Lalpania Diary 2

I am awoken by the ghoda dog. Billu seems to have misinterpreted our relationship, he's gnawing at my hip bones and has one arm lovingly tossed over my stomach. He's chased out of bed by my mum. Mami's in the kitchen making paranthas. She adopts the same maternal tone for everyone, the dogs, her son, me, her "sipahis" who she reprimands with ear twisting tones of familiarity. Ma says she's the typical officer's wife. My coffee is ready and waiting for me as I wordlessly plonk myself on the sofa. Mami keeps shoveling paranthas into my plate.

Waiting for the boatman to take us across to the mandir from where glossolalic adivasi songs float out, across the stream. The flutes and dholaks are simple and evocative. We're taking a parikrama of the mandir, our hands touching the walls as we pass. The bali ka bakra puts up a fight while being dragged to the bali sthan. I hear it howl in pain as the dao comes down. The sweepers wash the blood away, but I can still smell it. Damodar river on one side and Bhairavi on the other. The pandits and security guards herd people in. Chinnmasta devi, the fiercest of goddesses, (with her decapitated head from with she and her two female attendants drink, while standing on a copulating couple), is obscured by a cover of hibiscus flowers and chaddars. The women are buying trinkets from the little shops leading to the Surya mandir. I buy them too. Mutton is being cooked. We go to the mandir of the 9 deviyan. The idols are beautiful and their personalities burst forth. My favourite being Tara, in blue, standing over Shiva. Fires blaze behind her and scenes of her silhouetted form wrecking havoc (a nice touch by the mandir committee, it looks like one of the trippy sequences from Sita Sings the Blues). As a nastik, I can only appreciate the aesthetic, the mythology, the ideas. A woman is singing to herself in a corner, looking at the shrine. She's singing really well, too. Her kid looks as lost as I am. It's pouring now and everything is a waterfall. Two boys are approaching everyone, (specially the pretty girls) and asking in that questioning Bhojpuri lilt "photu khichwaiyega? Ek minute mein nikal ayegi". The pretty girls shake their heads, smile and pull their dupattas over their faces. I am as incorrigible a lech as the photographer boys. It's raining hard, the boatman has to strain to take us against the current. Now I'm walking barefoot up the rocks.

We stop while driving through a village to give prasad and the same necklaces as I'm wearing to some girls (Mami's pre-emptive Navratri goodwill). They ask "kahan ka prasad", "Rajappa mandir ka" I say. We stop again to buy makai and bhindi from some women in their fields. A man with a formidable mustache named Beegal stops to tell us about the tree that Ma and Mami are chadhaoing aggarbattis to. He says "murga, bakra aur mahua chadhate hain yahan." Beegal ji is the home guard ka hawaldar and a small time contractor. He's maska lagaoing Mama, giving him the low down about the roads, the school, the coal, local intrigue. There's so much coal here that people dig some of it themselves and go sell it. The woman selling the sabzi is giving us the sales pitch "heehan se lijiyega toh apko sasta padega, khoob acha bada bada bhindi hai". Mami asks about the age of the tree, she has fanciful notions about yakshas and higher purposes that made us stop at this very tree.

A heavily tattooed adivasi woman tries to drag her son away from a football game in the rain. A cheeky, good looking boy with sharp eyes catches my eye as he's chillin' in a shop selling jalebis and pakoras. Lots of the huts here have TV dishes. A girl fusses over her friend's long dark hair. Mama is ranting about god, Amitabh Bacchan style. "Bachpan se mandir ja ja ke kuch mila?", Ma completely demolishes his argument as only an older sister can. "Kyun, itne babaal, kaand karne ke baad bhi aish se baithe ho!". Mami is attacking him for his polo eating habit. "Arre bhaiyya, le li tumhari polo, chupa chupa kar khate rehte ho". Their arguments are most childlike and petty and hilarious for Ma and I to listen to.

We're in a silly mood, drinking Castle beer (lovingly packed and saved up for special occasions by mama) and looking at old pictures and laughing about who had more hair back then and who was thinner. The siblings are regaling us with tales of when they were mad kids my age. Apparently there was some Naxal movement near where we were this afternoon. We're playing with guns now, taking stupid pictures, while garba music is playing in the background.