Ever watched a visitor to Kerala walk on the road? If you have, you would have found him stealing regular glances upwards. No, he’s not thanking heavens for bringing him to God’s own country; he’s actually wondering when a coconut will fall on his head. A legitimate apprehension, considering the number of coconut trees around. He looks anxious, there’s no joy in his stride, made healthily brisk by the desire to reach a safe, coconut-free spot where the mind is without fear and the head is held high.
A question tourists often ask is, ‘How do people here walk on the streets?’ The nervous look that accompanies the query prevents you from making the silly crack, ‘Why, on their own two feet, of course, just like all bipeds.’ Keralites are so used to the sight of coconut palms, they don’t regard them as a hazard. They are justifiably proud of the defining feature of this tiny state – its wealth of coconut trees that creates a lush canopy of green leaves or fronds, as they are called. Keralam, Kerala, Kera...they spout proudly, as if conjugating an irregular Latin verb, and wrongly at that.
Time was when a Malayali’s life was so bound up with that of his coconut palms that he wouldn’t dream of felling them. New houses were designed not so much with vastu in mind as the location of the trees, so that they could be built without cutting any. I've seen a house with a tree growing inside it and going out through the roof! During floods, men have plunged into the swirling waters to give hot chase to errant coconuts while their stranded families were left to fend for themselves.
No one would have cleared school without a mandatory lesson on the coconut palm or the ‘tree of life’ as it was gratefully called for its top to bottom utility value and its ability to sustain generations of families through income from it. Roots, shoots, leaves, not to mention the trunk and of course the kingpin, the coconut and its various parts... everything has its uses. There’s a well known story about a child who mugged up facts on the coconut tree, having been told by his teacher it was a sure question for essay writing. Unfortunately, the paper setter, who had a bovine bias and a sadistic streak running through him, chose instead to ask about the cow. The disappointed child managed to keep his wits about him and wrote, ‘The Cow is an animal. It is tied to a coconut tree. The coconut tree....’ and proceeded to write all he knew about the coconut palm. That’s how central the coconut was to the general scheme of things.
But how the mighty have fallen! Fronds now lie forlorn and unclaimed bang in the middle of roads or, if someone has shown some civic sense, on the roadside, for a long time. Gone are the days when just the faint cracking sound of a dry frond starting to break off from the tree would have brought the mundu clad owner, hair glistening with coconut oil, ears fine tuned to hear all coconut tree-related sounds and eyes peeled to locate the leaf, rushing out to stake his claim. He would drag it into his compound, delighted to have outsmarted the others who had arrived post-haste for the same purpose.
Alas, where has all this devotion gone? The asset has become a liability. With the youth preferring white collar jobs, the coconut picker is now an endangered species and knows it. He needs to be handled with care. Your quest begins when coconuts begin to fall. You have to call him, then call on him, bow, scrape, cajole and finally bribe him with a king’s ransom to pick them.
Your BP doesn't return to normal with the picking for you are left to dispose of the husks and the fronds. Rather than go through this stressful procedure, people now opt to cut the Gordian knot by chopping off the tree. Tender coconut water is available on roadsides, de-husked coconuts and packaged coconut milk in the market, so why keep these white elephants?
There is concern about the situation, though. Coconut harvesting machines have come into the picture. Some enterprising women have taken to this trade and monkeys may well be trained for the job. But the threat of a coconut falling on a head, a native’s or a visitor’s, is now a reality.
(khyrubutter@ yahoo.com)
(A fortnightly column by the city-based writer, academician and author of the Butterfingers series)
