'Oru Paattu paadein', my grandmother would implore with a tone of authority that was hard for any visitor to our house golu to decline.
In our home in Salem where I grew up, Golu was a much awaited festival, less to do with religious fervour or devotion to the significance it held in the Hindu pantheon but because it had the fascinating custom of displaying dolls in nine steps that occupied most of our drawing room once a year.
I wonder if any other culture has anything similar as I find explaining the concept to a foreigner quite daunting. I mean, display dolls and invite women and children over to your home to admire them, sing on request and leave with a return gift of goodies along with vethalai paakku/ manjal/kungumam? Sounds childish if not a total waste of time! As children, we would count days to go before 'Navarathri' began and rejoice in the exercise of setting up the nine steps done by a couple of men trusted over years to get them right. Then came the dolls. In all sizes, shapes, colours....figures of Gods, Goddesses, lesser known deities, pairs of an 'English Lady and Gentleman', gypsy and her partner, tribal folks, a marriage scene complete with the procession - men carrying lights and women trays of sweets and flowers, scenes from the Ramayana and some miscalleneous dolls collected randomly over the years to fill the gaps. And then there was the 'park' that we children got all hyper about......a small space below the mammoth nine steps was designated for a park meant to kindle our creativity. We would erect a small sand mound with a temple on top and put grains and legumes to sprout on it and watch with glee as greenery seemed to appear magically like "Jack and the Beanstalk'! Then there were unconnected small animals, figurines, toy cars and various stuff that would be displaced from the 'show-case' from our drawing room and kept in the park. Never mind if the dog was bigger than a man on the street or wild animals juxtaposed with kids in a garden! Thematic Golu was unheard of!
I was asked to go to every house in our street to personally invite the women to 'come to our house for golu and take vethalai/paakku'. After-school hours were mostly spent in these personal invitations extended to many more houses in town a week preceding Golu. Once Golu starts, the fun unfolds. My mother and grand mother prayed and chanted all morning and made the most delicious prasadams for the Neivedhyam. The evening began with the smell of sundal wafting through the house as we geared to receive visitors who dropped in at all times draped in their silks and adorned in jewellery. I think the men too enjoyed a respite from their spouses too busy in their golu routine with the additional bonus of ogling at the bedecked women who came calling!
Being the only girl child among 4 older brothers, I was pampered and reprimanded in equal measure - it was a privilege that sat heavily on my shoulders, what with my Grandmother often reminding me of how I was born after much prayer and penance by her and how a Thulasi plant sprouted on its own when my mother was carrying the divine me! So much for female infanticide that Salem, my home-town became notorious for!! And so I was always uncomfortably and awkwardly decked up.....in pattu paavadai, gold and stone necklaces, jimmikki, bangles, with my long hair braided in different pinnals adorned with too many flowers. But for some reason everyone found me 'cute' and asked me to sing, play the veena or 'show a few steps' from my Bharatanatyam that I was more famous for! Of course, the very act of giving sandhanam/ kungumam to the women upon arrival and vethalai/paakku, sundal on departure was done by me.....hard work for a child, come to think of it!
My last brother and I would play Golu games- total brain-teasers that called for out-of-the-box thinking!!! - like spotting the doll, changing a doll's place and getting the other person to find out, counting dolls in a step and so on. When our respective friends dropped in, we loved to show off our golu, pointing to the new dolls of the season and our 'park' that was a labour of love in hushed tones, while an enthusiastic maami would be singing out of tune in the background! The last day of Golu when the dolls are made to 'sleep' before they are again carefully wrapped in newspaper and stacked away in the loft for another year is always a bit sad.....steps are dismantled and with it goes another festival filled with merriment and childish joy. Even today, my brother and I talk of how we miss our Salem Golu that seemed to have vanished over time, the number of steps slowly dwindling from nine to almost nil, the dolls broken and the surviving ones distributed to the daughters-in-law to keep in their golu.
In Chennai, Golu has taken on a whole new dimension . Invitations are sent out by sms with specific dates and timings. We usually adhere to them, seldom taking the liberty of dropping in on any day of Navarathri. And if you choose to, you would be better off calling and ensuring the host is at home. Most homes serve high tea complete with bhel puri and dahi paapdi chaat, one of my friends served cocktails and lured the men to accompany their wives and another friend got an art director to do up her golu, had a dress code of pink silk and press photographers flashed their cameras on the celebrity guests...sure enough their pictures adorned a popular newspaper the next morning! We get some return gifts too - trays, plastic bowls, blouse pieces- most of which are passed on to others by way of rotation!
I miss our simple Salem Golu that had none of the fancy trappings of today, yet gave us immeasurable joy year after year.....
In our home in Salem where I grew up, Golu was a much awaited festival, less to do with religious fervour or devotion to the significance it held in the Hindu pantheon but because it had the fascinating custom of displaying dolls in nine steps that occupied most of our drawing room once a year.
I wonder if any other culture has anything similar as I find explaining the concept to a foreigner quite daunting. I mean, display dolls and invite women and children over to your home to admire them, sing on request and leave with a return gift of goodies along with vethalai paakku/ manjal/kungumam? Sounds childish if not a total waste of time! As children, we would count days to go before 'Navarathri' began and rejoice in the exercise of setting up the nine steps done by a couple of men trusted over years to get them right. Then came the dolls. In all sizes, shapes, colours....figures of Gods, Goddesses, lesser known deities, pairs of an 'English Lady and Gentleman', gypsy and her partner, tribal folks, a marriage scene complete with the procession - men carrying lights and women trays of sweets and flowers, scenes from the Ramayana and some miscalleneous dolls collected randomly over the years to fill the gaps. And then there was the 'park' that we children got all hyper about......a small space below the mammoth nine steps was designated for a park meant to kindle our creativity. We would erect a small sand mound with a temple on top and put grains and legumes to sprout on it and watch with glee as greenery seemed to appear magically like "Jack and the Beanstalk'! Then there were unconnected small animals, figurines, toy cars and various stuff that would be displaced from the 'show-case' from our drawing room and kept in the park. Never mind if the dog was bigger than a man on the street or wild animals juxtaposed with kids in a garden! Thematic Golu was unheard of!
I was asked to go to every house in our street to personally invite the women to 'come to our house for golu and take vethalai/paakku'. After-school hours were mostly spent in these personal invitations extended to many more houses in town a week preceding Golu. Once Golu starts, the fun unfolds. My mother and grand mother prayed and chanted all morning and made the most delicious prasadams for the Neivedhyam. The evening began with the smell of sundal wafting through the house as we geared to receive visitors who dropped in at all times draped in their silks and adorned in jewellery. I think the men too enjoyed a respite from their spouses too busy in their golu routine with the additional bonus of ogling at the bedecked women who came calling!
Being the only girl child among 4 older brothers, I was pampered and reprimanded in equal measure - it was a privilege that sat heavily on my shoulders, what with my Grandmother often reminding me of how I was born after much prayer and penance by her and how a Thulasi plant sprouted on its own when my mother was carrying the divine me! So much for female infanticide that Salem, my home-town became notorious for!! And so I was always uncomfortably and awkwardly decked up.....in pattu paavadai, gold and stone necklaces, jimmikki, bangles, with my long hair braided in different pinnals adorned with too many flowers. But for some reason everyone found me 'cute' and asked me to sing, play the veena or 'show a few steps' from my Bharatanatyam that I was more famous for! Of course, the very act of giving sandhanam/ kungumam to the women upon arrival and vethalai/paakku, sundal on departure was done by me.....hard work for a child, come to think of it!
My last brother and I would play Golu games- total brain-teasers that called for out-of-the-box thinking!!! - like spotting the doll, changing a doll's place and getting the other person to find out, counting dolls in a step and so on. When our respective friends dropped in, we loved to show off our golu, pointing to the new dolls of the season and our 'park' that was a labour of love in hushed tones, while an enthusiastic maami would be singing out of tune in the background! The last day of Golu when the dolls are made to 'sleep' before they are again carefully wrapped in newspaper and stacked away in the loft for another year is always a bit sad.....steps are dismantled and with it goes another festival filled with merriment and childish joy. Even today, my brother and I talk of how we miss our Salem Golu that seemed to have vanished over time, the number of steps slowly dwindling from nine to almost nil, the dolls broken and the surviving ones distributed to the daughters-in-law to keep in their golu.
In Chennai, Golu has taken on a whole new dimension . Invitations are sent out by sms with specific dates and timings. We usually adhere to them, seldom taking the liberty of dropping in on any day of Navarathri. And if you choose to, you would be better off calling and ensuring the host is at home. Most homes serve high tea complete with bhel puri and dahi paapdi chaat, one of my friends served cocktails and lured the men to accompany their wives and another friend got an art director to do up her golu, had a dress code of pink silk and press photographers flashed their cameras on the celebrity guests...sure enough their pictures adorned a popular newspaper the next morning! We get some return gifts too - trays, plastic bowls, blouse pieces- most of which are passed on to others by way of rotation!
I miss our simple Salem Golu that had none of the fancy trappings of today, yet gave us immeasurable joy year after year.....
