A Mad Trip into the Mad World of My Mad Family - Part I

DAY 1
After barely four hours of very interrupted sleep, my cell phone clock decided it was time for me to wake up and blared out Enrique Iglesias' "Be With You" with a hope that I wake up all grinning and smiley dreaming about Spanish hunks. Wrong! I grunted and groped for the damned instrument and tried to switch it of, all with my eyes tightly shut. It chose to hang just then, forcing me to prop myself up on my elbows, prise it open and pull the battery out to silence it. Apparently, even delicious Spanish hunks are unwanted when a tired woman is trying to get some sleep. Alas! Only sleep was not to happen. For in a house that is being remodelled, and only one bathroom in the house (tragically attached to my room) to be used by four other people to get ready for the road trip, the traffic flow in and out of my room was incessant and desperate attempts to snooze were futile.

Leaden feet, scowls and some hurried freshening up later, I was ready and waiting next to our car in the parking lot by 5:45 am. There were five of us making the trip - Dad, Mom, Dad's childhood friend, his wife (they were in Calcutta to shop for their son's wedding in November) and I. The men and I couldn't figure out what was taking the women so long. We forgot to account for the gazillion "last minute things" they always have to do and, of course, the obligatory morning pooja before they started with their destination for the day. According to them, that would save us from any mishap during the journey. I cringed inwardly while I nodded vigorously in agreement, obviously to avoid a lecture on religion and spirituality first thing in the morning. I was also left wondering if God liked being woken up form his sleep at such ungodly hours.

With dad at the wheel, uncle next to him and the three heavy-weight ladies stuffed in the back seat of an Indigo Marina, already bowing under the weight of luggage that was loaded till the top of the boot space. The rear view glass was blocked with bags of all shapes and sizes, and how can we Oriyas forget that one big bag of ready to eat food packed for any time we felt hungry, or even plain bored? We hit the streets of Calcutta at 6 am. The roads were damp from the rains of the previous night. So was the paint on the old building walls that are the charm of the city of joy. I was seeing Calcutta this early in the morning after a really long time, and it was reminiscent of the morning walks and the chai at thronging Maharani tea stall on the way back home.

Sweepers cleaning the last day's garbage off the roads; newspaper delivery trucks and the stall men negotiating the day's numbers; the pharmacist in a 24X7 medical store asleep on the chair behind the counter in his shop; morning walkers, some with their dogs, briskly walking their routes, kachuri-tarkari and cha stalls with the same morning walkers milling around them; the park benches seated with the retired dadus and the still chirpy and bossy didas indulging  in their customary laughter club meetings and the famous Bengali adda... and the sounds and smells that accompany these characteristic sights of my dear city.

For the first half-an-hour, I take all of it in, letting my senses bask in the explosion of  things so pleasant, thanks to my dad's need for a cigarette. Once mom started complaining about her hair getting messed up in the wind, we had to roll up the car windows. Mom and aunty got into talking abut their kind of stuff and dad and uncle engrossed in recalling the road trips they took while in college. I was thankfully not required to be active in either conversation. After having caught interesting snippets from both pairs, I plugged my ears with earphones, closed my eyes and let go to the great medley of songs that I had painstakingly transferred to my cell phone the night before. Yes, that is why I had had only four hours of sleep and the comedic story warrants another blog post dedicated solely to it.

We stopped for some coffee at a highway dhaba and to buy flowers for pooja in a village on the way (why flowers and what pooja you ask? Hang on.). Somewhere in Medinipur (WB), there was a flat tyre, which I helped dad change, and pulling out all the heavy luggage from the trunk of the car and rearranging it in the manner of a jigsaw puzzle was no mean feat. There were two suitcases, seven bags, a huge carton containing some 150 sarees and two cartons full of food stuff to be delivered (hang on!). I also hired a van and went some couple of kilometers backwards on our route to get the flat tyre repaired. So much for the early morning pooja to appease the Gods to let us have a safe and not-troublesome journey. I bet they were peeved at having been woken up so early and they had decided to teach us a lesson. I had dragged uncle along, and we were having fun. My parents thought I was in the adventurous mode. Truth be told, they have never seen me in my true form.

For all those who are not used to rural Bengali colloquialisms, a van is a cycle driven cart - used to transport things and people over short and not-so-long distances. The way I took a lead to go and get the tyre repaired came as a shock to my parents. Mom got motivated too, and offered to come along, riding on the van, with her legs dangling down its back, her expensive crepe saree's pallu wrapped around her and tucked into the waist. Only after we convinced her that she would get a backache and her saree would be ruined, did she grudgingly relent. The songs playing on the repairman's mobile phone were predictably 90s, but brought back zingy memories of their terrible picturisations and made me double up with laughter- insanely popular (how?why?) songs of Jeet, Jaan Tere Naam  and Daag - the Fire! That done, we resumed, on a route I had not seen before on our innumerable trips to Bhubaneswar. But it had been a while since I drove down there, and I just assumed it was a newer route. How wrong could I be!

I still did not ask any questions. But during the changing of a second flat tyre (yes, in a matter of 30 minutes!), bang in the middle of the morning haat in another village, I heard my mother tell one of the many helpful men who came forth to help dad change the flat tyre that we were headed towards Katakhali. I was taken aback. My feelings bordered on gross indignation. I felt cheated. I did not know what to say. The name 'Katakhali' rang no bell, howsoever tiny, in my big head.

It was after we thanked these men and plonked ourselves into the car again, that I asked where we were actually headed towards. "Why? We're going to Guruji's ashram. I thought you knew. There is a pooja in your name tomorrow, you know, to help soothe your temper."

That flared my temper again, but I decided to look as calm as peace itself. I clamped myself shut to avoid being bombarded with advise about how a girl needs to be calmer, cooler, more, well... more like a "girl". Uh oh! That didn't help. There was still a barrage of advise from dad, mom and aunty. Uncle hates talking too much, and he looked at me, silently extending his apologies and sympathies for the ordeal I was in.

I have nothing against Guruji. He seems to be a nice man and he doesn't force me into believing or doing anything I don't want to. He and I have had discussions about dogma, spirituality, religion, and life in general. In fact, what I appreciate most about him is that he is a karmayogi and that he respects my opinion and my questioning nature.

But I was irked; for the sole reason that I was not told about this puja and I was going to be forced into sitting for it. I breathed deep and decided to make the best of what was to come. It would be my first stay in a village and I intended to have my share of fun. I stuffed my ears to the strains of 'Come Undone' and looked out of the window with something akin to excitement and dread brewing in my gut.