By – Rabin Prasad Kalita
Our eventful life from dawn to dusk might have separated us from clutching relationships with others. Life becomes too tough and chaotic running after achieving one’s own goal. The very own “our” has already been transformed into the selfish “I”, which has relatively made our pretty solidarity into dotted and dwarf.
What a wonderful my tiny village was! I become so pensive, remembering those sweet childhood days left behind. One cannot weigh the amount of cohesiveness amongst villagers.
The complete village looked enchanting when there was a celebration. Let that be a mere function or marriage ceremony, everyone came and extended their helping hands voluntarily and took care of each department willfully from the beginning to the end of the ritual. They became one on that particular day forgetting their difference if there was any misinterpretation earlier.
Each one of them shouldered one’s assigned responsibility as if the ceremony was their own and made the ceremony into a grand success. This selfless collective works had made a perfect bonding of brotherhood solidarity amongst each other. I pray, those innocent hearts would still exist, but alas, they are long gone!
My incipient grooming to be perfect in all aspects gave me the confidence to look after the house with no fear when grew up. I did cheerfully which was not considered child labour then. I got up a little early along with other young elders of the family who went for plowing to the paddy field. Handing over the breakfast to the field workers who were still plowing was one of my regular tasks before I proceeded for school. Collecting green grass and hays for cattle was also a part of my daily routine.
I enjoyed fishing after coming back from school. Fishes were abundant and found where there was a pool of water. Hardly there was someone who bought fishes; otherwise, it was exchanged in kinds, such as rice, grain, or vegetables.
I recall, at the time of harvesting, all the farmers of the village came forward and joined their collective hands while sowing and harvesting crops for each one of the inhabitants as per the turn.
Mostly our turn came in the middle of the first half of all the farmers in the village. We were exuberant by seeing them singing and cutting jokes with each other with the rhythm of reaping crops. The reapers were refreshed with the varieties of rice made redolent eatables like Pan Cake, banana leaf role; kettle lid rice cake, etc. so that they don’t feel hungry. When reaping was over, they brought all harvested crops in the same spirit and stacked them like a hill in our home.
At the end of the day, a wonderful palatable dinner was arranged for all of them. I was busy engaging all other friends of my age of the village pocket to help us host. All were helping each other and had the fist with rapture to mark the evening into success. We couldn’t express in words how happy we all were. This organized harvesting was continued until the last one of the farmer’s crop collection was over.
Such a lucid bond garnished with fun and frolic amongst the villagers can never be found anywhere else. I saw real strength and unity amongst them.
Here is an uncomfortable elfin story I would like to share. In those days there had been no good communication like today has, because of which we faced a lot of tongue-tied situations.
One day my brother-in-law suddenly arrived at our home. Welcoming guests with a cup of tea with snacks and betel-nut is an old tradition in our society. Daily used items like tea leaves, salt, sugar, milk, or any such obligatory items may not be available all the time at home. The deficiency was mitigated by borrowing from neighbours amicably.
Something similar happened to my mom that day. She got puzzled thinking of how she appeases her son-in-law who came after a long gap. She discovered a couple of items were short in the kitchen. As I was in school, fetching those items immediately from the shop was not possible for her.
While she was immersed in thought, some girls came through the backdoor to assist my mom. Thus the paucity was overcome in a snap. This was the true relationship we all had with our neighbours. If a guest from far-flung came all of a sudden at one’s home, the news was broadcast in a minute around the village.
Erstwhile, the guest remained no more a stranger for the rest of the villagers. The villagers didn’t hesitate to borrow anything from the nearby home if fell short of something. Even they were available at the host home for physical help until the reception was over. Exchanging cooked appetizing dishes during the lunch or dinner were common amongst neighbours. It was like one home but cooked in different places.
When Naamprasanga used to be in someone’s house, then things were different, we all children would go crazy with happiness. The entire village became live with ecstasy on the heavy sound echoed from Nagara, Khol, or Taal (Cymbal) made the evening rhapsody. The devotional psalms orchestrated with those age-old percussions enticed us to unknown happiness. High pitched sound of cymbal made all of us thrilled and the whole things were converted to a festive evening for the children. We all children were waiting for the Prasad, the sacred food offered first to God.
My elder brother and I mostly studied in broad daylight because of the limited lantern at home to study at night. There was only one kerosene hand lamp in our entire house for which there was a tug of war on every evening with my brother. The winner got the opportunity to study smile fully under the lantern and the looser had to read under the trembling light of the wick or glass bottle oil lamp. One of us had to forsake or wind up one’s study a little early due to the insufficient light.
We recited sounding high syllable to syllable so that it goes to the ears of our parents. Else, an inquiry came from the other side, whether we were playing with the wick or chit-chatting each other. One can find the same up roaring tone reverberated all over the hamlet even if their parents were illiterate.
Most of the villagers slept before 8 o’clock. Some families were compelled to embrace their beds even in the early evening. Owing to the lack of kerosene to ignite the braided fiber of the wick to keep their homes bright at night, they were forced to go for bed a little early.
Herein my urban locality, the person who resides to my next door doesn’t know me or even I don’t try to connect him. Though I stay at a snoring distance from one another but yet, it seems far-off from physical contact. Nobody wants to know what’s happening across the boundary wall of one’s neighbor. But the untold truth is this; our entire perceptivity has been limited to the individual concern.
The legacy of our once unified society is forlorn today. The selfish “me” or “I” have taken over the charge in place. Unity is a far cry in this virtual world. In this space-age, high-tech gadgets are also equally responsible for pushing us to a considerable distance from one to one physical reach.
Texting through social media has become enough for all sorts of communications, even it is seen in between the family members while communicating from one bed to another. My eyes go moist thinking of those lovely childhood days sailed behind. Where is my once resilient and most organized society heading now?
(The writer is an Ex-Air Warrior and presently works in Indian Audit and Accounts Department Guwahati, Assam, India.. He can be reached at E-mail: [email protected])
