Tag Archives: Gujarati

Water from a Stone – Gujarati Proverb

“પથ્થરમાંથી પાણી લો”

Translation: “getting water from a stone”.

Context: The informant, my mother, was born in India in the 1970s. She had an arranged marriage of sorts, in that she was introduced to different people from good families and could choose someone from them. They would figure out if they were compatible, and get married nearly immediately. She told me that when she was looking for someone to marry, her uncle told her one of the criteria should be to look for someone who could do this. All of my family is from Gujarat, and this is a Gujarati proverb.

If you describe someone with this phrase, it means essentially that they can make something out of any situation– if you give them a stone, they will find water in it. Typically, the “something” they could make would be money. It makes sense to advise someone not to find a man who is already rich, but one who is industrious; even if he has money now, if by circumstance he loses it all, he will be able to make it back.

Analysis: Gujarati culture tends to put a lot of value on being able to make money. It’s a good quality if you want stability in life regardless, but also it comes from years of being traders and businesspeople. A significant amount of Gujarati people are part of the merchant caste, including my family, and so it makes sense to place importance on having the creativity to get oneself out of any bad financial circumstances.

I’ve also noticed that the idea of coaxing something out of a stone (specifically blood) is a concept that can be found in other cultures’ proverbs as well. Interestingly, however, that tends to be in the context of talking about an impossible task or achieving something incredibly difficult. Here, it’s not a “you are destitute and must spin straw into gold” but instead a “you are destitute but you have the intelligence to make this straw you just found into something and the charisma to sell it to someone else”. They seem like oicotypical variations on the idea of someone achieving the difficult task of producing something useful out of something useless, with both likely rendered different by what their respective backgrounds hold relevant.

Indian Superstition – Leaving the House

Main Piece

Informant: “If you’re about to leave the house and someone asks you where you are going, you have to come back in and sit down for a minute and then tell them where you are going. Basically it’s because it’s bad luck to interrupt someone as they are leaving. You shouldn’t ask someone where they’re going if they’re already on their way out and if someone asks you, then you should come back inside. Or else whatever you were going to do will not get done.”

Background

My informant is a practicing lawyer in Los Angeles, California. She is of Indian descent, and her knowledge of Indian folklore comes from her father. 

Context

This superstition is enacted when someone is about to leave the house and they are interrupted.  

My Thoughts

There is not always a rhyme or reason for superstitions. According to my informant, people follow superstitions even if there is no good reason to follow them. However, there are certain elements in this superstition that I connected with others. This superstition falls in line with the Indian black cat superstition (originally from Egypt, popularized in India). This popular superstition says that if a black cat crosses your path, you will have bad luck. Both the black cat superstition and the superstition told by my informant depict the interruption of a journey. In both superstitions, your interrupted journey will bring bad luck and assurance that whatever you were doing will not get done. 

Indian Proverb – “After the Ramayana is over, she’s asking who is Ram and who is Sita.”

Main Piece

Informant: “Another saying translates to “after the whole Ramayana is over, she’s asking who is Ram and who is Sita.” The Ramayana is a super famous story in Indian culture and history, and is also very long. Ram is the main prince character, and he is also a god reincarnated, and Sita is his wife. So basically you are saying you just heard this long story and now you’re asking who the main characters are.

Background

My informant is a practicing lawyer in Los Angeles, California. She is of Indian descent, and her knowledge of Indian folklore comes from her father. 

Context

Informant: “It’s used in situations where someone asks a really obvious question after hearing the whole story, which they would have known if they were paying attention.”

My Thoughts

I have studied the Ramayana before. I know how intricate and complex the stories are, and I am familiar with how long they can be. Having researched and learned about the Ramayana, this proverb was something that I can understand and laugh at, which is why I enjoyed this proverb. 

I have heard variations of this proverb before in English. But clearly, the English version does not reference the Ramayana. This shows that a proverb can be translated into more than one culture. In other words, proverbs can be cross-culturally valid. But during the translation process, certain key elements are changed to make it more culturally relevant and accurate. In this case, the Ramayana would be substituted for another work. In the English version, I have heard Harry Potter used instead of the Ramayana.

Joint Marriages in Gujarat

Context: The following is an account from the informant, a family friend. She told this during a conversation at a get-together.

Background: This information was regarding the wedding customs of her village in the state of Gujarat in India. She had firsthand knowledge from her family and her own wedding.

Main piece: 

Informant: In our village, it is common and customary to have big joint weddings. Families will get together and plan to have five or six different couples getting married at the same time. 

Me: So do they know each other, or are they just random couples from the village?

Informant: Since most people in the village are either related to each other at least distantly or know each other well, people can coordinate without much difficulty. Everyone gets together to help, and my own grandfather helped cook the food in traditional cauldrons. Usually it ends up working well, and is much more economical since multiple marriages happen at the same venue, and the attendees who would have otherwise had to have been invited separately can all come at the same time.

Me: Wouldn’t there be extra attendees because there are so many families?

Informant: No, most of the villagers will come to any wedding that is happening anyways, so the number is about the same as there would be for just one couple getting married.

Analysis: This is a unique way of performing the wedding ceremony that seems to work well mainly due to the close-knit nature of the village, especially since many of the families of those getting married are actually relatives, whether close or distant. It seemed surprising at first because usually weddings are considered to be a special event for the couple, but this style of marriage seems to have more of a social aspect.

Gujarati Protection Against Evil Eye

Note: The form of this submission includes the dialogue between the informant and I before the cutoff (as you’ll see if you scroll down), as well as my own thoughts and other notes on the piece after the cutoff. The italics within the dialogue between the informant and I (before the cutoff) is where and what kind of direction I offered the informant whilst collecting. 

Informant’s Background:

I’m from Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India.

Piece:

So my grandma always did this thing, where she had this belief where if people see success too much, they give you the stink or evil eye, trying to wish you bad luck. So what she would do and say to do is to make a black mark somewhere you cannot see it- so take a little bit of like eyeliner, or mascara, and put it like right behind the ear or something to ward off evil spirits, and people’s bad visions. It’s the same way either way for males and females, but females do it generally.

Piece Background Information:

Informant already mentioned within piece that their grandmother taught them this folk belief on protection against the evil or bad eye.

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Context of Performance:

In person, during the day, in Ronald Tutor Campus Center on USC’s campus in Los Angeles.

Thoughts on Piece: 

Upon further research, it is commonly believed in India that the main source (i.e. givers) of the evil eye are women, which is why they generally use this protection against the evil eye.  The black mark is meant to cast or ward off negative energy and evil spirits. I could not find significant meaning as to why it is a black mark, or behind the ear, but I found this protection against the evil eye very interesting.