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ON THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING A GRANDMOTHER
I grew up listening to the tales told to all the grandchildren
in my clan by my old and frailgrandmother. As one among the
youngest of her grand brood, I had always seen her as an aged
woman. She was as thin as a leaf, illiterate and toothless too.
Her hollowed in cheeks are what is
etched out in my memory. She had to pound the must- chew- after-
meal betel nut, leaves and alittle lime trio inside a hand held,
tubular mortar and pestle both made of brass and scrape them
out into a coarsely minced ball and pop into her mouth and we
the hungry kids would get a
portion too in return for the service of pounding the
mixture.
Funny, because I never thought that the old lady would leave
such a strong impression upon me.
I was not particularly attached to her either during her
lifetime. Ironically, I realize that a lot of
what I am now is because of her. Despite illiteracy and orthodox
bringing up, she was adisciplinarian and a perfectionist too. In
the naivety of my childishness I had adapted myself to
her instructions with an annoyance and complied with criticism.
Never did I imagine that I would
grow to appreciate and adore the old dame in my mature years; I
am equally surprised by the
knowledge that I begin to recognize her as the mould into which
I have been poured and shaped.
Serious thoughts apart, she had given me wonderful moments
through her narrations that would
fill our vacant times. With an age gap of more than six decades
between us, her childhoodexperiences became excellent raw material
for her stories. In her times, water had to be fetched
from common wells and the hearth burnt with dry branches and
twigs collected from the wild
growth at the village borders. (Not that she lived in villages
but the present day mega cities werestill hamlets during her
growing- up years.) Paid assistance was taken only to build the
walls and
the roof of the house and the women in the family were in charge
of maintenance which included
apart from daily sweep and mop the white wash of the walls to be
done annually and whenever a
joyful or a sad occasion demanded it. It was a time when the
subordination of female gender wasaccepted in totality. She claimed
not to have looked at any man eye to eye and threw us into
guffaws at her confession that she had not spoken to her husband
till she gave birth to her second
child. Her wrinkled cheeks glowed into a blush when we oohed and
aahed in disbelief.
My childhood then is vastly different from the childhood now.
Days were when we had to
learn with what was taught in the class rooms during regular
school hours. Tuitions were givenonly and only to slow learners and
had a stigma attached. Sans television, sans computer
and sans mobile phone, the only pastime at home was listening to
listeners choice in Radio
Ceylon and the radio set lacked the multisensory grip of the
modern gadgets and fortunately
allowed us the pleasures of playing hide and seek outdoors and
crowding around granny to listento her tales. Indeed there were
plenty of opportunities to stick around her in view of manifold
chores disguised as games allotted to the children.
One activity that stands out in my memory was removing stones
from rice. Modern rice millshave state- of -art machinery to remove
stones and sort and grade the rice granules according to
color and size. The rice I buy now at departmental stores is so
clean that all that is needed in way
of preparation for cooking is a single rinse under running
water. About four decades back, thingswere not that simple. Rice
bought in stores had a generous mix of stones; stones as black as
coal
and as big as pepper corn; some were glassy little pebbles. It
was not unusual to find seeds of
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varied sizes and varieties too. Removal of stones was an ongoing
process. A common sight at
households was squatted people with heads bent and hands
rhythmically moving around a pile of
rice in the process of picking stones.
Whenever the elders complained that we the tiny tots had time to
kill, my grandmother would
manipulate us to sit in a circle, unload a small mound of rice
from the sack onto the floor andapportion small or big scoops
according to our age and capacity and we had to spread the rice
onthe floor and remove stones one by one and the rice so cleaned
would be stored separately ready
for cooking. The competition would be to accumulate maximum
quantity of stones and that
meant cleaning more than originally allotted rice. What kept us
glued to the job was invariablythe yarn that she would start to
weave and prolong as long as she thought that we had done
justice to the task cum contest allotted.
Granny would lament the fact that all the stones were going a
waste. In her home town, so shewould start, the stones had been
recycled. People stored the stones in tins until they grew to a
sizeable quantity and made a profit by selling to the grocers
who would go from household to
household buying those stones at a price and the stones so
collected would be mixed in freshbags of rice. Families did not
mind buying rice deliberately enriched (?!?) with the unwanted
addends as long as they were paid a few annas for the stones
returned at a later time. But that
was the practice at her native town. In our place, since no
grocer came to buy, the stones of our
labor had to be thrown out. I am amused to recollect now, how in
those days I felt miserable andalmost cried that all the stones I
removed could not be exchanged for money. In my own way, I
devised means of offsetting my loss. I could safe keep the
stones until they became a bagful and
carry the bag to grandmothers town at my next visit and sell to
the highest bidder in the localmarket. The idea of counting coins
in my palms helped to bring a smile in my face.
I think it is high time I wound up this session because I see
the tender red lips part in a yawn and
the eyelids droop down in spite of efforts to remain awake. So
sleep well, pretty baby and I shallregale you with another story of
mine tomorrow. For now it is Good night! My little
grandchild.
