...New Year Gru ntings!

 

 

Driving past the Vidyasagar Setu or milling amidst the bhadralok of Kolkata, it was difficult to imagine that snuggling in the armpit of this bustling metropolis lay a quaint little hamlet, as Chinese as any in Guangzhou or Kowloon. On 18 February this year, you needn’t have necessarily been in mainland China or Hand-Over Hong Kong to behold the significance of the turn of the Chinese lunar calendar. All you have to do is walk down an alley in northwest Kolkata and follow the wafting aroma of tanned leather mixed with incense and fried dim sums and you’ll find yourself staring into pretty oriental faces that’ll smile and wish you Gung hay fat choy (meaning, ‘May you become prosperous’) or Sun nien fai lok (meaning, ‘Happy New Year’).

A 50-minute ride from Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport – a generous estimate discounting the joyless traffic in the City of Joy – Tangra, or Dhapa as it is locally known, is supposed to be the Kolkata gourmand’s (mutually inclusive) coveted point for Chinese cuisine. From a distance, though, it’s no appetising aroma that welcomes the Tangra visitor but an almost revolting reek remindful of the tannery travails of the region. Labyrinthine lanes dotted by dovetailed Chinese restaurants, the Dhapa ghetto and the depressing destitution leading to it is one that cries for some Feng Shui fix in the least. Despite the bleakness of the Indian shacks, the Chinese (a term referring only to the people’s origin; most generations are Indian) residences, big and small with doors mostly in red – colour of luck and prosperity for the erstwhile Dragon Land denizens, are abuzz with feverish preparations to welcome the New Year of the Boar. Preparations for the New Year aren’t a day’s affair for the young and old Chinese. “It’s like how you celebrate Diwali”, explains Mary Wu, a Tangra native. Swept clean of replaceable old items, Mary’s house looks like a spic ’n span Feng Shui model – wind chimes in every second corner, good luck graffiti in red on the walls, and of course, lots of fishes! From dragon fish to flowerhorns, in aquariums, in tubs and before you unwittingly dip that mug, beware... in buckets too. Proclaims the proud elder son Edwin looking at the one and a half foot long dragon fish, “I bought that for a pittance and now they are offering me twenty grand for it – not that I’m baited!” Mary and Edwin are a family of four generations settled in Tangra and celebrate the New Year in all native spirit. Apart from the cleanliness spree, all, especially the children, are required to abstain from foul language in the week’s run-up to the D-Day. For the children, there isn’t greater frolic than to indulge now and you’ll see how…

As darkness falls on the eve, all family members collect for the prayer session. The Tangra Chinese are mostly Buddhists who offer their obeisance to the ancestors with neatly packaged fruits, whole chicken, candles, incense sticks and money! Done up in lights and flowers, the house and the ancestors’ mantle don a divine air as the members stand and pray together holding incense (red again!) sticks, the biggest of them 4 feet long!

Special scribbled paper called Tz Pao, deemed wealth for the ancestors, is also burnt, all symbolising a means of transferring comfort and peace to the ancestors’ spirits. There then follows a sumptuous feast between 7 and 8 pm that all household folks partake of together, and the scene of the occasion then shifts to the highlight of the carnival – the lion and dragon dances. After the meals, all of Tangra breaks out in resounding and rhythmic drum roll, as energetic young ‘uns set off holding creative club banners in an entourage of elaborately crafted dragons out of silk, bamboo and paper towards the compound of the local alma-mater, the Central Chinese School. There were clubs like Warriors, Lucky Star, South Tangra Chinese Youth Club (the oldest club operative) and they all compete in terms of the best costumes, steps and best of all, the amount of Fung Pao or Lucky Money that’s tied at a height and the dragon must procure. As the various processions converge at the school, with deafening drums in tow, the sight of the couple of dancers simulating the dancing dragon or lion and rooting for the money, with sky and earth playing canvas to psychedelic pyrotechnics… it was almost like New Year meets Diwali meets Ganesh Chaturthi!

The celebrations last through the night and ends with the family elders heading for either of the monasteries at Lake Town or Chor Bagan where prayers are followed by vegetarian community feasts. The elders also go in droves to Achipur, where lies the temple of Tong Achi thus eagerly invoking a beautiful New Year.

With the Chinese in Tangra, not all remains the same or good – the tanneries have been asked to shift, the food isn’t as exclusive and the population itself is weaning away from the city… But when they say that the forthcoming year is that of the Golden Pig – a rare occurrence (once in 600 years) that augurs harmony and luck for all, then we’d like to hope there are blessed times ahead… A little bit of India, a little bit of China & a whole lot of Tangra

In 18th century Bengal, Tong Achi, a Chinese businessman was promised all the land he could cover on horseback by the provincial government, thus laying the foundation for what is popularly known as Tangra today. A dilapidated but lively corner of the city, tanneries and restaurants flourished once, even as Sino-Indian relations soured. After the war in 1962, the Indian government stopped the influx and the residents endured suspicion and hostility. The bitterness has faded now as Chen Hua Jung, 78, exclaimed, “I belong (here). Why would I want to go to China?” A harmonious neighbourhood, Mohammed Qadir, an ethnic Indian old-timer from the area remarked with a smile “The Chinese are very peaceful and friendly and treat everyone with respect”. Be that as it may, inter-racial marriages are still frowned upon within a community that has remained cordial with the deluge on its shores without compromising an inch on its cultural integrity. The tanneries have gone, and Tangra’s predominantly Buddhist population has assimilated itself into mainstream careers in IT etc. Others, whose ancestors came here in search of pastures greener than those back home have moved on to pastures greener still- everywhere, anywhere but China...