Travel Tales

Finding Malaya

When you slip a spoonful of  Malaiyo into your mouth, the froth of stiffly churned milk meets the cold dew of a winter’s night on the tip of your tongue.

Malaiyo is a winter dessert of Varanasi, available only on the cold misty mornings of this season. As a dessert, it checks many boxes- it's  light, sweet and  fragrant. It comes in a small earthen pot with the mouth the size of your palm and depth that of a thimble. It’s gone before you know it, but it’s heavy flavours linger long after you have swallowed the last fluffy spoonful.
But... for any self respecting idea or dish there are always buts. Before the buts, a little about how Malaiyo is made.
There’s something magical about  the process when a local explains it to you

You boil the milk in the Kadhai for sometime.

How long?

You will know when it’s done.

Then?

Then we leave it out under the cold sky through the night.

Just like that, in the open?

Of course not. We cover it with a fine mesh or muslin cloth to allow the dew to seep inside.

Then?

Next morning we churn it by hand, scoop out the froth, add sugar, saffron, cardamom, almonds , pistas.

The dessert cannot be made without the cold dew, hence only available in winters. 

Something that sounds like it's  made of moonlight and pixie dust ought not have buts, surely. But there are Buts.  One could not help thinking that the sweetness, the flavours, the nuts overpowered the core. But what else would  happen when the core was just milk froth? And perhaps the dish got its character from the overpowering flavours.

And so, what of the experience? It was like eating a tiny fragment of flavoured cloud. You are highly unlikely to experience it elsewhere or ever again.

Varansi, Nov 2019

History, mythology, epic, poetry, drama, folklore and legend flow and merge into this ancient
city and its scared river. The city is bent over by the weight of spiritualism that these many
rivulets carry into this old, historic city. And that is what I came to find in Varanasi/
Banaras/Kasi.  That with peace, learning, enlightenment, benediction, redemption, salvation, liberation. More big words, more burden. 

Any city approached against this reputation will suffer. In this Varanasi doesn’t’ disappoint. 

Among the noisy  roads, the clamouring streets,  hungry mouths, greedy touts, priests who like
any good business men speak in your own tongue, telling you the stories you want to hear and
just as swiftly turn into an Avenging Angel of Moral Justice when they feel they are under-paid, 
there is no space here for spirituality, unless you are happy with a bottled, erstaz version, for a
price naturally. The River is majestic.

The Banaras/ Varanasi/ Kasi of learning, of discovery of self, of  spiritual growth that was in the
stories of your great-grand father and your grand father ,if it still exists, is buried under all this
patina that shrouds the whole city. A thick suffocating patina of hunger, greed, squalor and Godliness that came with a price tag.  The kind that leaves a bruise on the soul.

But the River, she is Majestic.

I walked the ghats but the city did not redeem itself there either. There was just enough energy
to negotiate the filth on the ground and rebuff the calls of the many touts of the steps- the river
continued flow silently beside me .  

I took  ride to the bank across.  There is no one here, once you finally convince the young boy
that you have no desire to ride his horse for any price. If you once again ignore the debris
under you foot, and focus on the ancient buildings across the silent turgid river, you can imagine
a more glorious past, - the Kasi of the tales of your childhood. 

The boat ride on the river  brings its own calm. As the sun sets on the ghats, the arthi starts on
the banks. There is a moment of splendour and mesmerism. 

The boat glides on. There are two ghats, Manikarnika and Harischandra, that are lit by a very
different kind of fire. the ones that give me goose pimples. There is something awe-inspiring
about  watching the flames blaze against the darkening sky and know that you are watching a
farewell to a life once lived, while deep down runs an awareness that one day it will be you.
There is no sorrow here.

Here is where you find that serenity , as the water laps against your boat and orange flames

leap against a darkening sky  - you watch and filled with a certain knowledge. you find your

peace.

For a fleeting moment , I glimpsed the Banaras/Varanasi/Kasi of the legends and tales.