A Tale Of Two Birds & Tulu Mushroom Gassi

My memories of the monsoon are mostly associated with my matrilineal ancestral home around 25 kilometres from Mangalore, a manor called Yelathuru Guthu. Every summer vacation, we would take the train from wherever my father was posted, working for the Indian Army. Sometimes, the journey was very long. Like all the way from Assam, in the 80’s. Sometimes, it meant overnight bus journeys. It always meant adding everyone – matrilineal Guthu houses are joint families with many kitchens; we would, as children, have access to all and would be fed by all too – into the Ambassador taxi for the last two miles. It didn’t matter if there was space or not, they would be accommodated, along with their shopping from the main town, Kinnigoli.

First, the memory of the intense heat. Then, the rain. Buckets of it pouring down. When there was a respite from the rain, we would go mushroom foraging. There were many types that would come and go. We children, to keep us from getting into trouble, would be taken on a hunt for what was seasonal and aplenty. These holidays meant a lot of freedom and the pleasure of being in nature, and most importantly for me, getting to eat all the food.

I was an avid reader from a young age (a genetic problem), and my interest was in two things. One: the stories we were told at home, especially by the eldest child among us who was held responsible for our outdoor adventures, which in hindsight had a simple moral lesson. Two: anything to do with food.

This story, then, is about parel laamb. Laamb, in my native language Tulu, simply means “mushroom”. Parel, on the other hand, is much more difficult to translate. Loosely, it means “a pearl”, or as my mother the poet says, “It’s like the slow unfurling of the parijata flower. And as short lived. It’s only available for 3 days a year and fades quickly.”