In my last column, I wrote about the surreality, the numbness immediately following my mother’s demise. I felt completely alone because those I counted as close and therefore, expected to rally around me, didn’t. (So that’s Life Lesson #306 learned: expectation = disappointment. It’s the death knell for any relationship.)
I’m really happy that mum got to re-connect with so many of my dad’s family before she died, although it was dashed bewildering for me when people called to sympathise, because someone was condoling maamiji and someone else chachiji, while a whole other bunch were talking about tayyiji and tayyaji…took me a while to associate these terms with my parents! All the world’s a stage, yes, but there are so many roles that one person gets to perform!
As for me, I get to be maasiji for men called Happy and Lucky (oh yes, proper Punjabis, we are!) who are well into their 50’s! Well, when you reflect on the fact that my tayyaji’s daughter and I are both ‘Poonam/Punam’, it’s either that my daadi didn’t have much imagination when it came to names or, by the time I was born, after my parents had been married for 14-years, I was so low down the family totem pole it didn’t matter much!
I’m the kind of person for whom a sense of humour is vital; it’s my defense mechanism for coping with the curveballs Life chucks at me. I remember my mother frowning at me in disapproval more times than I can count, because I’d find something funny in every situation, even the horribly grave ones (pun unintended)!
And so, harking back to her funeral, I found several comic moments even in the midst of the grief, although at the time, they were anything but hilarious!
So there were these totally redundant, Punjabi drama moments that happened. Didi, the eldest of the paternal cousins, who very kindly rushed down immediately for mum’s funeral and to whom I’ll be eternally grateful for this gesture, wanted to organise this on the scale of some Sanjay Leela Bhansali magnum opus, while all I wanted was a) for this nightmare to finish or, b) rewind, re-set the alarm and wake up to a different morning. I want to keep it simple, I insisted.
“Papaji de time poora mohalla aaya si. I spent over a lakh when Papaji died”, she countered. How nice for you, I muttered.
“Ki kendi ae”? she asked suspiciously.
Nothing, I say, wearily. I want to spend the money where it will actually help, like an orphanage or old age home, not on fattening Brahmins! “Bhai, yeh reet–rivaaj hota hai. Ab tujhe pata hai nahin, tu toh chotti hai.” I know, I know. But this chotti is suddenly the adult left in charge of this madhouse production.
Unfailingly, each day I got asked by the assorted tabbar: “Tu kadein aa rahi ae”? Variation one: “tu ne kab aana hai”? Variation two: “Aur? Phir kya socha hai? Kab aana hai”? I wish people would leave me alone, I wailed (but there’s no concept of ‘alone’ or ‘space’ with Punjabi families)! I don’t own a plane, you know, I said once, rather daringly. Didi was unfazed by the poor attempt at sarcasm.
“O Sweety nu vekh, o vi aayi si Dubai toon”, she said complacently. Yeah, well, each country has its own travel restrictions…oh, I give up!
There was more to come. Imagine this bossy Punjaban in a face-off with one of my maternal cousins whose dad was a Parsi and who, therefore, is genetically wired to be on a permanently shifting mood axis! Woof. The Punjabi contingent arrived late for a havan and so the bawa lot just walked off. I can joke about it now, but it was extremely harrowing when it happened, not to mention utterly insensitive.
How can any drama these days be complete without the Hindu-Muslim angle?! For the last few months of mum’s life, she’d been looked after by Salma and Didi was always full of praise for how well Salma cared for mum.
Suddenly though, she tells me sotto voce on one of our daily calls: “Salma nu keh kal o khaana nahn banayegi”. Huh? Why? Isn’t tomorrow the havan where people are expected to turn up?
So Didi spelt it out: Salma, as a Muslim, cannot cook the havan food and expect Hindus to eat it. But Salma, as a Muslim, can care for mum, bathe, cook and feed her in all the months leading to her death, when none of you were around? I asked, genuinely fascinated that this kind of mindset still exists.
I mustn’t be too unfair to my Punjabi tabbar, though. I still recall going to Bangalore on one of my only two visits ever! to my Malayali in-laws, where I watched the mother-in-law hand the dirty lunch plates we’d just eaten on to the maid through the kitchen door (partially ajar, not fully opened, lest the maid tar us untouchable by osmosis, presumably!) who washed them outside in the backyard and returned them through this human dumbwaiter style!
How is it okay to eat from the dishes washed by this achut kanya, but not okay to let her into the kitchen? Mind you, pa-in-law had been in the air force; two of his sons were in the army, the younger two in the air force and the only daughter married to an air force fighter pilot who retired as an Air Marshal. The entire dashed lot were inordinately proud of being Namboodiri Brahmins. And yet, this is the mindset they cultivated in their homes.
Oh well. As I always say: pade–likhe se zyaada jaahil koi nahin. Salma has no idea how lucky she is, being stuck with plain, humble ole me!
The pictures are from Pixabay and have been used for illustrative purposes only. The views expressed here are the author’s own and The News Porter bears no responsibility for the same
