Should I Become a Pauper?

The dates of the Muslim and Hindu festivals celebrated in Jhakri and Dharmnagri were settled according to lunar calendars comprising twelve months of twenty-nine or thirty days. ¹ Islamic festivals shifted backward by about ten days every year in relation to the seasons. By contrast, the “leap month” inserted into the Hindu calendar every third year ensured that Hindu festivals moved within a small range during the same season every year. Thus it was completely fortuitous (and not wholly welcomed by us) that the Muslim Eid marking the end of the month of Ramzan in August 1982 took place on the very same day as the Hindu festival ofTījo. ² Our frustrated attempts to cover both festivals simultaneously caused a great deal of mirth in both Dharmnagri and Jhakri. ³ As people repeatedly pointed out, the two festivals neatly highlighted married women’s links with their parents and siblings. After a month of fasting and practicing other forms of abstinence, Muslims had eagerly awaited the Eid moon, which marked the new month that would begin with Sweet Eid [Mīthi Eid]. ⁴ Special dishes, many of them sweet, were prepared. A Muslim woman—especially one married within the previous twelve months—should be in her husband’s home for Eid. There, she would be visited by her male kin, who would arrive bearing their Eidi gifts of cash, clothing, foodstuffs, and especially sweets. For Hindu women, though, Tijo was an occasion for visiting their parents and celebrating the festival by singing Tījo songs at the tops of their voices as they swung on specially constructed swings.