Happy Pujo!!!

And on this Durga pujo I realise that Mohammad was always meant to go to the mountain. Always, even if it meant on youtube.com. Almost three years after an emotionally distraught denouncement of Durga, this Mohammad came crawling back... or trawling back. It was a friend's status update on Facebook, "That time of the year, waiting for the sound of the dhak," that got me by the gut and twisted so hard, I had to hear the dhak for myself.

I've never had the padha (colony/street) experience when growing up. Never been part of a 'cultural committee' that puts together the Durga pujo, of kids who participate in the evenings' entertainment, of young girls who help their mothers prepare stuff. I've always been the 'only visiting' variety. I've pandal-hopped with my parents, bowed and prayed before various idols and gone home. I've also never been in Calcutta/Kolkata for a pujo.

The most spectacular pujo and Ma-er mukh* I remember is from a pandal in west Delhi's Nivedita Colony. I was perhaps 12 years old and she was beautiful. We also had the most amazing kosha mangsho. What had captivated me though was the dhunuchi dancers and the trance inducing beats of the dhak they danced to. The girls were older, perhaps 18, amazingly graceful in their wide-padh sarees and they danced with so much rhythm, so much beauty... I wanted to join them. We didn't watch to see the whole thing because... for various reasons.

Ever since -- at different ages -- I've had a favourite dream sequence of doing a kickass dhunuchi dance, in a lost temple by myself with the most-beautiful Durga idol, huge torches on the walls and the biggest, loudest dhaks ever. I am in a white-sari-with-lal-border, a huge bindi, lots of kajal, hair open, sheathed in perspiration and I don't have a care in the world or awareness of anyone or anything else. And no one can stop me, laugh at me, ask me to go back home and I have no inhibitions about how I look or how my body moves. I'm aware only of the dhak that leads me. And I dance and jump and twirl and leap and collapse in a heap. I'm forgiven. Very filmi but I am very filmi and I love it and I love the dream and each time I hear the dhak, I know I'm going to dream again. (grin)

(Click for details about pujo in Melbourne --->)
The Nivedita Colony pujo is the last 'proper' pujo I remember. The next was in Kalimpong, me 14 in 'love' with a Bengali boy of the same age. And we all met at the pandal, he met my parents too and I hoped in my heart that he would be the man I marry. Ha ha, so silly, so innocent. Of course soon after I found out he was chasing a girl two years older, very beautiful, very fair etc. I don't recollect being heartbroken, I was definitely furious.

The subsequent Durga pujos are fuzzy, the ones in Amritsar involved going to the Army-arranged pujo, nothing spectacular, but the bhog as usual was delicious. Then I was in Delhi, the first year without my parents, in 'love' again, 21-years-old, standing before Ma's idol in Chittaranjan Park with much-older boyfriend, me a two-year-old journalist, dreaming of making a difference and happy I had a man and a career. The boyfriend had his wallet pickpocketed. And of course the relationship ended with much learning and serious heartbreak.

Repeat that story -- without the pickpocketing -- over five more years till 2006. The earth moved, I had many experiences I'd never intended having and my personal resume read of things that had earlier been on the list of bad things that could happen to me. Strangely -- and almost scripted -- the culmination was around Pujo time. So I told myself (and Durga), I wouldn't see her face again. Ever. I didn't go for pushpanjali. Didn't return phonecalls or 'happy pujo' wishes and avoided Durga. I tried sneaking a peek at her in newspapers yet eerily enough and despite the usual coverage in the media, I couldn't see her face that year. Not even a picture.

2007, due to stranger circumstances I was back at the Chit Park pandal. And I ran away. And life changed drastically and put me in Melbourne before the next year's pujo. I cried a lot last year. Didn't do anything on pujo, sat at home, blogged (of course) and cursed my stupidity at various levels. It was same with every other Indian festival in 2008. But I did promise not to repeat it in 2009. I might have left India but I don't want to leave India behind me.

I am not ashamed of my country. I am not confused about who I am and I know what I want. If those experiences will not just 'happen' to me, I shall seek them out. So this year, I should be at Oakleigh Street on October 4th. And maybe, I'll have a little dance with the dhak.

Happy Pujo all of you, particularly the ones outside India. Warm hugs and good wishes. And see this video, it is so, so beautiful. Many thanks to the creators.
*Ma-er mukh: Mother's face, reference to the face of Durga
PS: For the over-enlightened, non-Indians who'd wonder why Indians pray to gods with many arms, it's the same reason why say, Catholics pray to someone who turned water into wine.