Dolls all dressed up
This is Gulli & her new/old gift. It was given a while ago, but kept aside until she could play with it more delicately. She received a similar one that night, which was kept in its box and this one was dusted off for her to play with!
Rustic decor: In the background are sacks of wheat grain, to be ground into flour by the portable mill that visits the neighborhood, pulled by a tractor. My mother-in-law had ordered it for a group of people from a relative who’s a wholesaler, and the others pulled out of the deal. Anyone want some wheat?
- A mother’s love
- the feeding ritual without which no celebration is complete
hanging out around the table. the girl eating alone is me (my mother-in-law prepares my food seperately, without chilli & onions. sometimes that means i eat seperately, & she usually eats last!)
Gulli was born two months after we moved to Jaipur, so her birthday is another kind of milestone for me. I remember being in quite a bad state healthwise when she was born, and almost not being able to attend her naming ceremony a week later.
I would only eat rice, and everyone was bothering me to eat more because of the joyous occasion. I was trying to hide in the corner, away from the smoke of the puja and what seemed like hundreds of guests. It was hot and I refused to leave the side of the water cooler.
Now she calls me “Becky Chachi” and gets so excited when I visit, but we can’t have conversations beyond “How are you?” She gets frustrated when I don’t understand the rules of the games she invents.
She doesn’t understand that I don’t understand. And I don’t want to learn Hindi…!
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