Once Upon a Hill by Kalpish Ratna

Author:Kalpish Ratna
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Non-fiction
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2012-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

What might have been and what has been

Point to one end, which is always present.

T. S. Eliot, ‘Burnt Norton’

VI

Once Upon A Hill

Finding Gilbert Hill, at last

‘What you saw?’ Cajetan, as expected, comes straight to the point. ‘Very big hill, no?’

I set him right. ‘It’s not a hill, Cajetan. It’s just a rock, a big chunk of rock.’

‘Then where is Gilbert Hill?’

‘The hill’s gone.’

‘Gone? Too much they quarried, I heard. Gone? Frankie D’Silva, gaothan side, he was telling me the other day. Grew up there. How much they cut, I asked. He didn’t know. Not fifty years old and forgot already. But you found out, no? How big it was?’

I sketch what I think it might have looked like.

‘So this rock was inside the hill? How come nobody told us that? How can we call this Gilbert Hill when the hill is gone? We should call it Gilbert Rock. Or maybe some— There’s special name for this kind of rock?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Never mind. Who was this Gilbert fellow? From British time, I think?’

Again, I confess ignorance.

‘That you can find out easily. Famous person. Places we forget, but people we remember. How big it was, where they cut the rock, why they call it “hill”, these things you must find out. Records will be there for sure. That temple, you said—’

‘Gaodevi.’

‘What Gaodevi? How it can be Gaodevi on top of a rock? Where is the Gaon? How can there be a village on top of the rock? Is there water? Well, spring, river, something must be there, no? Mad or wot to go live on top otherwise? Gaodevi is meant to guard the village, like our Gaodevi here, right in the middle of the paddy fields. Every gaothan you go you will find Gaodevi, sometimes Virgin Mary became, but same lady.’

‘So you think that can’t be Gaodevi?’

‘That I never said. Maybe she is. But first you find her gaon.’

I had asked already. Beyond the guruji’s Vijayanagara fiction lay Pawar’s simple statement: Gaodevi’s gaon was Andheri.

Cajetan nods thoughtfully when I tell him. ‘Maybe he’s right. Then he will know how big this rock was, no? Deed of sale and all he must be having.’

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