Joy. Yes, that’s the word that comes to mind when I listen to Soundaram V speak about her childhood. The eleventh child of the Lena household, she was born in 1942 in a large home in Devakottai. “All the children were born here, in this very house. Children were married, born and raised within this premise,” she recounts.
Her mother’s home is a typical Chettinad home, one that is sprawling with large courtyards and small arais (rooms). Like most homes in Chettinad, this property belongs to a number of families, and back then they all shared the space. Though each one had their own kitchen, cooks and akkas (women helpers), there was an understanding between them on how to use the space harmoniously. “If one family was sun-drying this week, the next week the other would begin. Though the courtyard was large, people took turns to use it,” reflects the octogenarian.
Soundaram, fondly referred to as aayaa (grandmother) recounts that her childhood revolved around play. “Unlike children today, we never read. We went to school, and came home and played. We would eat and play all through the day!” she chuckles. The games included hide and seek, pandi, pallangkuzhi and so many others she points out.
Pallanguzhi in particular, was a very popular board game especially played by little girls and even elderly women. The idea was to drop your coins, shells or seeds into pits on the board in a particular format, and finally the person with the maximum number was declared the winner. “I don’t recall having a strategy when we played. We just played. The goal was to win,” shares Soundaram. Today, research has proved that this single game would improve the mathematical and motor skills of players. “The coins used to be either ‘sozhi’ (shells) or ‘puliyankottai’ (tamarind seeds). The one we played with was a simple rectangular foldable one and it was made in rosewood,” she points out.
Among the nagarathaar community that Soundaram belongs to, gifts for the bride, generally termed as ‘saamaan’ plays a crucial role. Among the series of gifts that include home essentials and personal care, you would find a couple of board games. “They would make pallanguzhi boards in rosewood or teak wood, and add it along with the saamaan”. Girls would continue to play, except their partners would not be their sisters, but the women folk in their in-laws’ family. And so the tradition continued.
So, before she got married, who were her play partners? “My sister Indra, my cousin Ponni. But, there was always someone to play with,” she affirms. “Somehow time flew! By the time you knew it was already 8:00 pm and the bamboo mats were rolled out for us to sleep!”.
Play was around the courtyard and the girls never stepped out of the house, unless it was to the temple or to the school, and that too supervised. As I listen to her speak, it only reiterates that such homes allowed children to be children. It gave them space, not tools, but space to enjoy growing up, to explore, to laugh, to fight – to be themselves in the purest form. That to me is joy.