Title: Camel Karma: Twenty Years Among India’s Camel Nomads
Author: Ilse Kohler-Rollefson
Publisher: Speaking Tiger Books
Whenever we read about travel narratives by foreigners in India, especially Westerners, we assume it to be primarily superficial, skin-deep, and without much contact with ground reality. This non-fiction book, that can also be read as a sort of travelogue, busts that myth. It begins with a German veterinarian, Ilse Kohler-Rollefson’s arrival in Rajasthan in 1991 and almost twenty-five years of association with the same. On a field trip to Jordan in 1979, she first became fascinated by the relationship between pastoral peoples and the camels they shared their lives with. After a brief stint of camel field research in Sudan’s eastern desert, her choice to continue her research on camel husbandry led her naturally to India, the country with the third-largest camel population in the world, and she arrived at the National Research Centre on Camel (NRCC) in Bikaner, Rajasthan. Wanting to know more about the practical aspects of camel-keeping or its cultural foundation, she encountered the Rebaris, also called Raikas in Marwar, who are proper breeders of camels and whose whole lifestyle centred around it. She writes, “To me it seemed that the Raikas’ relationship with their animals was equally worthy of conservation as a uniquely human heritage.”
Historically, the Raika of Rajasthan have had a unique and enduring relationship with camels. They offer a compassionate alternative by keeping farm animals as part of nature, allowing them to move and do so in herds. Farm animals can thus extend their potential as humanity’s greatest asset. Their entire existence revolves around looking after the needs of these animals which, in turn, provide them with sustenance, wealth and companionship. Ilse is immediately enthralled by Raika’s intimate relationship with their animals, but she is also confronted with their existential problems.
For her, her research among them gave her not just a glimpse of the history and culture of Rajasthan, but also a way forward in her personal journey. Denying all kinds of creature comforts, the hope of saving both the camel and the Raika way of life took her and her spirited ally, Hanwant Singh Rathore, from vet labs in the city, to Raika settlements in the remotest corners of the Thar Desert, and everywhere in between. The intractable dilemmas— both bureaucratic and cultural—they were often confronted with required creative solutions. As they adapted to their circumstances, they found their orthodox Raika friends adapting with them. Kohler-Rollefson’s is a journey that is often exasperating, sometimes funny, but keeps revealing unexpected layers of rural Rajasthani mores and diverse cultures that make it such a fascinating place.
Spending her own research grants on a shoe-string budget, Kohler-Rollefson set up a base office in Sadri, close to the Kumbhalgarh Wildlife Sanctuary at the foothills of the Aravalli mountains, where she employs several Indians as research assistants (none of whom stay for long), veterinarians who help in administering the teeka, the vaccines to eradicate common camel diseases. With her trusted driver cum translator, her ally, she interacts with several nomadic tribes who rear camels, but whose caste and culture are radically different from one another as chalk and cheese. The narrative also gives details about her interactions with the local people — some of whom had earlier eyed her with suspicion of being an outsider, but later accepted her whole-heartedly.
She describes the sign-language with which she interacts with the womenfolk in the Raika households, her regular visits to the annual animal fair at Puskar, where she even bought a young female camel and named her Mira, leaving her to grow up and breed with the other camels of the Raika. Kohler-Rollefson learned that the Raika did not sell camel milk or eat camel meat. They used other camel by-products, but clearly the economic returns from a camel did not seem optimal. Mostly, they bred female camels to give birth to male camels that could be sold to other caste for work. She was surprised to find that “these camels resembled family members and were treated almost as intimately; nobody was afraid of them.”
Despite repeated setbacks, both from government apathy as well as social taboos, Kohler-Rollefson’s dedication to the cause was so sincere that she was able to found many organisations like the Lokhit Pashu-Palak Sansthan (LPPS), including the Camel Husbandry Improvement Project (CHIP), promote the study and documentation of ethno-veterinarian practices (the melding of traditional and modern approaches to treating camel diseases), highlighting the Raika’s grazing needs at the World Parks Conference (2003), and along with Rathore and a Raika team, even embarking on an arduous 800 km long yatra on camelback throughout Rajasthan to raise awareness and draw attention to the dwindling camel numbers.
She successfully organised a meeting where apart from the traditional Raika constituency, she could include members from a range of castes spanning the whole social spectrum of Rajasthan – Rajputs from Jaisalmer, Bishnois from Barmer, Jats from Bikaner, Gujjars from Nagaur and Sindhi Muslims from deep in the Thar. She even escorted a group of Raika, including a colourful Bhopa (a wandering minstrel who sings and narrates the story of various episodes of the mythical Pabuji’s life through unfolding of cloth scrolls) to Germany and then to Interlaken, Switzerland for an FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations) conference. She set up the League for Pastoral Peoples and Endogeneous Livestock Development (LPP) in Germany. In other words, Kohler-Rollefson has been successful in drawing attention to the problems of camels rearing at an international level.
The first edition of this book came out in 2014. Since then, they have had a daunting roller-coaster ride, shuttling back and forth between the depths of despair where they thought all was lost to exhilarating heights from which they fleetingly espied camel nirvana: a scenario where camels, people, and the environment live together in harmony and mutually support each other. Interestingly, the second revised edition of Camel Karma was published in 2023 and the other good news is that 2024 has been declared the International Year of Camelids by the United Nations General Assembly, with the stated goal of raising awareness of the contribution of camelids to livelihoods, food security and nutrition. It also aims at encouraging all stakeholders, including national governments, to work towards recognising and valuing the economic, social, and cultural importance of camelids in the lives of communities, especially those that are highly vulnerable to extreme poverty.
In combination with the India government’s recent discovery and appreciation of the country’s pastoralist cultures, this may be just the constellation that successfully revives India’s camel sector. In a scenario where companies and countries are competing for shares in the globalised market, the unique selling point of Rajasthan’s camel milk is the Raika’s heritage of producing milk humanely and with compassion. The biodiverse diet of the state’s camels is composed of ayurvedic plants that add another unique quality.
Thus, it seems appropriate that we all read Camel Karma now and let the world know about the unique Raika heritage and to serve as a baseline to look back on ten or twenty years from now. Despite the rapid technological development in all spheres of life, the author sees a future, and even an urgent need, for both the camel and for the Raika and other nomadic livestock keepers. She is optimistic for several reasons as everything in India is cyclical. The camel is a versatile and multipurpose animal that can fulfil many basic needs of humans. Its role as transport and farm animal is certainly on the retreat, so long as oil is available and affordable. Yet its potential as a dairy animal remains huge. Apart from that, there is a range of other eco-friendly products that can be made from happy living camels and that may just satisfy that budding urge of urbanites – in India and abroad – to re-connect with nature.
Apart from wholeheartedly praising the endeavour of Kohler-Rollefson in spending twenty years of her life among India’s camel nomads, in sacrificing her personal and family life for the welfare of the camels, and in drawing the attention to their problems in various fora in the international context, Camel Karma is a must read for everyone who is interested in learning about the socio-economic lifestyle of several castes and tribes of rural people in Rajasthan. We are looking forward to reading the sequel to this book which the author is planning to write, and which she tentatively calls “Camel Dharma” – a book about finding the right way of living with camels!
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Somdatta Mandal, critic, and translator, is former Professor of English at Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan, India
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
An introduction to Ratna Magotra’sWhispers of the Heart: Not Just a Surgeon (Konark Publishers) and a conversation with the doctor who took cardiac care to the underprivileged.
“I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy?”— Tagore, Whispers of the Heart: Not Just a Surgeonby Ratna Magotra
“There are at least five estimates of the number of poor people in India, which put the number of poor in India between 34 million (equivalent to the population to Kerala) to 373 million (more than four times the population of West Bengal). This puts the number of the poor between 2.5% of the population to 29.5%, based on different estimates between 2014 and 2022.”
How are the healthcare needs of the poverty stricken met in a country with a vast number who are unable to foot their daily food, housing, and potable water needs? This has been a question that confronts every doctor in cities where labourers who build housing for the middle class are themselves homeless just like the street side immigrants who beg. Even dwellers of shanties that spring up around colonies of the well-to-do to provide informal labour to the affluent are hardly any better off. Few in the medical profession move towards finding solutions to bridge this gap.
Dr Ratna Magotra, who moved from Jammu to find a career in healthcare in Mumbai, is one such person. Recently, she wrote an autobiography which has consolidated the work being done by cardiologists to bridge this gap. In her book, Whispers of the Heart: Not Just a Surgeon, while identifying this divide, she writes: “Poverty, inequality, deficient primary healthcare, unequal access, and the escalating commercialisation of medical care were causing an angst that I found difficult to make peace with. As medical practitioners, our expertise lies in providing treatment, but we often overlook the broader social factors underlying ill health. It might escape the attention of a surgeon performing intricate heart surgery that a child who survived a complex heart surgery could succumb to diarrhoea due to the lack of access to clean drinking water. Issues like malnutrition, skin infections, superstitious beliefs, and poverty may be the harsh realities in the patient’s actual living conditions beyond the confines of sanitised medical environment. /Medical training, regrettably, seldom includes the connection between poverty and disease.”
The land reforms laws that followed post-Partition[1] led to her family losing their wealth. But Magotra bears no ill-will or scars that have crippled her ability to contribute to a world that needs to heal — of taking healthcare to those who can’t afford it. She starts her biography with vignettes from her childhood: “I recall that the agricultural land we owned in our village in Jammu was considered very fertile with the best Basmati rice grown there. Though I was very young, I have faint memories of the house amidst lush paddy fields and a small stream that we had to cross to enter the village. It was very close to the international border between India and Pakistan. The way my mother was respected reflected the high esteem that villagers had for my father. Though their tenant status had changed to that of being landowners, the villagers visited the house as they did before and received generous gifts from her. /They would indulge us children with home-made sweets made of peanuts, jaggery and spices. Rolling in heaps of post-harvest grains piled up in open fields was great fun.”
She lost all that and her father. But with supportive family and friends, drawn to healthcare, she became a doctor in times when women doctors were rare. If they at all specialised, it was mainly in gynaecology. She chose cardiac surgery trained in UK and US. She made friends where she went and with a singular dedication, found solutions to access the underprivileged. She elaborates: “The quantum leap in India’s healthcare sector occurred during the 1990s following the economic reforms and the liberalisation of the economy. The end of the licence raj system facilitated the imports of advanced technology and medical equipment. Specialists, who had long settled abroad, began contemplating a return to India.”
While she attended an International Course in Cardiac Surgery at Sicily to update her skills, she tells us: “During our interactions, some German surgeons raised questions about the rationale behind a developing country like India engaging in an expensive speciality like cardiac surgery. I realised how biased opinions can be formed and spread, though rooted in ignorance. /By this point, however, I had grown accustomed to explaining the paradox — why it was essential for India to advance in specialised care alongside its priorities in basic healthcare and poverty alleviation.”
She cites multiple instances of cases that she dealt with from the needy rural population, for who to pay prohibitive costs would mean an end to their family’s meals. Magotra writes, “I had seen numerous poor heart patients who suffered not only from the ailment itself but also from financial burden of the treatment. The medical expenses incurred for a single family member affected the well-being of entire household, depleting their limited resources and savings. Unfortunately, medical education does not include health economics as a subject. As a result, doctors, especially specialists, trained in a reductionist approach to diseases tend to move away from a holistic perspective. They readily embrace new technological advances, often neglecting proven and cost-effective treatment options. This, in turn, drives up healthcare costs and makes it unaffordable for the common man.”
Living through a series of historical upheavals, she brings to light some interesting observations. She came in contact with Jinnah’s personal physician while looking for a placement in Mumbai. There she mentions that many wondered if the Partition of India could have been averted if this doctor had shared the information that Jinnah had limited life expectancy as he had advanced tuberculosis. She has lived through floods in Mumbai and riots and wondered: “I was staring at the blood on my clothes, which had come from multiple patients. In that quiet moment, I couldn’t help but wonder if there was a ‘test’ to distinguish between a Hindu blood and a Muslim blood.” She joined the anti-corruption movement started by Anna Hazare and fasted! She has travelled and watched and collected her stories and she jotted these down during the pandemic to share her world and her concerns with all of us. In the process, recording changes in health care systems over the years… the historic passing of an era that documents the undocumented people’s needs.
Dr Ratna Magotra
An award-winning doctor for the efforts she has made to connect with people across all borders and use her experience, she talks to us in this interview about her journey and beliefs.
What made you write this book? Who were the readers you wanted to reach out to?
I had asked myself the same questions before I started and even while I was writing: Why and for whom?
Some younger friends and family members would find the anecdotes and stories, I would relate to them from time to time, interesting. They would often prod me to write about these. People, situations, my travels to places — not the usual popular tourist destinations, invoked further curiosity in them to know more about my life. As such I like to write my thoughts (usually for myself) and have been contributing small articles to newspapers, magazines, and Bhavan’s Journal for their special Issues. The pandemic provided me an opportunity to contemplate further when I seriously considered about writing an autobiographical narrative.
As I progressed with my account, I envisaged a wider readership outside the medical community as multiple facets emerged about places, people and events of varying interests.
What were the hurdles you faced while training as a doctor — in terms of gender and attitudes of others?
Fortunately, I can’t recall any specific hurdle or adverse experience because of my being a woman. Studying for MBBS degree at Lady Hardinge Medical College (LHMC), made it a normal affair as LHMC was an all-women medical college.
The struggle that I faced in getting PG admission in Bombay also had nothing to do with gender. The problem was being an outsider in Bombay when number of seats were limited. Students from local medical colleges and rest of Maharashtra had first preference for selection to PG courses. Anyone in my place would have had to go through a similar grind as I did.
Once PG admission was secured, it was smooth sailing through training and working alongside male colleagues! I asked for no concessions being a woman and worked as hard as they did or may be little more. We had a very close and harmonious working relationship with healthy mutual respect leading to lasting friendships.
What made you choose cardiac surgery over other areas of specialisation?
The decision to become a doctor and a surgeon was firmed very early in life. Interest in Cardiac surgery was acquired much later when I started working with Dr Dastur in Bombay. Seeing and touching a beating heart was fascinating and at the same time very challenging at that time. I was tempted to take it up for further specialisation. And yes, it was a very glamorous specialty at that time with names like Denton Cooley[2] and Christiaan Barnard [3]making waves in mainstream conversations!
Cardiac surgery was perceived by some as the forte of the rich, but you have shown how many villagers also had the need for the same specialised care. So, what was it that made you realise that? What could be seen as the incident that made you move towards closing social gaps in your horizon?
Heart disease affects the rich as also the poor. In fact, in earlier times when lifestyle diseases were not as common, it was the poor who suffered more from many afflictions including heart disease. Rheumatic heart disease was the bane of the underprivileged, living in overcrowded spaces with repeated streptococcal throat infections that eventually ravaged their heart valves. Congenital heart disease was common though not diagnosed as often. While the rich and affluent could afford to travel abroad to get treatment, in turn costing precious foreign exchange to the nation, others had to make do with whatever was available. Indian surgeons stretched their resources, skills and imagination to fill the gaps in the infrastructure.
Working in teaching hospitals, I saw the suffering and helplessness of the poor from very close. Inadequacies in healthcare stared at us every day. Moreover, those days cardiac surgery was being performed only in 4-5 teaching hospitals in the country.
I tried looking beyond the patient, connecting their illness with the social and economic environment they came from. Their personal courage, resilience and faith in overcoming difficult moments of life stirred something inside me. One such incidence involved a patient, Ahir Rao, from interiors of Maharashtra. His surgery at KEM and my subsequent visit to his home opens the chapter on ‘Reaching the Unreached’ in my book.
Ironically flip side of development and changing economic status, is that lifestyle diseases like hypertension, diabetes and heart disease are affecting less affluent even more. Lack of awareness about diet, and rapidly adopting urban fads have changed the rural-urban spectrum of heart disease.
The prejudices and biases of the developed countries influenced many in the country also to question a developing country like India from investing in super-specialty like cardiac surgery instead of focussing on providing basic amenities to the people.
It was amusing to see the BBC presenters asking the chronic questions as recently as the landing of Chandrayaan on moon in August 2023 — whether India should have space missions? Persistence of same mind set exposed their ignorance about the benefits the technology and the science bring to common man as also reluctance to accept the progress India has made!
How did your travels to other countries impact your own work and perspectives?
Traveling is a great education to broaden one’s horizon. My travels in India and to different countries contributed towards my personal growth by helping me connect to the geography, nature as also the people belonging to different cultures and sensibilities. Different foods, attires or attitudes but with one common underlying bond of humanity with similar aspirations.
Professionally, going to advanced centres exposed me to a work culture that was very different from ‘chalta hai’[4] attitude back home. Staying ahead with the best research, better working conditions, new technology were just the stimulants I needed in doing better for our patients.
There were many people you have mentioned who impacted you and your work. Who would you see as the persons/organisations who most inspired and led you to realise your goals?
I owe so much to so many people, whom I met at different stages of my life and who influenced my thinking, values and my work. It is difficult to pick one or two, however, if asked to narrow down to three or four most important individuals, these would be my mother and Prof Rameshwar in early years, and Dr K. N Dastur in my professional choice and career. However, biggest influence in my later life has been my Guru, Swami Ranganathananda — who imparted the wisdom of practical vedanta giving ultimate message of oneness and freedom of thought and action for universal good as propagated by Swami Vivekananda.
Why did you join Anna Hazare and his organisation? How did it impact you? What were your conclusions about such trysts?
I had heard of Anna Hazare as an anti-corruption crusader and had met him once at his village while accompanying Dr Antia. It was very admirable the way he had motivated the village people to participate voluntarily in the economic and social development making Ralegaon Siddhi a model village. This simple rustic person could stand up to the high and mighty and often made news in local newspapers; the politicians took his protests seriously at least in Maharashtra. When India Against Corruption (IAC) came into existence in 2011, I didn’t think twice before joining the unique coming together of civil society to fight corruption in the highest corridors of power. I was personally convinced that corruption had eroded and marred the dream of India keeping the common people poor and backward even as the corrupt flourished. As an individual, one could not do much beyond complaining and paying a price for a principled life. It required the civil society to stand up collectively to oppose the corrupt who were (are) actually very powerful!
There was nothing personal to gain by joining the protest but only lend my voice to the common objective of checking, if not eradicating, the menace of corruption.
The experience, highs and lows of the movement form a chapter in my book. The movement becoming political and losing the momentum of a countrywide movement was a big disappointment.
What would be the best way of closing the divides in healthcare?
There has been some forward movement in healthcare at grass root levels in last two decades or so. These gains need to be streamlined as at present we have islands of excellence with vast areas of dismal healthcare — the imbalance needs correction.
Increased spending by the State for healthcare, forward looking national health policy keeping in mind the diverse needs of such a vast country, rural urban realities are the way forward. Investment in medical and nursing education, primary health care, paramedics, rational use of appropriate technologies — all these need to be considered in totality and not in isolation.
Lot of the healthcare work is bridged by NGOS as per your book. Do you think a governmental intervention is necessary to bring healthcare to all its citizens?
My narrative belongs to the eighties and nineties when NGOs were vital in taking basic medical services to remote places where none existed. These organisations did a herculean task and several continue to be a significant provider even as the governments, both at the Centre and State level, have initiated many schemes that include healthcare besides general rural development. I personally think that the NGOs too need to retune their earlier approach of being stand-alone providers seeking funding from government and foreign donors to remain relevant. NGOs, though a vital link between the governments and the communities, have traditionally taken adversarial position to the governments. While keeping their independence of work, maybe they should strive to avoid duplication of services; provide authentic data, and create awareness. These along with constructive criticism and cooperation would benefit the communities and the stakeholders alike. Health education, women empowerment, strengthening the delivery of healthcare integrated with holistic rural development are best done by NGOs working at ground level.
What reform from the government would most help bridge these gaps and can these reforms be made a reality?
The question has been partially answered as above. Increase in budgetary allocation and intent are the prime requirement with focus on nutrition, clean drinking water, sanitation (end of open defecation, provision of toilets, is a major reform) and clean cooking fuel impact public health at grassroots substantially, especially that of women and children. These alone should reduce the load of common diseases and prevent 70 to 80 percent of maladies in a community. This is similar to what Dr Antia used to advocate — “People’s health in People’s hands”. No medical specialists are required, and community health workers would be fully capable of taking care of routine illness. The gains would need to be evaluated periodically to see the impact by way of reduced infant mortality, maternal health, reduction in school dropouts and increase in rural household incomes. Use of technology is an important tool to connect the masses with healthcare centres for more advanced care.
More thought is necessary for specialist oriented medical care. I am aware that we have some very wise and thinking people at the top deciding on national medical policy that should actually map the number of specialised centres and the doctors in each specialty and super specialities (SS) required over say next 10 years. The number of training programmes should be tailored accordingly. It is saddening to know that so many seats for post-doctoral training continue to remain vacant. It is specially so in surgical SS like cardiovascular, pediatric, and neurosurgery that are seeing less demand with interventional treatment making roads in treatment.
The change in the attitudes of administration as also the medical community is important. The benefits should be harvested with honest appraisals for course correction where needed for better planning in consultations with doctors, civil society, and the NGOs working in the rural areas.
Another idea close to my heart has been to motivate or even incentivise the senior medical practitioners to serve the rural areas for 2-3 years prior to their retirement from active service. They would carry experience and wisdom to manage medical needs even with limited resources as compared to enforced bonds for fresh graduates who are short of practical experience, anxious about their future and that of the families. Seniors on the other hand have fulfilled their responsibilities and may be really looking forward to satisfaction of giving back to the society. Having secured their future and relatively in good health, can be very useful human resource for the governments and the communities. This should be entirely out of volition and not under any pressure from the authorities.
Now that you have retired, what are your future plans?
Life is unpredictable at my age. I would, however, wish to remain in reasonable health to be able to be a useful citizen. I have no firm plans and will go where the life takes me like I have done so far.
I am aware that the age would no longer allow me to continue with specialised and highly technical profession I am trained for. Modern communication has narrowed the distances and made it possible to stay connected. I should be satisfied if I can provide any meaningful inputs, retain the attitude of service and remain contended in my personal being.
A writer, a painter, an actor too? Which of these have I known in my friend, Bulbul Sharma? Ratnottama Sengupta ponders as she reverses the gear in the time machine
Bulbul Sharma
I have never formally ‘interviewed’ Bulbul Sharma. That’s because I was editing her writings even before I met her, became friends with her, with her brother Dr Ashok Mukherjee, her sister-in-law, Mandira, whose brother-in-law, Amulya Ganguli, was a much-respected political commentator including with The Statesman and The Times of India which I joined after I shifted to Delhi.
There were many journalists in her family. Bulbul herself was a columnist with The Telegraph when I joined the ‘handsome’ newspaper. Her columns on ‘Indian Birds’ would always come with her own illustrations. These later combined to become The Book of Indian Birds for Children – and now she’s penning stories for neo-literates. So I have never been able to separate the two souls of Bulbul – a writer whose books have been translated into French, German, Italian, Finnish, and an artist in the collection of National Gallery of Modern Art, Lalit Kala Akademi, UNICEF, Chandigarh Museum, Nehru Centre, London, National Institute of Health, Washington.
Bulbul, born in Delhi and raised in Bhilai, studied Russian and literature at Jawaharlal Nehru University before going to Moscow for further studies, in 1972. When she returned a year later, she decided to pursue her other love and made a career in art. So, in mid 1980s, once I shifted to Delhi, I got to know the artist Bulbul at close quarters. By then she was an active graphic artist who worked in the Garhi Artists’ Studio.
She would do papier mache items – sculptures, or of day-to-day usage. Then, she was teaching art to children of construction site workers left in the care of the Mobile Creche. Soon she was handholding me in creating monoprints in printmaking workshops, while my son started taking serious interest in art even as he keenly participated in her storytelling sessions.
Paper mache sculpture: BowlAubergines & Onions: Etching from Ratnottama Sengupta’s collectionArtwork by Bulbul Sharma: Photos provided by Ratnottama Sengupta
And then one day Bulbul invited me to join her and Dolly Narang of The Village Gallery in Hauz Khas, to do a workshop with the inmates of Tihar Central Jail, one of the toughest in Asia, which had started off on its reformation trail under the no-nonsense IPS officer, Kiran Bedi, who dreamt of giving convicts “the hope for a better future once they stepped out as free people.”
The other avtar of Bulbul is the one you are most likely to encounter online. A gifted narrator who depicts people and places she has known and seen in person, styled with little complication, to bring out the beauty in everyday life. Her first collection of short stories, My Sainted Aunts (1992) had bewitched me as much as my son, then in his pre-teen years. For, it etched with endearing affection the reality in a Bengali household that abounded — especially in my childhood — with pishimas[1]and mashimas[2] who were eccentric yet lovable. These aunts are easily identifiable and not easily forgettable though few aunts today are widows in white, eating out of stoneware, shunning onions, or an ‘outsider’: caste, creed, chicken and dog — all were barred.
A few years down, Bulbul, a naturalist who grows herbs in her orchard in the folds of Himalaya and often etches carrots and onions, came out with The Anger of Aubergines (1997) which had cuisine and recipes layering the text. It is a collection of stories about women for whom food is passion, or obsession. “For some it is a gift, for some a means of revenge, and for some it is a source of power,” as Bulbul herself might summarise. Once again, my gourmet family loved it.
Food is the most elementary aspect of human society and culture. And Bulbul has repeatedly capitalized on this multi-contextual significance of food. Not surprising, when I was editing an Encyclopedia of Culture, for the publishing house Ratna Sagar, I directly went to Bulbul for the chapter on ‘Cuisine’. In quite the same way, when a literature festival in Amritsar’s Majha House got Bulbul and me together on a panel, it was to talk about food as an expression of culture. “Learn everything you can, anytime you can, from anyone you can. There will always come a time when you will be grateful you did…” Bulbul once told a classful of students what she herself has practiced through life.
But with all this, I had virtually forgotten that Bulbul had acted in a film by Mrinal Sen[3]. Bulbul herself reminded me of this after reading my interview with Suhasini Mulay[4] occasioned by the ongoing birth centenary of the director of watersheds in Indian cinema like Bhuvan Shome[5]. I promptly wrote to her asking her to remember the salient ‘truths’ she had learnt by acting in the first of Sen’s Calcutta Trilogy[6].
Interview (1971) was a slim tale – a uni-linear storyline that unfolds on screen as a non-linear narrative. Stylistically it was the opposite of Calcutta 71 (1972), the second of Sen’s Calcutta trilogy, which built on stories by eminent authors like Manik Bandopadhyay, Prabodh Sanyal, and Samaresh Bose. Interview was about Ranjit, whose love interest Bulbul, was enacted by Bulbul Sharma.
The story went thus: A personable, smart but unemployed Ranjit is assured, in Calcutta of the post-Naxal years, of a lucrative job in a foreign firm by a family friend – if he shows up in a suit. It can’t be such a big ‘IF’, right? Wrong. He can’t get his suit back from the laundry because of a strike by the labour union. His father’s hand-me-down doesn’t fit him. He borrows from a friend but, on his way home, a fracas ensues in the bus and the net result is Ranjit is without a suit to appear in for the critical Interview. Will he, must he, go dressed in the hardcore Bengali attire of dhuti-panjabi?
Just the year before, Pratidwandi (1970) had been released, and it too had an interview at the core of the script. The first of Satyajit Ray’sCalcutta trilogy[7], it had cast newcomer Dhritiman Chatterjee, who would play the pivotal role in Padatik (1973), the clinching film in Sen’s trilogy. But Interview had cast another newcomer who was crowned the Best Actor at Karlovy Vary for playing Ranjit. In subsequent years, he became a megastar of the Bengali screen whom Ray too cast in his penultimate film, Shakha Prosakha (1990). And even as he was scoring a century in films, Ranjit Mallick’s daughter, Koel, was scaling heights as a lead actress.
Bulbul Sharma and Ranjit Mallick in Interview: Photo provided by Ratnottama Sengupta
Contrast this with Bulbul: She did not pursue a career in acting. So how had she come to play the Bulbul of Interview? Let’s hear the story in her own voice.
Bulbul Sharma: I was visiting my cousin sister Sunanda Devi — Banerjee who was a very renowned Bengali actress in the 1950s. She had featured in New Theatre’s Drishtidan[8] (1948), directed by Nitin Bose; Anjangarh[9](1948), directed by Bimal Roy; opposite Uttam Kumar in Ajay Kar’s Shuno Baranari[10](1960) and Chitta Basu’s Maya Mriga[11](1960).
Sunanda Didi and her husband[12], who was a film distributor, had produced Mrinal Sen’s first film, Raat Bhore[13](1957). Mrinalda had come to her house to discuss something with her husband and he saw me. He asked my cousin if I would like to act in a Bengali film. I was 18 years old and a student at JNU then. I was thrilled but my parents were not keen at all. However, though reluctantly, they agreed since it was Mrinal Sen. By this time he had won national and international awards with Bhuvan Shome.
Me:How did you prepare for the character? Did Mrinalda brief you? I don’t think he had a script in hand…
Bulbul: I did not do anything to prepare. My name in Interview is ‘Bulbul’, and Ranjit Mallick is ‘Ranjit’. Mrinalda said, “Be your natural self. Don’t try to act.” In fact I am an art student in the film. The only problem was that since I had lived all my life in Delhi, my Bengali accent was not very good. He often teased me about it. “Keep that smile for my camera,” he would say to me.
Me:Tell me about your co-actors Bulbul. Do you recall any incident that stays on in memory?
Bulbul: I remember my co-actor, Ranjit Mallick, was a serious, very quiet person. I think he got fed up of my constant chatter. He asked me once if everyone in Delhi talked so much. I was not surprised that he became one of the biggest stars in Bengali cinema but we did not keep in touch, alas.
Me:Why did you not think of pursuing acting as a career?
Bulbul: Acting was not something I had ever thought of doing. This film just happened by chance. Painting and creative writing was my passion and still is. But don’t lose hope! Recently I was offered a role of a grandmother. I might just do it!
Me:How did you respond to Interview when it released more than 50 years ago? And how do you respond to it now?
Bulbul: When I saw the film almost fifty years ago I don’t think I really understood what a brilliant film it was. I was 18 and just happy to see myself on the big screen.
Now when I saw Interview again, I really admired the way the everyday situations in a middle class Bengali home are played out. The scene when Ranjit’s mother, the great actress Karuna Banerjee – who had played Apu’s mother in Pather Panchali – searches for the dry cleaner’s receipt is just heart breaking.
The interview scene itself is so sensitively done. You want Ranjit to get the job but you know it will not happen. There is such understated humour, anger and sadness in that scene. I wish I could tell Mrinalda all that today!
Me:Interview, the first of Mrinalda’s Calcutta Trilogy, is considered a milestone in his oeuvre because of its socio-political content as well as its naturalistic form. How does it compare with the other two films of the Trilogy – Calcutta 71 and Padatik?
Bulbul: Unfortunately I have not seen these two films.
Me:Would you compare it with Ray’s Pratidwandi which also centred on a job interview?
Bulbul: Yes, Ray’s Pratidwandi also deals with the theme of unemployment during that turbulent period – 1969 to 1971 – in Kolkata. Yet they are not at all similar.
I think Mrinalda’s slightly impish, dark humour is lacking in the other film. Both are amazing films by our most brilliant directors. Films you very rarely get to see now.
Silk Painting with Kantha stitch by Bulbul Sharma Photos provided by Ratnottama Sengupta
Okay Bulbul, now my son and I will both wait to meet your onscreen Grandma avtar!
[6] Three films by Mrinal Sen: Interview (1971), Calcutta 71 (1972), Padatik (The Guerilla Fighter, 1973)
[7] Known collectively as the Calcutta trilogy, The Adversary (1970), Company Limited (1971) and The Middleman (1975) documented the radical changes Calcutta.
Ratnottama Sengupta, formerly Arts Editor of The Times of India, teaches mass communication and film appreciation, curates film festivals and art exhibitions, and translates and write books. She has been a member of CBFC, served on the National Film Awards jury and has herself won a National Award.
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Chembra stands out imperceptibly in the background as the mist descends over its northern side. The driver of the rickety auto-rickshaw in which I make the topsy-turvy trip from Kalpetta settles to drop me at the backpacker’s hostel at Chembra’s foothills for 500 rupees. A vast tea estate stretches out for as far as the eye can see, and it is only when one edges closer to the property’s north-western precipice is any semblance of Wayanad encountered.
Originally a hospital set up by the British in the 1920s, the hostel is a renovated colonial-style structure with a vast corridor that runs parallel to its rooms. I learnt much later that the tea estate that houses the hostel is spread over 700 acres. The fall to the northwest is spectacular, with hills in the lower range of the Western Ghats basking in the late evening sun as it makes its way down to the low-country orbs of Mysore and Chamarajanagar.
It is no surprise that one has to cross Bandipur to reach Wayanad in the first place; any easier and one would have been tempted to think that one was within the anonymity of civilisation.
*
Earlier in the day, the elephants that I spotted from an unobtrusive window on the bus from Mysore seemed triumphant and exultant — for what I did not know. The egret that sat contentedly upon the shoulders of a rather guileless water buffalo winked at me as I struggled to bring my camera out of the mishmash that my backpack had become. I was reminded of an older boy with whom I never got along in school and who often bullied me for the pancakes my mother painstakingly packed.
*
I am forced to snap out of this reverie when my hostess reminds me that elephants were spotted at the southern expanses of the property a few days ago. She asks me to not step out after dark. In the common area boasting of a sit-out on a makeshift tree house, a motley crew from all hues of life rejoice at what appears to be a joint venture launched by a businessman from Bangalore and an engineer from Bombay. I join the pack and am welcomed by a loud cheer.
John, a chartered accountant who rode all the way from Coimbatore on his imported motorcycle, recounts having seen a leopard when turning in one of the several snaking curves when climbing from Kalpetta. He slurs as he articulates and his eyes appear bloodshot; I know only too well to separate the wheat from the chaff. Advait, a veterinarian from Anantapur, rebuffs everything that John says and vociferously advocates for an early dinner. He is, quite promptly, turned down.
*
The trek towards the peak of Chembra is made through the heartland of the eponymous forest range. Langurs peer out inadvertently while a flying squirrel makes an appearance from its cosmic abode. Catching sight of me and my companions’ incongruously sunscreened visages, it jumps shyly onto the double-storied Bo where it has made its home. Murali, the young forest officer who accompanies us jokes with Estelle, the German lady who quite fortuitously chooses to trek in her Birkenstock footwear, about sightings of bears in the vicinity but restrains himself when she turns ashen white.
The heart-shaped lake peeks with unabashed curiosity as we huff and puff our way up to the midway point of the trek. To our great consternation, this is where we have to end our trip as the summit of the peak is sealed off by the government. A few years ago, Murali tells us, a group of nincompoops who made it to the summit lit a couple of cigarettes to celebrate. They did not, however, stub them when they were done. What happened next is well documented — a forest fire of gargantuan scale that wiped out about 60 hectares of forest land and claimed the lives of hundreds of wild animals. The summit has been off-limits to travellers ever since.
The parched outcrops that surround the lake by no means diminish the panorama that lies to the west. A faint countenance of the vast fields of tea and paddy which fortify the district of Wayanad is visible through the mist. It is almost noon, but my companions and I find no reason to shed our coats. Specks of Mohit Chauhan’s Phir Se Ud Chala[1] fill the air; it feels as if Chembra herself has come to life.
It is not exactly wise, but we surrender to the lure of lying down on the grass and bask, cocooned by the benevolent gaze of Chembra. Dark clouds brew overhead but Begum Akhtar reassures us in her palliative voice, and it is not before the first drops fall on my forehead that I alert the others over our predicament. Unsurprisingly, I find that most of my friends had nodded off, obliged by the exercise and the accompanying iridescent breeze.
*
The descent, as always, is trickier than the climb, and we take refuge from the rain under a giant rock midway. The shelter is insubstantial for a group of ten, and we end up getting soaked to the skin anyway. Murali, rather ingeniously, offers his service raincoat to Estelle. Much to his chagrin, she declines, and continues unabated in her soaking t-shirt, Nike track pants and Birkenstocks. Someone mentions a childhood spent in the Bavarian Alps…
Dry leaves fall from the trees — these untimely showers ensure that they are not held on to their material comforts for long — and the fauna we encountered on the way up seemed to have disappeared. The langurs call out occasionally, but the mynahs respond in dulcet tones of their own.
Drenched to the core yet alive beyond measure, the rain loses significance as we meander down the trail. Consciousness makes itself felt in every cell of my body as I lumber past the sludge and try to find a foothold on the wet tracks. Awake to the moment and mindful of not slipping — essentially holding my life in my hands — I experience a pacifying sense of tranquillity that I normally associate with timing a straight drive back past the bowler on a cloudy afternoon at the Gymkhana.
Damp pathways mark our way back to the hostel. On the way, an appetising breakfast of puttu and kadala curry[2] is sought to calm our nerves. A gulp of tea, brewed from the plants of the estate on which our hostel stands, soothes and brings some warmth back into our bodies. After that, we sleep all afternoon. The 1980s restaurant at this point serves as a reputable hotbed for the exchange of accounts as fellow travellers make their way upcountry for further investigation. Krishnagiri, Edakkal, Banasura and even Ooty, among other places, feature on their itinerary. Buses out of Meppadi take the circuitous route towards Sultan Bathery via Kalpetta. A few companions remain as I make the hike back to the hostel.
Last vestiges of the raindrops from earlier in the day cling on with pride on the tea leaves. Seen from a distance as we walk up the bend onto the track that leads to the hostel’s gates, it appears as if the leaves have shed tears of their own.
The sky turns a dull shade of orange, almost as if playing testament to friendships made and attachments uncovered. I am content enough to watch the sunset over the lower Western Ghats as another pre-monsoon drizzle wafts in. Someone mentions a fresh batch of pazham pori[3] being made in the kitchen. I scramble down the tree house to beat the rush.
[1] Song from Bollywood movie, Rockstar. Translates to: He flew again
[2] Local fare. Rice cake and spicy chick pea curry
Mohul Bhowmick is a national-level cricketer, poet, sports journalist, essayist and travel writer from Hyderabad, India. He has published four collections of poems and one travelogue so far. More of his work can be discovered on his website: www.mohulbhowmick.com.
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I am intrigued by the whole process of translation, a most remarkable alchemy of words and meanings, and when it comes to the translation of poetry, I find the operation especially bewildering and beguiling. But this is not the place for me to discuss my views on the mechanics of the subject, for in fact I have no such views. I am not a translator. I merely wish to explain that the following poem is the result of a minor experiment I have been planning for a long time, a variant of the ‘Chinese Whispers’ game, performed using an automatic translation program. A poem is written, a poem using fairly obvious imagery, and then the translation game begins. The poem is translated from English into another language, in this case Albanian, then from Albanian into another language, Arabic in fact, and from Arabic into Basque, and so on. Eventually the poem exists in Zulu, and from there it is translated back into English.
Possibly it will no longer sound like a real poem at this stage. But it can be easily adjusted, turned into something resembling a new poem, and presented as a continuation of the original poem. The final poetic work will consist of the original stanza followed by the manipulated stanza. If they enhance each other, so much the better, but if not, nothing much has been lost.
The Transformation
The transformation is lengthy
but painless,
it does not drain us. The way
ahead is clear
as far as the glowing horizon
where the moon
has promised to rise. The eyes
of the night
stare intensely in preparation
for blinking
thanks to the white eyelid of
a belated moon
and we grow wise when at last
it arrives, saying
that the stars belong in sleep
and so they do and so
do we and finally
the change
occurs
rest
ful
ly.
This poem was automatically translated between all the following languages:
English – Albanian – Arabic – Basque – Bengali – Czech – Dutch – French – German – Greek – Hindi -Indonesian – Korean – Latin – Macedonian – Maltese – Nepali – Persian – Portuguese – Romanian – Sanskrit – Slovak – Swahili – Thai – Turkish – Urdu – Vietnamese – Welsh – Zulu – English
And the result, after a very small manual adjustment, is:
After a long time
I’m still crying,
a street name outside of us.
This is obvious at first:
bright horizon.
Where is the moon?
And so ends the contract.
Dinner?
I can’t wait to get ready.
This is not a rumour
of white hair
or months.
Finally we bring you a sage.
They started talking,
you are sleeping,
and so
I continue to do so.
Be careful,
what’s up is silence,
targeted
from where?
Rhys Hughes has lived in many countries. He graduated as an engineer but currently works as a tutor of mathematics. Since his first book was published in 1995 he has had fifty other books published and his work has been translated into ten languages.
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We did it! … Announcing our first anthology … Monalisa No Longer Smiles… Click here to read.
Conversations
Suchen Christine Lim, an iconic writer from Singapore in conversation about her latest book, Dearest Intimate. Click here to read.
Blazing trails, as well as retracing the footsteps of great explorers, Christopher Winnan, a travel writer, delves into the past, and gazes into the future while conversing with Keith Lyons. Click hereto read.
Saturday Afternoon is a poem by Ihlwha Choi, translated from Korean by the poet himself. Click here to read.
Tagore’s poem, Tomar Shonkho Dhulay Porey (your conch lies in the dust), has been translated from Bengali by Mitali Chakravarty as The Conch Calls. Click here to read.
Basudhara Roy has reviewed Afsar Mohammad’s Evening with a Sufi: Selected Poems, translated from Telugu by Afsar Mohammad and Shamala Gallagher. Click hereto read.
The credibility of a writer is important. Of course, anyone’s credibility is important because without it, you are keeping time with someone who is a phantom of a personality if they can’t be believed for one reason or another. One must trust that the person telling a story is not sitting in a Starbucks for hours at a time nursing a small coffee and babbling away about things that never happened or didn’t happen that way. Just to put your mind at rest, I’m not currently in a coffee shop, I never linger over coffee and everything I say happened, more or less as I describe.
Here’s where my credibility might be called into question: I am psychic. There, I said it, it’s on the page, a frank admission that makes most people start to wonder where the nearest exit is, or perhaps you are now looking for the nearest recycling bin for this peice. I remember saying this to a fellow at a party once and his expression froze. Not being the most socially adept creature, he was looking for a way to get away from me before I put a hex or curse or whatever it is psychic people do.
He grabbed his cell phone and said, “Sorry, I better take this.”
And as he backed away his phone began to ring. So, either he was pretending to have a call, or he was the psychic — one who knew it was coming. But he found an almost smooth way out of a conversation with someone who might just be an oddball. You do not have to fake a call and presumably you’re reading this with open eyes and an open mind, so let me tell you a bit about this nether, dark world that both fascinates us and repels us like standing naked before a mirror once you’re well into middle age. Here is a story that might not be spooky in the other world sense, but it certainly gave me pause.
It was an overcast fall day in an old room in an old school. How’s that for a spooky, atmospheric set up? I was teaching another class of basic level grade 10 boys. These poor devils have been committed opponents to English classes likely since their first day in kindergarten. Again, it’s not that they’re dumb, at all. But they sure didn’t like English class.
I came up with a brainchild of an idea to get them to work. I could always keep them quiet and seated, which is a feat in itself. But to get them to work I thought I would go right back to a depression era technique and told them I would give the best student of the day a prize. Now these poor working-class sods were not used to prizes. Mostly at home they got slaps across the head for transgression both real and imagined on the part of parent(s) whose only embrace of parenthood involved forgetting to bring a condom. Their faces lit up at the prospect of a prize. An award! They had spent their school years running into punishments, but a prize!
I felt a little bad when they immediately grabbed their pencils (this time not as a weapon), opened their books (this time not for a pillow), and began to read and write. There is no more stirring or heartbreaking sight for a teacher who cares than watching students try so hard to do something well for which they have no confidence. I sat at my desk and began to wonder.
The first thing I wondered was what could I give for a prize. I assumed they would scoff and make some kind of a sucking noise with their teeth. In 1991, this was a favourite of rappers to display dismissiveness. I had encountered it many times as a teacher. My defense was to ask, in a sincere voice, if they wanted some floss.
“Floss? For what, man?
“Sorry, I thought you had something stuck in your teeth from lunch. I do have some floss in my desk. It’s been there for a while, but it might just do the trick of dislodging that bit of food you feel the need to suck out.”
With a lot of teachers this might well have resulted in a small-scale riot. But my kids knew I liked them, and I tease and, as I said, they might not be bookish smart, but they knew sarcasm when they heard it and they usually just laughed.
But back to the problem of offering a prize that I didn’t even have. I cast a quick look around the room for possibilities. There were some posters on the wall of an educational bent that I could use. There was a lovely one of a parachutist drifting down to earth with the caption below saying: “The mind is like a parachute. It only operates when open.”
I could imagine telling some poor slob that they could take that home for a hard day’s work. I imagine I would eventually make it out of the class, but not in one piece. The pounding I would take would put me on long term disability. Not a terrible idea but the journey to get there would be hard.
I thought about the money in my pocket, full five dollars and some change. But wouldn’t that be a bribe or some form of prostitution? And the next class all behavior and production would come with a price tag. And when the principal got word that I was paying my students, it would mean a different route to long term disability.
I rummaged through my desk drawer when I saw it. My salvation! It was a glass jar of shark’s teeth. Now why in God’s name would a teacher have such a thing on his desk. Simple. It cost me nothing and was a gift. My wife’s uncle was this eccentric but genuinely nice man who collected things. It didn’t matter what, he would collect them. He had scoured the countryside looking for Indigenous arrowheads and tools and guess what? He found them by the hundreds. His collection was so impressive that the Royal Ontario Museum gladly took them when he offered them up out of the goodness of his heart. So, one day we were in his cavernous basement, strewn with rocks and fossils and bits of metal and God knows what else. It was a summer day, and his hay fever had the better of him. He let out a sneeze that no doubt shattered an arrowhead or two.
He blew his nose into a handkerchief that would likely never be used again for any human purpose. He looked down at the contents and said,
“Oh, I thought my nose was bleeding, but it’s snot (instead of it’s not, you see).”
That was exactly the kind of joke this guy made and one of the reasons I found him so much fun to be with. The odd thing was he had survived a German work camp as a teenager during World War II, one in which his brother had died. Yet here he was, in his seventies, bent and old and so full of life and always finding a reason to laugh. How could I not like him? And now was he related to some of Tina’s family? They were people who could find a dark cloud in the second coming of Christ.
“You know he really should have called first. This is really not convenient.”
Anyway, this jolly old fellow saw me admiring his countless bottles of shark’s teeth lined up on a shelf.
“Geez, just take one. I got plenty.”
“That’s awfully good of you, Bill. But all the work you took yanking them out of their mouths. It just doesn’t seem right.”
He would never laugh at my jokes, but I know he liked them.
“Here, you keep ‘em. Mostly they were lost in bar fights anyway.”
So, thank you very much, Bill. Now I could give my winner a reason to not add my teeth to the collection.
The class came to an end, and I knew I had my top student. I would have liked to have given them all something because they had all tried, and I was very proud of them. But if you give a prize to everybody then it takes away from the very idea of a prize which is a celebration of accomplishment in a field of others. It reminded me of the increasingly bizarre notion that had come up in education in the last few years, namely that everyone is special and stands apart and should be recognised as such. I am all for increasing students’ sense of self-worth but here’s the trick: if everyone is special, then nobody is special. If every child is recognised and labelled as having poor behaviour or attitude because of their genetics or how they were raised or because they weren’t tucked in at night in order to maximise their potential, then they all have an out.
Unfortunately, it gives every kid a playing card that they can pull in any situation. I remember breaking up a fight and as I guided the hulk along to the office, he looked at me wide eyed and said, “It’s not my fault…I have anger issues.”
This was a kid that was not exactly a future student of psychology. A future as a study model of aberrant psychology possibly. But he had been told by teachers and counsellors and no doubt his parents that his ‘acting out’, to put it mildly, was the result of this syndrome. It is to laugh for.
Though I wanted to reward them all, I knew that I had to choose just one. Bobby Mack (yes, it did sound vaguely like a cosmetic line) was the one. I don’t think anyone ever made fun of his name to his face. He was very tall and naturally very strong. His strength wasn’t achieved from holding big books in the library. His love of academics was an empty love. He was, however, a very good future plumber. That’s why he was at school. He was a likeable fellow with a good sense of humour, I knew this because he laughed at my jokes. 16 years old in grade 10, turning his life around to pursue his love of plumbing. It would also help him support the two children he had with two different girls similarly young. Ah, well, he had a goal and I felt he could do it.
With a few minutes to go before the end of class I stood before their expectant faces and said my piece.
“Well, after careful consideration, and after having fed data into the computer, it has been calculated who is student of the day and thereby the winner of a prize that will change their lives.”
I love a big build up, but the faces in front of me told this young teacher that they didn’t use computers, only had calculators for projectiles and didn’t think lives could change. I cut to the chase and told Bobby to come on up and get his prize. He lumbered to the front of the room with a shy smile as the class applauded. I’m sure the guy never won a prize in an English classroom in his life. When I say applauded, I mean a few did, several whined that they should have won. One fellow called out,
“Oh, sir, that’s not fair. You’re a racist.”
I looked down at this white face, back to Bobby’s white face and wondered where he got that complaint from.
“No, it’s not racist. For one thing I didn’t even know you were Chinese.”
“I’m not Chi…!”
He cut himself off realising that there was both a joke as well as a jab in there for him. Bobby stood in front of me and I slowly, for even more dramatic effect, took out my little bottle of shark’s teeth, took one out and put it in his outstretched hand. The smile didn’t run from his face, it sprinted. He looked hard at the tooth and held it as though he were holding a turd.
“What the hell is this?”
As he was genuinely angry and outraged, I let the swear word go. It floated up into the air not to be addressed by the tough teacher I usually was. It fled the room along with his smile and his joy at having won. He was angry. He was big. I was scared.
“That, my friend, is a shark’s tooth from Florida!” I said, pumping up the item like a door-to-door salesman.”
“I thought I was getting chocolate, or money or something not weird.”
“I want you to know why that is such a prize, far more valuable and lasting than chocolate.”
He still looked angry, but I sensed he would listen. I figured I better talk fast and good or start running. At the Faculty of Education, they taught us that running away from threatening students can chip away at one’s credibility in the classroom. I addressed the whole class as well.
“A hundred years ago there was a shark swimming in the warm waters of the Atlantic Ocean. It didn’t know about death; it didn’t know about anything. It simply existed. That’s all it wanted, to eat and swim and make little sharks, not because he thought those were good things to do. He just did what came naturally to him…stay alive and make more life. But he died, in some way we will never know. And now Bobby here is holding one of his teeth in his hand.
This is a reminder to all of us that life is beautiful, but it doesn’t last. That shark had a last day on this earth and so will we. We don’t know how or when. But one thing we do know is that we should treasure every day we have, and remember, always remember, this is the only life we have and today is the only day we get, so make the most of it. Value it. That shark, though he didn’t know it, has taught us that lesson.”
Bobby now had the tooth between his fingers and smiled.
“Yeah, that’s kind of cool sir…thanks.”
He tucked the tooth into his pocket and took his seat. The bell went a minute later, and I was pleased to see several kinds around Bobby as he showed off the prize that had meant less than nothing to him moments before. I was proud of myself for having taught a lesson, a life lesson that would hopefully stick with those kids for their whole lives.
I know it stuck with Bobby for the rest of his life. For his life ended that night. He was at a party, a drunken argument and another kid came back with a gun and shot Bobby in the head. I like to think he had the tooth in his pocket and that maybe his last day on earth, he might have valued the little things a bit more, his child’s smile, his mother’s farewell hug. I even fool myself into thinking he looked up at the sky for once, not to check the weather, but just to be happy.
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Erwin Coombs is a retired teacher of philosophy, history and literature who has rejected all forms of retirement. He is an avid writer, reader, and observer of life. When not observing and reading and living, he is writing. Erwin has lived in Egypt, Jamaica, England and travelled a great deal but, in his mind, not enough. His writing is a celebration of people and opportunity, both of which life gives in abundance. These stories are from his, as yet unpublished book, Dusty the Cat: Her Part in My Downfall.
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Borderless 