Tribal Antics

Back in the land of moustaches again… that is lowland north India… In Calcutta now thinking about how to cross the Bangladeshi border. The thing is that it’s Friday afternoon and the embassies are closed until Monday. Unfortunately my Indian visa runs out on Sunday, so in theory I’d need to get out of here by then. Could chance it at the Bangla border without a visa but I’ve heard from other Irish people that they got laughed at when they tried that (although in theory the Irish don’t need a visa for tourist purposes – theorizing with border guards don’t always work though!). If that doesn’t work then I could make a beeline for Kathmandu, but I’ve got Bangladesh on the brain now. Maybe I’ll just overstay my Indian visa for a day, sort out my Bangladeshi one on Monday and go then. I’ll be a day late, but the Indian guards shouldn’t go too mad on that… I might just have to grease them up with some baksheesh to keep ‘em sweet! Anyway, it won’t have been the first time I’ve overstayed a visa and been an illegal alien… (USA, Bolivia, Pakistan…)

Anyway, let’s see what happens… In theory I could go anywhere I want, so we’ll see where I end up.

I’ve spent the last few days in a tribal village called Umsavvar in the East Khasi Hills of Megalaya, outside Shillong. It was a brilliant experience. A development worker I met in Shillong, Prince, invited me to accompany him to this village where his work was focused on education. He had a hut there and had been accepted by the villagers, so it was a great opportunity. I sat on the roofrack of a jeep for three hours while we dirt-roaded our way there (sore arse extraordinaire!)

There are three tribes in the State of Megalaya: the Khasi, the Genthia and the Goru. This village is Khasi and I met many of the villagers during the two days I was there. Prince brought me from house to house introducing me as Khana from Ri Pharang or The Foreign Land (as if there was only one). He also acted as an interpreter and would translate so that the villagers could ask questions. They asked about what we ate in my country, about my family and my work, about the weather and about my travels. I asked them about there kids, their work, their festivals and village traditions.

The village was pretty poor, without electricity or phones or anything like that. The land there was rocky and not arable, so people made broomsticks out of brush they found in a nearby gorge. Prince had been visiting the village for ten years and had established a school there and some other education-linked initiatives.

One of the interesting things about the Khasi tribe is that they are matrilineal. This means that the mother’s clan is of primary importance, rather than that of the father as is usually the case. Children inherit their mothers name only, and all property and wealth is passed on to the youngest daughter. The birth of a daughter is celebrated here as a son would be in the rest of India (given that a dowry is necessary for a daughter normally).

On a tangential note, I only found out last week that pre-natal gender determination is illegal in India, since in the past, female foeti have been aborted upon such. Is that mad or what?

Anyway, as I was saying: matrilineal… sounds alright doesn’t it? But it’s a bit weird as well! It’s not that it’s a feminist inclined society, considering power is still wielded by men: The local durbar, or village council, is a men only affair, with women banned. It’s just that the mother’s clan is of prime importance, i.e. The most important man in the family is the mother’s brother, as opposed to the father. This means that the nuclear family, as we know it in Europe, doesn’t really exist here and men are left slightly disenfranchised and tend to disappear off the scene as soon as their child is born.

I also spent the few days horsing this paan into me. They chew it all the time here, paan being to the Subcontinent what the coca leaf is to the Andes. In the northeast, they have a particularly vile concoction, which I have found myself actually getting quite used to: they wrap up a chunk of betel nut in a leaf from the paan tree smeared with a small bit of limestone paste and stick in their gobs. The betel nut and leaf make you salivate like a rabid dog and turn your spit red like blood, the lime gives you a slight high. It’s a bit of disgusting habit though. First of all, all public areas are covered in a layer of red spit that has been gobbed out by a variety of people. Secondly, you sometimes see lovely people only to open their mouths to reveal a stained set of rotting choppers from chewing paan all day.

See below for pictures of my tribal experience.