Mashh, Sathyavan-Savithri and me - A look back...

In 1982, we came back from Indonesia after a stint of about 6 years.For about a month we stayed in Adakkaputhur, my home village before venturing out to find a suitable location to settle down.

During this time, we happened to go to Kalamandalam to watch a kathakali performance. Probably it is from there my daughter Daisy picked up a liking for Kathakali. She wanted to learn Kathakali and when we started staying in Asalpha in 1983 (in 1982 we stayed in Vikhroli), we started looking for someone to teach her Kathakali. A mutual friend introduced us to Sri Gopalakrishnan – He was teaching in Nalanda Dance Research Center - to us and he agreed to come to Asalpha and teach Daisy.

In the meantime, we saw a drama by Sri Ravindranath Tagore. My old love for Kathakali had already got a revival and after seeing the drama, I started thinking that this is a good theme for a Kathakali play (aattakatha).

I started looking for the book in English translation but couldn’t find one.

I had started touring a lot on work. During every travel, I would look for the book but I couldn’t find it. And as I had lot of spare time in the evenings (after work, come back to hotel and rest, was the routine wherever I went.  Slowly the urge to write an attakkatha had grown a lot in my mind.

I remembered listening to a radio musical drama ‘Savithri’ by Sri N V Krishna Varier. Sathyavan – Savithri story is well known and I felt that that is also good theme for Kathakali.

I started writing during the evenings.

One day the notebook (a real notebook – not a laptop) was lying on the teapoy.  Maash (we all at home called him Maash), after teaching Daisy that day, took the note book and said.

‘Narayanetta, I am taking this with me’

‘After a couple of weeks, he again said one day, ‘We will present it.’

Then things moved faster. We had a singing session where he sang the whole thing, recorded it, scrutinized it, and made corrections as necessary.

So, finally it was presented in Bharathiya Music Society hall in Matunga. Mashh himself was Sathyavan. Dr. Sunanda Nair, the well known exponent of Mohini aattam (She was a student of Mashh in Nalanda at that time) acted as Savithri and Shri Udyogamandal Vikraman  was Yama. The singing duo were Sri Kalanilayam Sethumadhavan and Sri Kalamandalam Ananthanarayanan.

Mashh organized the whole thing including bringing in the Kalakshethram banner after discussing with many people including Kunnam Vishnuettan a prominent enthusiast in Dombivli.

The Kathakali saparya of Kalakshethram also started from there. The energy of Mashh was so  contagious that Kalakshethram started growing up well. Today he has a group of students who do number of performances and share stage with eminent artists from Kerala.  He had conducted lecture-demonstrations in various parts of Mumbai helping to evolve a good audience.

He choreographed one more aattakatha written by me, ‘Naranathu Bhraanthan’. Both the aattakkathas were staged on a few occasions both in Mumbai and Palakkad.

Today the Shashtipoorthy – sixteth birthday - of Mashh is being celebrated and we wish him all success in future endeavours .

MY PRE-SCHOOL YEARS - 8

Earlier I talked about my Upanayanam. But there are a few other ceremonies one has to undergo before one reaches the stage of Upanayanam. I was told that the rituals start even before you are born, with two ceremonies called Pumsavanam and Seemantham. After you are born, there is Jathakarmam, namakaranam, choroonu,nishkramanam, choulam, kathu kuthal etc.

Jathakarmam is performed by father within 36 hours of birth. Namakaranam is giving a name to the child and choroonu is giving rice meal to the child for the first time. Nishkramanam is taking the child out of the house for the first time. Usually during this time the child is taken out by the father to a nearby tree. Choulam is the first hair cut and kathu kuthal is piercing the earlobes.

I must have undergone all this because we were very traditional during those days.

Cutting the hair for the first time, I think, is probably the first major ritual that I could remember. The head is totally shaved but for a small bunch which is tied into a knot, called kuduma. The aunts would go ga ga over me saying, I look very cute with my new hairstyle.

Kathu kuthal (piercing the earlobes for wearing small earrings called kadukkan) was the  ceremony which stands out in my memory.

I must have been just about 5 years, when Damodarettan pierced my earlobes. Damodarettan was a distant relative. He must have been about 60 or 65 years old at that time and was very friendly with us children. During the ceremonies, sometime during the homam, Damodarettan got up, came to an unsuspecting me menacingly holding two Kara Mullu (long thorns from the bushes) and mercilessly pierced my earlobes. I was shocked. The thorns were left in the pierced hole and it would be taken out only after the wound was healed.

Immediately after the ceremonies, I remember, I rushed to Malu teacher, held her very tightly, cried and cried. I also remember that for next couple of years I was so scared of Damodarettan and in my mind, I would equate him with all the demons in the stories that great grandma had been telling me.

In fact, Damodarettan’s house was about 3 or 4 kilometers from our house and I used to go there every month for something called ‘Iruttoonu’. What I remember most about these trips was that I would carried on shoulder by a servant for the full way up and down and while coming back after a meal, I would be carrying a mudpot with some water in it and a coin of two annas, a square coin, inside the water.

What I am coming to is this. For next two or three months, I refused to go to this house for iruttoonu. I had visions of Damodarettan waiting at the gate with two big kara mullus and as I would enter the gate he would jump on me and pierce my ears, nose, tongue etc. So, I would cry my heart out refusing to go and great grandma would tell.

‘Do not make him cry. Let him not go. Let them know that for tomorrow they have to call somebody else.’

Then in the night great grandma would tell a story where invariably a demon was demolished by somebody seemingly weaker and this would lift my spirits. I would dream in the night of demolishing many demons, some of them invariably resembling Damodarettan.

Of course, in a couple of years as I grew up, I became very friendly with Damodarettan and we had talked about this many times with some good laugh.

MY PRE-SCHOOL YEARS - 7

As I mentioned earlier, ours was a large joint family. My pre-school days were spent at home all the time barring the occasional short visits to some relatives or other. So, to understand those days, I should make a more detailed sketch of my household; sort of family tree and how various people interacted there. One should remember that this was how as a child, I had interpreted these interactions. My interpretations could be probably inaccurate, incomplete or irrelevant in several contexts.

First, let us get the family tree right.

I did give a detailed account of Great Grandma earlier. Now let us get to others.

I had no much interaction with my Grandpa’s younger brother, as I used to see him rarely during those days. He would be mainly sitting out there in the portico and chewing pan after lunch. At that time, I never knew where his living quarter was. In the nights after dinner, I had seen him going out and he would come back in the morning directly to the bathing pond.

I had three grandmas. The eldest grandma, was not my father's mother, though my father was the eldest. Later, I came to know that she had a son elder to my father but had died very young. She used to give me, after the daily morning pooja, the small piece of jaggery which was the offering to God and I used to wait for her to call me 'Kunjoo..oo..' lovingly for giving it. Jaggery is sweet. But these pieces were further sweetened with love.

My own grandma, my father's mother, was more into worldly things like supervising the making of pickles every year, assisting and advising the young daughters in the art of cooking etc.

The younger grandma also, as I remember, was pretty efficient in housework and used to move about very fast. And would take lead in gathering all the children for meals, make sure that they take bath and generally keep an eye on us so that we don't get hurt. So, if I had a fight with my playing companions, it was always she who would look into the matter.

In fact her youngest son, was just about four years elder to me. We used to play together sometimes and fight when he doesn't want to play with ‘one so young like me who did't know anything’. Especially when I wanted to act grown up and wanted to play with him.

I will talk about him later when we come to the male members of my father's generation. Before that, let me talk about the other two grandmas.

These two grandmas, were married to the younger grandpa. Their lives were quite abnormal as one was perennially sick and the other was mentally challenged. I was not encouraged to talk about them whenever I asked anyone about it.

Let us now come to the next generation.

I had not talked earlier much about any of the male members of this generation. My father was the eldest. He did not go to school. But had basically learnt to read and write Malayalam and a little bit of mathematics for checking the family accounts.

His elder brother who died before I was born was the first to introduce some modern education in the family. He himself didn’t go to school, but he tried to educate his younger brothers. I understand that he also secretly contributed to the independence movement. He coaxed and helped two of my uncles to run away from home to study.

The stories I heard, were that when they came home during holidays they were not let into the house. Grandpa was very angry and with a lot of pleading by grandmas, they were allowed to stay in the outhouse and their food was served there.

I had five uncles; two from eldest grandma, one from my direct grandma and two from the youngest grandma.

As I said earlier, my youngest uncle, sometimes would play with me when he was not having any other companion. Many times, I would go with him and his companions when they went to temple pond to take bath. The perimeter of that pond would be about half a kilometer and the water was pretty deep. I was not allowed to bathe there except under supervision from my aunts. When my young uncle and his friends swam, dived from a sidewall of the bathing house, (built on one bank of the pond with proper granite steps and a tiled roof), or when they did numerous antics, I would stare in wonder and admiration.

By the time the turn to go to school came for my younger uncles, things had eased out a little. They were allowed to go to the local school, but only after all the traditional ceremonies of the making of a Nambudiri were over. (Upanayanam, Samavarthanam and a host of other small ceremonies in between). This meant they could start going to the school only at the age of almost 10 or 11.

Between the three grandmas my Grandpa had 10 daughters and my younger grandpa had three daughters and all of them were so dear to me and would shower their affections on me.

The Indian freedom struggle was at its peak and most probably my uncles took initiative and bought a dozen charkhas for spinning yarns. These were kept and operated on the second floor of the western wing, a huge hall where all my aunts used to sleep like in a dormitory.

Now that the male children had started going to school and learning, it was felt that my aunts also should learn to read and write, learn a bit of music and to operate charkhas and spin yarns etc. and that is how Malu teacher came in and I got pre-school education at home.

MY PRE-SCHOOL YEARS - 6

A few days back, I had occasion to attend the birthday of my friend’s son. I was a visitor to the town where they lived and so got a special invitation for the birthday celebrations. The celebrations were organized in the same hotel where I was staying. So in the evening I bought a gift from the shop in the hotel itself.

I reached the hall which was well-decorated, in time. The children who had been invited to the party were there playing some games supervised by the boy’s mother. The gift packets were all stacked well on top of a shelf. After the games, the children assembled around the table on which the cake was ready to be cut. My friend was ready with the camera. The seven candles on the cake was lit, then the flames were blown off by the boy, the cake was duly cut, photographs taken, ‘Happy Birthday to you’ was sung by the children. Then they all settled with their plates with foodies.

Nostalgia stepped in.

I am transported to about seven decades back when my birthdays were celebrated with so much enthusiasm all around.

A birthday was a big affair, especially when it was of the eldest son in the new generation. My birthdays were big affairs when Grandpa was alive, especially before my Upanayanam. I would go to the temple early morning, where there would be special Puja performed for me. That day the Naivedyam – the offering to the God - would be ‘Nei Payasam’ (Cooked rice sweetened with jaggery and mixed with dry coconut pieces fried in ghee. There would be, in addition, a liberal dose of ghee poured in and things like cardamom, kismis etc. added.)

On this day, the food would be served in a plantain leaf, not in brass plates as was usually done. For the morning breakfast, my brother would sit next to me on the right side. The person sitting on the right side was also important on a birthday. Except for my birthdays, I would be the right-side-boy, naturally.

The feast in the afternoon would be very elaborate with all the Keralite dishes like Kalan, Olan, Erisseri etc and another Payasam. (We used to call it Edichu Pizhinha Payasam – meaning ‘crushed and squeezed payasam’. Payasam is a sweet dish, by the way). This was because many coconuts were crushed and milk squeezed out of them and rice was cooked in this milk with lots of jaggery added for sweetening.

Many relatives would be invited and they would come with their children. So after the breakfast, it was all playtime.

People from the village would be given lunch.

In the evening there will be some function in the family temple.

After I started going to school, though the birthdays were celebrated with same enthusiasm, I slowly started losing interest in such huge celebrations.

At this point my friend woke me up from the day-dreams and said, ‘Our role here is over. We can move to the bar where our other friends have already started celebrating’

So, we moved to the bar.

MY PRE-SCHOOL YEARS - 5

As mentioned earlier it was Grandpa who supervised my morning rituals and reciting of Vedas. I had developed a good rapport with Grandpa during this period of my life.

I think it was three or four months before I started going to school, I had occasion to be with him for most of the time during the day – for about a month. He was not feeling very well and was having body pain sometimes. He would say that it was only due to old age. Hearing about this, his sister, had sent word that he was to go to their house, stay for a month doing treatment like massages, oil baths etc. with special herbal oils. Couple of renowned vaidyars (village Appothikiris) of that time would attend Grandpa. So, the day was fixed and the palanquin came to pick up Grandpa.

I was accompanying him during this trip. He needed a companion through the day and probably he wanted to continue to teach me to recite Rig-Veda, which we were doing at home.

But sometimes, when we were not reciting Rig-Veda, he would talk about Nambudiri community and about our family. How our family came from another village far away, accompanied by many families of other communities who depended on us; why it was important to keep the traditions and the good culture and qualities of Nambudiris. He would talk about the chathurvarniam, the four classes, Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaisya, Sudra and how each community had their individualities but how together they make a society. Most of what he talked about was beyond comprehension for me at that time. But definitely they were food for thought. Also, I would miss Malu teacher during these discussions because I wished how I could have gone and sat in front of her and looked at those deep blue eyes and found the answers.

This period in my life, between the day Malu teacher left and the day I started going to school I felt very empty with more free time available. After the morning rituals, throughout the day I was free. I had more playtime with no companion. Achuthan, who used to play with me normally, had started going to school. This made me venture out more into the big estate surrounding our house. I would take a book and go sit under a tree and read. We had a good collection of books which were bought and stored secretly by my uncles in the second floor hall behind a cupboard. Aunts would tell me not to take the books outside as some of them were banned at that time.

One of my favorite spot was under the banyan tree within our compound. This tree gave shelter to me to sit quietly and read. Sometimes I would go around the estate, where there were lot of workers working. I was not supposed to go near some of them, though this rule was not being observed very often especially when elders were not around. But on occasions, when somebody spied on us and reported, I had to immediately take a bath and the offending worker would get a scolding.

I would look at the workers with wonder the way they climb up a coconut tree or an arikkanut tree. The biggest wonder of them all was when they make the thin arikkanut tree sway and jump from one tree to other. When ploughing was being done in the rice fields, using bullocks - especially during final preparation for replanting - they used to make the bullocks run in that muddy water, the boys themselves riding on the plough. It was very exciting for both the boys as well as onlookers like us. Sometimes the boys couldn't control and would fall down. These works I wanted to master some time or the other.

Grandpa would become very impatient with me when I read books. He would try his best to pull me out and practice some Rigveda recitation when I was found reading a book. As Malu teacher had taught me Devanagari script, I was able to read from Rigveda book of which we had a Sanskrit edition.

It was interesting to see and be able to read in print what only a voice recited down from Grandpa was so far. I never knew the meanings of the verses and actually, there was nobody in the house who could enlighten me. Malu teacher also, did not know Sanskrit and probably, that was one of the reasons why I would not take much interest in learning the Language. Otherwise if I insisted a little, Grandpa surely would have arranged a tuition. Probably, I thought at that time that what Malu teacher did not learn, was not worth learning.

Though not in connection with Sanskrit, what Malu teacher said at the time of leaving still rings in my ears. 'Omane, Learning never stops. If you get any chance to learn anything, take the chance. There is nothing in this world which is not worth learning!'

And miraculously, I thought, one night it was announced that I would start going to school when the school reopens after the vacation.

MY PRE-SCHOOL YEARS - 4

Originally, my life was supposed to have only no-school years.

As mentioned earlier, my education was supposed to be only Vedas, Rituals etc. Grandpa wanted me to grow up under his strict supervision. He woke up at 4 am every day and would wake me up and take me along to the family pond to take bath. After the bath, I will wait as Grandpa was doing all the rituals.

I was too young to do all those rituals but Grandpa probably wanted me to observe and learn something from those. I do not know what I actually learnt from those rituals, but I definitely got the habit of waking up at around 4 am.

After the rituals were over I used to go to the classes where Malu Teacher used to teach my aunts.

When I was about to turn 7 I had my Upanayanam. After the Upanayanam there were a lot of rituals to be done. Upanayanan is a significant milestone in the life of a Nambudiri. Theorically that is when the education of a Nambudiri boy starts. He also starts wearing the sacred thread poonool and starts learning, or rather reciting ‘Vedas’. My Grandpa will read the Rigveda line by line and I would repeat it after him.

After a few years of completing various stages of learning, there is another milestone which is called samavartanam. That is when one becomes a Nambudiri and would be ready for the advanced education. Again it was continuing learning of Vedas, Mantras, Rituals, Methods or kriyas of getting different things like Poojas, marriages and many other rites done.

The rituals of Upanayanam started very early in the morning and continued till afternoon. At the end of it, I acquired a Poonunool (the sacred thread) and krishnanjanam, (a belt worn just like the Poonunool). I had learnt the mantras to be recited everyday during dawn and dusk, the pranavam, the gayatri, Aanobhadram. I learnt also to do chamata, a ceremony to be performed in mornings and evenings.

At the beginning and end of practically everything that you do, you pray to God and there are mantras and rituals for it. In this phase of Brahmacharyam, we are supposed to beg for our food, even if it is from own house, given with love by our mother. So, the meals would start with a request to mother or anybody else who serves you, 'Bhavathi Bhiksham Dehi'. (Please give me alms).

As mentioned earlier, lots of privileges were lost.  The rituals in the mornings included an elaborate bath at the end of which, I take water in both the palms and give as offering to god. Then came reciting pranavam, Gayathri, Aanobhadram etc. and then chamata. The whole thing should take about an hour. Or more, if Grandpa was supervising.

Then comes breakfast, after which I would sit with Grandpa and recite Rigveda for an hour. Then I am free to play and this is the time I would rush to teacher and instead of in her lap, I would sit next to her. 'You have become a big boy now. See, your brother will start laughing at you', was the usual ploy to avoid my rushing to her lap.

But luckily when I was around 8, my Grandpa allowed me to go to school, with a lot of persuasion from my uncle.

One high point of my first year of schooling was the drama. The school every year celebrated the annual day and there were cultural programs by children and teachers. There were dances by girl students, some traditional folk arts by boys and in the end there would be a drama by students and then a drama by teachers.

I was selected for the drama. I don't exactly remember the story, but I remember that I acted as an old man from a lower caste. I did not tell anyone about it because if Grandpa came to know about it, there was every possibility that my schooling would end there. Somehow the next day after the  programme, he came to know of it, probably through servants. The only comment he made was, ‘At least they should have made him an old ‘Nambudiri !'

Sorry, I just crossed over to my ‘school days’.

MY PRE-SCHOOL YEARS - 3

‘Formal’ is not right even in the case of Malu teacher as, in the strictest sense, she was not a formal teacher for me. I remember Malu teacher as much as a 4 to 8 year old child can remember, because after she left our household, I had not met her.

She came to our house to impart some elementary learning to my aunts who had not had any chance for school education. My aunts are my father’s sisters and cousins. During those days, girls in the Nambudiri community were not allowed to go to school. In very highly traditional families even boys such as my father did not get formal schooling. Nambudiri boys were supposed to learn only to recite Vedas. Girls - well, they should just be there and grow up and be ready for marriage. Some of my uncles ran away from home to study and they had to undergo lot of difficulties during those years. But that is a story for another occasion. However, it was some of those uncles who persuaded Grandpa to agree for a teacher to be appointed for the aunts.

Malu teacher was from a neighbouring village. She must have been twenty or twenty-one and came with her mother. The mother went away the same evening, telling my Grandma,

'She is all that I have. I am leaving her here with you. Please take care of her.'

'Don't you worry. No harm will come to her. We are all here. Aren't we?' Grandma had told her.

For my aunts, the arrival of Malu teacher was like seeing the light of learning at the end of the dark tunnel of ignorance. It was like opening up the floodgates of knowledge. The life of everybody at home had so totally changed within a couple of weeks. Malu teacher was the angel sent from heaven to instill a purpose for life to my aunts, who otherwise would have remained in darkness, physically within the confines of the big house and mentally within the labyrinths of social customs and traditions.

I was about three when Malu teacher came. She had a pretty, kind face and looking at her, one felt that the best thing to do is to keep on looking at her deep blue eyes. She would allow me to sit in her lap when the classes were going on and would persuade me to read, write and count. My aunts, being of different age groups, were learning at different levels. But most of the time, I was present and had the benefit of listening to all the lessons.

In between teaching grammar, mathematics, history and geography, Malu teacher would talk about the freedom struggle, Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and other leaders. She would talk about how India came under the foreign rule and would talk about the struggles led by various small kingdoms. She would tell exciting stories of leaders from South, like Kerala Varma Pazhassi Raja, Kunhali Marakkar, Chidambaram Pillai, Subrahmania Bharati and others who resisted a foreign rule.

She would talk in small doses about freedom, individual freedom, social freedom, political freedom etc. I could not understand any of those things, of course. I don't know how much my aunts understood. But it was exciting to listen to her; to watch her eyes glow with pride while talking about an Indian leader; to watch her becoming sad when talking about a loss for the freedom fighters; to share those feelings. I would look at her as I listen to these talks to absorb as much as a four year old could.

After the lessons, we would go up to the second floor and operate the charkhas which my uncles had bought and smuggled into the house, and make threads. It was almost like a factory, with equipments to clean and soften the cotton, thakkilis to make threads by those who are too young to be initiated to charkha, then charkhas themselves.

I was not able to operate the charkha, though, at that time. The span of my hands was not sufficient to reach both ends of the charkha, leave alone spinning a yarn.

'You can do it after a couple of years Omane'. Malu teacher would say.

She would call me Omana, just as the servants would call me. Somehow, I wished teacher would call me by name or at least she would call me by my nickname.

I was 7 when I had my Upanayanam and I was no more allowed to sit in Malu teacher's lap. And I was not getting as much time to spend with teacher either, as I could earlier because there were lot of rituals I had to do. But whenever possible, I would be there sitting along with my aunts during the classes.

Because of the rituals in mornings, I would miss the music lessons and would feel bad. Somehow or other, teacher and I couldn't find another common time for music.

I also started missing my playtime with my playmates – practically all of them the maids’ sons. I was not supposed to touch them. If in the course of play I touch them, I must go and take a bath. And in most cases, those boys will get a scolding from my grandma and beating from their mothers.

Malu teacher was there now for almost four years and suddenly one day, the whole world changed for me. Came crashing down is probably more apt description. Malu teacher's marriage was fixed and she had to leave us and go back to her house. I howled and howled, I don't know for how long. For two days, I remained so upset that I would forget the mantras during the rituals, which would make Grandpa angry. His scolding will upset me more and I felt very miserable when I knew there was no welcoming lap of Malu teacher to go and cry my heart out.

I had started my formal education, or rather formal schooling, in 4th standard because when I was around 8, my Grandpa allowed me to go to school, with a lot of persuasion from my uncle. I didn’t have any problem on the academic front because Malu teacher had prepared me well enough.