Maticoor is a new word for me. Everything I’ve read refers to women – “Maticoor night is for ladies to get away.” It talks about drumming and dancing and letting your hair down, as well as the elaborate ceremony. However, it seems that the bride and the groom can each have their own Maticoor night and tonight was the night for Moh’s family to gather in his family home to perform the puja, while over at Sharon’s the same was happening with her family.
From the Sanskrit ‘Matti’ means earth and ‘kor’ means digging. I’ll copy the whole explanation at the end of the post so read it, if you want.
In the morning, the tablecloth steaming continued, followed by me assembling wedding programs as I watched several episodes of Bewitched!
When we arrived at the Maticoor, there were drummers at the entrance of the home. They played loudly and for a long time. This is called tassa drumming and it started again after the puja and again at the wedding, then once again at the reception where the bride’s drummers and groom’s drummers joined together. I dodged them a bit – drumming and tinnitus don’t mix too well – but I loved the energy of it.
There was the usual large gathering of Krish’s family inside the house. The puja would take place in a tent in the back garden. It was pouring with rain!
The pundit ties the raksha sutra around Moh’s wristProtective thread or raksha sutra
Women and girls feature heavily in the ceremony. Moh sat with his mother and an aunt also stood by to help. The pundit also had a woman helping him with the various items that were brought and taken away. The prayers and chanting were quite melodic, each verse ending in Swaha which means ‘Well said’ so similar to amen. So many things were coming and going, Moh or Karna handling them and seeming to be well instructed in what to do. I’m sure I’d forget! At some point some young girls (four, although they asked for five) came onto the stage area but I can’t quite remember what they did. As well, most of us sitting watching were also female, with just a few men here and there. This all remains a bit mysterious so I need to find out more! My take on it is that Moh was being blessed and purified for his wedding.
Krish and Moh’s mother sits with Moh inside the tent for the puja
A Hindu wedding isn’t just a one-day affair. In fact, Moh and Sharon’s wedding went on for five. Now, not the actual wedding but the events surrounding the wedding and each with its own significance. I’d been to Avi’s wedding back in February and that was an Indian Muslim wedding so I wasn’t sure how much similarity there would be. The answer is – a bit. They use a lot of the same words, anyway, but they do them a bit differently.
The M&S Wedding was spread over the five days as: Mendhi night, Maticoor night, the wedding, the reception, and the Kangan. So each blog post will be about one of these and then I’ll link one to the other.
We went to Moh’s house on Tuesday, the 18th June. Moh lives in the home that he grew up in, since he bought the house when his parents moved further out of Toronto. So the house is familiar. He’s done a bunch of work to smarten it up and it shows. Moh put us both to work immediately, Krish applying film to the basement windows and me steaming some huge table cloths for the reception. And he said ‘Naomi’ was on her way. Naomi is Krish’s cousin and very close to Moh. I liked her right away. She turned up with her husband, Rana, and Krish’s dad. A full house already and we were planted in Krish’s old bedroom. That’s a strange feeling, since I knew it from before. It’s a lot tidier now!
Everything was nice. We had some food, we chatted, and it felt like we’d all known each other for years and years. I love when that happens!
The next day more work but that evening Naomi and I got dressed for the Mendhi night at Sharon’s family home. I’d arrived in Toronto with five outfits for the five wedding days. My wardrobe has never looked so fancy.
I got a wedding pedicure!My outfits scattered around Moh’s spare closet in our roomI chose my green lace Lindy Bop dress and the green sparkly bag Jenn bought for meA rare and fancy version of me!
Sharon’s family lives in Woodbridge, which is just north west of Toronto. When we arrived, there were giant ceramic elephants in the driveway and family members were sitting in deckchairs on the drive and in the open garage. Someone told me to go to the tent in the back garden to get my mendhi done but when I arrived, there was quite a queue, so instead I went to get food from the large containers on tables in the garage. Continue reading “Sharon and Mohan’s wedding – Mendhi Night”
I shouldn’t find it so hard to write about Toronto. I know it very well, even as it changes. Perhaps it’s the familiarity that stops me in my tracks.
But what is different…in Toronto?
So I’ve been lazy about blogging and perhaps the plan needs to be to see things differently. There’s always something new and interesting everywhere…if you look for it. I’ll do some catch ups with photos for a while until I get into the groove. There’s likely more to say than I imagine.
It’s a different look around here. The streets have smaller trees but during May, after a hard winter, the rain comes and the sun shines, and things get very lush and fairly wild. This to me is what Toronto in May is. I’m not sure how different this is from anywhere else but it’s certainly not Hackney.
The architecture in Little Italy and Little Portugal is…well…quaint! It veers between hideous, garish, practical, and pretty. I remarked it’s like a mini Garden District at times….all the verandahs and gingerbreading…the mix of styles could be disconcerting but it flies in the face of a city I’ve often called too homogeneous. What’s remarkable is how very close to the centre these streets are. Less than a couple of kilometres.
For me, nothing beats London for street art. Toronto likes a lot of script type art (Wikipedia reminds me that the writing style is the true graffiti and everything else is street art) but there are some gems if you keep looking.
There’s a huge foodie scene in Toronto but you have to know where to go. For me, it’s always the simple, hidden gems that I’ll come back for.
Very many years ago I got a temp job on Spadina Avenue at a tailoring factory. At lunch time, everyone stopped work and ate lunch on the factory floor. Someone gave me a taste of their sandwich (bun) one day, when I asked what they were eating. It was amazing. I thought about it for years but could never remember what it was or where to get it.
Then by accident, when my sister was living in Little Italy years later, she took me for a sandwich. And it was the same one! What was it? A ‘hot veal sandwich’ from San Francesco Foods, a tiny Italian grocery store that made sandwiches in the back room for the locals. A pounded veal cutlet is fried, dipped into tomato sauce with added peppers (as hot as you choose) and piled onto a Kaiser bun. And you have a Toronto institution. (You can also choose the eggplant, chicken, meatball, steak, or vegetarian options. For me, it’s always veal.
We once asked an Italian, my friend Esmeralda’s then boyfriend, if he’d ever heard of such a thing. He was horrified – that’s not Italian! No! But In Toronto, that is Italian.
San Francescio has become a slicker chain and I don’t like their sandwich any more. So this time Krish and I went to nearby California Sandwiches and shared their monstrous sandwich between us. It’s always with a Brio, which is the Toronto version of Chinotto – slightly less bitter, more sweet, but perfect with a spicy meat sandwich.
Little Italy has that distinctive Canadian-Italian touch, with its own community. It even has its own radio station, which has its own enormous annual picnic. Johnny Lombardi was a pioneer of multicultural broadcasting in Canada and his shadow looms over everything. And it’s a great place for a time warp. Maybe more about that later.
Statue of Johnny Lombardi, pretty much the King of Little Italy, for so many years (Amusing touch from Krish in his hand)Time warp in Little Italy
Toronto now has a Toronto sign. Try getting anywhere close to it with all the tourists and photographers, though. It’s in front of New Toronto City Hall (the old one is beside it, across the road);.The new City Hall was built in 1965 and is iconic for the city – also appearing twice in the Star Trek franchise so you may recognise it.
Nathan Phillips Square (City Hall) and the new Toronto sign
And about the cannabis culture. Now it’s legal, it’s lost its grass (haha) roots. So shiny. I can smell it everywhere. No one mentions it, no one thinks about it. And no one looks intoxicated.
Toronto is becoming denser and more populated, thanks to the mega new development everywhere. New condos are squeezed between older condos. I have no idea how this compares to London but it feels worse. The skyline is disappearing, parking lots are gone, small buildings are being razed and replaced by two, three, four towers.
Toronto The Good may be good (polite, measured, modest, orderly) but, despite its much quieter pride of place in the world, it’s trying to catch up in other ways than the condo culture and growing population reflects. It’s quietly proud. People like Drake have helped that.
Also helping is sports. This year the NBA team (Canada’s only basketball team) The Raptors have reached the finals and have won their first game. The city, as always, has come alive.
Canadian pride in a muralCanadian (Toronto) pride – reflecting the Raptors win
I’ve been much more conscious of Canadian pride and Toronto community spirit on this visit. People hang together, not standing apart. Perhaps this was always there but right now I do feel it.
I make no secret of the fact that Toronto disappoints me in many food (when it comes to shopping) arenas. There are lots of reasons for this, and the price point is probably the least of these….maybe. But we can talk about prices – sure we can! They’ve skyrocketed.
I do expect, after being away for a while, to find prices higher. However, this time the trajectory has alarmed me. I’d say that most things are about 50% higher than I found them in 2016. So the pork tenderloin i bought for $3.75 in Chinatown this week cost me about $2.25 when last I was here. Of course, this price is pretty fantastic, no doubt of that. However, to find lettuces at $2.99, cauliflower at $6.99, asparagus at $4, bread at $4-5, chips at $4 a pack – these things do alarm me.
However, I do have to eat so here’s a bit of a pictorial essay of my shopping experiences so far. There’s enough time to document more!
These shops at the North West corner of Spadina and Dundas are slated to go. No idea how long they have sat there but it looks really scruffy and neglected so far. New condos on their way?Abnormally quiet day outside the supermarket in Chinatown. Rain keeps the crowds away and there’s been a lot of it.Inside the Chinatown supermarket. I got a pork loin, some hot sauce, and some frozen shrimp and pork dumplings for dim sum. Oh, and these tomatoes (next photo)I don’t like buying the much-picked-over things in Chinatown but there were freshly placed, reasonably priced, and actually looked good. Tasted OK too!
I’m not fond of the readymade food in Toronto on the whole but there are certain things I can’t get elsewhere or they are ethnic foods that Toronto somehow does so very well.
I’ve missed this sort of readymade food – a variety of Portuguese snacks in Little Portugal – takes me back to Lisbon
You know those cool dreams where you can fly? It’s never cool for me. I have no desire to be able to fly, actually fly using my arms, or getting on a plane. That’s me. I first flew in 1967. I was a new Canadian immigrant and I wanted to go back to London. This desire got stronger when my parents announced they were relocating to Los Angeles. I was 20 so I wasn’t going to be allowed in without yet another emigration application. I was just getting used to Toronto, I had a boyfriend, and my heart was still in London.
So I saved money every week for a charter flight. I had never flown before but somehow knew I wouldn’t like it. And I didn’t. There were only narrow-bodied planes in those days, no seatback videos, or tablets or mobile phones, but at least they were jets. I was incredibly relieved to land and dreaded the flight back. When that day came, we were delayed, only to be told that our plane was out of service and we would be going home on a jet propeller plane, 13 hours of flight. I wanted to leave the airport but I hung in there. The flight was bumpy, very long, and had a refuelling stop in Gander, Newfoundland, which I remember as very foresty and the greenest sight ever from the sky.
I’ve flown a lot since then. I’ve also attended Fear of Flying classes. I cope – sometimes better than other times. Nothing takes away my fear completely. There’s no 100% guarantee of a safe landing no matter how prepared or educated or reassured you may be – and that’s that. And on the 15th of May I was flying to Toronto – an eight hour flight with British Airways (not Air Canada, who had become my lucky charm over the years – they never crash!)
We were all packed for our very expensive flight – prices have pretty much doubled in the past several years – and we felt remarkably calm. I amused myself with watching Krish’s packing. My own carry-on case was considered ‘a mess.’ Well, I felt OK with it.
Krish’s cases are always neat and tidy, the usual Tetris formation with all clothes neatly into plastic bags. The red item was my last minute addition to spoil the display
