Two nights after Christmas, the North Kolkata Kali Puja ended. The standard way to end one of these celebrations is to take the house-sized image of Kali, put it on a trailer, train floodlights on it, take it to the river and toss it in, on the presumption that after the puja, the goddess, like Elvis, has left the premises and that the image is no longer sacred, just a bunch of flowers, plaster, and paint. Oh and on the way to the river, it gets carted through every side street along with half the light show and a bunch of marching bands. The image is so tall, someone is posted by her crown to lift the phone and electric wires over her. The whole thing teeters and wobbles, and it gets pulled through very busy streets, followed by a bunch of devotees ranging from kids to seniors, with the kids running about like a holiday trying to catch the prashad being thrown from the fron of the truck while not missing the view of the image on the back.
At one point, a bus tried to slip by, but got too close, and would have knocked off Shiv’s foot. Even though the whole thing was about to be thrown in the river, and the god was lying under Kali’s foot (its a long but interesting story…she likes to go out at night and party at the burning ghats and stepped over her sleeping god of a pot head husband, Shiv, in order to get out), it would be a no-no for the bus to damage it. So for ten minutes, everyone including the bus passengers, a strolling cop, the devotees and various hangers-about, gave advice to the two drivers as to whether the bus could get past the truck full of deities without touching. In order to do this, the Kali truck had to move back a few yards, which is in effect, stopping an anarchists’ parade and making it march backwards, a messy trick. The driver achieved this by just putting the float in reverse and going. People got the message and backed up rather than get run over, the bus went through, and all was well.
But what about the music you say? This time, for some unknown-to-me reason, all the bands were comprised of bagpipes and drums, each group playing something different, with each led by a shehnai player calling the tune, usually in a completely different, dissonant, and ever-changing key. Be warned if you listen! Crazy sounds within.
Bagpipes? Kali? OK, let’s take the Glenn Beck analysis route and see if we can figure this out…Scotsmen are warlike, play bagpipes and wear kilts, Kali kilt a bunch of men at war, chopping their heads off to make a garland around her neck, ergo, Bagpipes are the perfect instrument to worship Kali. Nevermind that the pipers wore pants.