Memories lost in crevices of time

Forty years is a long time and even cities that are over 200 years old change during that time. That’s how I felt on a recent visit to my birthplace Patiala, especially the Tripuri area. Tripuri was the closest market from my house in New Police Lines in Patiala, and in the mid-1970s it was more like a village caught in the middle of a town.

Most of the families there were from Bahawalpur in Pakistan who had settled in the area after the Partition. It is famous for Punjab’s traditional embroidery, phulkari, which the women of the area used to do in their homes.  Humble houses with brick facades and wooden gates and narrow lanes characterised Tripuri where I would often visit along with my mom, to get the phulkari done on bedsheets, dupattas and sarees for our more “metro” relatives from Delhi and elsewhere in India.

The homes of these women, with a distinct smell of fabrics stacked all over and reels of silk threads in myriad colours lined neatly on floor, were fascinating for a child as it was to see them effortlessly embroider intricate designs. That was before the era of middlemen and one could directly deal with the artisans. These images from the past flitted before my eyes, as overzealous salesmen explained the difference between handmade and machine-made phulkaris during my recent visit to purchase a piece of this Punjabi heritage.

Now, the shops there have become modern multi-storeyed structures. The road is no longer bricked and the narrow lanes and houses with simple facades have changed. It felt surreal as new images slowly overwrote my childhood memories. My eyes searched for some family member of the humble artisans whom I once knew, but I couldn’t find a single familiar face, making me wonder if I had visited the place 40 years ago or whether it was in a different lifetime.

As I wandered along those roads, a couplet of Ahmad Faraz flitted through my mind:

“Ab na woh main, na woh tu hai, na woh mazi hai Faraz, jaise do shakhas tamanna ke sarabon me milein.”

(Now neither does that past exist nor that me or you. It seems like two shadows had met in the mirages of desire)

Geetu Vaid, Chandigarh

 

 

Patiala