Guest Post: Dooma's Story
A tale from Tulunadu, contributed by Dejappa D. Shetty
The sky was dark with monsoon clouds, and in the forest, a peacock was showing off his iridescent tail-feathers to a straggly cluster of disinterested peahens. Two female sparrows were watching his efforts with interest.
“Hey, give it a rest,” called one sparrow after a while.
“Don’t try so hard! Come and have a chat with us instead,” added her friend.
The peacock, who was by now quite bored with the whole exercise, gladly folded his tail-feathers and sauntered over to the sparrows. “Nice to see you around, story birds,” he said cheerfully. “I’ve been waiting to tell you about Dooma. He lives at the edge of the forest, and has to be the most foolish man I have ever seen.”
And this is the tale the peacock told.
DOOMA’s STORY: contributed by Dejappa D. Shetty
Once upon a time there lived a young man called Dooma and his old grandmother. They were very poor and his grandmother made ends meet by begging for alms. Dooma was also something of a simpleton and goofed up even simple things so often that his grandmother worried for him and wondered who would take care of him after her death. But she loved him for his simplicity. He would help her bring firewood from the nearby woods, fetch water from the well, and wash the clothes. They would share whatever food she received as alms — sometimes she would make conjee from it, sometimes prepare some other simple food. Dooma never made a fuss and gladly ate whatever she gave him.
One day she fell ill, and being old, she could not manage her daily chores. She was shivering with fever and our Dooma didn’t know what to do. He put his hand on her forehead and felt it was too warm. He thought drenching her in cold water might bring her temperature down. So he took a bucket of water and poured it over her. Alas, she stopped moving! Thinking she was well again and only sleeping, Dooma tried to wake her up, but her body was as hard as wood. He realised she had passed away. He wanted to bury her in the jungle. So he took a pickaxe and went to the jungle, where he dug a large grave to bury her. He returned home, wrapped her body in a torn mat, lifted it on to his shoulder and carried it to the grave. To his surprise, he discovered the body was missing! Now what to do? He returned home, but by a different route. On the way he saw another very old woman collecting dry leaves. Ah, thought Dooma, his grandmother was alive after all! But what about all that effort he had put into digging that large, deep grave for his grandmother? He could not let that go to waste! So he gave her a thwack on the head and she dropped down dead. He wrapped her body as before and carefully carried it to the grave. This time he followed his earlier route — and found a body lying on the way. He realised this was his real grandmother. So he took both the bodies to the grave and buried them.
Now Dooma was alone. He was hungry but there was no one to give him food. He wandered about sadly all day. The sun had almost set when he saw some men who had the lower halves of their faces wrapped in dark cloth. They were thieves, but Dooma did not know that. He went up to them and begged them for something to eat. They scolded him and told him he must earn his food. Seeing that he was strong and well-built, they offered him food on the condition that he would work for them. Dooma happily agreed.
The thieves then showed Dooma a large and magnificent house and ordered him to enter it at night when it was dark and bring out some heavy things from inside. Dooma was happy to work so he did as they said and entered the house when it was dark. But he could not find any heavy things inside. He searched and searched, till at last, he saw a grinding stone used for grinding grain. “This should do!” he thought. But when he tried to pick it up, he found it was too heavy for him and decided to call for help. “Is anybody there? Anyone awake?” he called. “Can you help me lift this?” Suddenly, and much to his surprise, he was surrounded by yelling people pointing at him and calling him a thief. “Chor! Chor!” they shouted as they beat him. He somehow managed to escape with his life and went back to the band of robbers.
The thieves cursed to see him come back empty-handed. “What a useless fellow!” they scolded. “We will give you one more chance!” The next day, they showed Dooma a large house belonging to some rich people. “There should be valuable jewellery and metal utensils in that house,” they thought. Once again they ordered Dooma to go to the house at night and this time to throw some sand inside. If he heard a metallic sound, they said, he should go in and picking up the metal objects, carefully carry them out of the house.
So Dooma went to the rich people’s house. Now, Dooma, though he was foolish, was considerate. The sand, if it got into someone’s eyes, could hurt them and so, he decided, it was only right that he warn them. So he called out, “If anyone is awake and your eyes are open, close your eyes because I am throwing sand inside!” Much to his surprise, the people in the house woke up, and yelling and shouting, chased him away. Dooma had failed again. The gang of thieves were fed up with him and sent him back home.
Dooma once again had nothing to eat. At last a woodcutter promised to give him a meal if he would cut a dry branch from a tree for him. He showed Dooma the branch. So Dooma climbed the tree and seating himself on the end of the branch, began sawing away at it, not realising that he too would fall with the branch once it was cut from the tree. A passerby saw this and called out to him “If you sit like that, you may fall and die!” Now Dooma was busy and didn’t want anyone’s advice. “Go away!” he scolded the passerby, who went off muttering to himself. Almost as soon as the passerby left, the branch broke off from the tree and down fell Dooma with it. Though bruised by the fall, he got to his feet and rushed after the passerby who was walking slowly at his own pace and caught up with him. Falling at his feet, Dooma praised him and thanked him for foretelling his fall. The pedestrian was now more convinced than ever that Dooma was very foolish, and wanting nothing more to do with him, he walked away. But our Dooma would not leave him.
“Why are you following me, you fool?” cried the man.
“I may be a fool, but you are god-sent. Tell me, when will I die?” said Dooma.
“You will die when your beard gets white. Now stop following me!” replied the pedestrian angrily.
Dooma, happy with the man’s reply, let him continue on his way.
The woodcutter took the dry branch and gave Dooma some money with which to buy food. Now Dooma was very hungry but did not know where to get food. He saw a house in the corner of a field and asked for food in return for payment. The kind woman gave him a large helping of rice and curds and told him to sit in the shade, under a tree, and eat. He washed in a small stream in the field and started eating.
“Wah! What tasty rice and curds, that too with a pinch of salt,” thought Dooma. He gobbled down the food, not realising that in his hurry he had spilled some of the curds on to his beard. He ate his fill and burped with satisfaction. But when he went to wash in the stream and looked at his reflection in the water, what did he see but that his beard had turned white! Now Dooma remembered what the passerby had told him and decided his time had come. “But who will bury me?” he wondered. “I will have to do it myself.” And so he dug a grave for himself and climbing inside, filled the grave around himself. As he sat there, a villager walking past laughed at him. “Why have you buried yourself in that grave?” he asked.
“Don’t talk to me,” said Dooma, “I am dead.”
Still laughing, the villager pulled him out and said, “You are not dead! You have a life ahead, and I will help you.” So now Dooma had a new master.
Dooma’s new master was also poor. He had a son called Koncha and a daughter called Kanchi. Koncha was already married and settled in life. But Kanchi was not at all beautiful and so he had not been able to marry her off. Nor did he have any money to spend on a wedding for his daughter. Our Dooma was a well-built young man and his new master thought him a suitable match for his daughter. Besides, thought the master, by marrying Kanchi to him, they could both continue living with him, which would be convenient. So Kanchi married our Dooma. But a few days after the wedding, Dooma’s father-in-law died. The young couple lived very simply, but still found it difficult to make ends meet.
One day Kanchi said to Dooma, “My brother, Koncha, is rich. Go to him and see if he can help us. He is quite high and mighty and may throw his weight around, but don’t let him push you about. And make sure you sit somewhere high up when you get there so he can see you have come to visit him.”
Dooma nodded and went to see Koncha. He remembered what Kanchi had said and climbed up on to the roof and sat down in the vine spinach growing there.
Koncha saw him sitting on the roof and asked him to come in, saying, “Arre Dooma, come, come.” So Dooma followed him inside but did not sit.
After a while, when Koncha realised that Dooma was still standing, he said, “Arre, Dooma, why are you standing? Sit, sit!” So Dooma sat down.
Now there was no talk between them as Dooma didn’t want to talk first.
Finally, Dooma got up to leave. “Arre Dooma, why are you standing?” said Koncha.
As Dooma prepared to leave his brother-in-law said, “Arre Dooma, you are going? Go, go.”
By the time Dooma reached home, it was dark. Kanchi was waiting anxiously and asked him what happened at Koncha’s place.
Dooma began telling her all that had happened. “When I reached there, Koncha said, ‘Arre Dooma, come, come’.”
Now, here is a twist in the tale. A thief, also called Dooma, had taken his loot to the edge of the woods, near Dooma’s house. As he sat looking over his ill-gotten gains, he heard Dooma recounting his brother-in-law’s welcome. “Arre Dooma, come, come,” he heard and thought someone from the house had seen him. So he stood absolutely still, unmoving . Then he heard Dooma say, “Arre Dooma, why are you standing? Sit, sit.” Our thief grew alarmed and sat down quietly, without making any sound. After a while, he slowly got up to see if anyone was watching him. Then he heard, “Arre Dooma, why are you standing?”
“Time to leave!” thought the thief.
“Arre Dooma, are you leaving? Go, go!” the voice from the house said loudly.
“If I run now, I might live to steal again!” thought the thief and, leaving all his loot behind, ran away.
Now Kanchi, hearing a slight sound, went to investigate and discovered the thief’s loot lying behind their house. She took it all and brought it inside without telling Dooma. “If I tell him, he’ll do something foolish again,” she thought.
Now both are fine and enjoying life. I met them once and they said they have a little child too. Ha ha ha!
The sparrows wiped tears of laughter from their eyes.
The peahens had been watching, and jealous of the attention the sparrows were receiving from the handsome peacock, came up curiously. “What’s the joke?” they asked, gathering around the peacock admiringly.
“Go for it, man!” said the sparrows with a wink at the peacock, and flew off, still chuckling, into the trees.
Story credit and copyright © Dejappa D. Shetty 2021
The peacock is India’s national bird and has been present in Indian culture since Harappan times, where peacock motifs appear on pottery and burial urns. In ancient Rome, the peacock was a symbol of immortality because the Romans believed its flesh did not decay after death. The peacock also appears in frescoes and mosaics in ancient synagogues and Roman-Jewish catacombs. Early Christianity also adopted the peacock as a symbol of immortality.
More on the peacock:
The Peacock as an Early Christian Symbol of Eternal Life, by Russell Smith
Peacock: A Constant in Indian Culture, by Aditi Shah
EDITORS’ NOTE
Dooma’s Story has been generously contributed by one of our readers, Mr. Dejappa D. Shetty. Mr. Shetty, retired from The Economic Times, Times Group, is based in Thane. He is originally from a village called Kodethooru, where his ancestral house, Pejethimar, is located. Even though he now lives far away from his native Tulunadu, he is still passionately interested in all things Tulu, including its literature and folklore. Many of the tales he remembers were told to him by his mother, Cauvery.
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One of our readers, Mrs Chandrakanta Chandra, has sent us two delightful stories from her book 'Folktales from India'. She was reminded of these after reading 'Dooma's Story'. We present them here with her permission. Thank you, Mrs Chandra!
Tale 1: AN OBSTINATE GUEST (from Punjab)
There lived a man called Guruditta in rural Punjab. He was very lazy and did nothing to earn a living. He would go to neighbouring villages and introduce himself to a villager as the friend of a relative’s, and stay there as long as possible.
Once he knocked at the door of a villager named Parmeet. When the door opened, he told Parmeet that he was coming from Moga village, and was a friend of his brother-in-law. He also said, “I have some work here. If you don’t mind, may I stay with you for some days?”
He was more than welcome and was looked after well because he was Parmeet’s sister’s husband’s friend. Day after day, he would have his meals, go out and come back in the evenings.
Parmeet realized that Guruditta had no intention of leaving. He and his wife thought of a plan to oust him. The next day, early in the morning, the wife started wailing and crying, “My mother! You left us alone! I will never be able to see you again.” She said to her husband, “We must reach my parents place and attend Mother’s funeral.” As they were going away, they told the guest also to leave. Seeing no other choice, the guest took his bag and left.
After some hours when they thought Gurudutta had left the village, Parmeet praised his wife for her superb acting. She had a good laugh and boasted,
“How clever I have been,
Cried but not a tear was seen
In my eyes, as I was keen
To oust the man so mean.”
Hearing this the guest appeared before them and said,
“Guruditta is my name,
I guessed your game,
In your backyard I slept,
And a watch I had kept,
I have not left as yet.
The poor hosts had to bear with him for a very long time.
Tale 2: RAMU AND THE MANGO TREE (from Uttar Pradesh)
There lived a rich farmer in a village. He had three sons. Two of them were very clever and cunning. Ramu, the third one, was a simpleton and his brothers often used to tease him. After some time, their father died. The clever sons shared all the property between them and gave Ramu only a thin cow. Ramu decided to sell the cow. His brothers teased him. “Make sure you don’t sell yourself instead of your cow.”
Ramu said nothing and walked towards the market. He passed through a mango grove. A storm was coming, so he stood under a mango tree. The leaves made a sound: Sarrr, sarr.
Ramu said, “Oh, you want to buy my cow? How much will you pay me for it?”
The leaves moved again: Sarrr, sarr. Ramu tried to listen and said, “Fifty rupees. Very good! I will be a rich man too. Take the cow and give me fifty rupees.
He tied his cow to the tree and the leaves said, “Sarrr, sarr.”
Ramu said, “You say you will pay me tomorrow? O.K. I will come tomorrow and you must pay me the money.”
He went home and told his brothers about the deal. They had a good laugh at it.
The next day he went to the tree to get his money. The cow was not there. When he asked for his payment, the tree again went sarrr-sarr. Ramu said, ”I cannot help it if someone stole the cow. I want my money.” The tree said nothing but sarrr, sarr.
Ramu was very annoyed. He brought an axe and started cutting the trunk of the tree. As he hit it, he found it was hollow. He put his hand inside and found a bag full of money. He asked, “Whose bag is it?”
The tree leaves moved again - Sarrr,sarr. Ramu said, “Thank you for giving it to me as the price of my cow.”
He took the money home, bought land with it and became a rich farmer. His brothers never made fun of him again.
Standard instructions have implied meanings and are often not straight forward. And this they call as intelligence exhibited by intellectuals. In Dooma's case, he followed it in the literal sense. Was he wrong? Successful he was, in the end! Great story and wonderful illustrations!