The plans and wait..

After all the waiting, all the eager anticipations, all the preparations, all the excitements we are again back to the same routine life. The festival is over.

Last week, Bengal celebrated Durga Puja. It is the greatest festival of us Bengalis, a festival worshiping goddess Durga, symbolizing the win of good over evil. In the end however, it is a celebration of life, joy and happiness, in the most glittering and grand scale possible. The festival officially started last Sunday, semi-officially seven days before that with Mahalaya. However, in reality, it had started months before with all the preparations. Month long preparations for just five days. And after those wild five days, everything just has to go back to the same routine. One can stretch it for a couple of days more. But the sad tune starts playing already on the evening of the fourth day. With immersion of the idol the next day and distribution of sweets, we sadly remember, ‘from tomorrow it is the old life again’. It makes us all sad. Even sitting in a different continent with no sign of festivity around me, I am sad that the puja is over

It all starts with the para clubs (neighborhood clubs) frantically trying to finalize their themes for the year. It is only February, when the club members are already busy with the meetings, brain storming different ideas for a festival in October! The smaller clubs would start with their discussions a bit later, but still quite a few months before the puja. In their case, it is mostly about the budget and other technicalities.

As the grey sky slowly turns pristine blue, and kash (a typical autumn weed with white blossoms) blooms in the fields, you suddenly see all around that there is this air of festivity. One morning, some bamboo poles on the blind-end lane or the nearby field will announce the coming festivity. It is coming, it is coming. The greener fields, the bluer sky, the merrier air, all announce, it is coming.

People start with their shopping slowly. I think we Bengalis buy the most clothes during this occasion. One has to get at least five sets of clothes for wearing on the five days. Better if it is ten, for wearing each morning and evening new clothes. Then there is jewelry and other accessories to match the new clothes. From roadside stalls to glossy shopping malls, everything gets busier as days get closer. Then one has to of course buy new shoes. And the new attire is not only for us. The house needs some refurnishing; let us wait for the puja. Planning to buy a new car, let us wait for the puja. If the plans are not so big, then we buy new table clothes, cushion covers, curtains, etc etc. We seem to schedule everything around those five days. For those five days.

Idol makers get busy with making the idols of the goddess. However, just before the festivity, they have to work all night to finish in time. The potters get busy making the clay utensils required for the worship rituals. Artists are busy making the pandals, the temporary temples where we will worship the goddess. Each pandal turns out to be such a beautiful work of art. Also, no less busy are those simple pandals with smaller budgets. People are busy creating pictures with little colorful light bulbs, beautiful decorations that will light up the whole city for those five nights. The special shops get busy stocking up all supplies required for the rituals, and so does the flower shops. A few days ahead, village families are busy picking lotus flowers. Hundred and eight of those are required for offering to the goddess on the most beautiful late night ritual. The drummers set out for Kolkata.

Children are busy deciding which dress they will wear on which day. Counting how many new each one got, they compete with their friends in school. They remain busy planning the games they will play, the storybooks they will read, the fast food they will eat, the pandals they will visit. Those five days will be without any strict rules, five days of freedom to do whatever the heart desires. Young people make plans regarding when they will go out with which friend groups. The pandal hopping routes, the parties, and all other details of the five-day long celebration are carefully decided. The middle-aged people choose to relax and just spend the days in the neighborhood area chatting all day long, visiting friends and family, eating good. Or some of them goes back to become young again and roam around the whole day. Older generation plan for their families, maybe the daughter or the son will return home from their work city. They do not plan to go much out, but still have all modest ideas especially for those five days.

The writers are busy finishing their novels. For this occasion, several literary magazines are published with novels, stories, and essays from eminent writers. Bengalis celebrate festivity with literature also. Special features start on the newspapers and magazines. New individual books are published, new music albums are released. All puja special.

The media is busy reporting the themes of the famous clubs for the year, the latest fashion, and so on. The advertisements are targeted for this occasion, and there are a lot of offers and discounts in every shop. This is also the time when people go for vacations, and there are even ‘puja special’ trains! The traffic control board has those important meetings to come up with strategic methods for controlling the passionate crowd those puja days.

Now if we are talking about festivals, can we leave out food? Therefore, families plan what special dishes they are going to cook. The best restaurants in the cities are noted down in the list ‘to visit’ during these five days. The restaurants get busy putting together the puja special menu. Traditional recipes are on the magazines. In some neighborhood, the lunches are planned in the community hall for these days. The people in charge of arranging the food seem to have the most important job among all.

Outside Bengal, and even outside India, wherever there are a few Bengali families, together they plan and try to organize the puja in their own way. They get busy with the preparations. The idol must be arranged to be shipped from some interior village of Bengal. A nice cultural program is planned and rehearsed. The lunch menu consists of typical Bengali delicacies. All in an effort to get a flavor of their roots, a flavor of the festive hometown away from home.

What about me? Well, here there are not any puja or celebration. However, I cannot spend these festive days pretending them to be just any other day. So I plan to wear new clothes, and dress up. I plan to cook special dinner each evening, a dinner with desserts. I plan to check the websites putting up detailed pictures of the celebrations in my Kolkata. I simply plan to make everything special in their little ways.

 Everyone is just busy planning before the puja…

After all these preparations, planning, excitements, anticipations, expectations, the puja came. Those happy, crazy, glittery, grand, extreme five days of festivity. Then suddenly it is over. The five days pass by more quickly than one can even imagine. The eager plans quickly transform into happy memories of past. We had so much fun and created such beautiful memories. However, there is nothing to look forward to, to plan for, and to feel crazy about. We wait and wait and wait for it so eagerly, and then it comes and goes in a blink. And we do feel sad. We feel sad to go back to the routine again. Sometimes maybe waiting is so much more exciting..

Well..

Asche bochor abar hobe

Next year it will happen again..

Soon we will be busy planning for that. Someone rightly said, we Bengalis live from one puja to another.

The train and me

Kuuu... Jhik jhik.. Jhik jhik.. The whistle blows. The train slowly departs from the platform. I am by the window. My face, pressed against the window rod, looks back to the busy Howrah station. I look down at the rail lines, how the train is changing tracks. I try to follow one until it gets lost in another. Slowly the train picks up speed. One after another, it is passing the electricity poles by the rail line. A dimly lit small station comes. By the time, I could read the name, the train hurries by it. I now look inside the train, the people around. Wow! I am riding a train after so long. I am going to a new place for holiday. How exciting is that!! With the rhythm of the moving train, my thoughts get lost in the vanishing horizon outside the window.

This used to be the picture every time I boarded the train as a little girl and headed towards a new holiday destination. And after all these years, the picture is still the same. Today also, I am similarly excited to board a train. My face remains glued to the window as the scenery outside changes. Therefore, with an occasion or without, I am always happy to be on the train. As I was on the steam train (museum train for tourism) all excited, happy and smiling some days ago. The wind messed my hair and I smelled the smoke, and along with came back all my little train memories..

The recent steam train ride

After getting to know about the destination, the next question during our childhood vacation planning used to be about the train. How long would the train journey last? Were we going to spend the night in the train? Train train. A vacation was not complete without it. And a train ride was not complete without a overnight journey!

The olden times of sleeper class journey. Dad would try to get two tickets with the window seats, and two with the middle berths. Both were must. Brother and I would spend the day by the window sides. For sleeping at night, we occupied the middle berths. I do not know what amusement we found in sleeping on the middle berth. And dad had to make us a temporary fence with some nylon ropes joining the bars holding the berth. A measure to prevent us from falling during our sleepy wander! Another attraction to us was inflating the air pillows. I would inflate two, and brother would get two. We would inflate a bit, and then while we tried to catch our breath, it would deflate again!

My face used to be fixed by the window. The wind would play with my hair. The eyes will turn a bit watery in the constant wind. Ma would say, during her childhood she also used to do the same. Then it used to be coal engine. From coal to electric, the technologies have changed. Nevertheless, the picture by the window side managed to remain constant. A curious face, looking out to the unknown world.

Outside, the frames of picture change one after another. Green villages of Bengal. Little ponds, the dark shade of trees, paddy fields, a little hut. Soon wheat fields replace the paddy in my picture frame. Leaving that behind, the landscape becomes drier. Empty fields, grazing cattle.  In Bengal the huts are thatched with dried hay. In other places, dried date leaves thatched the hut. Look, isn’t the shape of these huts a bit different than the ones in Bengal. The tiles are also roundish instead of squarish. Oh, and there, is that a date plant dad? What crop is this in the field? The train then goes by a little town. On the other side of the level crossing, cars, cycles, vans, scooters are waiting for the train to pass. Then there are again just fields dotted with villages. A group of little boys runs along the train on the narrow mud path. Their bare feet are trying to be faster than the train; their faces are glowing with innocent glee. The railroad makes a bend. With my head almost out of the window, I try to count the number of train cars. Lost in thoughts, I idly read the milepost number. And then suddenly.. Jham Jham Jham Jham.. The train crosses the bridge with the loud metallic sound.

The train stops at a big junction station. So many trains. Announcements in different language. Everything looks so busy! The hawkers walking by our window with all those yummy fast foods makes my mouth water. Bhaiya, give me one serving of the fries. Can a train ride be complete without buying these fast foods through the window? Dad gets down with our water bottles. There my brother starts getting nervous, will dad manage to board the train before it leaves! Those were the days when mineral water bottles were not available everywhere. In each big station, around a single drinking water tap would gather a big crowd trying to refill their bottles. 

Where are you going? The question comes from the opposite seat, and begins a chatty conversation with the co-passenger. In between all these, the lunch is served from the pantry car. I do not know how we used to find that food so tasty! After growing up, I would never even try it. Surprisingly, then the food in those aluminum foils and boxes was one tasty exciting thing. Those almost watery lentils, chicken pieces in oil and spices, almost cold rice or paratha. I loved the fish sandwiches we used to pack from home for the first night if our train was departing in the evening. And I remember how getting food every hour drove us crazy while we were travelling with Rajdhani Express (a semi-luxury train), even though it was so tasty. With the food there used to be a lot of toffees, chocolates, and lozenges. I remember the Parle Mango Bite and Orange lozenges. Strangely, I do not like them anymore. Either they are not any more the same, or I have grown up..

I remember the first ride on First class train compartment. A closed-door four seated arrangement. Uff, I can never forget the excitement and apprehension before the ride. I was so surprised when we got the bedding during our first AC compartment journey. Our sleeper class journeys slowly turned into travelling in AC cars. The calls of the hawkers, the buying fast food through the windows stayed on the other side of the glass windows. Boring but comfortable. However, buying the comfort could change only that much of the whole picture, the rest remained same. Only, instead of the iron rods, my cheeks now touched the glass as I looked out of the window.

I remember the numerous and never-ending journey between Pune-Kolkata during the college days. For the first time a bit of sadness mingled with the joy ride on train. For the first time I was travelling with train alone. Ah, I used to be so exhausted after the 34 hours journey. Those whole night chats with Beenish. Our topics ranged from books, college gossips, philosophy, serious things, and back to boys. Or I would just finish the new book in hand in those two days. As the train would cross the Kolaghat Bridge, I would say, ‘okay, one more hour’. Train brought the joy of returning home after a busy semester.

Now a days, I mostly travel by air. From the steam trains my parents rode, to Sleeper class of my childhood days, to AC, and now flights; the world has changed. Nevertheless, train still evokes the same excitement wrapped in curiosity, the same as Apu-Durga^*. I have grown beyond the days when before the school bell we all friends used to play ‘train-train’ in a line. Nevertheless, as the train runs towards a new direction, my thoughts get lost in the myriad of dreams. That is why I am so excited to go on this museum steam train ride. That is why I am eager to join Blaž for any train ride. A train ride just to ride the train. That is why I just go to see the Howrah station when I visit home. To me train still means vacations, so much fun, a new place, new landscapes, crowded stations, loud announcements, hawkers, the green fields spreading outside the window, a book in my hand, a sudden music that I start humming, the metallic clanks of changing lines, me by the window, and the whistle blows..

Kuuuuu….

*Apu and Durga are characters from one of my favorite books, ‘Pather Panchali’ by Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhayay. The part in the book describing their innocent curiosity, excitement and longing to see the train for the first time, according to me, is the most romantic and true narration of the wonder that trains bring to a child. To me. 

The sound-words used in describing the train are those typically used in Bengali language.