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AI: Well, I also wanted to ask you a little bit about early memories, early childhood memories, things that, of course, you did write about some of them in your book, but whatever comes to mind that you would like to share.

PJ: Well, you know, it's always interesting 'cause, 'cause we do rewrite stuff. And sometimes I don't know whether these are actually what I remember or whether it's things people have told me, or things I've reconstructed from later life. But the things that I remember are so much of the smells. Because we had, my grandmother was a, was an amazing gardener, and, of course, she had gardeners to do things, but she would go out and tend her jasmine plants all the time. And the jasmine is just a persistent memory, even today when I go to India, I can smell it immediately, and it brings back all kinds of associations for me.

And the same thing with the puja. My grandmother was fiercely religious, my grandfather was fiercely atheistic. And he just had no time for her, for all of her "religious superstitions," he called them. Though, what's interesting is when, again, when we were going through his things later when he died, he has numerous books on religion, and he was very well-read about religion, he just, he didn't believe in prayer and things like that. So I remember my grandmother praying every morning. That's a very consistent memory, because we would hear it. And you know, the prayer is very, very melodic. It's almost as if you're singing. And even now, when I, you know, I say, "Namah Shivaya, Narayanaya namah, Achuthaya namah, Anandaya namah," I can go through the whole prayer, and I have her in my mind, 'cause she taught us all those prayers. So I remember that very clearly.

I remember a lot of sitting. You know, sitting around. We had these big kind of cane plantation chairs that were on the balcony. And the house that I remember is the house that my grandfather built and where they lived for the whole time that I was, that I was, after I was born. And it had a balcony that was cool stone and so I remember it would be so hot, blisteringly hot in Madras, and I would just go and lie on the stone because it was the one place, where -- you know, we didn't have air conditioning or anything -- it was actually cool. So I remember sitting there, and I remember in the morning, early morning, I remember early mornings very well, because my grandmother would wake up and I loved that time of day because it was quiet, and it was cooler, and my grandmother would be there, and then my grandfather would come out and have the newspaper and would sit in these cane chairs. He had his special chair so if we happened to be sitting in it when he came, we'd have to rush out. And then the schoolgirls would start coming, you know, and they'd be walking by. And my grandfather was so connected to all of the kids, he used to love kids, and they used to love him. And they'd walk by and they'd say, "Hello, Uncle!" and he'd say, "Hello, Mala, how are you? Are you excited about school today?" And there'd be this conversation with about twenty kids that walked by. So I remember all of that.

I remember very clearly the, there's very special sounds in India of the, people who are selling, the vendors, they have these cries. And, and you don't know what they're saying until you realize, like they'll say, "Tomatter, tomatter, tomatter," and they'll keep going and going and going, and you just don't know what, what it is. But once you get it, you can hear it clearly. And so we'd have all these vendors that would be working by six o'clock in the morning. And so I remember all of that very clearly.

I also remember the house very, very clearly. What it looked like and where the rooms were, and this one particular room that was my grandmother's puja room, but also the guest room. And so there was a little, kind of, she had made a cupboard, and it was a, not a very deep cupboard, maybe just like a foot or foot and a half deep, and all of the pictures of all of the gods -- 'cause, you know, there were many, many gods that were worshipped -- and the center was Devi, who was our family goddess, and then around her there were pictures of Shiva and Parvati and Krishna and everybody, and that room was where we slept. So we, that's part of why I remember hearing her always in the mornings. But also in the afternoons, my grandfather would go to take a nap. And when my aunts were visiting -- 'cause usually we were home when everybody was home -- all of the women and lie on the bed. And the fan would be whirring above, you know, just kind of that sound of the fan and we'd just all be chatting away and talking. And half the time my sister and I never knew what was going on, but we didn't want to be excluded from anything. I mean, we always wanted to be right there. So I think that's...

AI: And speaking of your sister, I wanted to ask, how much older is she?

PJ: She's three years older.

AI: And so these were all, it sounds like, very warm memories, from the time before you went to school.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.