Let the Bees
be…
A confession, I’m superstitious.
‘Do lizards speak?’
In Bengal they do. I have quite a few lizards in my
apartment in Delhi but I’ve never heard them say, ‘tik tik tik…’ The lizards,
or house geckos to be more precise, here are mute. In Bengal whenever someone
is narrating a tale the lizard, mostly invisible, is very likely to punctuate the
story with a ‘tik…tik…tik…’.
The storyteller then is likely to light up and say, ‘You
see, I told you … “thik…thik…thik…” I’m telling you the truth.’
In Bengal it’s not uncommon for house geckos to endorse your
credibility. If you are saying something and the lizard buts in with a,
‘Tik…tik…tik..’ you can always claim to be telling the truth.
Are Indians, particularly Bengalis, more superstitious than
others?
I cannot say for sure. I was in West Africa, where I saw
some strange beliefs, some of them so macabre I cannot mention them here. So
I’ll confine myself to my clansmen, the Bongs.
We Bongs have a whole long list of dos and don’ts.
We don’t eat saag, spinach or other leafy vegetables at night.
‘Why?’
‘It brings you sorrow,’ believers will tell you.
Similarly, you cannot eat Bengal’s best known vegetarian
dish, sukto, at night. Why? Because it has karela or bitter gourd and eating
karela at night also brings you sorrow. There are many such foods to be avoided
at night. But I am not aware of foods that are to be avoided in the daytime.
Talking of foods….Banana might be a favourite with Bongs but
they will never carry bananas to someone’s home. Banana, an auspicious fruit,
used in pujas and other religious rituals, becomes inauspicious during travel.
A Bengali will never carry bananas during travel. It’s considered, ‘a’jatra’ –
loosely translated, an ill omen during travel. By the way, I can vouch for the
banana being ‘a’jatra’.
I was on a travel-reporting assignment along with a
photographer from Mumbai. We had nearly finished our five day assignment and
were returning to Patna for our flight back home. When we began our return
journey from this remote village in Samastipur, I suddenly saw a bunch of
bananas in the car. It was bought by the photographer friend. I laughingly told
him about how we Bong’s considered kela to be inauspicious during travel.
Saying so, I peeled a few and ate them. Being in the field
all day, we had even missed lunch. Starting our journey, soon we found our car stuck
at a railway crossing. It wasn’t a red signal we realized after half an hour. It took another hour before the broken railway
crossing-gate could be put back into service and we could cross the tracks.
However, when I tried to tell the photographer, ‘You remember I told you…!’ he
yelled back at me, ‘Please don’t spread superstitions!’
I was shocked into silence by his unexpected, violent outburst.
Here was a half-educated Mumbaikar teaching me lessons on how to conduct
myself! For the rest of the journey I exchanged very few words with the man. By
evening when we reached Patna, our jolly, young car driver, was on the phone. Moments
later he was sobbing. His wife had been expecting a baby anytime soon. He was
sobbing because she had suffered a miscarriage. We immediately made
arrangements for him to get back to his wife. That’s when the photographer
said, ‘Maybe you were right about the bananas.’ Chastised once, I did not
respond to him.
It’s not just bananas that are considered inauspicious
during travel. Bongs don’t carry - or even look at eggs - when undertaking
travel. Even carrying pickles is considered ‘a’jatra’. If my granny, who passed
away several decades ago, was alive she could add a lot more items to this inauspicious
list.
For all inauspicious symbols there are auspicious ones too. Before
starting out of the house for an examination or an interview my mom never
forgot to feed me a spoon of dahi. It was said to help you. Most South Indians
will never forget their ash mark on the forehead before leaving home.
Across most cultures, if seeing one common myna (Bongs call
them shalik) is inauspicious seeing a pair is considered lucky. Spotting a
white barn owl – Lokhir pencha, the ride of Goddess laxmi – is said to bring
wealth and for Bongs (Among Mallus from Kerala the screeching of an owl means
the ominous call of death). Most Hindus consider a cow or bull walking into
their homes a sign of good luck. Among the Chinese, who are nearly as
superstitious as we Indians, the presence of a swallow’s nest in their homes
signifies a harbinger of good times, just as the arrival of sarus cranes in
their locality also does.
In the middle of so many confusing omens when a swarm of
honeybees settled in my balcony garden one fine day, I was pleasantly surprised.
It was ironical, just a few weeks before I had written a story on the vanishing
bees and how it could affect our survival in the context of agriculture. Their
sudden arrival, of all places in my balcony, also confused me.
‘Did it signify anything?’
Like for all my doubts, I went to Google. Like for everything
it had an answer.
‘A honeycomb in your house means honey which signifies
wealth and happiness,’ Google said.
I was thrilled. Both items, wealth and happiness, would be
coming to my place after a long absence.
And Googles prophesy soon started to
fructify. I got my first royalty cheque of 25,000. Yes rupees, not dollars. And,
yes 25,000 is considered a fortune for B grade authors who are not Chetan
Bhagat or Amish Triparthi. A travel book contract, with an advance, also became
a distinct possibility. Another major writing contract was nearly there. And surprise,
surprise, someone was offering me a job. ‘Will you be interested?’ they asked.
Life had never looked so good.
I began to visit my balcony regularly to keep a watch on the
bees, hoping they would not fly away. They remained put, working copiously. But
soon the job offer flew away. In a way I was happy because with so much work in
hand I would hardly be able to do justice to it. But then, after putting in a
lot of effort, I realized that the travel book too was going nowhere. I had not
anticipated this at all. This was a big-ticket project where I would not only
be writing the travelogue but also illustrating the book. But anyway I still
had hopes of the report writing project in Africa. That would give take care of
bills for a year. But soon the frequency of emails from my contact in Sudan became
scarce. Then one final mail drove the nail in my coffin.
‘There’s been a budget cut,’ the lady informed me, ‘let’s talk
next year.’
So here am, left high and dry by my bees. Yes, once in a
while I do poke a stick into the comb and lick the sweet honey. But life is
nowhere sweet as Google had promised. The hope that they might still bring me
good luck has restrained me from chasing away the bees. But my patience is
wearing thin. One fine day I might just smoke them out.
But then, as I write, my palm has been itching. It is said to
be a good sign.
‘Money will come,’ it implies.
Yesterday the milk in the kitchen also boiled over. Instead
of crying over the spilled milk, I smiled. Boiling over of milk is also another
good sign of lokhi (laxmi) or wealth.
Maybe, after all, I’ll let the bees be!
