered and annoyed, Rachel watched them doting over Jacob, feeling both resentment and anger, caught in a web of conflicting emotions. When Rubybai removed the bandage from his hand, Jacob’s tears turned into smiles and he quickly started sucking his thumb. Snuggled up in Rubybai’s sumptuous lap, he fell asleep with an expression of bliss.

As the men continued with the prayers, the women whispered and discussed the problem of thumb-sucking among older children. Rachel felt humiliated that she had not been able to handle such a small matter. She was in tears as the women gave her some age-old remedies to cure Jacob. Rachel returned home wiser and decided upon a mixture of castor oil and fenugreek powder.

The next morning, after Jacob had had his milk bottle and was about to fall asleep with thumb in mouth, she applied a layer of the mixture on his thumb. He threw up and watched his thumb suspiciously, pursed his lips, sucked the air and was not sure whether he liked it or not. Much to Rachel’s surprise, he did not suck his thumb, but played with it for a couple of hours, then fell asleep, watching his hand.

Since then, the bitter herb was like a bond between mother and son. So much so that whenever Rachel made methi, Jacob invariably phoned her. Rachel wondered, now how did he know?

On one such afternoon, after a lunch of leftover roast meat from the night before, methi and chapattis, Rachel was dozing on the veranda when the phone rang. Instinctively, she knew it was Jacob.

‘How did you know it was me?’

‘I knew. Did you make methi for lunch?’

‘Yes Mama. I called to say that today I found methi in the Indian shop in Beersheba.’

‘Fresh?’

‘No, dry and packed.’

‘I am glad. Tell Ilana to soak it well in water, drain and cook with lots of onion and coconut.’

‘I will. But what are you doing right now?’

‘Worrying.’

‘About what?’

‘The synagogue.’

‘What are you planning to do?’

‘Ah!’ she laughed, ‘I am trying to create public opinion.’

‘How?’

‘That is the problem.’

‘Is Judah of any help at all?’

‘Why do you ask?’

‘Because I know he is stubborn. He takes up cases only if they interest him. What does he have to say?’

‘Judah is doing everything possible to help me.’

‘At last, somebody appreciates him.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I was one of the few close friends he had. Others thought he was rude and abrupt.’

‘He is, but we get along very well. He is very helpful.’

‘Yes, Zephra told me.’

‘What did she tell you?’

‘She told me how you have become an activist. We are trying to help you.’

‘How?’

‘I have contacted the Indian association of Jews here and we are going to start a signature campaign.’

‘How will that help?’

‘A campaign like that is the beginning of public opinion. In this way, Jews abroad know what is happening to our synagogue. As a beginning, the committee of the synagogue in Danda will receive a letter from us, after which they will realize that they cannot take such decisions on their own.’

‘Then?’

‘Once we get all the details,Aviv will start collecting donations.’

‘Aviv?’ Rachel asked in surprise.

‘Yes, he has already sent a circular to the members of the Indian association in Israel.’

‘I thought he was always busy, very busy.’

‘Aviv is making a list of possible donors.’

‘What will I do with the money?’

‘If you want to save the synagogue, you need money.’

‘I am not good at organizing anything.’

‘You are—look how you have roped in Judah.’

‘We get along very well.’

‘That is a miracle, because he has always maintained a distance from the Jewish community. He must be really fond of you.’

‘Yes, I think he is, and I am fond of him.’

‘Perhaps I should speak to him about the signature campaign.’

‘Do you have his phone number?’

Rachel gave him Judah’s phone number, went back to her chair and fell into a reverie about the family. Feeling sad and alone, she decided to take a stroll around the synagogue.

She changed her sari, powdered her face, covered her head and took the shortest route to the synagogue. She kissed the mezuzah, opened the lock and saw a ray of light falling on the teva from the broken stained-glass window upstairs. Rachel thanked the Lord for the beauty he had bestowed upon her.

Soon there would be a guard at the door. He would have the power to stop her from entering the house of the Lord. She saw the grounds of the synagogue transform into flowerbeds like in a picture postcard: clean, neat and full of flowers with a fragrance of talcum powder. She detested the idea.

Rachel dusted the teva, the chairs and the benches. Then, leaving the door wide open, she filled a bucket of water from the garden tap and returned to see Mordecai standing there with an angry look on his face. He did not smile or greet her. Rachel also did not think it necessary to greet him, yet asked politely what had brought him there at such an unusual hour.

He looked at her sternly. ‘Who is Judah Abraham?’ ‘What about him?’

‘He is asking too many questions.’

‘So what is wrong with asking questions?’

‘There is nothing wrong with asking questions, but I believe you have employed him to hound us.’

‘What do you mean?’ Rachel asked, indignant.

‘You know very well what I am saying.’

‘If you have come here to pick a fight, you are knocking at the wrong door.’

‘You know, I could stop you from entering the synagogue.’

Rachel looked at him defiantly. ‘Try,’ she said, dangling the bunch of the synagogue keys under his nose.

Mordecai had not expected her to react like this. He had assumed she would cow down and beg his forgiveness for having asked Judah Abraham to meddle in the affairs of the synagogue. In a flash, Mordecai changed his tone and said, ‘Come on sister, I was just joking.’

Rachel was adamant. ‘Using such language with me is no joke.’

‘Sister Rachel, why are you so angry? At least you could offer me a cup of tea.’

‘Brother Mordecai, don’t you know that there is no tea in the house of the Lord?’

‘All right, so why don’t you invite me to your house?’

‘As usual, if you had come to my house, instead of the synagogue, perhaps I could have offered you something as flatulent as peethal.’

‘Sorry for the mistake. I have been so upset about this Judah Abraham of yours that I did not know what to do. As soon as I arrived, I went to your house. The door was locked. So I assumed you were here.’

Hiding her resentment, Rachel told him to wait on the veranda of her house. She locked the synagogue, returned to the house and saw Mordecai sitting regally on her deckchair. ‘How dare he sit on my chair,’ she mumbled to herself and hastened to make tea for her unwelcome guest.

With cups of tea and a plate of biscuits between them, Rachel relaxed. Mordecai said he resented that an unknown Jewish gentleman with the name of Judah Abraham had had a long conversation with the old cantor, Hassaji Daniyal.

Placing the cup back on the table, he said rather reproachfully, ‘We have known each other for such a long time. You could have at least phoned me and I would have answered all your questions. Why did you have to ask this Judah to investigate into the committee’s decision to lease the land around the synagogue?’

‘Judah is not a stranger—he is like my son.’

‘He may be, but we do not know him.’

‘What do you mean, you do not know him? He belongs to our community.’

‘I do not deny that, but has he ever mixed with us?’

‘That is his personal matter. None of your business.’

‘Yet, he is more of an outsider than insider.’

‘You mean, if a person does not step into a synagogue or does not attend a malida, you can state that he does not belong to the Jewish community? I do not accept that.’

‘Since when have you become so modern?’

‘I have always been modern.’

‘So tell me, what is the meaning of being a Jew, if this Judah has never attended a single prayer at the synagogue?’

‘These are matters of the heart. There is no logic to a question like that.’

‘How can you say that? Do you know this Judah?’

‘I repeat again, he is not “this Judah”. He is a very nice young man at heart—he is as much a Jew as you and me.’

‘How can you be so sure of that?’

‘Because I am not a bad judge of character. He is as concerned about the synagogue as I am.’

‘What about the synagogue?’ Hawk-eyed Mordecai was watching her.

Rachel sat upright and said, ‘You know what I am talking about.’

‘Are you referring to Mr Chinoy’s visit to the synagogue?’

‘Yes. I have understood that you want to sell the synagogue.’

‘No, you haven’t understood anything.’

‘I understood very well.’

‘Let me explain. You know very well that we have no money to run the synagogue. The community is fast disappearing. Everybody has left for Israel, even your children. Where is the minyan of ten men to hold the Sabbath services? So we decided to lease out the land around the synagogue for a couple of years. Then we would know what to do with the synagogue.’

‘That is if you and I are alive to see that day. By then, Mr Chinoy will see to it that the land becomes his property and the synagogue will disappear from the face of the earth.’

‘He is not that sort of man.’

‘Just wait and see.’

‘But why are you interfering and sending this Judah after us? We, the elders of the committee, know what we are doing.’

‘Judah is a well-known lawyer and he is helping me to save the synagogue.’

‘How do you come into the picture?’

‘Because I look after the synagogue and belong to the Bene Israel community of this land.’

Mordecai sat up defiantly in Rachel’s chair and said, ‘As far as we are concerned, you are just the caretaker of the synagogue.’ Saying that, he rose to his feet and walked out of the house without looking back.

Smarting from the insult, Rachel stood shivering, angry and not knowing what to do. Suddenly she felt something like a roar rise within her. ‘Stop!’ she ordered.

Mordecai looked back, surprised, and his bag fell from his hand. As he bent to pick it up, he saw her towering over him, hands on waist, brow furrowed.

‘So, I am merely the caretaker, sort of a servant, that you can throw me out as though I am the sweeper woman? No, you cannot. You seem to have forgotten that I am Rachel Dandekar. I belong to an illustrious family. Do you remember names like Abraham, Solomon, Menashe, Enoch, Joseph and Joshua, my ancestors? I will not allow you to treat me like a common labourer. Just wait, you Mordecai, I will make you eat your words.’ Then opening the wicket gate, she ordered him out, saying, ‘Don’t you dare enter my house ever again.’