Mamoni, Ghosh and Bose households - memories.

22 June 2018

Mamoni is in extreme left, next to Buddha Bose aka Baba aka Guruji. Nanima is next to Buddha Bose. Then comes Byamacharya Bishnu Charan Ghosh aka Dadai, next to him is Arun Bose, Ashok Bose and Biswanath Ghosh. Sitting below is Karuna Ghosh and Rooma Bose.

Before I proceed I must apologise to Mamoni for losing the one photograph of hers I possessed. It was a big framed one. She was in a sari sitting and smiling her beautiful smile. I searched here in the house but could not find it. My life has not been exactly a stationary life and roaming from place to place I lost quite a few priceless stuff of my parents' too. 

Getting married to Ashok Bose was getting married to the whole family living in 4/2 Rammohan Roy Road, Calcutta -9. And I loved it. Honestly, I loved Nanima's (Ashalata Ghosh) praise and tender love. She shared many moments of her married life to make me understand how a woman adjusts in her married life. Ashok was not exactly the usual husband - 'husband'? No way! But this is about the whole family so I shall desist talking specifically about Ashok Bose. 
Mamoni - Ava Rani Bose nee Ghosh, eldest daughter of Byamacharya Bishnu Charan Ghosh. She was my mother-in-law. Sounds serious? Hahaha! She was a fun loving lady with grits. When I met her she was into wearing ochre coloured top and a skirt - she had become a self induced sanyasini and lived with us on the 2nd floor of the address, while Baba aka Buddha Bose stayed on the first floor inside the office room. That office room has been decked and coloured now and is used by Prem Sundar Das.

Betel nuts or supari and betel nut cutter or jnati (j pronounced in a nasal sound). 

Mamoni loved paan. She would have it definitely after meals and sometimes at other times, too. She had a big metallic box which had small quarters to keep the betel nuts, 'choon', 'khoir', 'dokta', big elaichi seeds. she also had a big silver jati to cut the betel nuts into small bite-able pieces. I learned how to do it. She would first take a half betel leaf, apply choon and then khoir and then sprinkle with tiny pieces of betel nuts and elaichi seeds. Oh did I forget mauri or saunf - fennel seeds in English! Mamoni would be in a very cheerful mood whenever she had this magic box near her or when she was about to savour the first bite of her handmade paan. Yes I too got to have it sometimes. And Mamoni would invariably give a small bite to Surya Shekhar Bose/Bablan or Chandra shekhar Bose/Bhumba before she put the green savoury into her mouth. That way she had the kids in her grasp and could cuddle and smother them with kisses. You see Mamoni sat in one place. Movement for her was confined to shifting her posture, sitting up or lying down on the floor on her huge bolster pillow. Yes she could get up painfully, go to the attached bathroom or sit at the dining table, especially, at meal times. But she could not run after the toddlers and catch them to hug them. Paan was an allurement to bring the little ones close to her and the other way to bring them close was when the television would be on. 

Mamoni used to drive a car like this in Calcutta - one of the few women drivers in the city in those days. She used to drop her sons and brother to their school and fetch them back. Ashok's friend, Arup Mukherjee, told me - ' I found her to be a very loving mother. She drove them (the boys) to school everyday and picked them after school.'
Once Mamoni related an incident involving this car. She said she was sitting in the back seat while Baba was driving and her father, Dadai was sitting next to him in front. Suddenly as the car kept moving she saw Baba's head turned to the right at a 90 degree angle and it was the same case with her father! She was about to yell for them to look straight when she too turned her head right to see what had captured her husband's and father's attention. It was a good looking woman walking down the road. Oh how Mamoni laughed when telling this story and said - "Tutu always remember men will be men. Let a good looking woman go past and their heads are bound to be turned."

A television set similar to this was brought in one morning in August 1975. It was a Weston tv set, I remember. Baba came in with some electricians and got it fixed next to the telephone in the second floor room. It was just right so that Mamoni could watch comfortably from the floor. It was the first day of television broadcast in Calcutta. The broadcast used to be in the mornings and evenings; and that day we watched the opening of television broadcast in Calcutta. And you know what Mamoni commented? She told Baba - "Ah ha! So now you got me a toy to play with while you are busy with your disciples, the whole day!"   Yes humorous and at the same time it revealed how much she missed being with her husband, working alongside him and practically being the busy-bee she used to be. Coming back to prime time, Mamoni loved watching Shib Shekhar/Icecream sit and dance to the intial music of the news broadcast. Icecream was about 7-8 months at the time.

Now why was my first born named Icecream? As you can see he was fair with blue eyes and pink cheeks. He was often mistaken to be a girl because of his deliciously good looks. Mamoni said he reminds her of vanilla icecream and so presto! he was nicknamed Icecream! Till date he is still addressed by this name by most of us, even though he is a grown man now.  Mamoni loved ice cream and sweets of every kind.  Even though she had blood sugar she would quietly get the kitchen boy to buy her sweets in the afternoons. And she shared them with me. I, too loved sweets. In her sweet, loving moments Mamoni would call me Tutti-frutti, instead of Tutu. 

I did not know how to cook. I learned from scratch from Mamoni. She would sit in the room or at the dining table and instruct me every step. I would keep running back and forth from the kitchen to get the next instruction. There was a cook, Gobindo from Orissa - a very temperamental human being. He cooked superbly, I learned cabbage curry from him. Mamoni taught me to cook dishes like keema curry, fried chicken (her speciality), razella, simple aloo curries etc. I became an expert in aloo dish and rotis/chapattis, so much so, Baba would have this everyday for his breakfast and I would naturally be cooking it with pride. while Mamoni would sit and watch over the serving and gaze lovingly at her handsome husband. wow! was there love in the air! She just worshipped the ground Baba walked on. 

I learned bhetki fry- how the fish needed to be immersed in lemon juice etc and then dipped in egg batter, then covered with crumbs before frying. delicious! Rooma taught me dhania chicken. Mami aka Krishna Ghosh taught me a special karela dish, which I make even now. Mami even taught me how to eat a big fish head. Honestly I literally learned to be a Bengali after my marriage. And how can I forget those days of my first pregnancy and how the sight of food made me rush to the bathroom.  Mamoni and Nanima would sit there watching me like a hawk while I sat down for lunch. Lunch meaning rice, dal, vegetables, fish curry etc. I would have gone through just about half of my plate before I would run to throw it all out. When I came out of the bathroom I would find another plate of lunch set for me and both mother and daughter sitting there till I finished my food. It went on for many days till my morning sickness (?) subsided. And so did this stern attitude of Nanima and Mamoni. As Nanima said - "You eat, You throw up. And then you eat the same amount of food again till you can keep it inside you." She always said that a pregnant woman must eat as much as possible and not let the baby grow too much inside her but to nourish and nurture the baby once it is born with love, massage,care and proper feeding. She was so right. 

I shall add to this later. There is too much to write. Too many memories. Too many incidents - happy and sad.