We Shall Come Rejoicing
Our locality is in
south-end of Calcutta city. You may call it an elevated suburb. Here we live as
a small Christian community. Today is the Harvest Sunday. Everyone in our
family is busy making last minute’s final details. Our house is next to the
church. So there is no distance the family members have to cover, but, the
harvest items from each family have to be placed at the altar before the first
church bell rings, that is at 7.20 a.m. My grand children stay a few blocks
away from our home, but they stayed on last night, so that they would not be
late for the church service.
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Deep was then around
10 years of age. Those days Harvest Sunday was an elaborate event. Deep’s
Grandpa would turn up early in the morning on the previous day, knock at the
door with a loud
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| Olden days Man Plants rarely found here |
harvest day song “We Shall Come Rejoicing ”. Deep would
come running to the door. Grandpa would invariably ask him to find out the axe
from the junk-room and Deep would oblige. The axe was a bit blunt, but alright
for the next act. Grandpa always insisted that for the Harvest Festival one
must offer at least one of the own home grown vegetables or fruits ! There was
of course a small vegetable garden in front of Deep’s house, but it only had
two guava trees, and, the guavas growing on them were not at all tasty and
hence not appropriate for offering in the
church altar. Ah... then there was this wild variety of Maan Kochu (Arum) with giant leaves.
Grandpa would very carefully dig out at least 10 such giant Arum plants,
complete with leaves, stem and the roots – the tuber (that’s the portion one
can eat). Carrying them to the church a
bit far away was a difficult task. First of all it was heavy for Deep who had
to make several trips, because he can at best carry a couple of them at a time.
Secondly carrying these obviously meant inviting itches all over the body--- this
wild variety of Arum’s raw juice was often very allergic.
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| Arum pieces, this days a rarity |
The Church those
days was made of mud-walls and it had a tiled roof. Those up-rooted Arum plants
placed inside the church would serve as decorations. Along with these,
from each member family, some vegetables procured from outside market were
offered on a Kula each. Now, what is
a Kula? It is a flat Bamboo plate
woven of bamboo strips. (This is used for
a different purpose all along the year. On this Kula older women in the
family
would put rice, about 100 grams, and while holding on both sides with thumb and
index finger, tap hard beneath the Kula.
This would create vibration and the paddy husks and other broken rice pieces
would surface. They would then throw out these unwanted elements! This process
of winnowing would be repeated till the entire sacks of grain are de-husked. No
doubt a very labour-some process ! ) At the end of the church service,
Grandma would cut the tubers, make small pieces and ask Deep and his friends to
share them among the neighbours. The non-Christian neighbours would receive
these with joy and respect.
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| Kulas |
**************
“Grandpa, Grandpa”.
I woke up from the nostalgic
journey, and, said “Sorry dear... I was lost in another age”.
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| My 3 grand children offer the harvest very sincerely |
My wife informed “ I
have already cleaned the Kulas, but
the trouble is there are some holes in it.... after all they are not in use any
more for rice cleaning”. She added “I
have placed some papers to cover-up the holes”. Then the grand-children got
busy placing the vegetables brought from the market on these kulas. We normally place fresh harvested
winter-vegetables. The tradition is that we start eating those variety of
vegetables only after the Harvest Sundays.
We now have a new
two storied church, with gothic style walls and marble floorings. And the Pastor
uses a microphone to share his sermon.
But personally speaking, I miss the mud walls
and the decoration with the wild arum plants. I miss those strangely, allergic
itches along my skin as I carried those huge wild plants- with my grandpa
singing loudly- praising the good Lord
for the bountiful He offers us each year!
