GRIHAPRAVESHAM OVER. HOUSE TO HOME

Today is the day. Though all is contracted out, there are tensions galore. The tent guy behaved badly and would not deliver the chairs and after much rude talk, the said chairs delivered with them stepping and dripping all over the maa kolam, in which I too posed by placing one dot. The kollams, flower decorations, huge pushnikai in place, was all done yesterday. Both Rama and Meera are adept at these things, kollams, tying flowers and talking to Sastrigals. The latter take this opportunity to create a certain kind of chaos. 'Mami, idha konduvaango, adu kudungo and so on.' And though it is all contracted, Meera woke up at 3 am to make shakara pongal and cook aavis. She made the kozhukattai yesterday. All the said items will be fed to the homam fire and later bits given to by-then-tired and eyes-burning audience as prasadam. There was an atmosphere of festivity with relatives in place, the food had already arrived. It was puri/khangu, idli/sambar/chutney, coconut sevai, vadai, and a fanta-orange colour kesari. Plus chakara pongal and salt pongal from a near by temple. Plenty of food. I like it that way, wanting people to eat lots. Ghar bhara bhara rehta hai. I got a lot of gifts, sheeru from my father's side, and my in law's side. Apart from dresses and discrete envelopes, there were also two varieties of paruppu tengais, one, manoharam (my mom's, favourite and, now mine too) and one gunja laddu). The room looked full and though the eyes watered, you could smell the perfume of the malli poo and rhe sweet smell of the roja poo. The house, all white was redolent with the holy smoke, even as we tucked into the food. I ordered a tad in excess but everyone ate happily, the timing being such. The tension has drained off and we went and thanked Lord Ganesha at a quiet temple and then further drove down to the famous Venugopalaswamy temple of Gopalpuram. Filled with mamis ready to attend a minor little programme by a fairly decent singer, it felt very Tamil and very bhavyam to be there. I loved it all.