George Lucas owes my people some money. That's because elderly Punjabi ladies are a lot like Ewoks. They're tiny, hairy, shrill-voiced and cuddly. They even have the same animatronic eyes.
A few days ago, my peeps and I recreated the fireside scene from Star Wars Episode VI: Return Of The Jedi. We sang and danced loudly next to a searing-hot fire fed by a combination of firewood, Indian sweets and popcorn. We invoked dead gods and woke up the recently deceased with our singing, amplified of course by modern technology, and celebrated our polytheism or paganism or whatever the least offensive term is these days.
There were only two Ewoks in attendance and the poor dears soon had to rest themselves on a society flowerbed. Their young ones, almost without exception taller and bigger than them, leapt, sprang and circled around a new flame of ancient origin.
The iconic Star Wars crawl runs: “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...” You mean like Harappa in 3300 BC? Aye, was it not a brave fleet of rebels that fought an invading army and tried to keep its homeland safe? And did not the bloodlust of my ancestors vanquish Luke and Han and Leia, unaided as they were by talking droids and lightsabers? What Death Star visited death upon a screaming nation and then entrenched itself in its new home, worshipping the sun and the sacred fire that it consigned its fallen victims to?
In the sacred fire, all flesh turns brown. The fair skin, the black skin, the yellow skin, the brown skin, it all turns brown. The warriors of the victors and the warriors of the vanquished ascend into the atmosphere on a train of grey-white smoke that is sweetened by sandalwood and spices, and the crackle of the flames beats time to their funeral march.
Around that fire, My Children, we danced that night. We sang of a secular thief who became a Punjabi Robin Hood and we pulled married couples into the circle. While the fire burned, the Force was strong among us. While it burned, we knew that we had five millennia of devastation and glory and victory and defeat and gold jewellery behind us.
In the darkness of Dwarka, the forest moon of Endor kept us safe. The smell of freshly-slaughtered paneer caused our mouths to water and presently, we ceased our wailing and our dancing and we withdrew into a community hall to celebrate our harvest.
In the hall, liveried servants waited on us with food and liquid refreshment. Middle-aged members of the tribe arrived, moustached and clad in the traditional buttoned tunics cut from sofa cloth. Marital alliances were broached, sought and declined. The younglings of the tribe chased red and blue balloons around the hall. All was merry.
On chairs of plastic sat we, running our eyes over the banquet and the banqueters. Yea, and the rented tablecloths and the chipped crockery and the instantly-brewed coffee were resplendent in the night, as the conversation turned to new power sources and the deplorable state of the highways and the lawlessness of the times and the importance of fasting on Mondays.
And slowly, we all began to disappear. We are the ghosts of our ancestors and exist only in the fevered dreams of a slumbering civilization. I see my cousin dematerialize, and my uncle vanish and I fancy I see my own hand merge with the ether. The community hall grows quieter by the minute until finally there is nothing left but the debris of our revels and the echoes of our laughter.
We mount our waiting steeds, enter our sturdy chariots and set out once more in the search of the vanished glory of the past. Guided only by the stars, we make our way over roads as vast and long as the Indus. In the distance, we fancy we hear the wailing of the vanquished once more, but it is perhaps only the sound of screeching rubber on an asphalt road.
We need not pause.
