Story to Sketch - ' Mookkutthi' by Nagarajam Devarajan.

I grew up in a small town in Tamil Nadu, and it was the norm then for young girls to have their nostrils pierced. I was a proper tomboy and disliked the practice of wearing a nose ring/pin intensely. The jeweller would come on an appointed day, and messages would be sent off to all the neighbouring houses that may have girls of the suitable age. I somehow always managed to escape this event and reached my early 20s without having either of my nostrils pierced. Then came the time when I was ‘seen’ and ‘approved of’. My future mother-in-law, when departing, said, “In our family, the women wear nose rings. So, please ensure her nose is pierced before the wedding”. That was it; now there was no escaping what I felt was torture. 

After a few days with my in-laws, my husband and I left for Calcutta where we were to set up home. Once we reached Calcutta, my husband said he never approved of the practice of nose-piercing, and I was welcome to take off the nose pin if I wanted. Gleefully, I put away the nose pin, assuming that I would not be seeing it again for a long time to come. A year later, when we were travelling down South to meet the family, my husband suddenly said, “maybe you should now wear the nose pin so that my mother doesn’t get annoyed with you”. I had no choice but to comply, but it was truly torture trying to get it on, as the pierced hole had got blocked over the year. I had to force the pin through, bearing a lot of pain. I decided to never go through this crazy pain again, and told my husband that if he could not convince his mother that it was not required, then I would never take it off again. I was being pig-headed but I was also really angry how this had become an issue.

After over 50 years, I took off the nose pin after my husband died – I had worn it for all these years, without liking it! I sometimes wonder why I was so stubborn about continuing to wear it. At least I ensured that neither of my daughters would be forced to comply with such strange demands.

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Credits :

For the first time, the sketch followed the story. 

Sketch by Usha Iyer

Story translated from Tamil by Sandhya Srinivasan