Alappuzha is a rustic town in central Kerala (Southernmost
Indian state) and many people tends to call it
the Venice of the East as they draw on the similarities of the nexus of
canals which serve their purpose well in Venice but not in Alappuzha. The canals
of course double up as a sewer and a seed ground for the water hyacinths and as
these days nobody prefers the waterways, these long stretches of canals lay
overwhelmed by the water plants that guzzle up space like anything. After all it’s
a pretension of greenery. I am spending my time in Alappuzha these days and
happened to go to the vegetable markets. Along with the usual purchase, bagfuls
of cabbage peels were to be fished out from the waste heap in the shops to feed
the bunnies and piglets. The salesboy encouraged me to take away the whole
stuff hoping to get a cut on his burden of cleaning them later. I didn’t need
so much stuff. Incidentally a seemingly
immaculate globe of cabbage (of course with their outer skirts on) emerged from
the heap and I stuffed it in my bag. It was then that my antagonist jumped in
as if he caught me red-handed in an act of felony. Mind me I was still sticking
to the garbage heap and was shopping to feed atleast 80 people a day and so
little a cabbage would only run down our collective nose. Perhaps he wanted a
point or two to impress the shop-owner. Storming at me with a curse (precisely
the M-word in Malayalam, standing for pube) he was driving his idea home that I
was pilfering that petty cabbage and that his keeping an eye on me ever since I
came into the shop was rewarded at last. To be frank I would have loved to see
him dead and rot there knowing that nevertheless I could not afford to do that
because: 1)he was standing in his turf, 2)he can go to any lengths of verbal or
tangible abuse to make himself over the top in a scuffle, and 3) my station did
not permit use of immodest behaviour to defend myself. Next day I scanned the newspapers
to see whether this guy turned up in the obituaries or reports of some freak
accidents or road mishaps.
After much fretting and fuming, I gave up that shop. Next
time next shop which was more airy, spacious, lit, graceful and what not. They
could spare cabbage leaves too. Typical Indian cooking involves the use of many
spices and few leaves of which I can point out curry leaves, coriander leaves
and mint. These days due to the taste for other-worldly dishes new leaves are
spotted here too. I asked the man for the name of the bunch he placed on the
scales. He told me it was parsley. Thanks that I knew that name already I didn’t
learn it from him the way he mispronounced. So this is the first of that
quartet, immortalized in the refrain “Parsley,Sage, Rosemary and Thyme”, I have
heard Simon and Garfunkel sing ever from my childhood and of late through the
mellifluous voice of Celtic Woman and the improvised Gregorian Chants. It
brought back dear memories to me. I broke a twig of parsley and buried it in my
vademecum.
The ballad Scarborough Fair is one of longstanding in the English
folklores. It is presented as a dialogue
between a man and his lover girl. They demand of each other seemingly impossible
tasks as a proof of their love. To love (not exactly the carnal one) is to embark
on the impossible, to impart love where it is most unwelcome and difficult.
Perhaps I can sew a cambric shirt for that man who tarnished me and wash
that in a waterless well to prove that I am still capable of love.
Parsley. Sage, Rosemary and Thyme were suggested in this
ballad as hints to contraception posing them as having symbolic or
pharmacological values. Thus says an erudite article on this topic. Love should
have a restraint. I am sure that I elicit a guffaw now.
My feelings about Scarborough Fair, the canticle, are deeply
personal. My dear father, long defunct, had a particular liking for this song
which was communicated to us. Before the
advent of this barrage of information and data-mines it was very unlikely that
an average Indian would figure out the lyrics of an English song anywhere near
the original. So this was his limit too. Once I could procure for him the
lyrics of the song obtained for me by Mr.J (later to become my BIL) but it was
too late. My father was in hospital getting referred to Regional Cancer Centre
in Thiruvananthapuram and was bracing up that night for the trip. I cannot
exactly say what doleful sentiment was written all over his face that night. A boy
who had many words to tell his father when he was younger and yet misplaced most
of them when he grew up, declining into silence is now before the father for a
start-up. Things become clumsy simply because of the misfiring or mistiming. Just
like that. He just brushed that printout aside and lost himself in the worries,
which I am no man to judge. There is something about our lives which can take
away even our best favourites from us leaving us to lurch in the dark. Love
asks for the impossible.
“Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme
Remember me to the one who lives there…” 
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