All In A Morning's Work
I stepped out into the street today, armed with my mask to buy a small crinkled cantaloupe from the fruit vendor. Another vendor cycled by slowly and I noticed that he had a stack of beautifully carved stones that are amazing kitchen equipment requiring zero maintenance for upto thirty years.
I stopped him and we began a masked conversation, wherein I admired the chiselling he had done on the stones. Each stone slab was exquisite and a finished art work, reminding me after a long long time that everyday objects could be both functional and aesthetic, and add to working pleasure every time they were put to use. I use a silbatta (or ammi kallu as we call it in South India) in my kitchen and it belonged to my mother-in-law. She would often use it to rustle up a small handful of dry or wet chutneys when the big and small mixies were not required or unusable in the event of a power cut. Now it sits on a ledge outside my kitchen, and it is a pleasant spot to grind and crush small spices and leaves, and little bits of rock salt when I cook.
Silbaatas, other than being effective kitchen assistants could generate mirth and raise a laugh as I discovered when my daughter came home from primary school with news about an ohjective test on household objects and what they were made of. "Amma,what is a silbatta?," she had queried and I had pointed to the ammi kallu. "Oh! she replied, her face falling, "I didn't know this is called a silbatta and is made of stone. In the test at school I crossed out stone and circled paper as the correct answer." Amused at the idea of the paper silbatta I explained that the grinding stone was named differently in different languages, wondering if it was solely up to mothers and language teachers to establish links and connections between languages. Shouldn't teachers of other disciplines also endeavour to do the same?
This year, it will be thirty years since my mother -in -law passed away, but her silbatta continues to be one of the workhorses in my kitchen, because the texture of crushed ingredients in chutneys that silbatta -grinding produces followed by the effortless wash with water cleaning -up -after remains unparalleled. Over time, my silbatta has been worn down to smooth stone so I asked the iterant vendor if he could re-chisel my silbatta for me. He agreed and I brought it out from its perch in my backyard to the front door where Bablu settled down to work his craft. A couple of neighbours also brought out their old silbattas for chiselling.
Twenty minutes later, here below is my new Bablu -chiselled-silbatta., with its personal stone accessory. I took an ordinary photo and then staged the next photo, on a red cushion.
Kavita who comes in to help with kitchen work has been wanting a silbatta and I had promised to pick up a new one for her, reluctant to part with mine. My sister confirmed that she too required a small table top silbatta, although she hosts mom's granite ammi on her terrace. Here are two new guests, handchiselled by Bablu, enroute to their new homes.
After a long, grim winter, the weather seems right and the possibility of connecting to the quiet pleasures of the quotidian have begun to surface. With many thanks to Bablu , here is looking forward to summery buttermilk times, redolent with the flavours of fresh currypatta and green chillies, silbatta -crushed with rock salt and hing!
