Just when you think you've pretty much touched all the bases of your dissertation research topic, out of left field will come something completely unexpected. Something that will likely take your breath away or, in rare cases, really turn your stomach. That's the beauty of doing research in a place like India. It's not going to be boring, and there is a seeming bottomless well full or unique rituals and gods and beliefs that you have never heard of or imagined before. This keeps things interesting, but it also sometimes give you the feeling that you can never know enough. You could study one small corner of this place your entire life and keep turning over stones with unbelievable things underneath.
Yesterday I made the "mistake" of wearing a nice salwar. It's a few years old but new to the folks around here. One neighbor told me it was so nice it will make your head spin; this is because it's black and I'm white and she thought it was a nice contrast. So yesterday I got some compliments on this thing. Then this morning I wake up and my middle fingernail on my left hand was infected, swollen, and very painful. I had a hangnail there that suddenly got really infected. Chellapandi took one look at it and said it was "kanneeru" or evil eye, a classic case. Suddenly it was all being pieced together, starting with the salwar from yesterday.
So she recommends that we go downtown to this sandalwood/puja supply store run by a Muslim gentleman. He would do mantras and cure my hand, she says. (Naturally I really wanted to check out a Muslim manthiravaathi, as I just interviewed three such Muslims ladies the other day who do mantras. It's very interesting to see the overlap between Hinduism and Islam in India, as far as "black magic" is concerned. Noticing that I had a cold, one of the older grandmas took my water bottle and did mantras over it and then blew into it three times. She told me to drink it in three gulps. Her daughter is basically a professional manthiravaathi who diagnoses and does evil eye cures and prophylaxes for Hindus and Muslims alike.) Before we headed downtown to visit the Muslim manthiravaathi I attempted traditional cures like iodine ointment and bandaids but it kept getting worse. I figured this witch doctor was worth a shot. Besides, it would kind of be like donating my (living) body to science.
Needless to say it was a very interesting trip. He diagnosed my finger right away as an evil eye problem. And it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see how much attention a white girl like me gets around these parts; so if there is a such thing as the evil eye, I'm going to be having constant problems it seems. He applied some ointment to my finger and then splashed me with some blessed water from a small vessel that contained lots of very intricate Arabic inscriptions from the Koran. The ointment was the consistency of petroleum jelly. We got to talking to him about the evil eye, and it wasn't until shortly after the ointment application that I realized we were standing right next to three cages, each containing a sleeping jungle cat of some kind. Turns out that this ointment is milked from the testicles of these jungle cats! When I realized this I felt very ill. But not as ill as I felt once he reached for a jar full of hairy jungle cat testicles that stunk to high heaven. I wasn't quite clear on the Tamil but it would seem that these are gleaned from the forest areas from dead jungle cats that have been killed by foxes. These attractive items fetch Rs. 150 a piece on the black (magic) market. If you are looking for a new line of work, this may be the ticket. And for a bargain 20 rupees you can get this stuff smeared on your hand and also a little carry tin of it to take home with a nice crescent moon and star design on the front. Very classy.
This gentleman was very helpful and knows a lot about drishti, needless to say. And I am going to go back and interview him in the near future. But next time I am going to avoid the jungle cat juice as it is certainly a non-vegetarian treatment.
Yesterday I made the "mistake" of wearing a nice salwar. It's a few years old but new to the folks around here. One neighbor told me it was so nice it will make your head spin; this is because it's black and I'm white and she thought it was a nice contrast. So yesterday I got some compliments on this thing. Then this morning I wake up and my middle fingernail on my left hand was infected, swollen, and very painful. I had a hangnail there that suddenly got really infected. Chellapandi took one look at it and said it was "kanneeru" or evil eye, a classic case. Suddenly it was all being pieced together, starting with the salwar from yesterday.
So she recommends that we go downtown to this sandalwood/puja supply store run by a Muslim gentleman. He would do mantras and cure my hand, she says. (Naturally I really wanted to check out a Muslim manthiravaathi, as I just interviewed three such Muslims ladies the other day who do mantras. It's very interesting to see the overlap between Hinduism and Islam in India, as far as "black magic" is concerned. Noticing that I had a cold, one of the older grandmas took my water bottle and did mantras over it and then blew into it three times. She told me to drink it in three gulps. Her daughter is basically a professional manthiravaathi who diagnoses and does evil eye cures and prophylaxes for Hindus and Muslims alike.) Before we headed downtown to visit the Muslim manthiravaathi I attempted traditional cures like iodine ointment and bandaids but it kept getting worse. I figured this witch doctor was worth a shot. Besides, it would kind of be like donating my (living) body to science.
Needless to say it was a very interesting trip. He diagnosed my finger right away as an evil eye problem. And it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see how much attention a white girl like me gets around these parts; so if there is a such thing as the evil eye, I'm going to be having constant problems it seems. He applied some ointment to my finger and then splashed me with some blessed water from a small vessel that contained lots of very intricate Arabic inscriptions from the Koran. The ointment was the consistency of petroleum jelly. We got to talking to him about the evil eye, and it wasn't until shortly after the ointment application that I realized we were standing right next to three cages, each containing a sleeping jungle cat of some kind. Turns out that this ointment is milked from the testicles of these jungle cats! When I realized this I felt very ill. But not as ill as I felt once he reached for a jar full of hairy jungle cat testicles that stunk to high heaven. I wasn't quite clear on the Tamil but it would seem that these are gleaned from the forest areas from dead jungle cats that have been killed by foxes. These attractive items fetch Rs. 150 a piece on the black (magic) market. If you are looking for a new line of work, this may be the ticket. And for a bargain 20 rupees you can get this stuff smeared on your hand and also a little carry tin of it to take home with a nice crescent moon and star design on the front. Very classy.
This gentleman was very helpful and knows a lot about drishti, needless to say. And I am going to go back and interview him in the near future. But next time I am going to avoid the jungle cat juice as it is certainly a non-vegetarian treatment.
Purveyor of fine sandalwood paste,
incense, rosewater,
and jungle cat juices.
incense, rosewater,
and jungle cat juices.
Does anyone know what this animal is exactly? I feel sorry for him, whatever he is.
Fortunately there are only three such jungle cats currently being squeezed in Madurai.
1 comment:
It appears to be a civet: any of various Old World carnivorous mammals (family Viverridae) with long bodies, short legs, and a usually long tail
2 : a thick yellowish musky-odored substance found in a pouch near the sexual organs of the civet (especially genera Civettictis, Viverra, and Viverricula) and used in perfume
It appears to be brindled and on Google Images there are several brindled varieties.
"Give me an ounce of civet, good apothecary, to sweeten my imagination." -- King Lear
I assume, the witch doctor wasn't using perfume on your carbuncle.
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