My Life in Colvale, Goa - Guest Post by Fashion Designer Wendell Rodricks

Our home Casa Dona Maria. I can create in peace in this 450 yr old home

I live in a big home in a small village. Surrounded by nature, I am always reminded of the divine and the beauty that has been bestowed on us. 

The villagers proudly point to my home and say ''Fashion Designer, Padmashree!'' I can hear them over the high walls and smile at their simplicity and sincerity. And I also feel their sense of pride at this oddball in the village. 

 

Wendell's signature colour - white - collection called 'Yoga Calm'

 

They have little or no idea that I use the village and the villagers to creatively weave the warp and weft that keeps me afloat in fashion. It is their passion for life that drives me to a similar passion in clothes. It is their harmonious voices at morning mass that keep me singing all day. It is their fervent devotion to Lord Ganesha that makes me pray to Him and overcome daily obstacles in this journey called life.

Thanks to 200 yr old mango trees, the light in our garden is mystical and delightful

 

Ray of Light entering the garden - January 2016

It is my village which weaves a kind of magic around me and has created what the world calls Wendell Rodricks. After two decades, there are many things I have learnt from observation. Like the fact that our pool should have been built a foot away from where it is now. Each monsoon, I watch hapless baby crabs and blind field mice floundering in its blue waters.

Crab tracks on beach dune - testimony that life is hidden all around us

There was once an old pig door near the pool. In those days, the pigs would trot in and out that door to roam the village and visit homes. I sealed the pig door when I bought the house as I did not want stray serpents, scorpions and mongoose sliding and swishing into the property. Not that they still don't manage to enter the property from other areas. We left a small hole between the laterite bricks to allow the rain water to drain into our garden as two similar spaces existed at the other end to drain the water into the fields yonder.

 

Pets are a source of joy. Zeus and Athena suntan by the pool

Gifted by neighbour - surreal double hibiscus within a hibiscus - this one is most exotic of the 8 varieties in garden

Plant gifted by my catering college professor - the purple is source of much joy.

Green Peacock Fern in his garden, glows with these hues in various corners of his garden.

I once asked my sister-in-law how the crabs and blind field mice born near the river traverse a path they have never travelled before to get to the fields. She told me that it is in their migratory DNA, similar to how the salmon swim upstream to give birth. No one guides them like we humans often are; they just know instinctively that they need to get to the fields. For three weeks every monsoon, we watch and wait. And guide the crabs and mice to the other end of the property so that they can continue on their way to their homes in the fields.

 

Beach in South Goa, renowned for its beauty, where I head off to, when I need a break

Every Sunday, when I do my gardening, I watch as caterpillars spin cocoons around themselves. A patient wait follows...as the pupa turns into a Giant Red Eye Butterfly. What a joy to watch what most people dismiss as insects and bugs. Have you seen ants collecting for the rains? They take away every morsel of food including nail clippings to re-enforce their ant hill.

 

Nature colours my work - Banana leaf thrives in my garden, for a good creation should be multiplied

No idea what this insect is, I named him the sausage leg insect

My verandah shelf has a book on birds. Each morning I watch and count the bird species that visit the garden to feast on the flowering plants and fruit trees planted solely for their ‘Royal Majesties'

 

The Yellow Chest Mynah is Goa's 'State' bird

 They love the mulberry trees. Every bird from a tiny bulbul to a giant hornbill feasts on the mulberries. On a spectacular day, I counted thirty bird varieties over breakfast. Incredible!

 

I took this pic off the net - reminder that we can all live in harmony

 And what do we do about the baby cobra that has ventured into the garden? Just let it be. It is nearing Naag Panchami and it has come to bless us. After a few days, the pheromones from the three pet cats will drive it away. One year I saw three cobras slide a foot away from me on Naag Panchami. Imagine! Everyone was at the temple and I was the blessed one whom the naag visited. The neighbours told me "You are truly blessed". And I can tell you that I do indeed feel incredibly blessed.

 

Our Colvale church sits on a river bank - a 425 yr old source of divine calm, where I attend mass every morning

I enjoy meeting the people in my village, Colvale, and especially my interactions with them. Dinesh, the fisherman, I love to chat with. I have his cell phone number so I am in constant touch and will rush out the front door to see his catch of the day. He points it out with pride, advising me on what to eat or not.  "These are bony fish. Don't eat them. But when you put them in the curry, you will see the dramatic flavour they impart," he will say. From Dinesh I have learnt the names of local fish - Chonak, Modso, Sheotai.

 

Best catch of the day from Dinesh our local fisherman

The vegetable vendor is an elegant lady with a beautiful blossom behind her ear. Her shringar is impeccable. She tends the fields and brings the choicest, crispest vegetables to our threshold. The colours of the vegetables are so vibrant that even the saturation slider on Instagram pales by comparison.

 

I love my home

From our ‘Balcao’ I see the world pass by. In a small village such as Covale everyone knows each other by name. And everyone knows what job or work they each do. Every village in Goa has  coconut pluckers, the Mango tree parasite removers, the painters who paint our walls with shell paint, the blacksmith who can fashion grills and gates to your design, the cobbler, the tailor, the carpenter, the 'ranpinkars' (who cook for feasts,  weddings, births and funerals) and lesser known occult practitioners such as the 'drishtikaar'. Our local drishtikaar is a voluptuous, always smiling lady. She arrives with three coconut shells and assorted materials of her trade. ''Why three coconut shells?'' I ask. "Nine eyes," she replies, pointing at the three markings at the top of each coconut. Then she swirls the fire into them with salt and red chillies, muttering what sounds like a prayer, with African lingo thrown in. I have learned that African slaves introduced us Goans to some occult practices, which continue to this day.  The drishtikaar leaves, with the hot, burning vessel, to throw the evil ashes into the river.

 

My favourite beach - nostalgia of youth and lack of crowds makes it serene

Having travelled from Mumbai, Muscat, Los Angeles and Paris, I have made my home in Colvale. I often wonder what I am doing here, among this colourful assortment of people, the Padre and the villagers. But, surrounded by nature and these people, this is now my home.

 

Wendell Rodricks spent his childhood in Bombay and started his working life in Muscat. He then moved to Los Angeles and Paris to study fashion design and couture. He returned to India in 1988 and quickly gained repute as a designer, working with renowned brands such as Garden Vareli, Lakme and De Beers. He established his own label in 1990 and moved base in 1993 to Colvale, Goa. A pioneer in the world of Indian fashion, Wendell is considered one of the most influential designers in the country and has received international acclaim for his work. Wendell also writes about fashion and lectures on world costume history. His book on the history of Goan costume, Moda Goa, was published in 2012. He is passionate about art, music, literature, food, travel and Goa's environment.

 

 

Tea and Tales from Tawang

Sela Pass

The cup of tea on the table in front of me is quite repulsive, to say the least. The container is squat, made of greyish, flimsy (possibly toxic) plastic that wobbles when held in the hand, threatening to spill out its contents. The tea, thick, dark brown and glutinous, is forming a crinkly skin on the top. It’s 7 am and I’ve just bought this brew at the Guwahati airport.

I’m seated on a large brown faux leather sofa in the VIP lounge. On another sofa, across me, Mr Nitin Gadkari, BJP ideologue and current minister for roads, is reading aloud a joke about the Congress on his cell phone and giggling happily along with his retinue. He is waiting for a helicopter to take him to district Zero in Arunachal Pradesh. I too am waiting for a chopper to get me to Tawang. 

 

A Stream by the Road

I drink the tea. It is hot, sweet and thick, as is all tea you might get at an airport – and nothing like the milk-less light Lipton Green Label I’m used to. I feel it travelling down my food pipe in a mass and hit the stomach. Instead of jerking me awake, as I had hoped (I’ve been up since 2 am to travel), it has a strangely soporific affect – and I fall immediately and deeply asleep. The next thing I know, I am being shaken awake: “Madam, the helicopter is ready, it’s 10 o’clock.” This is a commercial flight run by the state government and I go through the security check again and soon find myself on the tarmac, near the helicopter. Mr Gadkari and his group fly by overhead in a couple of Army copters. 

 

The Road to Twang, from the helicopter

The only other passenger in our chopper is a Washington Post journalist who is worried about altitude sickness in Tawang – the town is located 10,000 feet above sea level. Since I had not thought about this, I too begin to worry but not for long. Our helicopter takes off and soon we are engrossed in the visual delights outside our windows. We are travelling over hills clad in thick virgin forest, the green broken only by the pale thin ribbon of a road winding up and down endlessly. The road trip from Guwahati to Tawang takes about sixteen hours and the chopper ride a little over an hour. However, the latter is dependent on weather conditions and quite erratic.

 

White Tara at Lumla

We soon arrive at Lumla, and hover almost eye level with a huge, beautiful statue of White Tara, seated atop a hill. At the helipad, my host, the district commissioner of Tawang, has sent a Jeep and driver to meet me and soon we are on our way to Tawang Township. The air is crisp and cold, the temperature hovering around 12 degrees centigrade. The journey is an hour-and-a-half long over very bad road. Small waterfalls and streams trickling down the hillside, fields of brilliant yellow flowers, an occasional flowering rhododendron tree, a yak grazing in a meadow, prayer flags fluttering gaily from poles and rooftops, and people busy with their daily lives in the small village we pass are some sights that keep me visually engrossed and cushioned from bumps. 

 

Monpa women dancing

Tawang district is also known as the Land of the Monpa. The Monpa are an ancient tribe that migrated to Tawang and adjacent West Kameng district from Tibet and Bhutan over time. They are followers of Buddhism; in fact, the only Dalai Lama – the sixth – to be born in India took birth in Tawang in 1683. There are many myths and stories about his life as a child, his journey to Tibet and his eventual mysterious disappearance. In the mists of time, Tibet held sovereignty over Tawang and later China became involved. The McMohan line demarcated Tawang as Indian Territory in 1914, but China still lays claim to the area. In fact, Chinese troops over-ran the place in the 1962 Indo-Chinese war and later retreated when peace was signed. The bravery of the Indian soldiers in this war is commemorated through the War Memorial in Tawang and the Jaswantgarh War Memorial close by.

 

White Rhododendron

Tawang’s other claims to fame are the Tawang Monastery, said to be the largest in Asia, and the fact that when the current (14th) Dalai Lama fled Tibet in 1953, he entered India through Tawang. I can see the sprawling Tawang Monastery’s buildings with their whiter than white walls and vibrant yellow roofs from the Circuit House where I am staying. The structure dominates the town which is built on the spines of a couple of green hills – and the entire vista is really as pretty as a picture.

Having arrived at the Circuit House, I proceed to ask Yadavji, the 

Monpa men with Yak dance costume

general factotum, for ‘separate’ tea which means that the hot water and tea leaves arrive in a tea pot accompanied by milk and sugar in separate containers as opposed to the thick curry-like masala chai which is a near universal favourite. The tea arrives on a tin tray with the three containers on it. But…. the teapot contains the hated masala chai, with additional sugar and milk in case I felt like making it sweeter or milkier! I swallow my disappointment and the tea, and head out to see the sights of Tawang.

There’s a fair amount to see within the small radius in and around town. 

 

Tawang Monastery

Tawang Monastery

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The first stop, of course, is Tawang Monastery. We enter the ancient building into a courtyard that plays host to the annual Torgya monastic festival every winter. Up front is the assembly hall that is home to the 25-foot beautiful gilded statue of the Buddha. The room is festooned with banners, the floor has prayer mats on it and the walls are richly decorated with intricate murals and thangkas. Other buildings around the courtyard include a museum, an impressive library, storage for provisions and a cook house. Beyond are buildings that are home to the male monks and novices; every Monpa households sends one son here at a young age to learn the scriptures. 

Tawang Monastery

We then wind our way downhill to the modest Urgelling Monastery. It has some antique thangkas of the sixth Dalai Lama, prayer wheels, lamps for lighting, and other accoutrements of faith. On the first floor, in the hall, we find a priest and his family. I light the lamp at the altar and am invited to share tea with them. The Monpa butter tea or sueja is salty and made from jari or crude tea leaves that are churned together with a little milk, butter and salt in a long cylindrical churn made of bamboo or jan dhong. The sueja is served warm. The taste, though unlike the tea we’re used to, is pleasant and soothing; a certain sense of contentment falls upon me, brought on by the place and the tea.

Mentally shaking myself, I take my leave and we make our way further down to yet another monastery, Khinmey. This is a beautiful structure that has been renovated recently at the behest of the current dynamic Rinpoche. Inside, apart from the statues of deities and saints, the walls are covered with tantric (fairly erotic) paintings showing life in all its stages, especially the fate that awaits the wicked and the sinful.



Khinmey Monastery

By now it’s late in the evening and the temperature has dipped further. I decide to head back and turn in for the evening. Along the streets, especially in the market, the local people are busy transacting daily business. The Monpa are a good looking people. The young men and women sport the latest haircuts and clothing:  jeans, boots, jackets and scarves. I think that if you were to transfer them to, say, Bangkok or KL, they’d be quite at home. Not many wear the traditional gear - which uses a stunning combination of brick red and cobalt blue – everyday; it is usually reserved for festive occasions. 

 

Pond by the roadside

The driver informs me that yaks can sense the weather change and know it’s going to snow higher up so they rush downhill.

Yaks running downhill
 

The yaks are right. Weather rapidly deteriorates and it is raining in earnest by the time we hit Tawang. There’s a cultural festival on – the reason for my visit to Tawang -- and I leave my driver at the parking lot and walk down to the grounds where the festivities are organised. Luckily, it’s stopped raining but the ground is full of slush.
 

PT Tso Lake

Regardless, the place is bursting with activity. People from different tribes across Arunachal in their traditional, colourful costumes and beads, wearing exotic headgear and masks; men roaming around in the yak dance costumes or dance masks; musicians tuning their instruments; young and old monks; and the town people excitedly talking – it’s a scene that fills the senses. I cannot but help marvel at India and her diversity.  The governor of the state arrives and we witness local dances performed by five or six different tribes. My cup quite spills over with excitement and happiness.The yaks are right. Weather rapidly deteriorates and it is raining in.

PT Tso Lake

 

The only fly in the cup is the telecommunication in Tawang; it belongs to the dark ages. The Airtel service comes on for a few seconds then vanishes for hours. I can’t make contact with the driver, so I eventually hitch a ride with two young monks in a bright red Maruti 800 back to the Circuit House. 

 

Twang Monastery from the Circuit House

Much as I don’t want to, I have to think about getting to Delhi. Since there is no chance of the helicopter taking off in this weather, I prepare to embark on the sixteen-hour journey to Guwahati. Next morning, my host sees me off in a taxi at around 11 am. Leaving town, we descend and then ascent up to the snow covered Sela Lake and Pass at 13,500 feet altitude. Again I get that sense of the majesty of nature and our smallness in its face.

 

Yak Dancers

We drive steadily through virgin jungle along the road that I had seen from the helicopter. There is hardly any traffic and the road is seriously bad in several patches. I get the opportunity to feast my eyes of lush green, unspoilt forests that we are passing interspersed by valleys of incredible beauty. We reach Bhalukpong in Assam by 7.30 in the evening and start again at 6 am next morning, reaching Guwahati airport by about 11, well in time for my 1.40 pm flight back to Delhi.

 

A young Lama

Ever the optimist about tea, this time I go to the slightly upmarket restaurant at the airport so that I can try some excellent Assam tea. The ‘separate’ tea arrives. But a bag of Taj Mahal masala tea dangles in hot water in the pot. The waiter assures me that this is the only Assam tea he knows of. I give up! And console myself that home just a few hours away. The first thing I’ll do on reaching will be to make myself a cup of tea the way I like it.

Urgelling Monastery

 

 

 

Ananda Swaroop is a itinerant traveller. An editor by profession, she edits corporate publications and is also the editor of garam masala chai. A watercolour enthusiast and practitioner, she works with the realist genre. Ananda lives and works in New Delhi, India.

How Do You Like Your Tea?

 

I haven’t been enjoying my morning cuppa for a while and it’s been bothersome because I like the idea of drinking tea in the morning. Coffee is too strong and something I indulge in only when I am really tired and need to keep going. Don’t get me wrong, I love the taste and aroma of coffee but it just wires me up too much. But while tea does add a dash of caffeine to my lazy morning start, it’s not a jolt; it enables a steady, watchful pace into the day.

I have been experimenting with all kinds of teas, mixing up unlikely leaves to get something, a new taste, infuse some flavour into a jaded palette. And, over the last couple of days, I have realised that I just want a sweeter brew. I want it milky and sweet and this is something new for me. For years now, I have kept both the sugar [well, I take sugar-free instead] and milk to an absolute minimum, to relish the flavour of the leaf – the essence of the tea –rather than bury it with the add-ons.

May be it’s just a phase. Maybe it’s the heat or maybe I am just feeling a bit lost in the mire of doing. I don’t really know at this point what is causing this change from the subtle to the robust taste of things, but it is something I have noticed and am curious about.

It’s taking me back into the watchful mode, making me look at my days, my feelings and thoughts in an active way which, with all that doing, all that work, that doesn’t really do much other than exhaust me and leave little room for reflection, has been enervating indeed. I love looking at life unfold. I like to see how miracles occur in the day, how my thoughts create or how things unfolding around me create my day – its events – not necessarily stuff that delights, but bringing forth anger and irritation and more. I have realised that it isn’t so much about being busy as it is about not being able to deal with the stuff inside, the emotional ups and downs through engaging with people and not getting the desired response, or having to deal with their energy levels which could well be at odds with mine. And over the past couple of weeks of some quieter moments, I have realised it mostly comes about because of judging the way that I feel.

I was coming out of the pool the other day and a young man of thirty-something, who had been playing with his wife and kids as I swam my 50 lengths in under 40 minutes [it’s a small pool so no more than 825 metres], commented on my stamina. He was a virtual stranger and I was taken aback and, in my awkwardness, didn’t exactly take the compliment with enough grace. And that made me start the old babble inside the head. I stopped myself saying, it was okay to have been awkward, I was taken by surprise and focused upon getting out and getting back to work, I hadn’t expected it. And it was unusual one, don’t you think? 

A few moments later, I did something else that made me feel guilty – even as I was asking something of someone, knowing full well why I was doing it. And it made me realise just how much one does tend to judge oneself for things.  Where does this judgement come from? Who has decided what is the right way and the wrong way to do things and live life?

I have just spent a whole twenty days tuning into the Hay House online summit and heard over thirty-five speakers over three weeks. It was very inspiring. I learned many things and certain things that I had experienced were given definitions and more in the same vein. But what I noted especially about the whole summit was that everyone spoke about different things. Some were scientists who had learned about the spiritual dimension through their work and some were just people who had been abused as children and found a way out. Others were people who had evolved deep philosophies for their own life which they shared as courses and books and stuff. What interested me most were the stories that everyone had to tell, where the most miserable of circumstances and enormous pain was not something that they allowed themselves to be stuck in, but through which they have found their own philosophy and techniques to live a better and happier life.  Often the ideas of one could seem to be in conflict with other speakers, but this is what made it a great lesson in non-judgement. It was so apparent listening to diverse voices from all parts of the world, from various disciplines of learning that anything and everything leads to a deeper understanding of the spirit of being. And that there really is no other path for everyone other than what your life has charted. It’s about the proverbial Mahabharata of our personal lives, not something that is understood or arrived at by renouncing the world. What we need to renounce is judgement that says this is right and this is wrong.

I was sharing this with a friend, who then asked but what would you say for a man who has just killed someone in road rage? We had been discussing a mutual friend’s sudden illness when the conversation turned to this as I was trying to explain the mind-body connection. I was telling her how illness is essentially caused by suppressing our feelings and not expressing them, for various reasons. She said would you condone the killer, would you say that it was not wrong? I didn’t have to think this one through because for me it was the same thing – the sick person and the one who carried so much rage inside of him were coming from similar spaces of suppressing their feelings, of not finding the courage to express. In effect, probably judging themselves for feeling whatever it was because someone, somewhere, had dinned it into their heads to either get over it and let go, or such like. Something we often do, when we cannot listen to another’s pain.

I also noted that some of the summit speakers impacted my mind more than others. I tried various techniques, choosing a few that fitted in well with the way that I liked to meditate and heal the chakras, etc. But, above all, what I enjoyed listening to was the way everyone had positive things to say about experiences that could debilitate the best of us into not feeling good enough, into not wanting to get up and face the day, into despair and depression. Non-judgement didn’t come from sitting and saying why did I say this or that, or why did I think this or that and feeling bad about it.  It came from an acceptance that what they felt and experienced was what they knew and that their experiences taught them. Once we become aware, things do change. Life was their teacher and this inference was uplifting. 

My need for a more robust flavour in life, for sweeter and milkier tea rather than the subtle was just something that I needed to allow to come into being, for it to reveal the change in the mental patterns and resultant body chemistry. Maybe I was more willing to experience life in a more robust way. Or, maybe I needed a more robust flavour to bring me back into the fray....whatever it was, who’s judging, right?

A Potter’s Parable

When I was asked to write about my day trip to Bhopal, I was grouchy as always about more work. I suppose my quasi-Bengali genes were acting up with their inherent laziness, although they also impart a creative bent. I was to learn in more than one way that every story has two sides indeed. With the first nip of winter and crust of clay, my whole view of ceramic art, its crafting technicality and the toil it entails  were about to change. It was to change my own way of thinking and working too.

The year began at Art Ichol in Madhya Pradesh, where I have been working as Ambica Beri’s managerial assistant, with our first symposium of 2015 which was an international rendezvous of ceramists and visual artists from various countries. We hosted Sandra Black from Australia, Cynthia Seigel from USA, Isabelle Roux from France, Eugenia Loginova and Anatolii Borodkin from Latvia and Anjani Khanna from Mumbai. Aditi Saraogi from Kolkata curated the residency. 

Shyamla Hills Bhopal

Barely had everyone settled in, than they began to explore the ceramic centre and even get to work immediately. They all threw themselves at the potter’s wheel while discussing the kind of clay it was and a lot of stuff that I was clueless about. During the course of their stay and the symposium, I was to learn a lot. Their hard work was inspiring; in fact, it seemed like fun too! A whole new world of clay opened up for me as I watched them work. The symposium itself took place at Bharat Bhavan in Bhopal and was a big success. Once everyone had made presentations of their work and process, we  had the rest of the day off to ‘potter’ about the antediluvian city. There are many unguarded secrets to Bhopal, a city steeped in ancient cultural legacy, mixed faiths and serene lakes. I hope that, given the opportunity, every reader finds time to discover their own Bhojpal. 

sunset-at-upper-lake-bhopal

Whether it’s the windsurfers, open air-amphitheatre of Bharat Bhavan overlooking an almost Mediterranean vista or the canoeing competitions, Bhopal offers an unusual cityscape. The details are for you to find out. What I’d love to share with you is a beautiful folk tale about Kumbhars or potters. This tale is relevant to my trip to Bhopal, as not only was I accompanying several world-renowned ceramists during their residency in Maihar, I also knew next to little about ceramics, much less about our indigenous history regarding this craft.

Our art co-ordinator (a very able ceramist himself and Deputy Director of Bharat Bhavan) Mr. Devilal Patidar took us to the Museum of Man and the Tribal Museum. I must mention here that I was overwhelmed by both places. They are a great tribute to our country’s innumerable tribes and crafts. It made me proud of my country and its creative dexterity.

The Museum of Man is truly a comprehensive visual and tangible

anthropological catalogue spread over two hundred acres of open land in the Shamla hills. It is solely dedicated to the various ethnicities and tribes of our country and the only museum in the world to have on-site prehistoric caves and paintings in reference to the Bhimbetka belt. Mrs. Shampa Shah (again a proficient ceramist) was our guide in the museum. Without her we would have been clueless. She has spent the last twenty years of her life in the study and formation of the Museum of Man. It was from her that we learnt of the interesting story I’m about to narrate.

Bhimbetka Cave Painting

It was depicted in clay on the walls of an installation. This installation was a display of various clay pots and plates, each intricately designed with tribal motifs. All our resident ceramists present were impressed by the craftsmanship. The designs had names such as ‘hair-pin’ owing to the inherent nature and story related to the patterns. The display installation itself had reliefs narrating the story and was made from a leepi of cowdung, rice husk and maati or mud. This was coated with chuna or lime and decorated with lovely little round mirrors.

relief-stories on the walls

The story goes thus: the eunuchs of India were once being persecuted by the king’s people. While fleeing, they came by a potter’s barn and decided to hide within the clay pots of his fire kiln. The potter warned them that they would burn to ashes if they hid there. The eunuchs however were adamant and felt it would be a better fate to be cremated alive rather than face such insult. Being so tired from his work, the potter then happened to fall asleep while the kiln was on. The eunuchs were inside, well concealed but in danger of being set ablaze. The potter meanwhile, in his dreams, was being told to wake up for his pots had turned to gold. The exhausted potter didn’t wake up. Again he dreamed of being told to awaken for his pots had scorched and turned to silver. But the potter tired from making the big pots that unbeknown to him now concealed refugees simply could not muster strength to rouse from slumber. Finally, the potter dreamed that his pots weren’t being baked well enough and he awoke with a start worried his work would be ruined. But, in fact, some of his pots truly hadn’t been fired. Miraculously, these were the pots that hid the eunuchs; their lives were spared. Had the potter not been so devoted to his work, the eunuchs would surely have been incinerated. Thus the story goes that every potter invariably finds that some of his pots haven’t baked well enough. And the kind of vigil the visiting ceramic artists were to enact upon our return to Maihar made this story come so alive for me, as I sat with them participating in all that they did to propitiate the kiln gods, and the exhausted anticipation when the firing was done.

The fable also relates how humble yet hardworking the potter is. This I can vouch for, as during the residency with these ceramists, I noticed that they were so involved with their art that they’d even forget to eat. I was very inspired by all that I heard and saw at the Museum of Man and by Shampa too. Not to mention Mr. Patidar who apparently has a knack for finding rural and tribal artisans and making artists out of them - a man who discovers raw diamonds and in effect refines them. We also had the opportunity to meet a few of the potters who had worked at the Museum of Man for years. Shampa specifically mentioned how dedicated yet modest they were.

Outdoor tribal reliefs and carvings - Tribal Museum

The Tribal Museum too was a visual delight, impressive beyond any words. The contemporary and minimalist external structure had been ingeniously masked from the inside with traditional and ethnic real-life installations. It carefully documented the sociological events, artefacts, rituals of the indigenous peoples of Madhya Pradesh. No attention to detail had been spared. After our tour, while having the best masala chai at the Tribal Museum, we met yet another Tribal artist. With her splendidly tattooed face , Bhuri Bai was delicate, intricate and beauteous like her work. 

Bhuri Bai Painting an Installation

Once back in Maihar, everyone’s work had been removed from the bisque and glazing began. This was fun and new for all as the potters was working with new clay, new colours and no one knew what to expect. And after the history lesson in Bhopal, I was now going to see contemporary potters at their dedicated best. Glazing all done, the wood kiln was loaded up for the final firing. In keeping with tradition at the ceramics studio in Maihar, we had a little puja in front of the kiln and shared prasad. Anjani had made an exotic and weird owl of clay for a Kiln-God and Milan (studio assistant at Art Ichol) had made a little clay Ganesha to make offerings to. Anatolii did a wonderful drawing of Genia and Aditi sitting by the kiln with all the details like the Gods we made, the puja and the swastika on the kiln. Round the clock we kept watch of the kiln, stoking the fire, working hard, maintaining a log book and poking the wood in. Checking every now and then if all was in order, roasting potatoes in waste coals, buttering them and gobbling them up. We took turns for meals and some even delayed dinner to midnight. Exhausted after an eighteen-hour vigil, everyone was eager for the Kiln-Gods to reveal their secrets. Many artists were soot ridden and some even burnt here and there. But they were dedicated as ever until they collapsed into bed.

Though the whole trip had been a triumph, no victory was greater than the opening of the kiln. It was truly a moment, finding that almost all works had turned out perfectly and there was barely any damage. These potters successfully transformed clay through fire, making art in a small town in Central India and I had been a witness to it as if watching the birthing of clay gods.

I would have never penned this story if Gopika hadn’t pushed me to. It would have remained a whisper soon to be forgotten. Yet how relevant it was, given my scenario, and how wondrous! And as I wrote this story on an overnight train, first thing in the morning before reaching my destination, I discovered for the first time in my lazy 29 years how delightful it was to work early morning with a fresh mind. I’m glad I came, I’m glad I saw and I’m glad I unearthed the parable of clay.

Tanya Dutt is the Communications & Outreach Manager at Art Ichol. She co-ordinates activities at the centre and is currently working on a book she hopes to publish soon. She wrote her first poem about a cat at age 10 and since then discovered her penchant for the pen.

A Proboscis and the Politics of Fear

It looked like a mosquito. Perched on the white ceiling, this small (but quite large for a mosquito) dark, lithe winged creature, hanging upside down beside the fan, caught my eye which had been quite distracted as I did my needlework today. Winding down for the night, doing some thread work, cradling a black stone-ware cup in my hands. Finishing a cup of not-so-hot Genmaicha (Japanese green tea with toasted rice), I was aimlessly looking around the room when I spied it. And I have to confess that I was more than just a little perturbed by its looming presence in my bedroom.

 

It was an unusually wintry March, so I couldn't quite put the fan on and swoosh it away with the power of the three-pronged circulating blades. I wasn't feeling very well in this unpredictable weather and started bargaining with the mosquito. Well I hadn't really done a thorough investigation, but the idea of it being a mosquito that could prick me into some dreaded malaria or dengue, in this rather chaotically busy phase of my life, alarmed me. Therefore, I decided to stick with that possibility as a probable certainty and plead my case. Even so, I first called out for its identity.

It stayed very still. I pleaded with it to spare me. I had enough problems on my hands as it is, I said. My cracked toe-bone hadn't exactly hampered my movements but all that organising of things that were rushing into my life was a bit of a brain-screamer. I felt these buzzing creatures must know a thing or two about such a state of mind. I tried being friendly. You know, just a couple of casual questions and stuff, hoping that it would respond amiably.

Not a flicker I noted. But looking some eight odd feet upwards, towards the ceiling, I didn't find my eyes focussing too well. It could have twitched a leg or its proboscis and I doubt I would have seen it. The mosquito seemed a little fuzzy - the details of its form were not very clear to the naked eye. It felt almost like a picture taken out of focus that I was zooming into, on the computer. It didn't exactly pixelate as on the screen, but the fact is that a fuzzy vision wouldn't see those pixels either, would it?

Anyway, the mosquito wouldn't budge, nor reassure me that no attack was planned for tonight. Or, that I wasn't the target. So I decided to arm myself with some repellent. I felt rather intimidated by this minuscule creature hanging upside down; waiting, until I had turned out the lights and could no longer see it, to buzz into my space and lunge for my blood. Infecting me with whatever dirt it had picked up on its flight path to my bedroom.

I searched high and low. I looked in every conceivable place that I may have kept the packet. And then, I remembered that I must have kept them in the half-unpacked toilet bag, which had recently returned from its journey accompanying me to Sangrur. I hadn't needed them there or in Maihar, before that. And the sudden cold and rain in Gurgaon didn't predict mosquito season anytime soon. So a careless unpacking had left them in the bag which, thankfully, I found soon enough.

In my feverish hunt, I had eyes only for the repellent. The mosquito

had seemed resolute and unmoving so I concentrated on finding the mosquito-repellent patches. I know that not everyone's convinced that they work, but surely the reeking citronella must have some effect? When I found them, I hurriedly opened a foil-cum-plastic pack of two and clumsily fumbled in my anxiety to be forearmed in a moment of imminent and unpredictable attack. I finally tore it open and pulled out the citronella-soaked, round, green patch and waved it at the mosquito in glee. Looking up at that spot, to the left of the fan, where it had stayed an interminably long time, I found that the not-so-small mosquito had slyly abandoned its perch. Now, it was nowhere to be seen, depriving me of my moment of triumph. Typical!

On auto-pilot mode, not wanting to think about the implications of the scene that had just unfolded, I placed the bright, lime-green, inch-long-diameter, that sticky and circular thingamajig onto my white tee shirt. I was more just a bit peeved by the antics of the mosquito and more so by the design of the mosquito-repellent patch. Neither of which did much for my self-esteem.

This protective patch that was my supposed shield against mosquito attacks, if not quite the knight in shining armour, bore a rather disproportionate drawing of a silly looking female bear, with a big face on a tiny little body, snugly fitted into a tight red dress. Her lips smudged, with an overdose of matching red lipstick. And between the ears, drawn strangely above the head, was something that must have been intended to represent a floral clip. It was mostly pungent lime-green with just a thin, curly-whirly, red outline.  It was the outline that made me think it must be something floral. Her head was turned upwards, eyes as if mooning after a gob-smacking kiss that had smeared the red lipstick all over her bearish nostrils. I looked at it, took in the whole picture, crinkling my nose at the now over-powering smell of the repellent and this unlikely figure that had emerged from the pack as my protection.

 

But I didn't have the courage to take it off. Beneath the strains of Rachmaninov that were filing the night, it could be buzzing anywhere. And sure enough, a short while later, I spied it, right there crawling beside the fan, in almost the exact same place I had first seen it. Making me wonder at my eyesight and the way this mosquito had succeeded in playing tricks with my mind. Fear does that to you doesn’t it?