Traditions

As a kid, I always knew it was only a matter of time.  Time to graduate from wearing shorts at home to wearing veshti. 

I do not recall when exactly that happened, but it did.

It worked well.  It felt wonderful to feel that I was being recognized as a grown up.  Almost an adult. 

When the veshti got dirty, however, there was no way to camouflage that.  Eventually the white became off-white, and then an inevitable yellowish-brown.  The attempts to whiten that and make it look new all over included dyeing it with Robin Blue, which always made it worse unlike what the manufacturer claimed.

Soon, the the charm of the newness of wearing a veshti wore off.  I didn't want to become a dull and boring adult.  And certainly I did not want to become a brahmin.  

So, into the teens, I suppose wearing a lungi was how we teenagers and young men rebelled within this traditional world. 

A lungi, also called a kylee, was a horror to the traditional elders.  Disgusted they were with what they considered to be trashy and uncultured.

But then it is not that the elders were sticking with the traditions either.  The traditional nine-yard sari (madisar) had given way to the six-yards.  Mother wore it only when she was participating in religious rituals.  On a daily basis, father wore trousers and not the panchakachcham.  

The drift away from traditions wasn't anything new.  My grandfather wore shorts in his adult life!

Grandfather during his undergraduate years at Varanasi (Benares)
in the early-1930s.  Notice his socks/stockings? ;)

Imagine that!  No veshti but in a pair of shorts.  And no kudumi but a "crop" as my grandmother referred to the modernized man's hairstyle.

Veshti and and kudumi stand out in a world that has become globalized.

In Neyveli, the town where I grew up, there were a couple of professionals who wore veshtis to work.  Even to clubs.  A favorite memory is of one gent, with the traditional kudumi rushing around town on his Lambretta.  And, even more surreal the image of him at the bridge table in the smoke-filled cards room at Park Club--apparently he was sharp at bridge.

The older I get, the more I tire of the modern, especially when the world begins to look the same.  I suppose the old rebel in me wants to rebel against this "modernity."  But, relax, I have no plans to wear a veshti to work, or anywhere for that matter ;)  The last I wore one was at my niece's wedding:

When I travel, men and women wearing clothes that reflect their respective cultures and traditions fascinate me.  When in India, I am impressed with the sight of half-sari wearing girls. Or, the women in their traditional outfits in Ecuador.

In the clash between the tradition and the "modern," rarely does a tradition survive.  But then we create new traditions as we become modern, which a future generation will slowly and systematically walk away from.

Traditions!