The last time Bamun wore a t-shirt and shorts, the whole community went nuts! It was awfully scandalous! What was he thinking? A member of the highest caste in such outrageous clothes and right in the holy temple?
Some even demanded he gets cast out. Luckily his father was an influential figure of the society and a committee member and he may or may not have said a thing or two in the right ears and the whole thing died down shortly. Bamun’s mother came off worst, her reputation as a good little bamun woman dwindled. She couldn’t even face her own circle she was the queen of. She shut herself off and shunned bamun altogether for the whole week.
Bamun wasn’t perturbed by any of this. He was, after all, very much WOKE. Besides, you only live once. So chill, bro!
One day Bamun slid his legs into a cool pair of snickers, popped his head through the most gorgeous top he had, and went to the mango grove. While he was sitting under a big mango tree and philosophizing whether anime profile picture was acceptable in modern societies or not—suddenly materialized a green young lady.
-- ‘Howdy!’, a cheerful voice came out of her.
-- ‘Um...hello? Wh...who are you?’,
-- ‘Daliah. All my friends call me Dali though. What are you doing?’
-- ‘Philosophizing.’
-- ‘What’s that?’
-- ‘It’s the process of… hey, are you sick or something? You look kinda… your face...um... different?”
-- ‘Huh? What do you mean? Oh! Thiiiss.’ She chuckled. ‘My skin is green. ‘Cause I’m a Shakchunni.’
Bamun missed a heartbeat. This cannot be! They are supposed to be ugly, big-toothed with dusty hair and glowing red eyes, and on top of everything, they are not supposed to exist! Myths, legends at best. Whereas, this woman… this woman…
--‘But.. but... you’re beautiful!’, finally he squeezed out some words.
-- ‘Yeah.’ She shrugged. ‘So everyone tells me.’
Bamun stared at her, awestruck. She had a slender body with black short boyish hair that danced around her neck. Her green skin glowed in the bright sunlight. And her curves… Bamun had to force himself to up his chin.
-- ‘Um, everyone?’ He felt relieved that Daliah didn’t notice his looking. Fascinated or not, that would make things awkward.
-- ‘My friends. Other “supernatural” beings you people are so scared of. Seriously, we are not scary at all. Like, NADA!”, her mouth made a round mocking shape at the word supernatural. ‘In fact, I was just going there. Then I saw you down there. Clueless as a sparrow. I thought you got lost. So many of you are. Who knew you were… well, whatever it is you’re doing.” She hugged herself nonchalantly.
Bamun stood there motionless. Thinking.
-- ‘So you’re coming?’ Daliah looked at him intently.
Bamun racked his brain. Was she really asking him to go with her? Where? To his imminent demise? But no woman so beautiful like her can possibly kill! Don’t kid yourself—he slapped himself in his mind. That line of thinking was the downfall of many men. What should he do? And what could he do? Maybe she was just asking him to go to her friends. Moreover, Bamun wasn’t sure he wanted that encounter to be the last.
-- ‘Yes’, he finally uttered. And followed her through the woods.
When Bamun finally headed back home, the sun was already down. It was the best day of his life, he recalled. Daliah led him to a place one might call a festival of the preternatural. She introduced him to her friends. All sorts of ghosts were there. Petni, Pechapechi, Nishi, Kanavulo, Mamdo, Aleya, Mecho Voot—all were in a very jovial manner. Mecho voot even performed his expertise at catching fishes in Bamun’s regard. He conversationally let Bamun know— Mecho voots no longer eat raw fish. They usually grill them with pepper and salt. He had Bamun tasted some of it. It was delightfully delicious!
But all Bamun thinking about then was—Daliah. Her smell, perfect cylinder-esque hands that can extend themselves (quite handy), the way she talked and laughed.
Bamun was in love.
Going back home, he came to a firm decision. A decision that might rock his entire world, send his mother to an early grave.
Thousands of years ago, bamuns and their wives cowered and ran from the abominable Shakchunnis.
Now this Bamun of ours — wants to marry one.
May he live long and raise little Shakchunni babies.
NB: Shakchunni's are common mythical creatures in Bengali folklore. They are usually described as horrid looking green ghosts (of widows) who want to take over living women's (usually young brides) bodies and continue to live the lives of the hosts as if nothing changed.
I wanted to see them in a more favorable light.
About Me
Twitter - https://twitter.com/not_a_c1nephile
Here you are posting in BDC! Nice and fun read...
Thanks!
I've been muttering on it for a while and what was bugging me is that - mythical figures in our lore are usually one dimensional. They're either horrendous or murderous. We're rather hard on non-human folk. There's a scarcity of fantasy tales in our reading sphere too.
So I made up a pretty shakchunni. Perhaps, more will follow. 🤣 Writing this one, I got to know the names of a bunch of different ghosts and their characteristics.
I dig this a lot. Now read it twice :)
It is time we bring back all our Bhut, Petni, Bhromyadoitto, Skondhokata.... and modernize them. Lets make them more suitable for the digital modern world.
Kudos!
I'm honored! Thank you!
Yes, let's do it. I forgot about Brohmyodoitto earlier, they are perhaps the only friendly voot we have in our lore or so far I've seen.
Congratulations @notacinephile! You have completed the following achievement on the Hive blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
You can view your badges on your board And compare to others on the Ranking
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPTo support your work, I also upvoted your post!
Do not miss the last post from @hivebuzz:
It reminded me of the "Thakumar jhuli" show. I used to watch them with a lot excitement. Ah! those were the golden days.
Haha, I actually retold that very same story with my ideas. 😉
Here friend, these are the links as we discussed on discord.
https://hive.blog/hive-190212/@tykee/how-to-build-a-good-chain-of-habits-using-the-domino-theory
https://hive.blog/hive-148441/@tykee/do-not-break-the-chain-seinfeld-consistency-strategy
https://hive.blog/hive-148441/@tykee/use-to-a-strategy-of-pointing-and-calling-to-reduce-bad-habits-and-increase-awareness