Sunanda Aunty passed away. The phone rang at what I imagined was early morning. Just once. And then I woke up at 6:30 a.m. to mum calling relative after relative: "Pratibha? I just wanted to tell you Sunanda Aunty passed away. Can you set up a chain...? Each one just tell one person?"
In the early mornings, everyone's voice sounds different. Subdued, thicker. Posher, almost.
At her home, she was laid out on a bed in a lovely blue Rajasthani print bedsheet. I thought she might be sleeping. She had none of that inhuman cottonwool stuffed into every orifice. No big flowers, just some small jasmines thrown between the her feet. Everyone was whispering, sitting around her, gazing at her.
She had left a letter. A letter that she discussed with Jayanthi aunty some months ago. In which she said she wanted no mourners, no flowers, no rituals, no body-gazing. Just the quickest cremation. If she died in hospital, she was to be taken to the mortuary straight; not brought home.
But there were mourners this morning. There were flowers, there were body-gazers and yes, there were rituals. The priest with his two cell phones and two cars was chauffeur driven to the flat. He muttered some slokas, threw some water on her and then handed out rice to everybody who began circling her, throwing the rice at her face till slowly it covered her mouth and probed by her nose.
I watched from a side. Mum cried. Usha mashi said, "How sad... she would not have liked this."
Afterwards, we stayed back while the procession left. "It'll take very long," said Rohini. Her baby is due next month.
Anish said, "No, it won't. It's electric. It's almost instant."
