Idli and Sambar
Written by Nickin Alexander
Concept by Judith Devraj
Saturday mornings are meant for recovery.
There is no negotiation and no debate… This is what it’s supposed to be.
But somehow, my mother has got it into her sweet, Malayali brain that Saturday mornings are meant for her being as loud as possible.
Blending, chopping, vacuuming the house with Star Singer playing on the TV at full volume.
It’s not late…it’s still early…
9 am on a Saturday is still early…which means I’m supposed to be asleep, but instead, I found myself blinking away strands of sunlight and struggling to find an inner peace that could deafen our houses noise.
But when you’re up, you’re up….regardless of what time you strolled in on Friday night…and regardless of how many drinks you skulled, not 12 hours beforehand.
Whiskey was still on my breath as I picked up my brush and rubbed toothpaste into my teeth with it. I stared at myself in the mirror….dark circles under dreary eyes and my hair matted and all over the place, but thankfully clean of all the product I had wrapped in it the night before.
I showered my best last night, mostly because the sweat had made it impossible to sleep in my bed…
I had to get it off…so I chucked my clothes into the laundry and bathed myself…hoping a clean body would somehow give me good sleep and save me from a wretched hangover. I also thought brushing my teeth was a good idea, but all that did was make me throw up.
It could’ve been worse though…it could’ve been in my bed rather than in the shower.
I stomached some water after and slid under warm covers with a clean body and a drunk mind, unaware that id wake up with the smell of whiskey still on my tongue and a throbbing headache that made the whistles of a pressure cooker downstairs, all the more unbearable
I washed the sleep out of my eyes and gave myself a disapproving look as I hunched over the bathroom sink….
What a night…
And what a way to ruin it with a 9 am wake up from an overbearing South Indian mother.
I grabbed a t-shirt and slipped it on, slowly making my way down the stairs, careful as the kitchen table came into view.
WE got the house a couple of years back…it was nice…multiple places to eat and drink…but everyone was everywhere, and everywhere could be seen…which I low key hated.
I liked being unseen…under the radar…to myself…especially in a house like this…
I know…I sound like Bruce fucking Wayne right now…but it’s true.
Weekend mornings usually mean breakfasts with the family…but because I’ve been spending more and more time out late, breakfast to me is more often than not lunch.
So I guess my mother finally got her wish… kinda.
I walked down the remaining steps and spotted my Dad walking his plate over to the kitchen sink.
The last of whatever curry now stained onto his plate and the smell of South Indian breakfast lingering as he joined Ma in the kitchen.
I walked over to the table and spotted the empty plate that should have belonged to me.
Carefully looking over to the kitchen Island, I was met with a disapproving look from a pair of eyes.
I tried to shrug them off but even that wasn’t enough to deafen the loud muttering of my mothers Malayalam.
“…wakes up late for breakfast…doesn’t even say good morning….might as well stay in bed all day…”
Yeah, Mum…that was the plan until you ruined it with blending and motherland music.
My attitude matched hers.
I know I’m a brat…but I had a headache, and again, Saturdays were meant for sleeping.
I opened the steel lid over another porcelain bowl. I knew what was in it before I saw it, I mean how could I not, the house was filled with its smell.
Sambar.
It was my favourite. I loved it on everything. A simple vegetable curry with a number of spices that worked well with pretty much all possible combinations. It was good for breakfast lunch or dinner, and there were many of my childhood days that I ate it for each meal without getting sick of it.
A twinge of guilt stung my insides as a single thought entered my mind.
I turned back over to Ma, her back now facing me as she busily worked away in the kitchen. Dad was chatting to her about something work-related…
I wondered if she made this with me in mind….hoping to drag my ass out of bed and have a proper family meal to start off our weekend.
Surely not. She knew I would try and sleep in and would be in a bad mood if woken up early…and besides…it was normal for sambar to be had on a weekend morning…
I turned back to the contents of a lidded casserole.
The steel had slightly fogged up and I could smell a soft scent of rice flour…
Lifting it up carefully, I thought it would be Dosa. My dad loves dosa…everyone does. It’s a real favourite…and perfect with sambar.
But it wasn’t.
Small white little muffin top like cakes sat neatly inside the steel bowl.
They were still warm and the aroma wafted into my nostrils as the lid disappeared from view.
Idli.
No one liked idli.
Well a couple of us did…but no one my age liked it.
My mates always gave me shit for loving the taste of what they affectively called, “a white sponge”.
I don’t know why I loved it so much… I mean dad was a fan too, but he’d choose Dosa over idli any day of the week. Maybe it was because of my grandfather…the bloke would smash 5 or 6 before working in a field for 6 hours. He stood tall and was strong as an ox, muscle-bound and a real hard man…something I always envied as a small, stick-like brown boy.
But all that didn’t really matter, all I knew was that if idli was on the menu, then I had no complaints.
I reached inside and grabbed a few before smothering it in a spoonful of sambar.
I spied some chutney in a small bowl and carefully placed some on the edge of my plate.
Not wanting to get an earful, I headed outside to our backyard, looking forward to the soft cushion the awaited me on our outdoor chairs.
The sun was shining, and there were birds chirping. A couple of robins softly calling in the spring day…the temperature was just right, with a breeze that swung through at the perfect time to help ease any heat that the sun would throw down.
I sat and watched the world around me for a second. The houses around us were busy yelling and screaming their own days away…but my ears drowned it out with the click of some insects nearby and the sound of wind chimes singing in the air.
I leant over for my first bite, carefully pushing apart the soft round mound of rice lentil cake and let it soak in the sambar around it.
Heaping a small bit into my forefingers, I slowly let my tongue taste every little spice that was sent through to my brain.
If there were ever a hangover cure…for me anyway…this was it.
I leant my head over and went in for another mouthful, careful not to spill any to the floor.
I closed my eyes this time, hoping that whatever it was that made me like this so much, would let it stick around.
I didn’t get why other people hated it…
I mean sure…it wasn’t dosa…it wasn’t the greatest thing to be made, but it was good…a solid, tasty way to start the day.
I opened my eyes and hiccuped in surprise.
The breeze was still there…but the world around me had changed.
A large paved driveway, the length and width of a small car park stood in front of me. Trees emerged from a ledge 15 or so metres away, coconut and jackfruit spilling from under their umbrella-like leaves. A steep driveway sat on my right, while the rattling of a dog cage on my left, the occupants of whom were now suddenly whimpering and barking in my direction.
I could hear the whistle of a pressure cooker, the yells of Malayalam from below the ledge and the clicking sound of more insects in the forest area that littered around me.
I knew this place.
This wasn’t foreign or forgotten…this was a home.
Ma’s home.
I hadn’t been back to India in ages…a couple of years maybe, trading it out for trips to Bali and Europe instead…mostly to enjoy some time with the boys and soak in the youth that was now desperately trying to leave us.
I always meant to come back. To come back to Kerala and see my family in Wayanad, but I guess I thought I’d seen enough and I’d seen it all…that it wasn’t really necessary.
I looked down and saw the remains of my idli. The plate was completely different, still porcelain white but with a trail of light blue flowers decorating itself along the edge.
These were the plates they used here… I knew them well…
I looked to where I was sitting, the hard marble of some steps…a place meant mostly for the play of children…
But I always found a weird comfort here…maybe because it was usually clouded in family…
I looked behind me, wondering whether this world was filled with the familiar faces of a different time…but I couldn’t hear anyone…just the same yells from below the ledge…
Was the house empty?
I looked into the living room behind me…the same brown leather chairs proudly in view, the same glass coffee table with the same vase of flowers…and the walls…the same off white that ran throughout the whole house.
I remembered how this was all so much smaller…
My uncle worked tirelessly to escape the little cottage-like home that had stuck with our family for generations. Labouring and growing his business eventually knocking down that old home, and creating this….for all of us.
Somehow though…it kept its comfort… its humility…with no expensive cars and no overindulgent furniture. Just the staples…just enough comfort and elegance that echoed the vibrancy of this world, while never betraying its attachment to family.
My eyes slowly trailed away to a photo that hung directly opposite me. Its black frame sticking out amongst the wall behind it.
Inside its glass was a portrait headshot of an elderly man who sat behind a blue background. His grey balding head contrasting perfectly with his tanned brown, leather-like skin.
A bustling grey moustache sat above his lip and under a nose that had seen more sun than almost anything else in this house.
He looked intimidating…like a man that feared almost nothing besides God…
His eyes, a light brown that stared deep into your soul and told a story of a world that now only existed in quiet Malayalam…He had seen things…
I remembered him.
But not as a son…father, or the head of a house.
I knew him as the grandfather that sat with me on these steps and ate with me as the morning rolled in.
Both of us filling our blue flowered plates with soft, warm idlis and coating them in sambar.
Both of us wordlessly eating as the sun started its work on the day around of us, both of us sipping a sweet chai and both of us enjoying a breakfast that so many others seemed to not care for …
The shock of me being here seemed to slowly ease as I looked deep into that portrait and back to my Idli, wondering not of how or why I was here…but wondering if this could be real and if that memory could ever happen again…
Without thinking, I reached down and broke off another piece, carefully letting it soak in sambar and closing my eyes as I placed it in my mouth.
I opened them up…but the world had disappeared…the breeze had remained constant, but everything else had changed.
I found myself back…the little backyard sitting in a suburban world, millions of miles away from where I just sat.
I shook off the illusion and finished my food, my mind wandering away with each bite till finally there was nothing left but a different plate sitting on my lap.
Wiping my mouth, and getting up, I edged back into the kitchen and ran water over my plate, cleaning whatever was left and hoping that it magically changed into being littered with those little light blue flowers…
But nothing changed, just the remnants of curried stains slowly waving away, and the smell of dish soap as I racked the plate to dry…
I leant over the sink and watched the day through the window outside… guilt had started to wrap my insides as I thought of why…why that happened….
Maybe I needed a memory to nurse this hangover…or maybe I needed to hear its call, to visit again… or maybe I needed to remind myself of the fondest times eating what I ate, with a person that was no longer here….
I turned around and saw my mothers eyes watching…a look of disapproval still printed on her face.
I didn’t bite…I couldn’t…the guilt inside had made me realise why I liked Idli so much….
Without thinking I gave her a hug…her body was surprised…
“Thanks, for the idli Ma…” I said.
I don’t know if it was the fact that I kept on hugging or the truth in my voice…but she wrapped her hands around me and laughed…
We separated.
I looked at her half-smiling face…
And as I stared into her eyes, those same eyes from that portrait that hung from that wall, I saw what I had always felt when I ate idli and sambar…and I saw what she always saw when I ate it too.
Not just a hungover, young man with a hungry and sleepy gaze…but her son sitting next to her father eating breakfast on a warm, Wayanad morning on the steps of where she grew up…
