Wagon Wheel

This week was the Rash Krishna festival at the temple down the street. For a week or so before the festival sculptors came and made clay figures large and small with straw and bamboo frames that would be displayed in booths that depicted different stories of Krishna. They would later be painted and dresses. Uttam introduced me to some of the people organizing the festival. None spoke much English but everyone was friendly and one man took a picture with me. On Wednesday there was no school but many of the students came anyway and we walked down to the festival grounds. One of the hostel boys dressed as Krishna and led the procession. They had not finished setting up all the booths, so the procession marched back the other way to another temple. There was much singing and most of the students were bored and wandered off. I was sitting next to Promen, the kindly science teacher at Parijat, and he sat next to a man with wavy hair and a big wart on his eyebrow. When the celebration appeared over, the man with the wavy hair walked down to the temple and said a few things and then called me over with the overhand beckon that Indians use, like clapping with one hand. The man introduced me and put a scarf around my neck and I said thank you and "mor naam Shaffer." Promen told me that they were honoring me with a gamusa, a red and white traditional Assamese scarf. Everyone wears them. I was extremely excited that someone would honor me with such a gift without even knowing me and it was the one thing that I really wanted from my time here.

Two days later we went back to the festival (at the original temple) to watch Parijat students perform. There was a carnival feel with stalls selling mountains of sweets and booths spinning gambling wheels. Eight girls put on two beautiful dances and Sankar and another boy, Bitupon, did a stand up routine that had the crowd rolling on the ground. The drunk man who always thanks me was also there, and he thanked me several more times. Before the girls performed Uttam told me that I will sing an American song. I said no and he said You will sing and I said NONO and he said You will sing? And I said na lagay, no need, and he said OK you will sing and walked away. As much as I didn't want to sing, I needed to come up with something in case he didn’t understand my desperation and dragged me up on stage anyway. I couldn’t think of a song that I knew more than a couple lines of but after a few minutes I thought, well, I guess could sing Wagon Wheel. Yeah, ok, I could do that.

As they were announcing me as the American who was going to sing a song, there was a commotion in the temple part of the stage and someone ran over and told the mic guy to shut up and everybody got really quiet. There was some screaming and then a girl started spasming on the floor. I asked Uttam’s wife Aimoni if someone should call a doctor and she said no doctor. It seemed to get worse and I asked if someone should put something under her head. Aimoni said no and that she would explain it later, so I stopped talking and watched. The girl got up, still shaking, and sprayed people with water from a vase and screamed more. It was a very disturbing experience, more so because I think I was the only person there that didn’t know what was going on. Sankar and I went to get tea and rice cakes and he explained that it is believed that the Gods can possessed the human body, and that they remember nothing when they are dispossessed. After a break for some REAL spicy pea soup, the program went on and I reluctantly agreed to sing. When else would I have such an opportunity? So this is how, in front of at least 100 staring Indians, I got up and sang "Rock me Mama like a Wagon Wheel..." And then I was honored with another gamusa. I actually enjoyed the whole thing and it gave me a greater sense of belonging here in Pamohi. It’s a great feeling to be included into a community so rapidly and perhaps people will start to recognize me as the singing American.