An Overdue Haircut

Dear dedicated reader,

When I first met Mr. Tailor’s androgynous offspring, Krishna, I was stymied.

“Your… child is so cute,” I said, calling out the reserve word I formerly used when making cold calls to parents in the Boston Public School system when I couldn’t determine the sex of their child.

“Oh Thank You!” Kamleshbhai (Mr. Tailor’s true name, or so we’ve discovered) exclaimed with his usual exuberance. No follow up, no pronoun use. I couldn’t ask any questions about the small cute kid now running haplessly around the shop without giving away that I didn’t know his sex and since Krishna is both a girl’s and a boy’s name here, I wasn’t getting any help from that quarter either. So, I simply smiled and nodded emphatically.

Krishna, for his (or was it her?) part, burst into tears on sight of me. I seem to have that effect on small kids around here.

Since that encounter in Mr. Tailor’s crowded and colorful workshop, Melissa and I uncovered the answer to this elusive question through a recent invitation: I had stopped by Mr. Tailor’s shop as I sometimes do to sit in the back near the foot powered sewing machines whose whirring needles punch the fabric in a rhythmic way while Mr. Tailor looks on, now and then stopping to cut a piece of material.

We had been discussing the coming of Narendra Modi and the business acumen of the Gujarati people when he abruptly veered away from these topics.

“You…will…” he began in a sort of stop and start English, struggling to force the language to express his thoughts. I peered at him curiously until he switched into Hindi and the words began to flow. “You will come to our house on Thursday for the babri?”

“Babri – matlab (meaning)?” I asked him, not understanding.

“Er,” he paused, thinking of the best way to say it, “the haircut of my son,” (ah ha!) “he is cutting his hair for the first time.”

“Isn’t he like, two years old?” I said, confused.

“Yes, it is our tradition, no haircut until he is so old and then we will shave his head.” Suddenly, I remembered: I had seen photos of the ceremony at people’s houses and read about it in my religion class in college, but this would be the first time that I would see it for myself.

When we arrived on the appointed day, an awning had been set up over the street, blocking any traffic making the mistake of trying to get through on this special day. Chairs had been set up in rows outside for no one in particular’s use. All the men were simply standing around outside talking to each other while the women sat sequestered on the floor in the small main room of the house. Kamleshbhai smiled widely as he saw us walking up the street: when we arrived under the awning, after some warm ‘namastes’, he motioned for us to go inside with the rest of the women and take our seats. The room was packed wall to wall with women ranging from the beautifully wrinkled faces of old women with crooked teeth and wireless spectacles to young black-haired women bedecked in sparkling bangles and colorful, jeweled saris.

There was one open space on the floor which, after a moment of hesitation, we decided was the perfect size for two American teachers. When Kamleshbhai saw that we had elected to sit on the floor, he motioned to an empty bench in the corner where we could sit comfortably, but since none of the other women were sitting in such a manner, we protested and said that we would be fine on the floor. What we did not realize was that his generosity was not for our benefit but rather for his, since the open space in which we had elected to sit was right in front of the shrine to Ganesha where the family would need to sit for the ceremony. By the time we realized our mistake, it was too late: the arm of Indian hospitality had swung into action and rugs were being pulled from the other room and placed in front of us to give the parents and Krishna somewhere to sit as they performed the necessary pooja. My cheeks burned with embarrassment, but by the time I protested and said we would be happy to move it was far too late. I mentally added it to the ever-growing list of faux-pas by the American teachers.

Kamleshbhai and his wife sat on either side of small Krishna, whose hair had been loosed from the pony tail holder that usually keeps it out of his face in a tight sprout from the top of his head. When the priest began to chant, Kamleshbhai smiled down at his tiny son and put his hands together in a gesture of prayer; Krishna followed suit, straightening his tiny fingers into a gesture of piety, looking up at his father for approval.

The ceremony itself was merely a prelude to the big show which followed: once the rice had been powdered and thrown at the shrine of Ganesh-ji and two one rupee coins had been pasted to the wall using ghee, Kamleshbhai’s sister, as per tradition, grabbed a lock of Krishna’s hair and used a large blessed pair of shears to cut off a huge hunk of Krishna’s hair. Looking at the hair in her hands, Krishna began to loudly cry and was taken outside where the rest of his hair was shorn short so that it would be easier to shave.

The guests followed and I watched as both of Krishna’s parents had to physically restrain him as the barber brandished his sharp razor over Krishna’s screaming head. I gasped and bit my lip with nervousness each time the razor was brought towards his head: Krishna was wildly bucking and kicking in his parents arms, screaming a frenzied plea to all the delighted adults assembled to watch. Despite his parents cooing, and promises of forthcoming chocolate, he raged on; meanwhile, I found myself impressed by the skillfulness of the barber who always seemed to move the razor away from his rearing scalp at just the right moment, averting potentially bloody accidents left and right. The poor kid had cut hair covering every part of his exposed face, his neck, his arms. I would have bucked and screamed too, in that situation.

Just after the barber ran the razor artfully down the last curve of Krishna’s scalp, leaving him completely bald, Krishna was whisked away in the arms of his aunt inside to have the stray hair washed from his face and to have his clothes changed. When he emerged again, this time clad in a golden colored kurta pyjama, he was still bawling in her arms, refusing the comfort of all his well meaning relatives. When a sympathetic aunt handed him a Cadbury chocolate bar, he screamed even louder and threw the chocolate bar with all his might back at her face, narrowly missing her nose.

Perhaps as a way to distract from the ill-mannered reception of the his first haircut, Kamleshbhai drew our attention away from Krishna and his adoring relatives with an invitation of lunch. Two runners had been laid down on the street under the awning upon which, as with many feasts we have been to here, we were to sit. The rocky, gravelly street did not make for the most comfortable vantage point for eating lunch; however, I did not want to offend Kamleshbhai, so I maneuvered my legs around in my sari so that I could sit and eat the thali-style meal which was being served to us by jean-clad teenage boys (a theme for feasts here).

Just as everyone had gotten settled in neat rows of hands digging into food and mouths chewing thoughtfully at their Gujarati delicacies, an unexpected visitor arrived to partake in the proceedings. I looked up from my plate, hand poised in front of my mouth to deliver a tasty portion of papad when I saw a large cow with overgrown horns sauntering right into the middle of the tent.

For a moment, everyone just stared at it and for the briefest of seconds I thought it was going to be allowed to walk as it pleased through the tent. It stopped, looked, and then swung its head dangerously towards the left and stuck out its large, hammy tongue dripping with oozing saliva to indulge in some sabzi from the platter of a woman sitting across from me. She leapt up with a scream of fright and Melissa and I started back as well, thinking the scream would force it to head in our direction. Immediately, the men descended upon it, thwacking it and making clicking noises until it was run out from under the tented awning and made to promenade itself back up the street.

As we savored our meal, Krishna, tears freshly dried and smiling now as if all was indeed forgiven (I have my suspicions about the role the chocolate may have played in this decision), made is way in the company of his cousins down the row of guests, smiling and gurgling attentively as the perfect host. His newly bald head shone in the noon sunlight and as he passed me, he even put out a little hand.

As strange as the whole thing seemed at the time, on reflection, how natural is it to dress up male babies in white dresses and sprinkle water on them? I’m just saying, is all.

Best,
Cat