A Preface to Man

by Subhash Chandran

  ‘It’s poor me, Nanu!’ He entered the house boldly.

  Nanu saw Naraapilla, seated on the coir-wound cot, stuffing some papers folded in the middle and which looked like deeds, into a wooden box, only slightly bigger than the box used for carrying betel leaves and arecanuts. Before closing the box with brass adornments in its corners, Naraapilla took out a paper from it, offered it to Nanu, and said, ‘You couldn’t find a scavenger till now, no? I don’t need him either now! I find defecating in the open at the riverbank more comfortable. It couldn’t have been for no reason that earlier generations built their houses so close to the river. Anyway, let that be, but you read what is written on this paper. Read it silently. There are children around.’

  Nanu opened the yellowed paper that was tearing at the creases and smelled remotely of medicinal concoctions. Since a bunch of what looked like deeds on stamp paper had already caught his eye earlier, assuming them to be of great importance for Ayyaattumpilli, he looked at them with reverence and anxiety. However, it was only a sloka using small words written laterally. Holding it against the light from the open window, he started reading the Sanskrit words on it: ‘Dasha vaidya sama patni, dasha patni sama ravi, dasha soorya sama mathaa, dasha mathru hareethiki.’

  ‘Do you know whose handwriting that is?’ Naraapilla asked Nanu, who was staring uncomprehendingly at him after reading it.

  Not getting the riddle, Nanu was perplexed. After taking back the paper and putting it in the box, Naraapilla said, with a smile borrowed from his youth, ‘Do you remember that Achuttan Vaidyan of Kaniyankunnu who is dead? It’s his script. One can also say that this is the only bit of poetry I have with me. When I went to him for consultation once, he recited this and told me the meaning too. I got him to write it down and took it. Then, keeping it between the deeds, I forgot all about it! Dey, I just got it back!’ Naraapilla stood up, opened the tied mundu, shook it, and tied it back. Nanu espied his full-blown masculinity bulging out through the loincloth like a small bag of sand.

  Fanning himself with the arecanut spathe fan, Naraapilla walked to the portico. Nanu walked with servile deference behind him.

  ‘Listen to its meaning,’ Naraapilla said, ‘ten vaidyas equal one wife, ten wives equal the sun, ten suns equal one mother, ten mothers equal one hareethiki. What is this hareethiki? Here, like you now, I too stared with my mouth open that day, till Vaidyan explained it to me. Hareethiki means the gall nut. Understood?’

  Nanu understood more than necessary. When he imagined what could be the ailment for which Naraapilla had gone to Achuttan Vaidyan that day, a tale of great potential started to gnaw inside Nanu, given that gall nut was known to be an aphrodisiac.

  ‘That kind of…’ Nanu probed, with hesitation and coyness. ‘Does Naraapilla chettan have such feelings even now?’

  ‘Even though I am close to eighty, I can still see well, can’t I?’ Naraapilla said, ‘I can hear with my ears, smell with my nose, eat with my mouth. No? Then why should there be a problem with that alone?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Nanu toed the line. ‘Now there is only one doubt left. If it’s like this even now, why did you then go and ask Achuttan Vaidyan for the gall nut?’

  ‘Eh?’

  Nanu rephrased the question and made it more direct. Reproducing one of his simpers from the past, Naraapilla said, ‘You moron, who asked for gall nut? Achuttan Vaidyan prescribed gall nut for me. When he started reciting the sloka, I asked him to write it down. Then I locked it up in the box. Other than that, what gall nut or gully nut for Naraapilla?’

  It occurred to Nanu that Naraapilla, whose vision and hearing were getting weaker, might live on for another hundred years. That much fire, still remnant in the old man, scorched Nanu.

  ‘Shouldn’t we then admire people who become ascetics in their youth?’ Nanu asked. ‘What all they must be suppressing to live as sanyaasis? Aw!’

  ‘Idiot,’ Naraapilla said, ‘who says they are repressing? If so, they must be impotent, for sure!’

  At that point, Nanu suddenly remembered the sanyaasi who was camping in the lodge under the banyan tree of the Thachanakkara thevar. As he realized that the topic of conversation was taking a new turn, forgetting even his hunger he said, ‘Its only now I remembered. Did Naraapilla chettan come to know of a sanyaasi who has been staying in Thachanakkara temple? In the lodge under the banyan tree? A noble guy by his looks. Hair and beard, here, this long! Takes little food; he’s meditating all the time, meditating!’

  ‘Is that so?’ Naraapilla’s rheumy eyes widened. ‘In that case, I’d also like to meet that worthy. When I’ll go for Pooshaappi’s son’s sixtieth birthday, I’ll make a detour via the lodge. I have certain things pending that the sanyaasis can help with.’

  ‘The sixtieth birthday of which son of Pooshaappi? Radhikeshan’s, the one younger to Kochu Parashu?’ Nanu blinked.

  ‘Heyy, the second youngest after him,’ Naraapilla said.

  It was late afternoon. Seeing Kalyanikuttyamma coming with two vessels covered with plantain leaf, Nanu climbed down the steps of the New House and said, ‘Then you have your lunch; I will go home quickly and come back!’

  Paanamparampath Nanu still had a lot of things to discover. The sight of the frown between the arched eyebrows of Kalyanikuttyamma made his stomach uneasy. Wondering how the long cohabitation had made the features of her husband appear in Kalyanikuttyamma as well, Nanu passed through the fence.

  Poovamparampath Puththanveettil Prabhakaran Nair, the sixth son of Pooshaappi, and sibling of Kochu Parashu, and the one who kicked up the worst racket with his own father for bequeathing the shop to Kochu Parashu when the partitioning was done, was celebrating his sixtieth birthday with a feast where all of Thachanakkara was invited. Since the month of Medam was drawing to a close and there could be unexpected showers, a huge tent had been put up covering their entire yard. People had come even from Muppathadath and Paanaayikkulam. His glee at being elected as the new president of the local unit of the Nair Service Society, as well as his eternal loathing for his brother Kochu Parashu, had worked equally behind the holding of the celebrations. While even Devassy of Angamaly, who ran the brick kiln, was invited to the shashtipoorthi celebration marking the completion of sixty years, Kochu Parashu and his family were not. The shashtipoorthi became memorable as the first feast where two kinds of paayasam were served. That was also the last celebration and feast that Naraapilla of Ayyaattumpilli took part in.

  When Jithen started to play with his friends behind the tent, having not found a place in the first sitting in the feast, someone uttered that word: shashtipoorthi.

  He did not understand the importance of the celebrations and the crowd. After making his mother let go of her hold on his hand, he was walking with the other, older children from Ayyaattumpilli; but when he found an opportunity, he gave them the slip and started walking in the compound alone. He had fallen prey to the thrill of fantasizing about hitherto unseen lands as forests and traversing through them all alone. He would fantasize about a rogue elephant appearing from behind the tree just ahead of him. A wild, white-water stream, huge trees on its banks covered with giant vines, and if possible, a leafy bower in the midst, an aborigine hunter, with his arrow at the ready, in pursuit of his game … Jithen would start anticipating such sights. He went past the compound of the Poovamparampath Puththanveettil, which had been cleared of undergrowth for the occasion. Blowing up flowers of berries and popping them on his forehead and eating its yellow fruit, he walked. When he reached a small channel, which carried the rainwater into Periyar river, he saw a man standing like an angler. That was Alamboori. The fishing rod in his hand was just a bamboo stick pulled out of the fence. Jithen did not feel any fear. He did not realize that the name Alamboori, which was taken at least once a day by his sisters to frighten him, belonged to the man who stood ahead of him.

  Hearing the crackle of dry leaves underfoot, Alamboori turned back and looked. He threw the bamboo stick into the water, took up the phone
receiver lying on the ground, and spoke into it, ‘No, it isn’t the police. Policemen can never take on the disguise of a child. No, no, no. Okay. The rest I shall inform you later.’

  Jithen walked up to Alamboori and looked at the wondrous thing in his hand. The word shashtipoorthi came from inside him like a hiccup. Without being conscious of it, the question came out of him, ‘Tell me, what’s this thingy called shashtipoorthi?’

  Alamboori gazed intently at the kid in shorts who had to come to ask a valid question.

  Making sure they were alone, Alamboori came closer to Jithen and kneeled in front of him. Jithen could only stand in front of him with his eyes glazed, as if hypnotized. Alamboori started to say with a beatific smile blossoming inside his matted beard:

  ‘God has given all the creatures in the world seeds to bring forth the next generation. Pollen to the flowers, seeds to the jackfruit tree, coconuts to the coconut palms … Do you understand? In the same way, men also have a pouch full of seeds. Move closer. Now, take off your shorts. Good boy. This thingy is used to pee. What is this thing which hangs in between like a skin-sack? Ha! ha! This is the thingy I told you about. A super pouch of skin containing the seeds! A boon from God! But do you know what scoundrels humans are? Many live as misers, without spending these fully. And when they keep living like that, and when they are sixty years old, God would play a trick on them. This sac, which would have dried like dry ginger by then, would drop these nuts just like that!’

  Jithen was breathless. He pulled apart Alamboori’s hands by force and pulled up his trousers.

  Soman and Geetha were coming towards the channel in search of Jithen. He gazed down, impelled by an unknown fear. Alamboori completed his oration, ‘What is fallen on the ground is retrieved immediately and placed in the pooja room on a plantain leaf. Black sesame, flowers, and sandal paste are kept along with it. Then that sixty-year-old rascal will sit and pray along. He will invite all the people and give them a feast. They won’t have the courage to call dignified people like me. Ha! ha! ha!’

  Geetha screamed in alarm recognizing the person kneeling in front of her brother, ‘Ayyo, my brother has been caught by Alamboori.’

  Alamboori was more shocked than Jithen hearing her scream. He stood up in one breath, turned, and running away, disappeared.

  Running towards Jithen, Soman asked him, panting, ‘What did he do to you?’

  That was when Jithen understood that the person who ran away hearing Geetha’s scream was Alamboori. He laughed once like a retard. Then giving the feint to Geetha and Soman, he ran towards the tent.

  Before lunch, Jithen went to Prabhakaran Nair’s pooja room and peeped in. There was something brown there on a plantain leaf. It was that—resembling beaten rice mixed with jaggery and coconut. Perhaps, it may have been mashed by someone using a ladle.

  Protecting his own seed pouch with his right hand, Jithen ran from the pooja room towards his mother. While he was running, he prayed to Thachanakkara thevar that he should die before he was sixty.

  As he was stepping out of the tent after the feast, Thankamma came running to hold Naraapilla’s hand to steady him. Slapping away her hand, Naraapilla said, ‘No one need hold me. Naraapilla knows how to go back the way he came.’

  The Thachanakkara folk were seeing Naraapilla in a shirt after a long time. Though he was sweating in the hot and humid Medam, his shirt did not touch his body due to his thick body hair. He was holding a walking stick, which he himself had fashioned out of a big wild persimmon stick. With the help of that, he walked without missing a step.

  ‘Appoliyo!’ he called into the crowd behind him.

  On their return, Naraapilla and Appu Nair stopped in front of the lodge in front of the temple. Like a riddle confronted by imbeciles, the lodge remained closed. With the pointed tip of the umbrella, Appu Nair began to spike the fallen banyan leaves, scattered around. It was clear that the person was inside. Appu Nair also was curious to see the sanyaasi who had taken up residence in the lodge. But the door remained shut despite their repeated knocks.

  ‘He may be meditating,’ Appu Nair said.

  ‘Then let’s not disturb him,’ Naraapilla said.

  The old men walked back, their umbrellas open in the scorching heat. Above the dome of the greying cloth, strewn on the tip of the umbrella, the yellow leaves were still present, like prior deeds.

  For Naraapilla, it was not yet time for the rendezvous.

  SIX

  Oxen

  3 July 1999

  …If the plan is to wear jewellery bought with borrowed money on our wedding day, I’ll kill you! A girl covered in jewellery is a pitiable sight, like a tortoise turned on its back. Neither God, nor the Devil, nor I would like to stand beside such a bride as the groom. Then the question of dowry: tell your mother that I don’t want that either, since I know for sure that you will not be able to give as much gold and money as I may ask for. Now something for your knowledge alone: real men do not notice a woman’s jewellery— unless he is a jewellery thief. A man may, at the most, notice a woman’s nose stud; and it will end there. If it is a pretty nose, even better than a nose stud would be a God-given mole in its place. Therefore, my girl, come without jewellery, without garments, and if possible, forfeit your body and come.

  I remembered when I wrote this—we children of Ayyaattumpilli had developed a craving for rings. If we were to give goldsmith Chellappan a twenty-paisa copper coin, with the lotus emblem stamped on it, he would beat it into the shape of a ring. I would like to write about that in my novel. Since I remembered it suddenly, if there is time, I will try to write that section alone and attach it. If so, I will send you that sheet as well.

  My girl, after sitting up for one-and-a-half hours, I could write only eight sentences, that too with much difficulty. I don’t think they are of any worth. Throw away this sheet after you read it. I am not adding it to the novel:

  When Grampa used to go out to defecate, I was the one who always accompanied him. The riverbank in that area was full of coffee plants. Till he selected the spot among the coffee plants, which were greedy to grow into trees, but were cursed to be bushes, one had to walk with the bell metal kindi in the right hand and the left hand holding onto Grampa’s middle finger. When he defecated, the stench was of solidified misdeeds. There was a small reward for suffering through it. A copper disc with a lotus stamped on one side. Those days, we children as well as some of the grown-ups, used to convert this copper disc into a ring, with the help of the goldsmith. Thus, Grampa’s prehistorical stench provided rings to adorn the fingers of us boys.

  When Geetha and Rema were returning happily from school, after finishing their terminal examinations in March, a new word dropped down from the decorated truck which came against them, full of whooping and hurrahs: Murdabad!

  Shankaran had tutored his two daughters, who were writing their terminal examinations, especially Geetha who was hoping to go to Upper Primary by clearing her fourth standard examination, with some general questions.

  ‘The great Chinese communist leader who expired last year?’ Shankaran asked Geetha on the previous day of her Social Studies examination.

  Geetha, scratching her head, ventured, ‘Jimmy Carter?’

  ‘My blooming idiot,’ Shankaran said, ‘isn’t that the name of the new American president? That isn’t an important question. But this they may ask. Write it without forgetting. Mao Tse Tung. What? Mao…’

  ‘Se thoong!’ Geetha said.

  If her Social Studies exam were after two days, Shankaran could have taught her the answer to a more important question. Shankaran firmly believed that that question about A.K. Gopalan, the great communist stalwart of Kerala, had not been included because the question paper was set earlier. Unfazed by the question on Mao not being asked, Shankaran said, ‘Let it be; but remember the one I am telling you now. It’s going to be asked in the next year’s examination, for sure.’

  He opened that day’s newspaper and showed an obituary in big bol
d letters on the first page to Geetha, who was standing despondent that the questions were not ceasing even after the exams had.

  ‘A… K… G…’ Geetha and Rema picked out the letters.

  The girls remembered the new word that they had heard that day while returning from the exam. ‘Father,’ Geetha asked, ‘what’s the meaning of this inniraanthi moordabad?’

  ‘Haven’t you heard Inquilab Zindabad?’ Taking his eyes off AKG’s photo and looking at a female’s picture on the same page, Shankaran said, ‘The opposite of that is Indira Gandhi murdabad.’

  Upon hearing that explanation, a three-member procession with the sisters leading and Jithen, who was to join school after two months, bringing up the rear, got ready to go around Geethalayam.

  ‘Inkulaa zindaava, inniraanthi moordaava,’ they repeated as if it was an incantation.

  That night, Chinnamma heard Shankaran’s snore vibrate ‘Moraaaarjeee’, as she lay listening, and remembering reading in the daily about a person called Morarji, who had chances of becoming the next Prime Minister of India.

  Jithen liked Thankamani’s younger sister Radha, more than his own sisters, his aunt’s eldest daughter Thankamani herself, her two younger brothers, and the three sons of Pankaachammavan.

  Radha, left leg paralysed due to polio, would be present without fail every afternoon at the time when film songs would emerge out of the new Philips radio in Jithen’s house. She wrote down the lyrics of many songs in a beautiful hand, in the empty pages of an old notebook. Jithen understood that the digit two inside a circle at the right end of the second line was a sign that it was to be sung twice. Jithen was surprised at Radha’s eyes getting wet when she reached certain lines of some of the songs. He peered into the oblong-shaped sieve of aluminium colour on the radio. He saw nothing there which prompted tears. One day, Radha sang the most beautiful of the songs they heard that day, in the turgid silence that always followed the switching off of the radio.