Publisher’s note:  We start this post with the conclusion of the Dispatch of December 15,  2010, then move an extract from the Musical Dispatch From the Front, of February 2011.  

Next month we are privileged to have been invited to a wedding in Kerala Province (Southern India). Where the wedding will take place the language they speak is a palindrome: Malayalam. We’ll be able (however inadequately) to compare the incomparable: a society that has shaken off the shackles of a colonial power with a society where respect and independence from a colonial authority is but a far off dream.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOh2koyJt_4
We’ll be visiting the land of The God of Small Things!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgoGpfWU8qc
अगली बार (शायद अगले साल) तक
(Decode Google Translate from Hindi)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl3UKV1z9lM
सिर्फ एक बोनस गाना:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OO3ZMdcL8Pc

PART 2
On 22^nd. January Dilip and Priji  “tied the knot” (quite literally, in that part of the ceremony at the Temple consisted of Dilip placing a string around Priji’s neck and tying it behind her- which makes me suspect that that is the origin of the expression).

The generosity of Dilip and Priji’s families to us was unbounded. Seldom in our lives have we been made to feel so unconditionally welcome.

Our long sojourn in Yuendumu being a notable exception. The Warlpiri people have uncritically accepted our presence in their midst, and made us feel welcome, despite them having been subjected to a sustained and continuing neo-colonial assimilationist attack. Many societies would not be so tolerant and forgiving and lacking in bitterness.

Do Indians have a sense of humour? We went to the Thrissur Museum (attached to the Thrissur Zoo). A jar of formaldehyde in which a Tarantula had been drowned was labelled “Big Hairy Spider”, it was next to the equally submerged “green frog” and “house lizard” (gecko).

Our visit to Kerala Province reminded me once again of Martin Flanagan’s poetic paragraph in an article he wrote years ago for the Melbourne Age : “To visit Yuendumu is to have the glass tower of your preconceptions shattered into countless brilliant fragments”.

Visiting “foreign” places un-blinkered seems to invariably debunk stereotypes. Some years ago we travelled to Ireland. From a preconceived “uptight Catholic” country, it metamorphosed into a land were all taxi drivers were philosophers and comedians. To stand in the Long Room (Library) of Trinity College is a quasi-religious experience.

What Ireland and India have in common is that they are both proud of having won their independence from the English and are able to be themselves. In Kerala many things are labelled MG, such as the MG Road in Ernakulam. It took us a while to realise that MG is Mahatma Gandhi. Hopefully the times will change, and the day will come for Warlpiri to once again be proud and free to be themselves.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjc6bH9OTm4

Assimilationists and Interventionists take note: “…and don’t criticise what you don’t understand…”