My Identification mark

Talking about my early memories, one thing that I definitely remember - not because somebody had been hammering it into me - and probably I feel the horror of it even now. 


As I recall the events, we had gone to one of our relatives for a ‘Vaaram’, a traditional family festival there. After the festival, in the night there was a 'sadya' – a feast - and there were many relatives as it was an important event. I think I was about 4 years plus and had a good time playing with many children of the same age.


The morning after, we children started the day from where we left off the previous night and were running around in the courtyard. The firepits where the cooking was done, had hot coke from the burnt firewood, deceptively embedded in ashes. And while running around and playing, I managed to trip and fall into this pit. Until another child went and informed the elders and someone came running and lifted me out, I was sort of being slowly baked on my right side.


What stands out in the whole episode is while falling, my shoulder got rubbed on one of the stones and apart from burn, I also had a wound there. After coming back to our house, I remember being treated by an old lady from the village with a herbal oil, concocted by her. The treatment went on for an unbelievably long time, - as far as I could feel, for ever - and all the while I had to lie down on my left side and couldn't move much. 


But when I was able to get up and start moving a little, I managed to scrape my wound on one of the pillars in the main central courtyard. It was healing well and a good crust was being formed, but got totally opened up and started bleeding profusely. The treatment restarted and continued for another few months, before I was up and about.


Thanks to the old lady’s herbs, there was no scar anywhere on my body except where I scraped my wound. She would look at me, shake her head disapprovingly and say,


‘I wanted to make sure that you had no burn mark on your body, but you spoiled the whole show by going and getting stuck with that pillar.’


‘Well, it is the fault of that pillar to stand right where I was running!’


Anyway, the mark remained on my left shoulder until today and it is one of my recorded identification marks.