Memories of RRF: நான் சிரித்தால் தீபாவளி

நான் சிரித்தால் தீபாவளி*(Naan Sirithal Deepavali)

Deepavali in RRF

I do not remember being particularly joyous at the arrival of Deepavali in RRF. Most of the time, it was just a hindrance as it came amidst year end and public examinations.

As usual Amma will complain about the ever increasing cost of living and increased expenses incurred because of this one day celebration. Again, she would remind us not to overspend because even though Deepavali only comes once a year, it comes every year. And that we should not suffer the whole year just to enjoy on one particular day! 

A month before the auspicious day, Amma will start receiving sewing orders and this will go on until the eve of the celebration!

2 to 3 weeks before this day of the win of good over evil, the whole family will throng the stores at Penang Road, Campbell Street and ‘Jual Murah Bazaar’ on bargain hunting. It will end with each child getting about 2 sets of clothes and the whining of ever escalating price of things year in year out.

By a week before Deepavali, Amma without fail will start scolding all of us and will groped in (at knife point) to help out in carrying out simple manoeuvres (e.g. sewing buttons, cutting off the loose threads, sending for edging etc. etc.). In the midst of all these, something will go missing and again everyone will be at the receiving end (including Appa for the financial turmoil). The missing item will invariably be found right under Amma’s nose where it had been all the while! The brunt of the abuses will be hurled at pitiful Sheila who will be accused for all the mistakes, but life went on…

People will continue placing their order, some even pleading on the eve of Deepavali to get their saree blouse stitched. Amma will usually oblige on compassionate grounds. Maybe not so compassionate to Sheila – she will be chided for not helping. If it were today, Sheila could probably call 1-800-‘teledera’ number and the Americans would label our small cottage industry as sweat shop using child labour!

As the day got nearer, Amma would become more desperate. The children, all preparing for the examinations would be nagged for not helping enough, unlike other children – as if we were the only children in the world who needed to study! The sewing sessions would go on and on till the morning of Deepavali. On one occasion, probably due to fatigue, she actually cut out the wrong design for the wrong customer and Amma had to replace the material. Probably that customer must have ‘celebrated’ Deepavali that year with no saree blouse!
In about a week before Deepavali, in the middle of this entire melee, cookies will be prepared. By tradition, the first to be cooked must be oil based; hence the opening ceremony is done by murukku and ghee balls (ney orundei). I would be assigned to give my muscle power to press down the murukku dough with the troublesome Indian-made murukku device. 3 or 4 other cakes will follow – peanut biscuit, sujee and ghee cookies, plain butter cake, athirasam, jelly and glutinous rice with black sugar paste (wajik/pulut kacau).
On two Deepavali eves, I remember the similar incident happened twice. Sheila had been left inside the house to take care while parent went to do Deepavali shopping. Lats as usual was at Ah Leng’s house. I came home (after afternoon school) to find a big commotion outside E15-11! Who’s who of the 15th floor were all there standing outside the unit, banging on the door calling for Sheila who was cozily in slumber-land on the chair right in front of the TV! And that was not too far from the main door, but she continued snoozing. All our ingenious maneuvers finally bore fruit. As this type of incidence (being locked outside) was rampant, everyone had their own simple devices including the charcoal stirrer which was similar to what is used laparoscopic surgery! Finding Sheila snoring in the midst of that entire ruckus, she was severely reprimanded (meaning whacked!). Kaboom! Swish! Kastakaalam கஷ்டகாலம் !

With all that build-up, preparation and countdown, Deepavali was actually an anti-climax – except for the new clothes, the food and the angpows that we received after distributing cookies to our neighbours. Amma will be sleeping after finally finishing her sewing and cooking. Appa would be catching his forty winks on his easy chair and we, the children would be watching all the special programmes on TV. Nobody actually came to visit us even on Deepavali day. Afternoon would come and the family will again manifest in front of the idiot box to watch the Deepavali special Tamil movie on RTM. When this was over, essentially Deepavali was over and reality bit in. It was time to prepare for school the following day. In the Deepavali nights we would play from 1 or 2 packets of Chinese sparklers.
All the money collected in the form of angpow would go straight to the Post Office Savings account (No. 3472) in the next few days. The grand finale of Deepavali curtain would fall with the family outing to the movies in either Royal or Paramount theatres. We would invariably end up watching a Sivaji movie.
Amma may be painted like a female version of Uncle Scrooge in this article but she had her priorities. She wanted to extricate the Sham clan from the rubbles of fall and reinstate their place in society. As she would always say, “If you are healthy and wealthy, every day can be Deepavali

*நான் சிரித்தால் தீபாவளி (Naan Sirithaal Deepavali) is title of a song from the 80’s super duper Tamil movie titled ‘Nayagan’ about a ‘Robin Hood’ type of a Tamil mafia lord in Bombay. The scene in the song depicts the sweet sad mood of Deepavali in the slum area of Bombay. It was skillfully composed by music maestro Illayaraja setting the retro 1950s mood by using primarily using musical instrumentals used in songs of that era and background singers of that long forgotten era! The movie itself was the beginning of anti hero roles and escalation of nonsensical violence in Kollywood to the present movies of Anniyan and Ghajini. With that movie too, the focus of Tamil movies changed from the predominantly family oriented sob stories of the 60s and the arty movies of the late 70s (village backdrop, e.g. 16Vayathinile; minimal makeup. e.g. Pasi; adult topics, e.g. Aval Oru Thodarkathai and Nool Veli) to what it is today.

The film was nominated by the Government of India as its entrée for the 1988 Academy Awards in the Best Foreign Film category. It did not make it, however, to the final list. So far, only 3 Indian movies had made it to the shortlisted list – Mother India (1957), Salaam Bombay (1988) and Lagaan (2001). Sadly none has won. In 2005, Time Magazine included ‘Nayagan’ in its ‘All time 100 Best Film’ list.