HEAD BATH.....

some memories of childhood are poignant....some pleasant and some unpleasant.......one such unpleasant memory was a monthly head bath.....it was an activity that my grand mom ensured in the house....it was as if she maintained a roster in her head..she exactly knew whose turn it was for the monthly head bath....


I had the privilege of growing up in a huge joint family ...my father having taken on the responsibility after the sudden and untimely death of my grandfather...I was told he died when i was few months old...it was a real big family....me a little toddler ....among those growing uncles and aunts...they were many....almost two less than a dozen of them...and including me and my sister we made up for a dozen....


The chief director of the house was my granny....keeping a vigilant eye on everybody....especially the chief brat of the house that was me...she considered me as a big nuisance as i was always breaching the code of conduct and challenging her authority ....my poor mommy was very busy..coping up with all the chores of the house from cleaning up the house , cooking and in the end the end the laundry ..I never got to see her much except when she came at night to put us Little children to bed....


each one had to take a head bath once a month at least....that was what I was told at least....whenever my granny was getting a feeling that some one wasn't making up with her well she would declare that that subject (of course kids) was to be subjected to a head bath....You may wonder what was so painful about this head bath...well those ere not times of smooth silky shampoos like head and shoulders....or clinic plus....those were to a four year old terrifying times.


Since I hated head bath the way it was administered....my granny knew that it was the best way to get even with me...so she would declare that i should be given a head bath....it wasn't so easy to lay hands on a slippery character like me....I would run around the house ...as my mother would cajole to come for this unpleasant ritual...


It would start with first administering castrol in the ears nose and mouth....such bitter feeling it was....and there after applying sunipindi a type o flour ...and then dried up for an hour or so there on invariably mom or some one else would rub that flour off the body and off with it all the dust and muck.....reeta phal or kunkudukaya rasam will be then applied....on the head ....we were to keep our eyes closed..lest that acidic concoction would burn our eyes....it would all be darkness...our breaths held tight for the inevitable torture....my granny would be there always to supervise that i had a real good bath...to see that all things were administerd properly...i suspected that was her way of getting even with all the pranks I played in the house ..especially in the kitchen which was her exclusive domain.....

I for one wouldn't give in so easily so would run around the house eventually to be pinned down with all the uncles and aunts..dragged to my moms feet an administerd the castrol first and then sunipindi.....it was an awful feeling applying that sunnipindi...inevitably....the acidic juice of reeta phal would burn my eyes.....and as I shouted and howled through out the process..hot water would be poured over my head.... as if to add insult to injury....as I would get noisier and aggressive one of the younger aunts would be pressed into service to take charge of my arms and keep my head still....it was a real acidic experience...

This process continued for few years till one day my uncle who is a doctor told quite firmly that it wasn't scientifically correct to administer castrol.....in the mouth and nose..this he had to tell quite firmly to my granny who was having her say so far in the house....i was grateful to that uncle...for it was such a relief......i might have been then four or five

It took many years for me to really enjoy a head bath...much later in a boarding school with head and shoulders shampoo...working out smooth lather...wondering why our lives were made miserable......