Cousin Riaz debuts in Tehelka Mag

What joy! What kicks! 
On the last evening of my last trip to the village, Breswana as you all should know by now, I scribbled some information after quickly interviewing young Riaz on the Government's new BPL classification policy.  Riaz is one of five brothers, all of whom are the hardest-working, most decent lot of kids I know from the current generation. Like all the rest of my village, he is a sort of cousin to me.

Spot the Riaz: Correct! Sweet fellow on extreme right.

To my utter delightful delight. Riaz's piece was picked up for a Tehelka report compiled by lovely Nisha Susan, who BTW is a brilliance. I do love her. 
Anyway, moving on. I proudly present 'The New Fortune List' in Tehelka mag, featuring the first lad from our area in any publication. 
*rabble rousing cheers*
Instructions to find Riaz:
1. Look at the page.
2. Appreciate the two columns of faces, and their info.
4. Click on 4th thumbnail in right column. Yes, the one that clearly says 'Riaz Ahmed Batt. 22'
5. Enjoy reading about his take on things.


Goodbye.

Of Weddings in a Village

Made a slap-dash trip to Breswana recently to attend a family double-wedding. Photo-story follows [click on pics to magnify]:

Started with road trip from Jammu towards Kishtwar on NH-1B; disembarked 8 hours later at small roadside town of Prem Nagar. Where one crosses a footbridge to get to the mountains on the other side. At this time of the year, the Chenab has shrunk considerably because the source waters in the mountains are now freezing etc. Do the geography yourself.

Here is the bridge we cross and the other half of Prem Nagar built into the facing mountains. It's about a hundred metres max, if that, though when I was little I distinctly remember it being about 5 kms longer.

Once at Prem Nagar, the horses await, and we start our upward ride: 3 to 4 hours at a comfortable amble. Pits stops and refreshments are to be had as you like it.

 Ahem. By the way, this is my new gorgeous black mare. So far I call her Black Mare, which is #FAIL.

Finally reached my home in the hills after sunset, and it was c-c-c-cold, but aha! What's this I spy in my room? Verily it is a blazing fire. Zzzzzzz.

After a great overnight rest, which was preceded by fresh warm buffalo milk and a good hot water foot bath, I awoke the next morning to play with the pups and a few village shrimps. Boy on left is our in-house Gujjar kid, Hashim Din. Boy on right is young Irfan, who has some sort of mental disability and is still stuck at an infant's level of mental development. He's great with animals. :)

Close up of baby cocky spangrel [Cocker Spaniel+mongrel mix], Motu, at his favourite spot, under the dahlias in the sunny front yard.

Anyway... Wedding time, and we head to the next village where Shahida and her brother Nisar were both getting married on the same day. Shahida to leave for her new home, and Nisar to bring his new wife in.So this is the path we take.On foot and horseback, as the road allows.

Now, a village wedding in my ilaaka is of monstrous proportions for the very simple reason that everyone in a village is related to everyone else in the village... and very often the adjoining few villages as well. So a general invite to the whole world and its family is sent out, and since weddings are fun times and provide a rare reprieve from their daily lives to our hardy village peeps, everyone takes advantage of these occasions to come out in numbers. Huge numbers.
What makes a village wedding doable, for even the poorest of people, is the fact that everyone pitches in. Every single family offers something to the wedding preparations. People will either bring milk, curd, ghee, livestock, rice, wheat or whatever they have to help the host families do their thing. This is apart from the cash gifts they give to the bride and groom.


This particular wedding I was at was expected to host 700 peeps at each meal. And so cooking preparations were awesome to witness. The Culinary Department at such dos is the biggest deal. An outdoor cooking camp is set up, with logs, gigantic vessels and impressive manpower at work the whole day. They are in charge of providing chais, rotis, main meals and other special requests for special guests from time to time.

At meal times, the guests are called in batches to the eating tent. Catering units form a human chain and after the hand-washing routine [in Kashmir, hosts go from guest to guest, after they are seated for a meal, carrying the 'tash-nerr' (which means receptacle and kettle respectively) for them to wash their hands in], the preserved plates are brought in piping hot from the cooking area.

 

The pre-served plate will normally have a bed of rice, some chutney and a few pieces of meat from the various dishes on the menu. Then one by one, a line of servers start making rounds carrying huge buckets serving various curries or topping up plates and refilling rice as the case may be. Water bearers do their thing simultaneously. It is most wonderful to watch a well-oiled meal service in action.  [Please note, this is not a Waazwan. This is a most simple wedding meal practised in the poor mountain areas of our district. Waazwan happens in proper Kashmir, i.e. the Valley.]

Here is the young team of Caterers at Shahida and Nisar's wedding.

Inside the wedding house, the aim of the game apparently is to cramp as many human bodies as possible within the smallest confines, then sit and talk loudly or sing folk songs as the mood sets on you. :) The ladies and kids come decked up in their finest, they sit, chat, meet long-lost relatives, gossip and in general make for a very noisy and entertaining scene. For people who don't like crowds [guilty] it is a bit much, and I found myself standing outdoors, in the shamianas or secluded in a separate room with no intruders. Still, most interesting to watch.

 The men and women sit separately, with most of the men involved in the actual running around and wedding work. The ladies just have it easy.
And so, Day 1 of the Wedding, which was Mehndi Raat. Shahida's girlfriend from college in Doda came up to the village to do her mehndi and makeup.

Cute decorations for the next day, when the two brides would be seated side-by-side: One, the new incoming bride and the other, the bride to leave for her new home. [Check out the heart garland. #WIN!]

 New bride arrived in a paalki. Her village was about two and a half hours away, on mountain roads- which means uphills and downhills! Most impressive of the paalki-wallahs.

 And soon after, Shahida's groom arrived. [On one of our horses. :]

 Here are the two lovely ladies. Shahida, screen left, and new bride, screen right.

Cash garlands are a very big deal here, as in UP and Mayawati. Except these are believable sums, and ten rupee notes.
Another funny tradition: After the baraatis/groom come to the bride's house, a select group of close lady relatives from the girl's side, gets to come to his room and stare at him for a while. After many awkward moments, and a heavy silence, suddenly every one of them thrusts cash gifts at his loyal companion, who accepts these token as part of his duties. Scene ends.
Here is Zaana Auntie, Shahida's Ma, seated near the groom [but not talking to him: shy].

 Here is the dashing groom Nisar, happy to have brought home a blushing bride.

 And that was that. A most eventful wedding happened. Masses met and good wishes passed along for the next generation. There were no fights which is surprising for such big gatherings. Much chai was had, many songs were sung. One pretty girl left and another took her place. Lots of animals gave their lives for a good cause. Burp.

Back at the Haji homestead, on the morning of my departure, was hanging with our horses in the fields.

Groomed Black Mare for a bit and she was like, "WTF?" Zanskari horses are not namby-pamby and she was really irritated as I brushed her coat. Tee hee.

Quick stop at the school before rushing out. It was the first day of HPS's annual examination for the year 2010. Kids praying hard at assembly just before the event. :)

Examination hall was created outside in the winter sun because it was chilly inside the classrooms and most magical outdoors.

 Hehehe. Check out little Rubina applying herself as she works out an answer.

 Back home to say bye to the two pup faces: Motu and ThinSo. [ThinSo is stray boy we picked up from the streets in Jammu. He's a nutcase.]

 Farewell shot of the school as I left for Jammu.

Downhill is about 3+ hours of walking. We don't take horses going down because of the steep descent, big boulders and generally unnecessary leg-breakage-risk. In this pic, you can see my poor Abba limping along heroically with his cane for support. He had hurt his feet something terrible earlier and they were not healed yet. Toenails falling off, bleeding etc. But he did the trip and did it well. Hero!

 Here we are resting about halfway down. You can see the bridge at Prem Nagar at the bottom.

 Quick stop at our Doda digs and the office of the Amina Trust.

 

And another quick stop at Kishtwar, my mother's hometown, for a family visit. Here was the highlight of the Kishtwar trip, my bouncy baby cousin Sa'ad, a blonde bonmbshell and most clever kid who I have marked out for greater things in the future.

 

This concludes the present broadcast. Please leave comments and questions below. Also, point out typos to me. There is no way I'm rereading the entire post. :)

Yes, yes, contrary to what you think, I do not write only about Arundhati Roy. [Oh, look, I did it again.]
Anyway, am back from quick trip to Breswana and the school. Attended a couple of weddings, and a couple of funerals. Most disturbing.
Pics soon. Here's a sample, from happy times in Breswana:

This here is my new puppy face. So far have not named him because he has not yet developed an animality. Based on looks alone, we call him Motu. Sometimes we call him Fatty. (He does't respond to either.) He responds very well to food.
He's very adorable, okay? Okay.

Missing the School

It's been almost a month since I was at HPS Breswana. Miss these imps.
Here they are, demonstrating the hilarity of the word 'Akimbo'. :)

It's Been a While

And it'll be a little more, even.

Verrrry busy past couple of months with the school, travelling back and forth between the village and Jammu and doing this, that and the other.
RECAP:
Haji Public School's first Annual Day was held in May. Great times! The kids & teachers were prepared with song and dance routines, a darling play (Doctor-Doctor) and general showcasing of talents. My pick of the lot: Kids singing folk song "Surayya teri suit ne bigaadi duniyaaaa," a philosophical life-lesson in comic verse. Hilarious. Also a little prize-giving ceremony for the bright sparks of the school.
(Click on pics to enlarge.)
 

After that trip, it was more running around headless chicken-esque, getting together a Rotary Club in Doda. With help from the awesome Rotarian Adeep Singh in Jammu, we received our official Rotary Charter on May 17, 2010. I am now Rotary President, ha ha. (That's right. It's all about ME.)
Lots of prepping and preening required as a Rotary Club. Also attending meetings and conferences, creating PPTs and talking through them... things I've always LOVED doing. Not.
Anyway. It's a good thing. We can take our school much further this way. And do tonnes of other stuff. God knows tonnes of other stuff needs doing in our rag-tag Doda District - home of the extremely jobless, hay-chewing, laid-back, gossipy mountain peeps who are glad to fill their own pockets regardless of right or wrong, morals or ethics. *snarl*

Wow. Where did that come from?

Anyway. June was a fun month. I hosted my first CouchSurfing acquaintance, Miss Beata Labikova, who also became Haji Public School's first ever teaching volunteer. What an experience. First time toilet paper has ever reached our little village Breswana. :)
Bea is a young scholarship student in Canada, majoring in... wait for it.... Jazz! Yes, and she's doing another academic major as well, which makes her life slightly busier than mine. I found out Bea has no concept of meal times because of her crazy schedule back home. Our Kashmiri peculiarity of four full meals a day came as a shock, and eventual bowel trouble, for her. Oh, the memories.
Bea was a treat to host. Completely no-fuss, low-maintenance, easy-going and a great traveller. Getting to our village and doing the rigorous uphill and downhill stretches, not to mention the long hours of road travel, is not exactly easy for a city slicker. But Bea was not that. She had a pretty good time of it, while I was on a "show off your culture and village" spree for a fortnight. I anointed Bea my offical guinea pig, experimenting on her for future volunteers' stints and used her as a bouncing board for ideas and feedback, especially keeping foreign travellers in mind.
Since she had a relatively short stay in Breswana, Bea did a brief intro session with the kids, talked to them about herself and gave a little presentation on Canada. Over the week she was with us at school she did painting sessions with the kids, a little arts and craft, singing, taught them Hang Man, gifted them stationery, and most fun of all: brought out bubble makers! What larks, Pip, what larks! Forget about the shrimps, we had a pretty good time ourselves. :)

Before Breswana we took Bea to Kishtwar, where she enjoyed traipsing through Chaugan and clicking pics of its trademark donkeys (pronounced 'dunkies' in the real Pahadi accent). Stayed at our khaala's place where we taught Bea the intricacies of a game called 'kirket'.

After the village trip, on our way back, we had to take a bizarre detour to the police station in Doda (escorted by men in uniforms), where the cops 'verified' Bea's authenticity by checking her FB profile. Nyaahahahahahaaa. I.Kid. You. Not. It was hilarious. :)

Overall, great experience.
Note to Next Volunteer: The bar has been set pretty high. You have a class act to follow.

That was May and June. This week it's been paperwork madness, getting together stuff for the Rotary. Rotary Doda is organising a free medical camp in Doda on July 17th and 18h, BTW. And tomorrow onwards, I leave for a month of travelling.

First to Doda to organise the Med Camp.

And then........ *drumroll* ZANSKAR and LEH!!!  Where we have to buy horses to take back home. And in Leh it's reunion time with girlfriends from Down South in Hindoostan. Also, BB the Insane joins us on these mad travels. What excitement I say. :)

Crap. Is that the time? Must pack. Later, all. (Much later.)

Operation 'Relocate Ram'

That's 'ram' as in rhymes with Sam, not Ram of Ramayana fame.

Here's what ensued, in chronologically arranged pics :

Confused? Flabbergasted? Can't believe your eyes? Ha ha. Allow me to explain:
1. Latta poses with Ram #1, a ram.
2. Basheer and Bagh Singh position themselves good-naturedly on wall separating our lawn from neighbours'. They are going to 'receive and deposit' the package, viz. a ram.
3. Latta hoists Ram #1 onto shoulder in one fluid motion and prepares to hand him over to the Wall People.
4. Package (ram) is secured and comforted by Wall-Peeps. "This too shall pass," they say.

In the next unphotographed sequence, Latta jumps over in to the adjoining lawn, and receives Ram #1 in similar fluid motion as while giving. Ram #1 is let loose to eat, sleep and swing as desired unto the end of his days....

Same sequence of events follows for Ram #2, who unfortunately did not receive any footage.

Please note that none of the animals used in this stunt were injured in any way, nor were they photographed without permission. They were embarrassed, yes; they were shown dramatically what the phrase, "There's always a first time" meant; they were thoroughly nonplussed by all the hoisting-gitching.
But were they hurt, injured, put through agony and such? No. We village peeps like animals, you see. Pre- and/or post-humously.

Here's the back story.
We had brought home a couple of rams prior to Eid. They were supposed to graze and live the last few days of their lives happily munching on neighbour's grassy lawn and flowers. Said lawn even had an awning-ed wrought iron garden swing, of the kind seen in romantic Hindi fillum scenes (or at least appearing in b/g in all the rich peeps' houses). Something like this.So anyway. If the rams were in any doubt they were going to live the high life (before they were eventually brought to their heroic end as juicy kebabs-see end of post), the swing should have settled the matter.
[To pre-empt you asking, "Hey! Why should the rams feed off your neighbours' lawn and not yours?!!! WTF?", let me add that our neighbours had long months past quit Jammu and moved to Delhi, entrusting to us their gate and house keys in exchange for a solemn oath of protecting it against intruders, burglars, trespassers and natural disasters. We promised confidently on all points save the last, and they, looking at the thing reasonably, understood.
Gate keys being in our possession, we were eyewitness to the miraculously lush growth of grass and the proliferation of wild flowers in their lawn like a NatGeo documentary on the monsoons. In the absence of hours of daily gardening, Jammu lawns tend to outdo themselves and aim for jungle-like hauteur. Such was the case with this lawn. It was tooooo much. The flora had to be restricted. Enter: fauna, viz. the rams.]

Now. Herein lay the problem. Neighbour's gate keys had gone on a tour of the city in the left front pocket of our houseboy, who wasn't going to be back for a while. The rams had arrived and were anxious to get started. They smelt the berserk grass. They smelt the wildly insane flowers. The saw the huge padlock on the gate. They noticed the high wall separating our property from the neighbours'. They bleated something derisive about the "Good fences make good neighbours" ideology. In short, it was a tragic scene.
Suddenly, the indefatigable practical good sense that lies in all sons of the soil came to the fore in the person of my father, and his right and left hand men, the good lads of Breswana. These were farmer-folk, animal peeps, and more importantly, physically strong lads.

POST-SCRIPT:
Had barbecue party a few days later on Eid. Fun. Also, delicious.


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Allama Iqbal's 'Lab Pa Aati Hai Dua'

This most famous nazm of the great poet Allama Iqbal is a very common prayer in many Indian and Pakistani schools. Haji Public School, Breswana, is no exception. Unlike most of Iqbal's poetry, this is in really simple, beautiful Urdu, easy for everyone to understand.

Here's a preferred rendition by some kid called Siza Roy. Lyrics with translation provided in the YouTube video.


PS: Must make special mention of my kids who absolutely do not follow this tune. They have their own take on the music that should accompany this prayer.:)

The Spider and the Fly

Sensational scene at breakfast a few days ago, up in my village. When I say breakfast, I mean mine and the spider's. Have a look (click to zoom).A good-looking arachnid who's always hanging about near us is in the process of devouring an annoying fly. One must not speak ill of the dead but this fly had it coming.

That trip to Breswana

1. Peter: Lolling in the grass.

2. More Fearless Nadia action. God, I love that hat.
3. My ride. (The white horse, not the little boy. Little boy is chaperon.) 4. First few homes as we approach Breswana. This is what we'd call 'downtown'.
5. Back fields. Wheat crop, due for a June harvest.
6. Dad's Old Reliable. Very old stud from Zaskar. Lots of attitude and temper and tantrums. I am a strict believer in the Betaab tenet: "Jaanwar jitna sarkash ho, utni aasaani se train kiya jaa sakta hai....". That would make Dad Sunny Deol.

7. Canine v. Bovine: Ultimate Face Off. (Shortly after this pic, Peter tucked tail and ran...)