************************************************************************************************************
In our childhood at our village Muthukur, we never heard of dining tables. Our nuclear family had all of 9 members and a couple of unbidden or bidden guests and was like a small hostel and we would have had to have all of four tables and a dozen chairs...an impossible proposition.
So we never heard of table manners. But that didn't mean we had no feeding manners like Dennis said. We did have several manners during our community meals---let us call them 'floor manners' (which our esteemed parliamentarians don't have at all).
That it was time for food was announced by the final bell that mom rang during her pre-meal puja (there were all of three intermittent bells so you should be watchful counting assiduously).
And then all of us kids ran to our cutlery shelf hanging from the wall by a nail. Don't think cutlery meant plates, side-plates, spoons, forks, knives and napkins...no sir...just any one of the metal plates that you could manage to grab, and a metal tumbler to go with it.
If you were not smart and swift, you would get one of those last couple of plates that have lost one or two of their three legs and you have to place it on the warped floor carefully enough so that it doesn't lose its balance and start emitting sounds like tuk-tik-took while you ate which would be considered an ill omen...cats and dogs do such sounds licking used plates. So you had to diligently place spacers made of folded cut paper underneath the offending legs so that no metallic sounds disturbed the holy meal.
If you were a man or boy, you were supposed to throw away your shirt for the nonce and appear half-naked. The upper torso should be bare exposing the sacred thread if you were a man, or if you were a boy, your mom wouldn't have to wash your shirt to cleanse its stains of dal or sambar or ghee that would soil your shirt every time you had your meal. And of course you were supposed not only to wash your hands but also your feet...an advanced version of the western hand-wash etiquette. For, you were just back from your bare-footed kabadi in the dirty street and your feet would be full of streaks of wet cow-dung.
And during your meal you were not supposed to talk at all...at least till your father and guests got up from their silent meal and walked off. I suppose this rule was to prevent foodstuff trying to sneak into your lung due to the failure of what I recall was called epiglottis...not that I was aware of any such thing within myself. Not that your parents were scared of your choking to death (which would mean one less welcome mouth to feed) but that you may cough or sneeze and emit all the munched and chewed contents through your mouth or nostrils into the plate of your esteemed guest chancing to be sitting opposite you...well, it did happen to me once and that would be a different blog altogether.
During the meal there were what were supposed to be madi and maila...meaning clean and unclean stuff. For instance water is clean. So is ghee. So is buttermilk. So is pickle. But not cooked rice or curry or dal or sambar. If you happen to touch any of these unclean things that fell on the floor by the side of your plate and you picked it up slyly with a finger of your left hand, then you were supposed to dip that finger into a drop of water that mom would pour by the side of your plate.
After you got up from your meal, if you were male, you just get lost to the backyard and wash your hands and feet with a tumbler of holy water. If you were a female, then you had to collect the plates of those who had finished their meal and wash them along with yours. So each of my sisters was in a hurry to finish their meals in a trice towards the bitter end.
Once in a while when there was a special puja like Ganeshjee's, a brahmin pundit would be an invited guest and he would take precedence over everyone else. You can't start eating your appetizing plate full of goodies like payas before the guest starts his meal ceremoniously. And you don't get up and walk out before he did...that would be an insult to the guest who would arrive damn hungry, having prepared for the event for all of two previous days by half-starving, and so would eat leisurely for half an hour that would look like a lifetime to you who were eager to get off and resume that half-done kabadi on the street.
And once in a while there would be an invitation for meals from a neighbor if he happened to get his daughter married off in a hurry before she attained puberty. That would be a real community event which would involve feeding a half-century of guests big and small. And you wait and wait for the final bell and would run to join the floor-meal at his place.
Now, don't expect that he would order a hundred plates and tumblers for all of you. No sir! He would only buy a half-century of banana leaves and split each of them into two or more pieces. And to hold semi-solid stuff like payas, expert cooks would turn the remnants of banana leaves into cups by a deft stroke of folding and knitting up by pieces of broomsticks (which were clean unlike the ugly AAP brooms). And you had to carry your own lotha (metal tumbler) and keep a strict vigil over it and not forget to bring it back after your meal gets over duly.
During the meal which would see you sitting in a long line with folded legs on a sandy floor with or without grass mats, the routine is more elaborate...you shouldn't touch any item of the meal that was being served till all the items were in. And then the brahmin pundits assisting the illegal marriage would be the first to start their meals and a shout would announce that you can lunge into your own meal like so many starved kitties mewling with joy.
The same routine would also be valid for the annual vana-bhojan (community dinner in the woods) held in your locality soon after the cessation of the retreating monsoon in late December when the sun is bright but not hot. There were no woods or gardens in sandy Muthukur, so it was held in the shade of the sprawling and glistening neem tree in front of the president's house. Only now, there would be no fresh banana leaves but stitched dried leaves of any tree that had big enough leaves...watch out for the sand blowing in the unexpected wind spoiling your fun-meal.
I guess you get the hang, somewhat, of our floor manners at Muthukur.
Next installment would be the table manners at our Faculty Hostel at IIT KGP in the 1960s...watch out.
************************************************************************************************************
In our childhood at our village Muthukur, we never heard of dining tables. Our nuclear family had all of 9 members and a couple of unbidden or bidden guests and was like a small hostel and we would have had to have all of four tables and a dozen chairs...an impossible proposition.
So we never heard of table manners. But that didn't mean we had no feeding manners like Dennis said. We did have several manners during our community meals---let us call them 'floor manners' (which our esteemed parliamentarians don't have at all).
That it was time for food was announced by the final bell that mom rang during her pre-meal puja (there were all of three intermittent bells so you should be watchful counting assiduously).
And then all of us kids ran to our cutlery shelf hanging from the wall by a nail. Don't think cutlery meant plates, side-plates, spoons, forks, knives and napkins...no sir...just any one of the metal plates that you could manage to grab, and a metal tumbler to go with it.
If you were not smart and swift, you would get one of those last couple of plates that have lost one or two of their three legs and you have to place it on the warped floor carefully enough so that it doesn't lose its balance and start emitting sounds like tuk-tik-took while you ate which would be considered an ill omen...cats and dogs do such sounds licking used plates. So you had to diligently place spacers made of folded cut paper underneath the offending legs so that no metallic sounds disturbed the holy meal.
If you were a man or boy, you were supposed to throw away your shirt for the nonce and appear half-naked. The upper torso should be bare exposing the sacred thread if you were a man, or if you were a boy, your mom wouldn't have to wash your shirt to cleanse its stains of dal or sambar or ghee that would soil your shirt every time you had your meal. And of course you were supposed not only to wash your hands but also your feet...an advanced version of the western hand-wash etiquette. For, you were just back from your bare-footed kabadi in the dirty street and your feet would be full of streaks of wet cow-dung.
And during your meal you were not supposed to talk at all...at least till your father and guests got up from their silent meal and walked off. I suppose this rule was to prevent foodstuff trying to sneak into your lung due to the failure of what I recall was called epiglottis...not that I was aware of any such thing within myself. Not that your parents were scared of your choking to death (which would mean one less welcome mouth to feed) but that you may cough or sneeze and emit all the munched and chewed contents through your mouth or nostrils into the plate of your esteemed guest chancing to be sitting opposite you...well, it did happen to me once and that would be a different blog altogether.
During the meal there were what were supposed to be madi and maila...meaning clean and unclean stuff. For instance water is clean. So is ghee. So is buttermilk. So is pickle. But not cooked rice or curry or dal or sambar. If you happen to touch any of these unclean things that fell on the floor by the side of your plate and you picked it up slyly with a finger of your left hand, then you were supposed to dip that finger into a drop of water that mom would pour by the side of your plate.
After you got up from your meal, if you were male, you just get lost to the backyard and wash your hands and feet with a tumbler of holy water. If you were a female, then you had to collect the plates of those who had finished their meal and wash them along with yours. So each of my sisters was in a hurry to finish their meals in a trice towards the bitter end.
Once in a while when there was a special puja like Ganeshjee's, a brahmin pundit would be an invited guest and he would take precedence over everyone else. You can't start eating your appetizing plate full of goodies like payas before the guest starts his meal ceremoniously. And you don't get up and walk out before he did...that would be an insult to the guest who would arrive damn hungry, having prepared for the event for all of two previous days by half-starving, and so would eat leisurely for half an hour that would look like a lifetime to you who were eager to get off and resume that half-done kabadi on the street.
And once in a while there would be an invitation for meals from a neighbor if he happened to get his daughter married off in a hurry before she attained puberty. That would be a real community event which would involve feeding a half-century of guests big and small. And you wait and wait for the final bell and would run to join the floor-meal at his place.
Now, don't expect that he would order a hundred plates and tumblers for all of you. No sir! He would only buy a half-century of banana leaves and split each of them into two or more pieces. And to hold semi-solid stuff like payas, expert cooks would turn the remnants of banana leaves into cups by a deft stroke of folding and knitting up by pieces of broomsticks (which were clean unlike the ugly AAP brooms). And you had to carry your own lotha (metal tumbler) and keep a strict vigil over it and not forget to bring it back after your meal gets over duly.
During the meal which would see you sitting in a long line with folded legs on a sandy floor with or without grass mats, the routine is more elaborate...you shouldn't touch any item of the meal that was being served till all the items were in. And then the brahmin pundits assisting the illegal marriage would be the first to start their meals and a shout would announce that you can lunge into your own meal like so many starved kitties mewling with joy.
The same routine would also be valid for the annual vana-bhojan (community dinner in the woods) held in your locality soon after the cessation of the retreating monsoon in late December when the sun is bright but not hot. There were no woods or gardens in sandy Muthukur, so it was held in the shade of the sprawling and glistening neem tree in front of the president's house. Only now, there would be no fresh banana leaves but stitched dried leaves of any tree that had big enough leaves...watch out for the sand blowing in the unexpected wind spoiling your fun-meal.
I guess you get the hang, somewhat, of our floor manners at Muthukur.
Next installment would be the table manners at our Faculty Hostel at IIT KGP in the 1960s...watch out.
************************************************************************************************************
No comments:
Post a Comment