ashokbhatia

It was a splendid night that would have made even Jeeves put on his dancing shoes. I was decked out in my finest outfit, ready to make a grand spectacle of myself. It was Navaratri, or as we Bengalis call it, Mahanavami. A time of joy, abundance, and piety. Unlike the Scots, who celebrate the autumn season with kilts and bagpipes, we in India observe it with a spiritual and cultural extravaganza. The festival of Mahanavami is a time for revelry, worship, and artistic expression.

Ah, what an evening it was! We Bengalis, being people of culture and taste, celebrate Navaratri with a tradition called “pandal hopping.” We erect temporary temples – pandals – all over the city, and people go from pandal to pandal, offering prayers and admiring the artwork. And let me tell you, my fellow readers, the artwork is simply something to die for.

The best part of pandal hopping, of course, is the company. I was with a group of seven friends, and a wizened elder to keep us on the straight and narrow. We were all in the ninth grade then, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, excited to explore the city and its many pandals. We did not have a care in the world. A rather reckless mood prevailed, much like that of Bertie Wooster and his pals on the night of the Boat Race night.

All of us were merrily going from one pandal to the next, wonderstruck at the kind of magnificent sculptures of the mighty Goddess on display and taking in the finery worn by the bhadra lok. Wherever the gaze went, one could spot the glittering jewellery put on by the members of the tribe of the so-called delicately nurtured, duly draped in that six-meter enigmatic wonder called saris, that too of a mind- boggling variety, like Baluchari, Gorod, Murshidabad silk, Tusser, Tangail, and Tant.

As and when our wizened elder was looking elsewhere, our eyes would invariably get busy casting some furtive glances at the many giggling and merry-making girls who happened to be in the immediate vicinity. After all, at such a tender age as that of ours then, who could miss a chance to indulge in what is euphemistically alluded to as birdwatching? 

However, my sense of wonder was brief as I realized after a couple of pandal hops that I was separated from my comrades. It was like a scene from the Odyssey, where the protagonist finds himself lost in a strange and unfamiliar land. It was as if I’d been spirited away to a strange, unknown land in the blink of an eye. Meanwhile, the other musketeers accompanying me were nowhere to be seen. Allow me to remind you that we lived in simpler times then. Internet had not been heard of. Mobile phones were yet to arrive on the scene.  

Now, most people in this situation might have panicked or given up hope entirely. But not me. We, the Dattas, are made of sterner stuff. Seldom do we panic or despair. Howsoever challenging the circumstances, we believe in maintaining sang froid.  We possess a chin up attitude. We are a spiritually enlightened lot. We believe in acceptance and surrender. I confess that unlike Bertie Wooster, I never won a prize in Scripture Knowledge while being at school. I simply accepted that I was lost, surrendered myself to a higher power, as it were, and that was that.

You see, there are two types of people in the world: one, those who search for lost things, and two, those who let lost things be. I fell into the latter category, and I’m not ashamed to admit it. What I needed was a little motivation to keep moving forward, even if it meant moving alone.

And so I found my motivation: food. I stumbled upon a shop and, being the intense budgeteer that I am, found I could only afford a bottle of Coke. I paid the restaurant owner and left, content with my meagre rations.

But oh, dear readers, what happened next was truly the stuff of legends. As I quaffed my Coke, I noticed a bus moving towards my destination at a pace slower than that of a funeral procession. It does not require one to be a Sherlock Holmes to realize what my next steps were, but dear readers, just to get the facts clear, I would like to inform that I first checked my pockets to ensure that I had sufficient funds for the ride. After all, one does not wish to deprive the government of the day of some revenue. Boarding the rickety bus which was bursting at the seams with people of all sizes and shapes was then the work of a moment. The ride was less comfortable than the milk train ride undertaken by Bertie Wooster to intercept a letter before it got delivered to Madeline Bassett, but I finally reached my destination on time and avoided the raised eyebrows of my parents. Soon, I had a sumptuous dinner prepared by my mom followed by a good night’s what-you-call-an-activity-that- knits-up-the-raven-sleeve-of-care. It had been a long day, after all.

But the real story unfolded the next day, my dear readers. As I sat at home, basking in the glow of my achieved objectives, and sipping from a cup of aromatic Darjeeling tea, my friends arrived, with a sheepish looking wizened elder in tow. They were all in a tizzy, recounting their spine-chilling ordeal of trying to locate me in the jostling crowds from the night before. The sudden disappearance of yours truly from amongst their midst had left them shaken up from the base of their toes to the top of their heads. You know what I mean. They were all baffled, bewildered, confounded, confused, fazed, flummoxed, mystified, puzzled, and stumped. The hair-raising mystery of my disappearance from their midst had led to sleepless nights for most of them. 

‘The august guardian’, having circumnavigated the sun some twenty-two times till then, appeared to have aged considerably overnight, what with the emergence of dark halos beneath his ocular organs. It did not require the supreme intelligence of a Reginald Jeeves to figure out that his soul had been in torment, primarily owing to the thoughts of facing the firing squad waiting at home to pounce upon him for dereliction of duty. He was tongue-tied, reminding one of Bertie Wooster being presented to Sir Watkyn Bassett in a court of law. His relief, upon being told that I had made it back home in one piece relieved him instantly. His brow ceased to be furrowed. His visage soon adorned a toothsome grin. He perked up like a flower which had just been watered after a gap of few days.

Indeed, the way they went about trying to trace me and the related incidents narrated by my friends invoked a feeling of being a part of an ‘edge of the seat thriller’ amongst all of us, even though I or my parents were not a part of it.

By Jove, the account of my chums’ efforts to trace my whereabouts was nothing short of a gripping thriller! Their narrative of the numerous challenges they encountered during the hunt kept us all on tenterhooks. Sure enough, their skills of narration were no match to the sparkling way Mr. Mulliner would recount the experiences of his nephews and nieces to his companions at the Angler’s Rest. But while my sister acted like the erudite Miss Postlethwaite, ensuring a steady supply of piping hot tea to all those assembled, we listened in rapt attention to the trials and tribulations of my friends when I went missing from amongst their midst. Apparently, they even sought the help of a rozzer to locate me. Unfortunately, he was busy taking his own family around the multitudes of the pandals so all they earned was a stern rebuke for distracting him from his familial ‘duties’. Although my parents and I were absent at the time, we felt like active participants in the dramatic turn of events!

I believe that the festival of Mahanavami is a wonderful reminder that culture and tradition can bring people together, even during difficult times. It is a time for us to celebrate our shared heritage, enrich our spiritual leanings, enjoy the fruits of artistic expression, and gorge on the delicacies on offer. And it is a time for us to remember that even when we feel lost or alone, there is always a way forward with a little bit of humour and ingenuity. Above all, festivals happen to be subtle reminders of the values that we cherish the most – values of togetherness, caring, compassion, and empathy. 

So, there you have it, my dear readers. A night to remember, a tale of adventure, and a bottle of Coke to make it all possible.

How’s that for a slice of life in Bengal?!

(Illustrations courtesy Suryamouli Datta)  

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