Browsing Category

Heirlooms

Pachisi, Sepoys, Cowries: My Grandparents’ Tabletop Story

Throughout history, pachisi was the ‘poor man’s chaupar’. But to my grandmother, whose childhood pachisi grids were scribbled in chalk, my grandfather’s novelty board — like rubies, emeralds, sapphires, and pearls sewn together — seemed no less regal. “She embroidered each bead herself,” she tells me, looking back at the outbursts, meltdowns, and amusement this game brought to my grandparents’ living room 60 years ago. “I guess she’d be your great-great-grandmother”.

Vari da bagh

The story of this ‘vari da baagh’ begins with bebeji. It was hand-embroidered in around 1965 and given to my dadi as part of her wedding trousseau. The baagh is made of red “khaddar” hand-dyed and hand-woven cloth.

The cupboard that welcomed the daughter to the family

The cupboard is a tall and narrow one, measuring 6 feet in height.  It has four shelves inside, and a pull-out drawer symmetrically placed in the middle. The piece was in display in a furniture shop, and the shop keeper enticed him to pick it up. At Rs 200, it seemed a great bargain for a wooden unit claimed to be made of teak.

The ivory surmedaani and bindi stick

As a part of her trousseau, on her wedding – which incidentally took place during the India Pakistan war of 1971 – my maternal grandmother, Shashi Bhalla (neé Sood) carried a few objects from her mother’s trousseau from Bombay to Delhi. Two of these were later passed on to her daughter, my mother, Sapna Puri, and have now found their way to me. A surmedaani, and an ivory stick used to apply bindi.

Heirlooms from the Modern Gentleman

The two boxes – one engraved with flowers and leaves, and the other, a cigarette holder – that my mother had bequeathed to me not only belonged to my maternal grandfather, but they were also crafted by him. My nana, Naresh Chandra Sharma used to work at a wood factory in his hometown of Sitapur, in Uttar Pradesh.

Close
© Copyright 2024. All rights reserved.
Close

Subscribe to the Museum

Receive a new story from somewhere in the Indian subcontinent in your inbox every week!