An unhurried Holi
From Pink Splutters in My Mother’s Oil to Controlled Fires in Apartment Drums
Today being Holi, our nanny had asked for leave. Not because she wanted to play, but because she was scared that someone would forcefully put color on her if she tried to step out of her house to come to our home. I told her that nowadays people are lost in mobiles and reels, and it is very unlikely that at 7 in the morning someone would be waiting at the street corner to ambush her. She arrived at 8:00, safe and sound, without a trace of color.
Personally, I have never been fond of Holi.
My parents weren’t either, so while growing up we were always behind closed doors on coloring day. Burning the Holi fire the previous night was a big thing and my mom always did that, but playing with colors? Never. When I was young, almost everyone in our colony used to play—grown-ups and children alike—and they dragged people outside and colored them forcefully. In those days, that was considered festive. So on Holi morning, my parents would lock the main door from the inside; none of us ventured out, and we did not allow anyone to come in.
I remember one particular Holi, I must have been around six or seven, when a neighbor, JT uncle, was knocking on the door and wanted to color us. He was a nice uncle and I was fond of him. He tried pushing the door, challenging us to come out, but our hinge was strong and he could not force his way in. My mom was in the kitchen cooking something in hot oil. With no success at the door, he came to the partially open kitchen window and threw some water-based color. It fell right into the hot oil and produced firecracker-like splutters. JT uncle got a little startled and left us alone. Later, we noticed pinkish particles floating in the oil. I do not remember what my mom did with it—she probably used it anyway. Things were in short supply in those days, and she would not have wasted it.
When my brother got older, around eighteen or so, he started going out. By then, the concept of forcing and coloring people was fading, so we did not have to lock the doors anymore; neighbors did not bother us. My experience of Holi started with my brother’s friends. I would say I wasn’t playing, but they would trick me into stepping out and put some color on my hands or face. The fad in those days was to make the worst possible shades, the kind that would take days and weeks to rub off—brownish-black, dark green, the craziest colors one could find. I was around twelve then and honestly did not mind carrying that “bad color” on my skin. It gave me something to show to my friends in school.
The only time I really celebrated Holi was during my first job in Bangalore. I was part of a group of friends who were very keen to celebrate it. I would go around on a bike with a friend of mine who worked in an advertising agency. She was enthusiastic and chirpy, and we got along well. We went from house to house, coloring friends and being colored in return. I distinctly remember people on the street staring at us, because Holi was not so popular in Bangalore in those days.
Years later, I played Holi again when my son Kabir was five because he wanted to. We got him a water gun and he ran around our apartment complex throwing water on people—and, of course, on me. I found myself in the middle of it. It is different now. People are more conscious about using skin-friendly colors and maintaining personal boundaries. The building even sets up water sprinklers, so in its own way, it is quite nice.
What I really miss, though, is the tradition of burning Holi the night before.
As kids, Mom would send us to buy cow dung. My sister and I would cycle near the farms where farmers kept cattle, and they would give us dried cow-dung rotis. My mom would arrange bricks in a circle in our veranda, place dried twigs and the dung rotis in the middle, and we would light it. It would take its time—almost half an hour—for the fire to properly rise, with the crackling of twigs and the slow smoke from the cow-dung cakes.
Then Mom would roll jowar rotis, tie them with thread, and put them on a tava balanced over three bricks above the fire. When the rotis were cooked, she would crush them and mix them into melted jaggery syrup. It tasted heavenly. While this was happening, we would quietly go around the fire and mutter small prayers or wishes of our own. Mom had a song she always sang. Neighbors would join in, mostly to enjoy the evening and chat. It was an unhurried time, and I vividly remember frames of myself around that fire—as a six-year-old, a ten-year-old, and so on.
At some point, by the time I went to college and my older siblings got married, this tradition left us. I can’t pinpoint a particular year; it must have faded for many small reasons. We replaced our soil veranda with tiles, which were great for playing cricket but not ideal for burning Holi and spoiling the floor. One year my brother and I rode around for half an hour on our Luna looking for cow-dung cakes, only to realize the farmers had vanished from our surroundings.
I sometimes wonder if I should revive it for my children, but I live in an apartment surrounded by fire alarms, so that kind of adventure is out of the question. In the complex they organize a joint Holi. The fire is lit carefully in a metal drum by professionals, very controlled. It is almost like seeing a monkey in a zoo versus seeing one in the wild. Kabir is enamoured by the fire—this is all he has known. The sweets from the best gourmet shops of Mumbai are good, and it is nice to meet everyone in the building.
But sometimes I wish I could transport Kabir back to that veranda and let him experience that unhurried evening—the slow rising smoke, my mother’s song, the jaggery-dipped jowar roti, and the timelessness of sitting around a small fire with nowhere else to be.