It was a regular cultural spectacle – the numerous mamis
who descended into our home every few days. Each of these 'Mamis' in a manner
of speaking could have been called aunt, grandmother, elder sisters or any such
thing. However, mami kinda encompasses the gamut of women who bring a waft of
traditional flavour with them – silk or traditional cotton sarees, diamond
nose-rings and ear-rings, heavy gold chains, large red bindi, jasmine flowers, the
works. If you could say anything at all, they were definitely quite a colourful
lot adding flavour to our family gatherings.
The objective of these mamis, however, was
in one nodal person – our own patti - grandmother. Armed with her “harmonium box” as she
called it, she was quite a VIP in those parts, sitting at the lead of an army
of mamis – an army it seemed to us little kids running around, playing,
chattering, generally getting in the way of all those who came in.
Us grandchildren were usually warned, well in advance to
behave ourselves – meaning, stay quiet, stay away, stay put. With so much of
colour and clamour, however, it was a little difficult to keep us away for too
long. The music gathering readied itself – seated on jamakkalams in our living room –
facing patti on one side, the army of them on the other. It took a while for
the clamour to settle, after which the music began. This was the interesting
part. I don’t mean the actual making music as patti chased me down and made me
learn these separately, so the actual purpose of the meet was not that captivating.
What made it interesting was to watch each of the women as they sang.
We – the grandchildren – usually crept to
the staircase that led up from the living room and sat peering through the
coloured grillwork. It was a ringside view – and weren’t we rewarded! The music
began and so did the various whispered comments and giggles from our end as we
watched. Watched, not listened. For instance, the lady right in the front row
had a reasonably thin and wobbly head. It was fascinating to see her shake and
push her head in different directions, craning up as she hit a high pitch. She
was the “wobbly mami”. Another was the “kannadi mami” so called because of her
over-sized specs that dominated most of her face. Yet another mami was rather
plump and usually out of breath. We usually waited, hoping for something
dramatic while she strained and gasped through the songs. Fortunately for her,
nothing of that sort happened. Rumour was that she put on this act so she could
not be blamed for her out of tune voice. Children are usually the first to
spread and hear such rumours.
The list of mamis was fascinating with the
diamond-mami, the chungdi mami, the chuckling mami, the crying mami and so on. The
list seemed endless and entertaining to us at the same time. After we became a
little noisy, some adult or the other – the spoilsport – usually chased us out
to play. Ya, we did have a large outdoors to play – cowshed and all.
On special occasions, the dramatics and entertainment reached
a peak. Some mami or the other would start crying and the others would follow
suit. Patti too would join them, wiping her eyes with the edge of her sari. We
were told they cried as they were thankful to patti for teaching her the
bhajans. I asked patti one day, “You teach me music also patti, so am I
supposed to cry for that?” I did not understand why she found it funny. “I am
nothing but a foolish old lady. All those women are making a scene for
nothing. Go on with you” she would say. After stoutly defending her that she
was not foolish, I would run off to play only to come back fascinated when the
next batch of bhajan mamis came. Then our little group of siblings and cousins
would gather at the staircase, our strong family bond aiming to predict what would happen next.
I’m quite sure patti enjoyed the classes
and so did the mamis, but they would not have had as much fun and entertainment
with the whole spectacle as we had, from our grandstand seat on the stairs.
