Karimpur
Local inhabitants call this part of Narsingdi chor, island. The landmass is not located anywhere near the Bay of Bengal, so the indistinct Bengali expression which signifies landmass formed in a river, a sea, or an ocean somewhat falls short of describing the place. It’s a riverine island, neither large nor small. And, unlike its counterparts in the coastal areas, it is densely populated. This chor is mostly sandy, although the soil from the middle part of the area is firm and tough. If one starts walking from Buiddhamara, the first village one encounters after landing on the chor from Narshingdi Police Station, Karimpur will be the fourth village that one is walking through. People living in the area call it Korumpur, not Karimpur as the government records and websites suggest. It is perhaps the dingiest of all the villages that are located on the chor, but years ago, when I was young, this was among the most beautiful and scenic places in the whole of Narsingdi.
This memory is almost four-decades old. One of my first cousins, whose father was entrusted with the responsibility of conveying a marriage proposal to my Naana’s neighbor, did something inexplicable. My Khalu, who was a member of the union council, was sent to negotiate a marriage. The bride, a few years older than me, was perhaps twelve or thirteen back then. In comparison to most other girls of the village, her complexion was lighter. To add to her already formidable advantage, Allah gave her bluish-hazel eyes, something no one was bothered about until she had entered puberty. When my aunt’s husband saw the teenager, adorned in a simple sari, he had an epiphany of sorts. He felt the strings of his heart pulling at it tightly. So, he went back and reported that the girl was unsuitable for marriage. Secretly, he sent out a marriage proposal, his third to be precise, to my grandfather’s neighbor. Little did he know that another drama was brewing in his own family.
My cousin, who was a vivacious young man in his twenties at that time, had accompanied his father to see the angelic beauty. He too felt the strings of his heart pulling at it strongly. He too, when he came back, had a sleepless night. So he dug in. If anyone was going to marry that girl it was him.
The wedding procession arrived at noon. I saw my cousin, in his groom’s attire, white all the way through except his pagri and paper-made wedding garland, standing with his entourage in front of a temporary, heavily decorated wedding entrance. I thought I was invited, so I, in my half-pants and with mud-covered feet, walked there and stationed myself by my brother, the groom. He brought out a bottle of Charlie, men’s fragrance, and sprayed it on my tee. Suddenly, someone grabbed me by my hand and dragged me out of that entourage, saying that my mother was calling me. I had seen her waving at me from a distance, half hidden behind the trees, but had chosen to ignore her. Even her hand gesture which signaled that I would be adequately punished if I defy her was not enough to persuade me to go to her. Now, stationed in front of her, frustrated that I was going to miss the wedding feast, I began to sob. My mother explained to me that I was to go there too, but not then. We were invited separately, from the bride’s side, and we would have our dinner in the evening.
The truth was it was a messy affair. My Naana—maternal grandfather—received complaints from the person who had sent my Khalu to broker the marriage. Little did that guy know that middlemen were dangerous beings. You trust them with anything, and they would prove to you that you should have known better, you should have done your bidding on your own. My Naana was mortified. In order to assert his neutrality and sense of deference, he rejected the invitation of his eldest grandson—the first of his line—and chose to stay home. But his neighbor, who didn’t know about the father-son scheme, was not culpable of any wrongdoing. I’m also sure that his then son-in-law’s lack of discretion played a part in it too. My grandfather reluctantly accepted his neighbor’s invitation, more out of an outlandish sense of duty than out of pragmatism. He was to go there, but not when the others were there.
The reason why I took such a long, winding path through this unremarkable tale of love and betrayal is not just to carve out a narrative about that particular incident—which, if dissected properly, will turn into a ghastly reminder of our society’s long history of enabling and tolerating patriarchal oppression, women’s objectification, racist notion of beauty, and child marriage—but also to talk about something more mundane: food. When we went there in the evening, me and my Naana were made to sit on a piece of white cloth placed on the earthen floor. That was the way back then. A few hajak lights—a type of kerosine lantern that gave brighter light than the typical hurricane lamps that were in use on other circumstances—were hanging from the raised bamboo poles. As I sat there, cross-legged, someone—perhaps the host’s brother—put a plate in front of me. It looked more like a deep bowl and less like a dinner plate. They put water on my plate. I washed my hands and then threw the water on the earthen floor. I saw my Naana doing the same. The thirsty earth quickly sucked the water, leaving only a faint dark mark.
As was the custom there, the first thing the serving men put on our plates was amritti, thick jalebi made of flour dough and sugar syrup. They casually threw a pair on each plates, to begin with. I don’t know why they did it. Was it because it was auspicious to start with something sweet? Or was it because farmers back in those days were ferocious eaters and it would be trouble to let them have their way with the main course? I never had the opportunity to find out the correct answer, but I have a hunch that both are equally possible.
Anyway, once people were done with their amritti, they received a good amount of rice, and then beef in thick curry, the star of the feast. The latter was served not by a spoon but by a ladle made from neatly polished coconut shell. Each one contained at least a pound of beef. The reddish dark color of the curry meant that it was cooked well. Back then, even cities had no use of powdered spices. In my mother’s village, where dried red chili, onion, garlic, turmeric, and onion seed came not from the stores but from the land itself, the meat was cooked with spice paste made by using a local variety of mortar and pestle known as shilpata or simply pata. Fresh curry paste, let it be known, makes much superior curry than does store-bought spice powder. The beef curry, with its color and aroma, was declaring its pedigree. This is why, if I am asked to think of the best meal I had, my memory takes me back to that humble beef curry, with its glazed dark red color, and not the fine food I had in restaurants.
A typical wedding meal in Narshingdi comprised of amritti, steamed rice, beef curry, mung daal, and homemade yogurt—served in that exact order. Only the amritti was brought from the bazaar. The rest were homecooked. Even the cow came from the shed right behind the house. It was sacrificed hours before it was cooked. Once the meat was cut into pieces, two or three massive cooking pots were put on a temporary stove made from raised bricks. Wood and charcoal infused their distinctive flavors to the dish. Less affluent served home raised Chicken instead of beef. Every family, back then, raised fouls. Hindu families—almost every village in the chor had a few households, mostly from the bottom caste—maintained their own rituals. Their staple, I assume, was goat curry.
Manohardi
I attended a few weddings that were more elaborate than the one I have described here. One I remember vividly. I have four maama—maternal uncles—and two of them were married by the time I was born. It so happened that the third, who was a year older than my mother, was to get married to a woman whose family lived farther inland. Back then, to access that part of Monohordi you could either take a bus or hire a boat. To go there by bus, people had to first take a two-hour-long bus ride to Dhaka and then take another that took three to four hours to go to the closest bus stop. And, from the bus stop, it was another hour of walk, because there was no rickshaw that could go that deep into the village. The boat ride, by comparison, was straight forward. The only trouble was it took almost seven or eight hours and more if the river had an infestation of kochuri pana, water hyacinth. These plants, which are now seen almost everywhere in Bangladesh, were first brought in during the British colonial era. Which culprit had the good sense of smuggling in this invasive species from South America is a mystery. But that it wreaked havoc in the local marine life by taking over waterbodies and by sucking the oxygen from the water is well-documented. In the past, it was known as the ‘beautiful blue devil’ in certain parts of Bengal; in other parts, it was called ‘Germani pana,’ the German weed. It is only recently that people of certain parts of this country have learnt to harness this intractable and invasive water weed by using them as beds for water gardens.
We were supposed to set out early in the morning, but no one showed up before ten. The ghat was almost thirty minutes’ walk from my Nanabari. Since I was small at that time, the walk felt unending. After reaching the bank, I saw a large boat of the size of a budgerow waiting for us. I was happy to have the opportunity to be on a boat of that size. Little did I know that it would be the most exhausting ride of my life. By the time we had reached our intended destination, it was dark. We were famished because not one among the adults thought it necessary to bring any solid food. They took puffed rice and sweetened puffed rice balls thinking we would reach the venue by the afternoon. The trouble was instead of early morning we set out at noon. When we reached our intended destination, people were about to puke. We walked through dark, plant covered, firefly lighted paths. We were frequently warned that there were poisonous snakes around. We were also told to be watchful. There were dacoits in those parts of Narshingdi. The first thing we did after reaching the large, enclosed place was to collapse on the floor mats that had been laid out for the wedding dinner.
Weddings are done in advance now-a-days. Back then, the feast took place after the wedding, after negotiations had taken place not only at the gate or entrance but also at the qadi’s desk. Food was served after all these things had been settled. Some of the sympathetic relatives of the bride gave us snacks, again puffed rice soaked in jaggery. After a while, when everything important had been taken care of, dinner plates were brought in. I was, by then, exhausted and sleepy. But sweets began to trickle in. First, amritti, as always, and then roshgolla. Then came the ‘lalmon’—the sweet that looks red from outside and white inside. Five more types of sweets succeeded the first batch of three. My empty stomach, by then, was bloated. After we had tasted eight types of sweets, the actual feast began. I don’t remember what my relatives had for mains, for I had fallen asleep midway through my dinner. As I lay sleeping, my head on my father’s lap, my relatives kept eating. Their voices reached my ears as I sank deeper and deeper into a sleep. I woke up hearing, ‘Payesh! Payesh!’ It was midnight. Abba confirmed by looking at his watch.
After we had reached the place, when our guardians were busy participating in the actual wedding ritual and when we had settled down after having more puffed rice and water, we, the kids, went to see the fireflies in the bush. That was my first encounter with fireflies. I noticed that they looked like lanterns, and that their lights flickered, went on and then off. I caught one. It was easy. And I put it in my pocket. Its light kept flickering inside my pocket. On, off. On, off. I felt it was my pet, my friend. I went back to the floormat with it. Outside it was dark. Outside, millions of fireflies were navigating the darkness, completely unaware of the people who had gathered nearby for a feast.
Going back home wasn’t that difficult. We walked for ten minutes, crossed a ditch, and then took a rickshaw to the bus stand. I didn’t go back to my Nanabari. Leaning on Abba’s shoulder, dozing off for most of the part, I came back to Dhaka.
By the way, people from Narshingdi do not call that place Narshingdi. They call it Nosundi.
