Cosmopolitan Raja | kakera Pitha

I don’t know why every time of this year I feel so joyous. It is Raja, a festival which celebrates the Goddess Earth. All young girls on these few days are considered incarnation of the Goddess. You suddenly seems to have graduated to a pedestal next to god. People of Odisha prayer to the goddess for good harvest and pleasant monsoons. The traditional rituals involve three days of intense preparations. The young girls get new dresses. Ooh and they are not supposed to step on the ground. They used to wear Kathou or wooden slippers in the ancient days to protect their feet from scratching mother earth and vice versa. Mutually dependent I should say. They are fed with all kinds of sweet meats and pittas. Pithas are pancakes made of rice flour filled with wide rage of sweet or savoury ingredients. Visiting friends and swinging on the doli or swings. The girls would gather near the Banyan & mango trees and sing songs and do puchi khela. The maidens would perform a rhythmic dance of sitting on the floor and twist their hands, waits and legs all in tandem which is called as Puchi khela. They say it strengthened the womb for future deliveries. The girls don’t cook, cut, tear and grind. The elderly women or the men partake most of the responsibilities.Just as the earth prepares itself to quench its thirst by the incoming rain the unmarried girls of the family are groomed for impeding matrimony through this festival.

Cut, we come to 21st century. This girl has been born and brought in a cosmopolitan town. She has no holidays, tons of homework to finish and rush to school. The mother who has been drenched in these memories, is hell-bent on celebrating this festival for her young girls in-spite of all odds.The girls on the other hand are completely wary of these nuisances.

Mum makes us wake up at 5 am and we are rushed to the bath in a half-dazed state. The hair still trickling with water. The new dress is slid over our shoulder. The house smells of pitha and incense.She sits down to put chandan on our forehead in intricate patterns. (No Mom, this is not done :-)).Hush prayers to the lord almighty.The same wish every year for good grades and a handsome groom.(Geez) A day before Dad would have hung ropes from our mango tree and improvised a swing. (Of course on Mom’s insistence).While mum arranged our breakfast spread. We would swing in turns up and down brushing past the curry leaves and almost dashing into dad’s yezdi. 🙂 Space is less as we live in Quarters. Now mom you can’t expect the vast expand of your villages. Flush down all those sweetmeats early in the morning with a glass of milk. My mother would wipe away the chandan as we stepped out of our house. My sister goes in a bus while I cycle away to school. I will run barefoot on synthetic tracks for the morning athletic practise. My sister will cut the crepe for her SUPW class.While I will grind myself into the maths class. This was raja passed all the way from my great grand mom to my grandmother to my mum and now to me. Today it stands in its diluted form in my hands. But whatever trickled down is the true sap. Culture is evolving and so are we. The baton lies in our hand to take forward or drop it down.

The most famous delicacy of Odisha are its Pithas and it boasts of some 20 odd varieties of Pithas which are prepared on various festivals of Odisha. Traditionally on Raja it is Podo Pitha and mutton curry which is savoured in the evening. But I have chosen the kakera pitha for preparation which requires skill but once done it is one of the most delicious pitha. This is my personal favourite. Whatever the occasion my mum would ensure she makes this for me. Hope you enjoy it.

This was such a time taking process that I hardly got the time to take more luscious shots. So they come to your plate as is wth no post processing and all.