Journey 3
As soon as the summer began, Amma would start planning the food-offering to Mariamman. When she began announcing twice a day, like a news broadcast, “It’s absolutely burning hot. We must make a food-offering to Mariamman,” Mythili would start to get excited. Because this short excursion was a special annual event. It always took place soon after the school holidays began. A little tour undertaken just by Marudayi who worked in their house, Marudayi’s daughter Minakshi, and Mythili.
The Mariamman temple was at the Majestic. Amma undertook all the preparations for the offering, but would never go to that temple herself. Marudayi interceded on their behalf and worshipped Mariamman who prevented diseases like smallpox. “She is their deity, you see,” Amma would explain to Mythili. Amma herself went to the temple of Kannika Parameswari at Malleswaram’s 8th Cross Road. On each of the nine days of Navaratri, Kannika Parameswari was offered a different adornment. Turmeric, sandalwood, kumkumam, javanti, jasmine buds, orange sections, kadali bananas, kanakambaram flowers, and finally a silk sari. Crowds surged in the temple at evening puja time. Amma usually took Mythili with her. When the screen parted to reveal the goddess in all her adornments, Amma would be transported. Folding her hands, she would begin to sing softly, “Amba, ninnu nera nammidi…Mother, in you I have faith.” But it seems that the goddess who received all these adornments didn’t have the power to prevent smallpox. Only Mariamman, who wrapped a bright red cloth about herself, daubed herself with kumkumam, and had huge staring eyes, had that power. And there had to be a Marudayi to act as a messenger from them to that Mariamman.
The preparations for the offering would begin with the question, “Marudayi, have you had your cleansing bath yet, this month?”
Once the discussion about Marudayi’s state of ritual purity came to an end, a date was set for the food-offering. On that particular day, Marudayi would turn up at their house at earliest daybreak. She would finish all the household chores at top speed and have a bath under the tap in the backyard. She’d call Minakshi who was usually running around the extensive back garden planted with oleander, southernwood, and kasi-thumbai plants, and mango, jackfruit, plantain, papaya, and drumstick trees. “Ei, Minakshi, come here,” she’d call out, and give her a bath too. Minakshi had curly hair. It spread out, flaring, before falling down her back. Marudayi would pour water over it, add shiyakai and scrub hard, while Minakshi screamed and screamed. She’d hold her firmly between her thighs and bathe her, while the little girl struggled to free herself, shouting, “Let me go, Aya, let me go.” Sometimes Mythili, who was watching from the back door, would be called and bathed too.
After her bath, Marudayi went into the empty garage to change her sari. There were some saris which she kept only for special occasions, such as the bright green Chinnalampati sari with the imitation zari border, or Amma’s old blue silk with its red border which almost hit you in the eyes, or else a glowing yellow handloomed cotton with black checks. She emerged from the garage wearing one of these with the same black blouse with red spots which went with all of them. She’d have fastened a paavaadai on to Minakshi — red with yellow dots, or purple with green stars — beneath her navel. The blouse above the paavaadai always stood a little short of her waist. Mythili often stood by the door to the backyard, waiting for the moment when Marudayi would emerge from the garage, with wet hair, her face covered in turmeric, and a big kumkumam spot on her forehead, holding Minakshi by the hand. In the back garden full of mango trees and plants, the very first rays of sunlight just beginning to glint, Marudayi would stand, looking like a woodland sprite. Next to her, Minakshi with her curly hair fanning out about her, a tiny sprite.
A big earthenware pot to cook the pongal offering. Another pot containing the rice, jaggery, coconut, bananas, and banana-leaf. Amma would have kept everything ready. By this time, Mythili too would have had her oil massage and bath, been dressed and adorned. She would stand next to her mother, her wet hair loosely plaited in order to allow it to dry, wearing her favourite green paavaadai, with a black velvet choli. Hers was a “bodice-paavaadai.” The bodice was attached to the skirt and concealed the waist. She used to pester her mother, demanding a naadaa paavaadai, which tied around the waist with a string, just like Minakshi’s.
Because Mythili and Minakshi were going with her, Amma would tell Marudayi not to take the bus. She gave her the fare for a jutka. Every year the return fare by jutka went up, from twelve annas to a rupee, a rupee and a quarter, and so on, until it was as much as two rupees on their last journey. Amma always added some small coins to the jutka fare. For Minakshi and Mythili to buy sweets.
Every time she said to Marudayi, “Marudayi, you won’t take the child to that side, will you?,” emphasizing “that side.” When she said “the child,” she meant Mythili. Apparently the other child, Minakshi, was at liberty to go to that side.
Marudayi would declare, “I won’t do anything like that, ’Ma.” That side was a place to be relished. A place that also aroused fear and excitement. A place where roosters, their screams rising and falling, or sheep calling out “me-e-e-e” as they were dragged along, were sacrificed, skinned in an instant, and cooked. A place where she and Minakshi stood with clasped hands, their eyes wide, their mouths gaping open. A place where the two of them walked about, asking each other about pain, blood, and death. Sometimes they would get piping-hot chicken pilau on sewn-leaf plates, the chicken meltingly soft, with cinnamon, clove, and pepper. Mouths watering, they would blow and blow on the rice, and then eat it.
When there were so many buses going to the Majestic, it didn’t seem right to Marudayi to take a jutka. On their very first journey, just as soon as they had turned around after waving goodbye to Amma and the baby, Marudayi asked, “Shall we go by bus, Mythili?” After that, it became their regular practice.
All three of them would set off along the street leading to the Pillayaar temple. The bus stop stood on the main street, before they reached the temple. It was right in front of a shop with a placard announcing, “Ganesh Butter Stores.” They could see the proprietor seated there, sometimes. He looked as if he himself had consumed all the butter in the shop. When her athai came to visit them from Trichur, she taught Mythili little songs. She taught her to dance, too. One of the songs she taught her went, “Aanatalaiolam venna taraameda, ananda Sri Krishna, vaay mudukku…We’ll offer you as much butter as an elephant’s head, joyous Sri Krishna, shut your mouth…” Every time she tried to imagine a person who ate as much butter as an elephant’s head, the proprietor of Ganesh Butter Stores would come to mind, holding a flute. As she approached the bus stop, her walk took on the rhythm and tempo of a dance sequence her athai had taught her, where she entered the stage from one side singing “Aanatalaiolam,” swinging her arm like an elephant’s trunk.
When he saw them, the proprietor would ask, “Off to the Mariamman temple?”
Aanatalaiolam, aanatalaiolam…the tune and the rhythm running through her head, “Yes,” she’d say.
“Come here.”
Aanatalaiolam, aanatalaiolam…She’d go up to him, with Minakshi. He’d pick up two small packets and give them to the girls. Aanatalaiolam, aanatalaiolam…“Thanks, maama.”
As they waited for the bus to come, they licked the butter. Until the bus arrived, “Aanatalaiolam, aanatalaiolam” filled the mind.
They had made a pact that on the outward journey, Mythili would have the window seat, and that Minakshi was entitled to it on their return. As soon as they reached the temple, Marudayi would make a hearth out of three stones and begin to cook the pongal. The two girls would hold hands and wander about, taking a look at Mariamman now and then. Once the offering was made, they would eat some of it, distribute the rest, and then leave. Amma had made it clear that they need bring home only the kumkumam prasadam.
It was only after this that the money saved by taking the bus rather than the jutka was squandered — in the shops spread all around the temple, loaded with hot, spicy fried peanuts smeared with chilli and turmeric; jujube fruit; ripe tamarind; parrot-nosed mangos; and sweetened balls of gram. Everything went into their stomachs. After that came sweet, sticky javvu mithai. The mithai-man held the sticky mass on a long stick. He could make whatever you asked from the sweet stuff — elephant, cat, peacock, rabbit, or deer. A rose-coloured sweet. The more one licked at it, the sweeter it tasted. Sometimes they bought glass bangles and put them on. As they licked away at the sweet, the bangles jingled up and down. Then came the journey home. As they got off the bus, lime sherbet from the corner shop, with ice-cubes afloat.
When they reached home, the kumkumam prasadam was handed over to Amma. And Amma would place the kumkumam on the foreheads of all three of them, saying, “Mariamma, keep us safe, di, Amma.”
After that, the cross-questioning session would begin, starting with, “Where did you pick up the jutka?”
On the days that the proprietor of Ganesh Butter Stores had seen them, Marudayi would say, “We went by bus to Mallechpuram Circle, Amma, and found a jutka there.” On other days, she’d answer that they found one at the 8th Main Road corner, or even at the next street. In every case, though, the jutka man would not have had time to turn into the 8th Main Road on the return journey. He was a man in a terrific hurry, insisting on dropping them off at the corner of the road and making off immediately. What sort of jutka drivers are these, Marudayi would complain.
“You haven’t eaten any rubbish, have you, only plain sweets?” Amma would ask.
She and Minakshi would shake their heads vigorously in denial. Sometimes, even as they did so, their stomachs would be rioting. The spicy gram and ripe tamarind and javvu mithai would all be in collision inside them. Belching from the lime sherbet, she and Minakshi would run towards the toilet in the back garden. And so the journey to the Mariamman temple would end. Every time.
When her younger brother was four years old, he insisted obstinately on going along with them. On that occasion, Amma gave Marudayi the round sum of three rupees. As soon as they came out of the temple, Marudayi bought them javvu mithai, and as they were licking their elephant, rabbit, and deer, she said, “Mythili, there’s a Tamil film running at Central Talkies. Shall we go?”
“M…m,” Mythili murmured in assent.
Thambi was primed to reply properly to Amma’s catechism. He learnt to repeat correctly, in telegraphic style.
“How did you get to the temple?”
“Jutka.”
“What did you see there?”
“Mari saami.”
“What did you eat?”
“Pongal.”
“And what else?”
“Orange drops.”
There was a huge crowd of women waiting for the afternoon show at Central Talkies. When Marudayi had bought six-anna bench-seat tickets, taken them to the toilet, and then ushered them inside, the film started straightaway. Because they were seated so close to the screen, they had to crane their necks upwards to see. The faces on the screen looked gigantic. In a very short time, it became apparent that the hero was up to something wicked.
“Corpse of a fellow,” the maami next to them cursed.
“You’re in for an evil time, da. Your wife is a chaste woman, da, a pattini,” another woman put in.
“Look at your face and your chin! You’ll go to hell,” Marudayi commented, cracking her finger joints.
After the interval, just when they had finished their ice-lollies, and the film started again, Thambi began to whimper that he wanted to go to the toilet. Marudayi led him outside. When she came rushing back, she asked the neighbouring maami, “What’s been happening, maami?”
“I tell you, this lecher has gone and fallen for that whore of a woman,” the maami answered.
“Look at the way the slut is showing her teeth. Her mouth is wide and her cunt is wide,” said Marudayi.
In the end, the man who had done wrong returned to his wife, and the audience roared its approval, “That’s right, come to your senses, now!”
They came out, caught their bus, and arrived home. As usual, Amma touched their foreheads with kumkumam, and then asked, “Where did you find your jutka?”
Out of the blue, Thambi announced in his shrill voice, “Amma, we went to the cinema.” Then he added, loud and clear, “A lecher fell for a whore. That slut’s mouth was wide and her cunt was wide.”
After that the excursions to the Mariamman temple ceased. Amma began to set aside some money in a yellow cloth for Mariamman. And with many prayers that Mariamman should not get angry, nor mind that the money was going into the safekeeping of the modest Kannika Parameswari, the offering was deposited in the hundi of the Parameswari temple.
Whenever their numerous uncles and aunts came to visit them, Mythili had the chance to see many films such as Guna Sundari, Kanavane Kankanda Deivam, Tuukku Tuukki, and Manohara. But without Marudayi’s and the other women’s special commentaries, her heart was not in it.