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The three components are iconic of Khasi culture. No festival is complete without them. No matrimonial or funeral rite can be performed without a serving of Kwai, Tympew and Shun. The maternal uncles of the bride and the groom serve each other and the well wishers beetle nuts before their entry into the church (a combination of the Christian and the indigenous religions). The relatives of the dead serve their friends and relatives kwai and tympew before their loved is finally put to rest. Kwai and tympew are even put inside the coffin so the departed soul can partake of it in the next world. When we talk of Granddad we remember him as ‘Bam Kwai ha duwar u Blei’, (eating beetle nut in the house of God). So eating Kwai identifies me as Khasi.
Dad’s a custom officer and mom’s a professor in English, and every weekday at half past nine I am behind the wheel of the car to drop dad to his office and mum to the University. It’s the same everyday. Traffic Jams! Cars lining the narrow two lane road, incessant honking, blaring sirens of VIP cars, (why don’t our politicians do something about widening the roads? A rhetorical question that plagues my mind each day). As I inched my way slowly down the serpentine queue, I made mental plans of what I was going to do.
An hour later, I am back home. A shower and a shave and I am on my way to join my friends at the studio. Two other friends and I had started a small production house called Burning Oil Productions. Together we do all kinds of audio and video productions mostly locally based. We were fortunate however this time to get a contract by UNDCP (United Nations Drugs and Crime Prevention), South East Asia to make music videos on creating awareness towards drug abuse. The videos are due for release in two weeks time. It is our biggest project so far, that will not only fetch a tidy sum but also the necessary publicity we needed so badly as a small organisation. We’ve been working on the project for about a month, involving tasks like finding actors, filming and editing.
A
round four hours later, the three of take a break and walk to our favourite joint,‘Jadoh Stall’, a small road side restaurant to join my brothers, Larry and Barry who as always find their way here at this same time everyday. It’s always been the same menu we treat ourselves to, putharo and tungrymbai or dohjem (putharo-rice pancakes, tungrymbai-fermented soya beans fried with onions and pork and dohjem-pork entrails cooked in blood…famous Khasi delicacies). All of this followed by a refreshing cup of red tea and of course kwai, tympew and shun. We always pass an hour or more here talking about almost everything. Today was on plans to try to get another contract, namely to cover the band 'Michael Learns to Rock' in a tour of Shillong.
Our topic today was about how within the last few years a lot of international bands had found their way to Shillong, some famous ones like Firehouse and Petra. Well, they don’t call Shillong ‘India’s little rock and roll town’ for nothing! A BBC journalist coined that term. Shillong has been renowned for having seasoned musicians in various genres of music. How dedicated Shillong people are to music is evident from the fact that it is one of the only places in India that hosts the Bob Dylan Concert on the 24th of May every year to commemorate Dylan’s birthday!
Mum rang me as we were conversing. She tells me that Mama John (Mama- Uncle) passed away at the hospital a few hours ago. I knew what was expected of me. It is a must that I should go and help. It’s a social obligation. I assured her I would try and pick her up from work early. I have to do away with my share of the studio work today. Uncle John is not my real uncle; we just call every elderly person Mama in our society, a sign of respect. He was my dad’s close friend and stayed in the same locality, Lummawrie, which is the locality I stay in.
I left my brothers and my mates and went home to pick up the car. I still had an hour and a half before picking up mom so I joined my grandmother today as she watched her favourite soap on TV, "The Bold and the Beautiful." This soap is a favourite in Shillong; it has been going on for almost seven years!
Leaving Grandma to get back to her cooking I went to pick mum and dad from work. I stopped at my sister’s piano tutor on the way back to pick her up. Ruth loves to play the piano. She takes the annual Trinity School of Music Examination for her grades. Mum wanted to stop by the local nursery to buy fresh flowers for the funeral service and dad had the chance to get a few orchids. Shillong is widely renowned for its orchids that come in different varieties. They need a lot of care and some flowers bloom just once every two years. Dad has mastered that act, as have many ardent gardening enthusiasts in town.
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Frank Bamon
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Comments
Iahunlang Diengdoh | Aug 24th, 2011
I really enjoyed the story... Can relate to it yet it's refreshing.
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