Navratri, was a
festival that was closest to my dads`s heart. I just love the way he introduced
me to this festival. He was the Garba poster boy of our cosmopolitan St Martins
rd, Bandra, where young and old, danced to the beautiful folk songs that he
sang.
Pa had an
unconditional love for Gujarati folk music & art. One of his earliest
business ventures as young student was visiting Kutch, Patan over the weekend,
buying handicrafts, kutchi bharat(
embroidery of Kutch > material and selling
them from a stall on linking road.
I must have been in my
mother’s womb, when Pa introduced me to his favorite Gujarati garba songs,
singing for me. As I grew up, he would sing them for me to put me to sleep.
When I must have been 4-5 he told me about the Rabarans( women from Gujarat who dressed up in colourful clothes with
beautiful embroidery and lots of oxidized jewelry)
The way he described
them to me, they seemed like truly beautiful women. He would spend hours dressing
me up, to look like a Rabaran. He would plait my hair, drape the chaniya choli,
exquisitely embroidered by the local artists of Gujarat .
This would be paired with the most authentic oxidized jewelry.
As I grew up he tried
hard to teach me the garba and dandiya dance, well I think he must have been disappointed, as I could not match up to
his expectations. But soon he taught me to sing the rhythmic gujarati folk songs, like Rangalo, Dholeeda, Mehndi tai Vavi, Jodhe re jodhar, Tara aakhien na awifle.
Thankfully I was able to sing them, although would often forget the gujrati
words. Somewhere in him he wanted to expose me to the depth and beauty of gujarati
folk culture and arts.
Each Navratri with
Papa was a different, fun and exciting. I still remember the last Navratri with
Papa, he was recovering from jaundice, not in the best of his health, but he
still sang his favourite garba song Rangalo in our new gujrati neighborhood.
Navrati now days has become to commercialized and more like the disco, this is
something which had started even when my dad was around, and he has never
really appreciated the sub standardization of one of the purest form of Gujarati
folk art.
This is how I was
introduced to this beautiful festival, But Navratri has never been & never
will be the same without Pa.
