months ago. It was a chance meeting that summer day since my friend roshan
and I hadn’t planned on visiting the church when we reached in Bandra on a
late May afternoon. There, Sandra Monteiro smiled at me when I stepped into
her stall. As we got talking, she told me that she hails from Verna, in
Goa. I asked her if she manages to visit Goa. She said, "Yes. yes. I do."
Then she told me that she will be visiting Saligao (a Goan town) the next
month, in June. “I visit Goa once a year to meet my relatives,” she added.
It was early evening when we took the turn past the Bandra Bandstand on our
way to the Mount Mary Church in Bandra. The monsoon was three weeks away
but clouds straggled across the sky from the west, in ones, twos, and
threes, sometimes more. In days to come more would follow. The rickshaw
labored up the hill, flanked on either side by residential high-rises and
bungalows that sat pretty facing the sea a short distance away. I read
Parsi names on a building or two. I like Parsi names. Jeejabhoy, Merchant,
Taraporewalla, Daruwalla. As we motored up, every once in a while I saw
people gathered on terraces facing the sea, gazing fixedly at the ocean.
Mid-way up the hill, the road narrowed; I cannot quite remember if it was
because of a tree, or on account of road repairs. Vehicles coming down the
slope showed little consideration for those going up the incline, blocking
way and forcing us into braking, losing momentum. The rickshaw stalled in
its attempt to drag us up the incline, it had lost power, eventually I
asked the driver to return to the base of the hill and give it another shot
up. We turned back and rode down, and waited until there was no vehicle
coming down the hill and gave it full power. He left us on the road passing
by the Mount Mary church.
Outside the church, stalls selling candles and wax dolls line the compound
wall enclosing the church on either side of the narrow entrance leading up
to the church. The compound wall has the same feel as the façade of the
church, made of stones demarcated by white lines. The church is dedicated
to Mother Mary, whose statue Jesuit priests brought from Portugal in the
16th century and constructed the chapel on the mount in 1640 where they
housed it. The church was rebuilt in 1761 after the original Chapel of
Mount Mary was destroyed in what is believed to be a Maratha raid in 1738.
The statue of Mother Mary was shifted back to the rebuilt church from St.
Andrews church where it was temporarily installed after fishermen found it
in the sea. The original statue was re-adorned with the child in her arms
after marauding Arab pirates cut off the hand to get at the gilt-lined
figure of the child in her arms.
Sandra Monteiro was alone in her stall. She was dressed in a frock and had
a kind face. When I first met her on alighting in front of the church, I
had a feeling she was originally from Goa. Time had etched its passage on
her face. Hers was a makeshift stall. Candles coloured white, dark blue,
light blue, red, and orange, hung from hooks looped around a horizontal
bamboo support held up by bamboos fixed to the
ground.
In a basket by her side, wax figures shaped as hands, legs, spine, head and
other parts of the human body were neatly stacked along the circumference
of the rim. Actually, some of them were reclining as if resting easy while
enjoying the view of the sun going down. The setting sun opposite lit them
up in a translucent white. Devotees who come to Mount Mary to pray for
cures for their ailments offer the wax figure that corresponds to their
ailment. “Here, this one is for the stomach,” said Sandra Monteiro, showing
me a circular plate-like wax figure. “A patient suffering from a stomach
ailment will offer it at the church by setting it alight, and saying
prayers.” Then she held out a wax figure shaped like a back and said, “This
one is for a back ailment.” As we talked in konkani, a steady stream of
devotees came up to her stall to purchase candles, and the wax figures that
she refers to as baulis (bauli is konkani for doll). Devotees belong to all
religions, and their belief in Mother Mary’s powers to affect miracles is
absolute, drawing them to the church from long distances.
About then a middle-aged couple steps up to Sandra Monteiro’s stall asking
her in hindi if they should offer the wax bauli at the church now or after
they get a house. I listen on for I never get tired of a Goan Catholic
attempting hindi. It does not matter if they’ve lived in Mumbai for years,
like Bandra’s Christians with roots in Goa, have, their Hindi shows the
influence of konkani, lacing it with an edge that people up North would
find a touch arrogant, insulting even. She advises them to offer prayers at
the church for the house they hope to own someday, and return to the church
to offer the wax bauli after their prayers are answered. “We prepare all
these wax items at home,” she told me, “using molds.
“Baba accha sa pass hone ka,” (Baba should pass his exams well) she said to
the same couple who mentioned about their son who was appearing for his
exams. “You can pray for him at the church now, then offer a wax-book after
he does well in his exams,” she told them. On a wooden plank near the front
of the stall, she had stacked packets of gram. “My mother-in-law started
this business fifty years ago,” she told me, running her hand in an arc
indicating the stall she ran on her own. “She supported the entire family
from her earnings from this stall. She is originally from this place. After
I got married and came to Bombay, I helped her run this stall.”
I ask her how old is she.
“Sixty. To sixty, add three more,” she replied.
“Sixty-three?”
“Yes,” she said, smiling.
Sandra Monteiro lives in Bandra. Then she told me of her children and her
grand-children. I listened on, pausing only when customers stopped by her
stall to make purchases, watching her treat them kindly and answer their
queries patiently. The sun cast golden shafts our way, lighting up the
stall in a soft memory.
I purchased candles for five rupees, thanked her and said that I would
return to her stall with copies of her photographs. She smiled back,
nodding her head.
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