For most of us when the holiday
list was shared 15th Jan looked like a long weekend staring at us.
The day being a Thursday, if you take Friday off you get 4 days – somebody
quipped. It’s Mysore, Goa or Phuket – maybe a cycling expedition or a food /
photography trail – which is in vogue these days. Oh! Of course all formats –
online / offline - So flipkart to Big Bazaar will be on sale – Flat 50% off
only for the weekend. Welcome to the consumer economy. How much can you buy I
wonder?
My baba traveled from a village
in the easternmost part of Bengal in 1949 enlisted in Armed Forces served the
country for 35 years or so, fought in 2 wars & retired 15 years back. But
in all those years, 13th night was always the same – it didn't matter if he was posted in Kashmir, Kanpur, and Hyderabad. He has to spend the 13th
night making pithe. I do not think an
exact translation is available in English language – calling it sweet is like calling
ostrich a bird. It’s a traditional Bengali sweet made out of rice flour &
coconut (sounds weird as I write it) on the occasion of Shankranti – a harvest
festival.
My fondest memory of Shankranti
is to go along with baba to the market hunt for a place where they could dry grind the rice (make rice
flour) the most important ingredient of making pithe then buy coconut,
jaggery & come back home loaded. Of course we will order 3 times the milk –
again a very important part of the ingredient. Then there is something called a
kuruni (kind of scraper but again not
the right translation) which is kept aside only for this one day. Later as the
fridge entered our house, we would keep a special kind of jaggery called patali gud in the refrigerator.
Post dinner the master chef of
our house would spread everything around him and start – with me & mom as
assistants, me for tasting, and she for helping & learning. The pithe
making & storytelling of what happened in his village would go on till
midnight. Once done, the entire house would be filled with this unique smell of
milk, sweets, coconut. In those days there were no refrigerator so we would
spread all types of pithe’s in a corner, cover them with newspaper and go to
sleep in the same room – that being a 1 room flat.
As a kid I used to look forward
to the 13th night – although it happened every single year – the
sweets were the same; the process was the same I used to become feverish with
excitement. There was something innocent about the whole affair. I guess in
those days – with no malls to go to, no TV to turn to, no mobile &
internets these were the small occasions we would look forward to & it
bound the family together.
Cut to 2015 – Baba at present
enjoying a longish breaks at the same village from where I am guessing he
learnt to make these pithe’s from his
maa & baudi’s, pre pone’s his night out by a few days.
He makes 3 types of pithe’s & couriers it to me by DTDC. And bang on that
reaches me on the 10th – few days before Shankranti.
I reflect on the effort &
hung my head in shame. As a family we would have spent hours staring at the TV
screen as the master chef takes us from US to Australia, we live with the
contestants every single day & our heart skips if Laura gets eliminated
& tears flow if our favorite contestant fails to win. Here is a 75 year
old live person carrying the tradition of food making in his head & making
it with his own hand but we haven’t had time to learn the same – at least in
the name of keeping the tradition alive.
Thanks! Baba is all I can say.
Next time I will give it a shot & inch towards my 3rd bok phul ;)
Wrote on 10/01/2015
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