Independence Day: Euphoric Memories from A Distant Past
Whether it is the author’s first bicycle in her teen years, or the scent of fragrant flowers—Gulab, Mogra, Champa, Chameli, Raatrani, Kevdo, Kadamb, Kesudo, Madhu-Malati, Parijat and more—from a bygone era in the India of her childhood, the tug of those memories is nothing short of intoxicating.
I remember the days from decades back when, as new Indian immigrants to the U.S., we missed intensely everything about the land we had left behind. Unlike today’s real-time, all-time connectivity with our loved ones back home, we felt cut off from the motherland, the weight of the oceans between us heavy on our hearts. We were often overpowered by an intense yearning for someone or something that reminded us of our native land.
For me, the sweet aroma oozing from the rain-soaked soil in Atlanta revived the memories of those balmy earthy scents of Mother India. Or when I felt suffocated by the humid summer heat of our “Hotlanta,” my skin remembered the biting sting of that hot and howling wind of summer months in Ahmedabad.
Such sweet and sour nostalgic feelings of acute homesickness are nowhere as well-expressed as in this song from the film Kabuliwala:
Chameli
“Ae mere pyare watan, ae mere bichhade chaman,tujh pe dil qurbaan.
Tu hi meri aarzoo, tu hi meri aabru, tu hi meri jaan…
Ma ka dil ban ke kabhi seene se lag jata hai tu or kabhi nanhi si beti
ban ke yaad aata hai tu….”
(“O my beloved land, my separated friend, I would give my life for you. You are my deepest wish, my pride, you are my very life.
Sometimes you cling to me like a mother’s heart, sometimes you tug at my memory like my sweet little daughter.”)
And my favorite lines from the song:
“Tere daaman se jo aaye in hawaon ko salam...
Choom loon main uss zubaan ko jis pe aaye tera naam,
Sabse pyari subah teri, sabse rangeen teri shaam...tujh pe dil qurbaan…!”
(“I salute the very air coming from your end; I would kiss the voice that utters your name. Your mornings are the most beautiful, your evenings most colorful. I would give my life for you.”)
My first bicycle and fragrant flowers
Among myriad such heart-warming and heart-breaking memories of back home are two that jump out in particular: my very first self-earned bicycle, and the other of those heavenly scented flowers of the garden of my childhood home in India. If a bicycle gives wings to youth, flowers adorn the vanity of youth!
At age 17, I felt “on the top of the world” for being the proud recipient of our community’s “Top Highschool Graduate” award with a scholarship of 100 Rupees—a huge sum in the mid-1950s. Luckily by then, I had learned to ride a bicycle, and my scholarship money went towards the purchase of what soon became my proudest possession. I can say without the slightest exaggeration that I had really fallen in love with my shining new bicycle! What a heady-giddy feeling it was to now be able to go anywhere and everywhere on my own bike. I rode it everywhere: to college, to run errands, from going to the post office to the library, and to visit friends. Reason or no reason, I found myself on the bicycle most of the day.
Most of the time, riding my bicycle was a pleasant experience, but not always! Once I was asked by my Grandma to go to downtown Ahmedabad to buy a special kind of ghee made from cows’ milk. Dressed in what was then called ‘Punjabi dress’ (salwar-kameez) and with my ghee-barni (metal jar) hanging on the front handle, I took off, zig-zagging through the heavy midtown traffic. All went well until on my way back, just outside the ‘Three Gates’ area, I had to go berserk with my brakes to save myself from a madly rushing oncoming rickshaw.
Not only did I take a nasty fall, but also my ghee-pot went tumbling down the road. The more I tried to mount my bike, the more I kept slipping off because both my shoes and the pedals were a sticky mess! As if that was not enough, a pedestrian woman began to laugh loudly and shout: “Arey dekho dekho, ye bechari Bibi gir gayi, aur uska ghee bhi dhal gaya!” (“Look...look at that poor young woman—she fell off and her ghee also went spilling down the road!”)
I felt like Sita in the Rama-yana, wanting Mother Earth to swallow me up alive! Well, despite such embarrassment, I learned a valuable lesson: What can give you intense pleasure can also give you plenty of grief.
The scent of the heavens
As I think about that embarrassing fall that left a deep mark on my psyche, now is a good time to segue into the aromatic memories of the fragrant flowers that I was fortunate enough to have grown up having around. These days, the flowers around me are beautiful to look at, but alas, most of them are devoid of a scent that can transport you to heaven!
And this is not only my observation but also of relatives visiting us from India. Here I quote verbatim from a friend from Gujarat: “Mua, tamara ahin na fuul, dekhav ma ketla saras che, pan sugandh nu nam na maley!” (“Your flowers here are so pretty to look at but have no fragrance at all.”)
I grew up with exquisitely fragrant Indian flowers. Even today, I can inhale the soul-stirring aromas of each one of them—Gulab, Mogra, Champa, Chameli, Raatrani, Kevdo, Kadamb, Kesudo, Madhu-Malati, Parijat and many more. I remember how I used to climb up the gate of our house to pluck those Jai and Juhi (Jasmine) flowers for making a veni (hair-garland).
Even today when I see some ladies adorning their hair with a Juhi veni, I get a severe nostalgic attack! No other flower on earth can beat that delicate yet intoxicating scent of the Indian jasmine.
Champo
[left]
Mogro
[Right]
Parijat
[Bottom]
But more than any other, I can still conjure up in my mind the intoxicating aroma of Parijats, those tiny white flowers with a pinkish-orange stem—so tender that even touching them would make them blush and wilt. They are called “heavenly” not just as a figure of speech, but according to the Indian mythology, these flowers have descended from heaven! The story goes Lord Krishna himself fought with Lord Indra to bring down these flowers from heaven—to pacify Satyabhama, his upset wife.
This Independence Day, I will be celebrating my native land with the priceless memories of my young days—more precious to me than parades and flag raisings. Jai Hind!
Now retired, Dr. Uma Majmudar has previously taught as an Adjunct Lecturer in the department of Religion and Philosophy at Emory University, and thereafter at Spelman College, She is the author of two books, “Gandhi’s Pilgrimage of Faith: From Darkness to Light “(SUNY, 2005), and “Gandhi and Rajchandra: The Making of the Mahatma” (Lexington Books, 2020).
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