An Aromatic Ode to Rajasthan: The Earthy Beauty!

I met her rarely… mostly during my summer vacations. Still she never failed to do this to me. The moment I touched her sun kissed skin, it was as if an earthing absorbed all my worries and tensions away and put me in a state of eternal joy and bliss.

I always tried to find this out… what was it about her that did this to me? Was it because I was the child of her womb? Or it could be the chatter of the Rajasthani women – cloaked in a ghoonghat or was it the magic of the dancing dunes that mesmerized me while I wandered around. Or maybe it was the odd camel who (always!) smiled beatifically as he clip clopped his way past my window or was it something else - an aspect that I had never cared to discover about her?

That trip of 2007 to my ancestral village in Rajasthan changed my perspectives; the smells inspired me... revealing her in a way I had never seen her to be. Something about her was intensely and insanely gorgeous this time. Something that I never could figure out after all my encounters with her. Something that was not in no way like the tourist brochures always claimed it to be. May be in parts - yes, but certainly not entirely. Something… that was something more. A matter of the mind perhaps. An untapped, unclaimed territory neatly contained, revealed only to those who had the audacity to step further and the oddity to dig deeper.

I rolled down the windows of my car soon after it hit the red mud tarmac. A gust of chilly January breeze combed my hair, sweeping through a vast landscape of rolling dunes stretching into infinity. At first it smelled nothing. Then it smelled something. A tantalizing fragrance rising from the earth, one that was rustic, fresh and mystical – all at the same time; the fragrance invaded my soul and senses in no time.

This earthen, dusky beauty was immaculate, unsullied; it was intoxicating, almost addictive. I loved the scent of it. The best part – it chased me for the entire trip, no matter where I went.

Dadaji’s Haveli

I stayed in my Dadaji’s ancestral house where he had lovingly spent a few years of his life. A massive Banyan tree standing right beside the thick iron gates at the entrance invited me in. Huge cobwebs hanging from the ceiling bore the stamp of abandon. Rusted locks slept on many of the rooms inside, deserted and motionless to eerie silence around. The haveli had not been opened for around 3 years or so. A heavy grinding stone sat idle right across the 3 legged charpoy in another. But it was the Tulsi pot that caught my attention. The same pot which once bloomed with the sacred plant nurtured by my grandpa, today, was no more. It lay bare, naked with the words Ram randomly inscribed. Moving my palms around the pot in reverence, I offered a few drops of water and the soil soaked it up all in.

That same scent of earthiness again – I felt it entice the deepest corners of my heart.

The house resonated in an all encompassing silence and yet I heard him. I felt his presence and I heard his voice - He was speaking to me through a language which transcended corporeal boundaries of existence and extinction – fragrance of his mitti which he had nurtured with his love and which in turn had fostered his devotion all life.

House temple – no idol or picture. Just a coat of geru.

I offered my prayers at the mand – a small structure housing our family god - the ancestral temple dedicated to our lineage deity located on the open terrace. I squatted on the uneven floor and creaked open the pretty little temple door. There was no idol inside, not even a photo. But an image - hand painted with geru (wet mud) on the chuna coated walls.

A whiff of earthiness hit me, again.

Many strands of sacred red threads called moli in varying sizes and lengths decked the walls of the sanctum. As I closed my eyes and muttered a silent prayer for me and my near and dear ones, the one that I had learnt from dadiji as a kid, I felt the presence of a higher force. Perhaps I had been hallucinating, what with me having traveled nonstop for the last 16 hours. Or was it for real? - The power of a force higher than us - The God?

Perhaps the molis weren't as ordinary as they had initially seemed to be. After all, these were diffident bundles of faith and beliefs tied since hundreds of years ago, perhaps even more. I guess it were the same beliefs that cumulated as stories and legends which my grandma narrated to me in my summer vacations. Even today, I could hear her soft whispers swirling around bringing those stories alive. I closed my eyes and clasped my hands tighter. Beneath the deep blue skies beaming with a golden sunshine, the breeze permeated my senses.

I felt blessed.

Local bazaars: Surahi

I plunged lazily into the warren of the local bazaars where heaps of vegetables were set on display and piles of spices lay for sale. But it was the fragrance of wet mud wafting on the village breeze that drew me into a tiny pottery shop. Amid a sea of mutkas – decorated by colors red, golden, brown – I saw women immersed in coloring pots while men waiting for the customers. Brown colored surahis with their artistic lion shaped mouth and a narrow trunk bowled me over. There was a reason. The surahi would provide me with cool water all through the year, claimed the grizzled craftswoman as she prepared to hand it over with a smile so wide that it amplified the folds on her face. A testimony to the hardships she had borne all her life, isolated from the outside world. And yet her face glowed with a sense of rich contentment. And her face radiated in a smile that lit her eyes. And warmed my senses.

That scent of earthiness, again.

It was not only about the surahi, which was now mine. But also equally about the mitti that had gone into its making – the sweat of labor, the talent of the craftsmen, and a connection to their roots.

A cup of chai and a bear hug

I drank tea with the cow herders of the village and swapped stories with them. I was amused by the sight of the watered down cow dung cakes drying in the courtyard outside the brick mud thatched roofs. These dried to a smooth hard surface on which they would thrash the harvested grains. Just before parting, she grasped my shoulder to bring me closer, and I immediately sniffed the aroma arising from her henna decorated hands which had been freshly ground and prepared by her own self.

That same earthy beauty again.

She laughed heartily and hugged me like a bear. I never wanted to leave, I could spend hours in that balmy embrace but I realized this was the nature of a yatra. I bid farewell but not without taking something along that would never part my being – the scent of the earthy beauty, a concoction of her henna dyed hands and the dried cow dung cakes in the courtyard. A smell that was real, warm and humanizing in a certain way.

Evening times brought me back to the haveli courtyard where bonfires were lit up and strains of music regaled in the air. The village was a family and it humbled me to realize, I was a part of them. A temporary stove was put out with wood and bricks to cook the food in the open. It was a time to leave all the sorrows and disappointments behind. Instead it was a time of sharing, caring and bonding over daal baati choorma, jalebi and mangodi ki kadhi. The slow drifting air carried the music and the aroma of food billowing up from the huge heated cauldrons. Filled with love and the same earthiness that had now become my companion for the journey.

The fragrance just didn't stop in Rajasthan – the stories and the sights carrying it, many. It wafted out from the parched blistered skin of the earth, swiped across radiant smiles, seeped through the fables of lore and swirled around vast heating cauldrons. No matter where I went, this fragrance dogged my steps and stuck to my memory. I couldn't help but drool over a sense I could barely figure out – something I chose to label as earthy over time – it tickled my traveler’s senses. This earthy beauty was as much a part of the city as the rustic havelis and the rolling dunes – as it is now mine… a fragrance that swaddles copiously every time I think of her, even now, while I write this piece … cocooned in the concrete of my house enjoying the pitter patter on the tin roof outside.

Aromatic Earthy Memories: An Ode to Rajasthan ... A Photo Montage

Glossary words:

Chuna - Limestone
Dadaji - Grandfather

Dadiji - Grandmother

Geru - Red-ochre colored mud, generally considered pure, hence used to paint images of Lord
Ghoonghat - veil

Haveli - Ancestral house

Mand - Ancestral temple belonging to local lineage

Mitti - Mud
Moli - Red sacred thread