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The Blue Dappi


Do you remember the blue dappi? Probably not. It used to stand on top of our kannadi alamari. I love how all the things and rooms had their own name in our old house. Kannadi alamari, ammachide petti, Radio muri, Kochu muri, Cement muri and so on. Now when I think back to it, it lends a certain charm to those places and memories. Anyway, coming back to the point, the blue dappi was made of plastic, round in shape and had a cyan colour – the colour I call blue and some call green. It held coins and rubber bands, loose nuts and bolts, torn off buttons and sometimes, even the remnant threads. It was small, the size of a katori and was neglected most of the time. But for me, it came to prominence every Sunday.
 
Just before leaving for church and Sunday school, I had the special power to take a one-rupee coin out of it for nercha. That’s it. Take off the lid, pick a one-rupee coin and go. Oh, how wrong. It was not so simple a task.
 
On some days, I wanted to find the newest coin – if possible, from the same year. But sadly, Thrissur is not in Bombay. The latest coin I could find as probably three to five years old. Bonus points if it is shiny.
 
On some other days, the hunt was for the picturesque coin. You know – those which were minted in memory of someone or something and had pictures on one side (Can’t specify whether head or tail because I still don’t know which is which). It held a special purpose too - I could gaze at it and spin stories around it to pass off the boring mass time. The fanciest picture won, and it was a joyous occasion to drop it into the nerchapetti, having found the special one. Inside my head, the church goers clapped and ooh-ed and aah-ed in appreciation for my discovery.
 
Some Sunday mornings were a blur of activity. I would wake up late, brush, eat and run. And halfway out the door, mummy will ask, ‘nercha edutho?’ And my answer would be no. Then she will pick a random coin and I will be off with it.
 
But the worst days were the ones in which even mummy would forget. When the nerchapetti came and every other kid dropped their coin with a cling, only I would stand empty handed. Burning with inward shame while I imagined everyone looking at me with scorn, shaking their heads in disappointment.
 

 
I remembered all this while attending mass last Sunday, digging into my purse for nercha. I got promoted from one-rupee to two-rupees in a few years. Then to five and later to ten. Now, there is no blue dappi and no mummy here to remind me to take nercha on Sundays. The blue dappi has morphed into my tan purse and coins into rainbow coloured notes. But the nercha lives on with all the memories it brings back.

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