Lifespan of a Chennette

Yesterday was Divali here in T&T, and the great thing about being home in the village during such times, is that people drop off goodies!! Of course we do the same for Eid, making the rounds (always the children) to drop off sawine and sweets, and fries too for good friends and neighbours who are not Muslim. This year Eid is only a few days after Divali and we’ll be making our own treats, but it’s nice to be home to receive.Every year, just around or after sunset people start ringing your doorbell on Divali night (yes, we bourge enough to have a doorbell in a village and we get all the schoolchildren ringing it between 3 and 3:30 pm, but we need to be able to hear when people come a-calling!). The dropping-off of goodies happens with such frequency at that time that Mom said we should have someone stationed at the gate.

I guess the same holds true for the non-Muslim households on the morning of Eid, just after the Eid Salaah (prayers). Of course, when this is the children’s job, we hate the walking around in the hot sun, calling at everyone’s gate, sometimes not knowing who you were supposed to be calling; in Guyana they have a nice way of doing this, you just call “Inside!!” and Inside then yells “Outside!” – all very logical. Some of us young ones decided years ago to band together, and we coordinated our deliveries. Easier to call if you’re in a group where at least one person knows who to shout for; and easier I am sure for the deliverees/recipients to come out and collect all the Eid treats in one go. That worked well for a few years, especially when some of us began driving (oh, so lazy, but look you can pack the whole car up and make ALL the deliveries in one trip!) and Mom started using disposable containers to pack up the sawine and other stuff. Imagine what it was like before to use say, glass jugs and plates. Not only did you have to drop off stuff, but you also had to wait outside the gate for people to wash them off and bring them back…fun times.

So, here are some pictures of what we received last night – saheenas. Of different types obviously, from different chefs. Love variation. The first picture is of two saheenas – the one in the foreground is softer and lighter, made with more flour. while the one in the background is made mostly from ground yellow split peas and not just flour, or the powdered split peas. Saheenas like these are also called Bhagias and they must have chipped up bhagi/spinach in them.

The inside of the 2nd saheena is here, taken because I loved the texture.