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Singing, swinging grandmom
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The Usha Uthup you know is the crooner in a sari plus bindi. <145,4>PRIYADARSHINI SHARMA brings you Usha, the grandmom and the cook
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Usha Uthup, the crooner. Who does not know her in that avatar? But what about Usha Uthup, the loving grandma? But would Usha Uthup herself be interested in a woman-to-woman chat about her sarees, sewing, bindis, recipes and grandmotherhood other than her music?
``Music is not my business, communication is,'' went the surprise reply. And though all through the conversation music remained in the background, a totally new personality stood unravelled at the end.
The world first knew her as a nightclub crooner who rose to fame, who was in 1969, a `welcome change'. Who has since then reigned over the Indian musical firmament with a strong presence, a personality who receded to the background for a while only to bounce back to the vanguard with the revival of Indi-pop and remixes.
Uthup is truly more of a communicator than a musician and that is the quintessence of her popularity. It takes her hardly a minute to bond with a crowd or with a single individual. She never forgets names, faces, incidents and above all, the Individual.
Thirty-two years of musical communication with a cross-section of humanity gives her the authority to profess, pontificate and explain. When asked on parenting she said, "My parents just let us be. Children of rich homes are confused because of the number of options they have. It leads to an identity crisis.'' But not her.
Her idiosyncrasies astound you. One of these is an obsession for well-ironed clothes. She irons most of her clothes and her husband's shirt till the defiant crease is smoothened. This fastidiousness for stitching, starching and ironing, she reveals, is her mother's training. When dressed, she had an impressive presence, she says. She unabashedly adds, "I must have been a dhobi in my last birth.''
Her daughter chips in, "Amma makes the ironing board come alive.'' Uthup uses the metaphor of ironing in life too.
"One must smoothen out the creases in life, sometimes you win, sometimes you don't.'' Uthup's bindis, sarees, bangles have always been a young woman's envy and the smitten man's joy. This ethnic melange beautifully encapsulates the woman as shakti. ``A woman must come to terms with the fact that it is a man's world. If she accepts that her shakti is doubled.''
The chronicle of Uthup's bindi goes somewhat like this: In 1969 when she took to singing on stage, she wore the kum-kum bindis. Vermilion was the only colour for the tikka. This, she altered to other colors to match her sarees. Soon, she was sticking on sequins and beads on it to make it sparkle and it became fashionable to do so. Simultaneously she stitched beads on to the sleeves of her blouse.
Her saree-bindi image became synonymous with her and she further innovated by painting Malayalam, Bengali, and Hindi scripts as a bindi. Thus there was `ko' for Kolkatta, `Ka' for Kerala, `Bha' for Bharat and the bindi became a statement.
The bindis so impressed the owner of the Mumbai store `Benzer' that he requested her to design them for his store. So started her ethnic, Indian scripts bindis, which proudly adorn her face and reveal her pride in the Indian culture.
``I am so grateful to be born an Indian,'' says Uthup and her saree printed with `Ente Keralam, Etra Sundaram,' finds a link with the audience.
Thus, ''Tumi Sundari Kolkatta' sends her Bengali fans into delightful raptures.
As Uthup bridges the gulf over language and regions, it is her sari-churi image of the `Indian stree' that men and women relate to.
The bangles are an influence of her Muslim neighbors and have become a part of her life.
Today, Uthup's sartorial pet, the saree, has given way to the practical salwar kameez and only one thing that could bring about the change is her granddaughter Ayesha.
She is "My life, my everything, really my everything.' Before her birth, Uthup began shedding weight to be fighting fit to run with her grandchild, to play with her. She did not want to be a dowdy grandmother.
''At one point you have to look beyond. Love can make everything happen.
When you give unashamedly it will come back sometime. It will because there is something beyond which meets the eye.... I changed for my grand daughter.''
Hers cooking is limited to 16 time tested and tried recipes. She always cooked for her children's tiffin break and does not know how to cook in small amounts. Though herself a vegetarian, Uthup's most popular chicken recipe, which her family devours, is Aunty Cheemu's chicken curry:
She was unfamiliar with the north Indian pulses and her experiment with `rajma' or kidney beans to impress her newly wedded husband was a fiasco. She happily narrates how she cooked rajma for hours in the cooker only to find it turning hard like stone.
It did not occur to her that rajma had to be soaked overnight to soften!
In sheer desperation she called the Trinkas owner and pleaded, "Send me a dish of rajma, and save my marriage''. And as Uthup effortlessly spoke of her life, times and tribulations, one could sense the veiled philosophic strain underlining her candid talk.
Perhaps it is the `unbelievable experience' of grandmotherhood, which has turned her so, or just the long way she has come.
She has shouldered beautifully the hopes and dreams of her family, friends and the millions of Indians here and abroad who yearn to hear her soprano voice as she sings with a flourish, ''I believe in music, I believe in love.'' Uthup stands tall (kanjeevaram, bindi bangles et al) as an embodiment of the free spirit of Indian womanhood, carrying the hearth, home and heart which makes her a more equal woman.
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Recipes for chicken curry, fragrant hair
Here is Usha Uthup's `Chimu Aunty's chicken curry':
1 whole chicken cut into 8 or 12 pieces
Onions-2 whole
Garlic 12 pods
Ginger 1 inch,
Handful of dry red chillies, soaked and ground into a paste.
Method:
Season hot oil with a tsp. of mustard seeds and curry leaves.
Put diced chicken pieces with the ground spices.
Add a tsp. of turmeric and cook on a low fire.
Add salt to taste. Garnish with coriander leaves.
Serve with raw, pounded onions and green chilies as salad.
Usha's tips for fragrant hair:
Light sambrani (incense or dhoop). Overturn a cane basket on it.
Lie down with freshly washed hair spread over the basket and allow the fragrance to smoke the hair. It leaves a haunting aroma among the tresses, romantic and irresistible.
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