Prema Jayakumar

This being the weekend when Easter and Vishu celebrations take over the households, it seems natural to think of why these family celebrations matter. Celebrations become celebrations only when the whole family, preferably an extended one, is involved. Just as nature puts on the yellow and green of celebrations, we too cannot help but slip into a celebratory mood (it was Dr Ayyappa Panikkar, the great Malayalam poet, who wrote ‘vishukkalamalle, kanikkonnayalle, pookkathirikkan enikkavathundo’ – It is the time of Vishu and I am a kanikkonna, how can I not flower?). Nostalgia is a pernicious habit one slips into with age, and yet this is one of those occasions when it seems excusable to remember a simpler time, when celebrations were family times and the quantum of money spent was not really of great importance.

The proliferation of holiday classes and activities outside the home for even little children is a little frightening. As though parenting or grand parenting is only a matter of giving expensive gifts that please or even thrill the children. Any family activity that takes place at all, takes place outside the home where entertainment is laid on and there is no need to talk to each other. The skills that seemed to come so easily to the earlier generations have been lost somewhere on the way – the skill of telling stories, of conveying wisdom without seeming to do so, of drawing children to a time that has gone by that was so different from the time they are living in (not necessarily better or worse, but different), so on. This has had an effect from the opposite side too – children seem to find listening to conversation a difficult thing to do.
It is not that what the elders say is always true, or always right. But they do have experiences that the younger generation has not had, and this in itself is valuable. They have lived through times that were different. Life is changing at such a fast pace that one generation can hardly absorb the changes in a life time. So, how would someone who is in their teens now be able to even imagine a world that was so different? One might, if one were so inclined, rail against the injustices of the present day, but a knowledge of far crueller injustices that were practised earlier might lessen the anger and encourage one that changes for the better are possible. When one talks of the differences that money can make and the injustice of it, a reminder that two generations back, even with money, a householder needed the permission of the local landowner to tile the roof of his own house might be a salutary reminder that times do change, albeit slowly. Someone protesting against dress codes might do well to remember when the length of the dhoti a man could wear and whether a woman could wear a blouse or not were decided by caste and position in life.
Telling stories, singing lullabies, playing round games of stanzas of poetry, all conveyed a lot of information besides providing a place for the family to be together. And with the acquisition of more knowledgelater in life, you got the feeling ‘Oh yes, this is what that story was about, this is what that poem narrated, this is what the song said,’ and so knowledge was
assimilated painlessly, unawares. A lack of such time together, a time when everyone or at least those who are there, relax with each other, is the loss of a valuable resource.
Of course, absorbing old prejudices along with old wisdom would be a sad thing to happen. That is less likely to happen these days when knowledge about anything is so easily available, all information is so easily verified. One does need an open mind for that, though, and that too is a contribution of discussions that are not structured, that just happen, that present opinions across generations and life styles.
Let us hope that both the festivals, which are celebrations of renewal, bring a short interval of peace and shared happiness. ‘Let us therefore celebrate this festival, not with old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.’