Today is Vishu. It was very late last evening when I finally made up my mind to set up a Vishu Kani. I did think about it earlier in the day but the futility and emptiness of the whole exercise successfully discouraged me. Not to mention all the work that had to be done. Of course these days one could get Dunzo to do the shopping, but still there was too much to do and all for just one person living in a studio apartment, where’s the joy in that? Instead I did something I really like to do, I sat on the couch and had tea and biscuits. I thought about the festivals we celebrated when I was young. All the people, the hullabaloo about the arrangements and the food and having to take snacks and payasam to your neighbours on large trays covered with lace cloth and what not.
In the good old days we would wake up very early in the morning, even before sunrise, look at the Vishu Kani, have a full fledged Sadhya for lunch, receive lots of money from all the elders, sometimes even from cousins who were just a year older but only after they made you fall at their feet.
Vishu is a festival celebrated mostly by Malayalees. I think some Tamils and Mangaloreans also celebrate it. It’s our harvest festival. That’s one of the things I like about it – it connects us back to earth. But there’s another reason I like Vishu. Most other festivals are about someone killing someone else. Sometimes I’ve wondered how, for example, the Sri Lankans might feel about Indian Hindus bursting crackers because one of ours killed one of theirs and apparently many lost their lives, on both sides. Remember this was not a cricket match. If it was up to me I would be like hey sorry that guy had to go ya, he was a nasty piece of work, not just that he had too many limbs and too many heads but also the fact that he kidnapped this lovely lady who was mostly minding her own business. Anyway, what I’m saying is, times were hard, we killed someone, can’t we be a bit more restrained about it?
If at this point you are tempted to say, ya but Deepawali is not celebrated because Ravana was killed but because Rama, Sita and everyone came back to Ayodhya, thank you very much. Please for now park that on the side because when we were young we were told that Deepawali was celebrated because Krishna killed Narakasura and that’s why we have oil bath and eat idli on that day. Whaaat? What’s the connection you ask? Sigh, I wish I knew. I have no idea why we eat Idlis but what I mean to say is that we are not dealing with the atomic number of Hydrogen so there’s always more than one reason to celebrate. Otherwise imagine how events apparently occurring in two different yugas could result in one festival. Even Onam, the other festival that Malayalees celebrate, has a little bloodshed associated with it. Very little thanks to the method of execution employed. The rule of thumb is that
festival = someone died
therefore
yay.
There are exceptions of course.
Imagine your neighbour is an asshole and you hate him, every time you park your car he comes out and shouts at you, he stones street dogs, he cribs about couples cuddling in the local park and about kids playing on streets, he sweeps his front yard and dumps everything in front of your house, he steals flowers from your garden, basically a rotten human being, and then one day like it usually happens, he dies. Parapara! You don’t run to the nearest shop to buy crackers and celebrate this event do you? You might take a day off and quietly have a drink with a few friends and talk about some aspect of his life that was not so bad. Ya, like you say something to the effect of yes yes all that is correct but he never let his wife sweep the front yard, he always did it himself. See, that’s a graceful way to celebrate when someone exits the world.
So that’s why I like Vishu. No one died, no one killed anyone, not even an animal not in a duel, not through treachery, not even of natural causes or sacrifice or willingly. None of the above. Pretty good no? Wow who dreamt up this one? That’s the thing with imagination, until it’s not there it’s not there and then one day someone says, I think we can have a nice festival and their friends are like, who died? No one died. Just a festival to celebrate the harvest. Look at the flowers, the greenery around, we have mangoes and jackfruits and just like that everyone is in agreement and they start tucking into a ripe jackfruit with hands oiled all the way up to their elbows and there you go. That’s probably how Vishu came into being.
One of the things that we do during Vishu is set up a nice array of things. Things you love and want in life for the coming year, remember it’s our new year too. Then, first thing in the morning go and look at it. Kanni, literally means a sight. A symbolic first image. For example if you woke up in the morning wondering if you should make tea or just wait till your sister wakes up so that she can make you tea and exactly at that time your neighbour, the asshole, (no he didn’t die, that was a hypothetical situation), is passing your house and he makes a guttural sound and spits a yellow blob of phlegm right in front of your house, you will probably first make a sound of disgust and then say “nalla kani”, literally “Nice thing to see first thing in the morning” what it means is “Yuck what a disgusting sight to see in the morning, my day is gonna be pretty fucked up”. If you are confused at this point I don’t blame you, not to worry I’ll quickly explain. Malayalees, the people who speak Malayalam that is, have an inherent sarcasm that makes them rely on the subtle art of subtexting, say something and mean the exact opposite. So, If seeing your neighbour spit can screw up your day it is possible that you try and see some nice nice things on the first day of the year and it could make the rest of the year decent at least, that’s the hope. That’s what Vishu Kani is, a beautiful arrangement to keep the dread of the coming year to a medium rare and bearable level.
We seem to love yellow things so, the Kani has, for example, the Mangalore cucumber, some people call this Madras cucumber and others call it Sambar cucumber, Konna poove; that’s a lovely yellow flower commonly known as Golden Shower, Bananas, Mangoes, new clothes especially ones with a gold border, books, pens and pencils, rice and other grains, a lit lamp. As a child I remember photos of beautiful gods, intricate calendar art with magical shades of blue, green and reds depicting such benevolent, slightly chubby gods. They looked like they might let me sit on their lap and maybe even tell me a story. So different from the depiction of gods these days that look like people who spend hours in the gym – I don’t think I would have anything much to chat with them about. They’ll probably only have stories of how many pull ups they can do now and how no one can mess with them, And some gold (if you own any), money and coins, betel leaf and areca nut, but most important-a mirror.
The way I remember this playing out is, we would help set all this up and then tidy the house and go to sleep. In the morning my mother would wake me with her palm held over my eyes keeping them closed and lead me slowly to the Kani so that when I opened my eyes I saw an image of myself reflected in the mirror surrounded by all these beautiful things. It felt good. I must have been eight or nine and I remember wondering how my mom managed to see the kani without anyone guiding her to it. I never asked her, I never found out. I know now that adults are good at navigating life pretty much blindfolded.
So yesterday when I was wondering if all this Kani and what not makes sense to me, aren’t they just empty rituals? I remembered that beyond the Kani and the sadhya, the money and payasam there was something that made it meaningful for me. Because as a child when I stood looking at that image with sleepy eyes my mom who stood right next to me also became part of my image of hope. Late last night I set up Kani and early this morning I stumbled and stood in front of it. My reflection looked back at me blankly surrounded by all the things that I had set up and as I stood there just looking, I remembered my mother and I slowly smiled and my reflection smiled back at me. I think I can get through this year.
(The author is a theatre performer and director. He lives in Bangalore)
Related:
Everyday Love: When Diwali becomes that much more special