Our car driver switches on the FM channel whenever we
travel long distance. The deejays, the word magicians capable of innovating the
old and repetitive into brand new material with the glib of their tongue
sometimes produce interesting conversations. One such discussion on that day
was with a man who loves to enjoy wedding feasts uninvited. Dressed neatly in
'Minister White' dhoti and shirt he would enter the venue according to the
dictates of his taste buds which can be North Indian banquet or a mouthwatering
Mughlai biriyani or a tasty vegetarian meal.
The 'Minister
White' dress code, the universally accepted as a ‘reverence invoking’ costume
of South India is sure to get a welcoming reception for all occasions
irrespective of caste community and religion. As he entered the venue our man
would happily nod to the welcoming
committee of girls smear a bit of auspicious sandalwood paste on his forehead
shake hands with a few important looking people go to the decorated stage of
the bridal couple, and with a congratulatory hand shake with groom and a reverential
‘vanakkam’ with folded hands to the bride, pose for the photo shoot and
graciously accept the invite from the host standing at the edge of the exit
point of the stage to partake in the dinner or lunch according to the time of
the day!
"Don't you have the guilt feeling?" asks the deejay
" Never" the man replies. "The feast is
for a large crowd and a single addition is not going to make a difference.
Further I never go there to steal or ogle at the well-dressed girls. My purpose
is very clear. Enjoy the feast in a pleasant ambience on the inviting banana
leaf spread and end it with paan."
"How did you get into this habit?"
"From young age I had a fancy for eating on banana
leaves and ached to have all my meals in those eco-friendly chlorophyll plate. This
luxury was impossible in my big family where each one of us had a porcelain
plate allotted and since it was a big family of 10 children my parents used to
take us for weddings and functions only in turns. But now things are very
different for me and my childhood wishes are doubly fulfilled.
"Have you ever been caught?"
"Why should I be?" The man was
nonchalant" As I leave the venue, they present me with the coconut and
paan gift bag with great reverence or request me to choose a nice plant for my
garden."
This dialogue kindled my thought process when we had
the opportunity to attend a close friend's wedding in England. As soon as the
church ceremony was over and the newly married were congratulated with the bubbly
champagne and congratulations, we were asked to proceed for the feast to a
white marquee erected nearby. Usually in Indian Christian weddings the church
would not see that much crowd as the reception.
As we were
looking for the place where the reception hall could be, we noticed the guests
walking towards a white marquee. We followed the crowed. As we entered ornately
decorated marquee, we saw a board where the guests going through the contents.
We too queued up wondering if that was some sort of congratulatory note or a
welcome for the couple! But to our amazement the list contained our names with
a corresponding table number. Fortunately, we were allotted a table close to
the bridal couple in that unknown gathering. Guests ambled along to their
allotted table with a pleasant chat.
I couldn't
believe what I saw. This is impossible. How could the wedding guests be
contained in a white board? Were there many more similar marquees? But it was
just a single marquee and only those many guests that could be allocated tables
were invited. But care was taken that the allotment of tables was always with
close friends or relatives who would enjoy the day!
Having witnessed thousands of weddings with thousands
of guests in my nation this miniscule size was an unacceptable factor to the
heart. The scrambling rush for dinner seats after the felicitations, a la
Indian style, was missing here.
I laughed thinking about our poor Indian 'Minister
White' who would have cut a very sorry figure in this British ambience!
It was the year 1976 when emergency was declared in
India by the great lady Indira Gandhi when Fakhruddin Ali Ahamed was the
President. During that period a guest control act was also promulgated to avoid
ostentatious spending on occasions like weddings when millions of poor people
went hungry. Like our English experience Indira Gandhi should also have
undergone a similar one and the same should have affected her psyche and made
her promulgate this austerity measure.
Luckily or otherwise my younger sister was getting married then and even
though we lived in a town where the wedding was to take place our rustic back
ground was deep rooted and it was a near impossibility to control the guests to
150 persons where the wheat and rice serving should be limited to 150 grams
according to the dictates of the guest control act. A wedding without a proper
dinner with abundance of rice along with various curry servings sweets and
payasam would mean a humiliation to the village people. We were in a dilemma.
Our amma got a bright idea. She could pin point a loophole in the guest control
act. The rule controls only rice and wheat.
If rice and wheat were not involved the assumption is that we could call
any number of guests. She said it could be a two-venue wedding! Since it was an
evening wedding the general invitation would be in a big hall where a feast of
tiffin items without involvement of rice wheat could be served to any number of
guests and the town people would enjoy this feast better. And for the villagers it would be an
invitation plus! the villagers were usually invited in the traditional paan
supari style and amma said that along with the invitation there could be an
additional card giving the address of dinner venue. Apart from the 150 guests a
hundred plus would not be a problem even if the checking officers come along
since they were also Indians and would understand that the proper treatment of
wedding guests is an unbreakable sacrosanct institution of “Aththi Devo Bhava”
in our beloved country!
Our Amma was indeed a clever lady. And during that
period many a wedding followed amma's tactics satisfying the guests with a
different culinary experience!!
Enjoying our 'moon meals' during our summer holidays
was not only a much-anticipated feast of our childhood days but even after we
grew up with a family of our own! It was an ambrosia beyond compare! My mouth
salivates as I type this blog! But my
prelude should not give you a wrong impression of a great feast under the moon.
The left-over sambar of the afternoon would be mixed with rice in a big vessel
and curd rice with a rich seasoning of mustard and finely chopped green chilies
and ginger and the additional summer bonanza of delicious mango pieces would
get ready in another vessel.
While the sambar rice and curd rice adorned the centre
stage we sat around in the open verandah for the feast in anticipation
irrespective the moon's presence! (for us moon was just a bonus.)
Beside the main vessels there would an additional bowl
of fried crushed appalams and pickle container. As one of the hosts made a ball
of the sambar rice and served it on one of the extended palms another would
generously spray the crushed appalams on the ball of rice. The process
continued till the members were satiated or the vessel went empty and usually
it was the second option that was the case! Then the curd rice course would
start in right earnest with a bit of pickle adorning it's top like a ruby
crown! Indulged and saturated we would happily run to the tank at the back of
the house only to play in the water again on the pretext of washing our hands!!
While this simple meal metamorphosed it into heavenly
food there was an occasion when we had a big feast which could easily be
forgotten than remembered.
He was a close friend who invited five of us, his close
friends for a lunch in his house the next day after an official meet. He
welcomed us at the gate of his ancestral house with beautiful terracotta
flooring and took us in. A big library announced his scholastic competence.
After introducing his wife, we were taken to the dining room where big banana
leaves in Chettinad style were spread out. After washing our hands as we took
our seats the lady of the house started serving. Our friend left the venue
informing us that he would eat later. Performing her duty perfectly the lady
too went inside the kitchen and we were left alone to partake in the 'feast'!
Our friend never entered the place even though we expected him to give company
though he might not be eating! His wife
darted between the kitchen and the dining space to keep feeding her guests. All
my efforts to create a small talk to enliven the ambience proved futile with
her monosyllable replies. We literally
hurried through the act of eating missing the very important factor of bonhomie
that could have made it into a very pleasant occasion!
At this juncture I remembered another time where had
our food alone but had the very opposite effect from our friend's place. It was
an Anglo-Indian family and we were invited for lunch on the occasion of their
son's first communion. The guests were many but their quaint little house was
not as big as their heart. We were seated in the front portico of the house. As
we wondered how they had planned to manage the crowd they invited our family to
come inside for the meals. They expressed their regrets for lack of space but
told us that the food was served in the room and requested us to enjoy their
sumptuous spread. After this, they pulled apart the curtains that separated
three rooms, with a request once more to relish the food. The three little rooms were thus converted to
a single dining hall. I thought what a contrasting experience we had with our in
the house of our scholarly friend and this little place filled with cordiality.
My thought process which started with the FM stopped
with the Anglo-Indians and with a single exception, I realised
that the whole show of feast in our lives had indeed been an enjoyable merry go
round!
