Poetic Justice

This is the story of the first… and last… love poem I ever wrote. I’ll also tell you about the village that experiences the most unusual weather patterns: once a year, it rains... fish. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
Today's stories about a love poem, being in the right
place at the right time, and fish raining from the sky.
It's also about me your host anupum Care, but mostly
it's about making you smile. Welcome to Anupum Cares. Chapter seven,

(00:31):
Poetic Justice. This is the story of my first crush
and it starts with the Family Planning Department of the
Government of India. But it's probably not what you think.

(00:54):
In the mid nineties sixties, the Indian government set up
the Family Planning Department. The department school was to spread
important health information and help manage the country's population, and
one easy way was to show films. When I was
a boy, I attended the screenings at Nava House. Nava

(01:15):
House was the locality I lived in in Simla and
that's where I met Huh. That night, the department was
screening the nineteen six seven blockbuster film op Car the

(01:42):
famous song. The film was chosen because it features a character,
a doctor who speaks positively on family planning. It was
probably important information. But seconds before the film started, a
young girl my age sat down next to me and
suddenly nothing else existed. I was looking at the screen,

(02:08):
but I wasn't watching the screen. Honestly, as soon as
she sat down, the film could have been anything. It
could have been a montage of my most embarrassing moments.
My mother hitting me on the bump with stinging nettles
could have been playing on a loop in the background,
and I wouldn't have even noticed. About halfway through the film,

(02:34):
I mustered up the courage to reach over and touch
her hand. I held my breath and fixed my gaze
straight head. I was too scared to look down, but
after a split second that felt like an eternity, she
interwined her fingers with mine. I was washed in a

(02:57):
feeling of pure bliss. Yeah. I never wanted the film
to end, but of course it did. At the time,
I was quite shy, so as soon as the film ended,
I took my hand away and got up and left

(03:20):
without saying a word. I floated back to my house
on a cloud. I was in love. I settled in
for bed with visions of my future with my love,
and then the gravity of my sudden departure setting. Really
the movie ended, and I just I just walked away.

(03:44):
Why would I do that? Why didn't I say anything?
What if she never knows that I love her. This
can't be the end of our story. Of course, our
town was small. Virtually everyone knew everyone else, so I
didn't need to be Sherlock Holmes to find her again.

(04:07):
But before I set off to look for her, the
girl's brother found me first. He told me that his
sister asked him to deliver something and handed me a
piece of paper. She had written a letter. I opened
the note, which was in Hindi or then, my dear Ana,

(04:35):
since the time I have seen you, my nights are
sleepless and my days are restless. There was more, but
would you get the gist. No matter what critics say,
I still think Indian films have a good influence on kids.
At the very least, they teach them how to write
love letters. I read it again and again, and then

(04:57):
finally the girl's brother tugged at my sleeve and expert,
make it fast. How much more time will you take
to read the letter? But I didn't have time for
his nonsense. I took the letter to my friend, which
a segal who has starred in almost all my escapades,
romantic or otherwise, And as he read the letter, he

(05:18):
made a very profound observation. He said this is a
love letter? Yes, I said, very excited and then exasperated.
But what do I do about it? Well, we must
write her a love letter back, of course, And then
he shot me as serious looking at it, and it
has to be good. I was a little bit comforted

(05:39):
when I heard him say, we have to write her
a love letter. I wasn't in this alone, but I
was still panicked. But but but I have never written
a love letter before. How do I know if it's
good enough? All of a sudden, I felt like cursing
a perfect, thoughtful, romantic letter. The power was set to high,

(06:00):
which he thought for a moment, and then his face
lit up. I know. We find the best books on poetry,
pick out a love poem and write it out in
a letter to her. After furiously leaving through the poetry

(06:20):
books we could find, Viji and I selected what we
thought was a perfect poem. It read Kiki kan me
hira kiki kaimi hirai hero. Some put diamonds in their ears,
some put them around the neck. Why am I concerned

(06:42):
about diamonds? My loved one is a diamond in herself.
It was not a good poem, but it fits the bill.
I copied it out and signed my name. I was
so satisfied with my letter, and I certain that when
she read it, she would be absolutely overcome with love

(07:04):
for me. And I was right. We were in love
all of a sudden. I was a relationship expert. So
when she told me that in a relationship, after exchanging letters,
the next step is to exchange photographs, I replied, of course,

(07:27):
of course I was going to suggest the same thing.
In fact, I've already taken a photo of you. And
then I rushed to Shimla's popular mall Road and had
my photograph taken. It was the first time ever I
had my official photo taken passport size. Of course. Later
that very same day, there was a performance based on

(07:48):
the classic Indian epic rama and called ram Nila. It
used to happen every year during the share time. It
was the perfect setting for the next step in our romance.
We met at the theater, climbed up onto the seats
in the balcony and settled in for the start of
the show. When Ramila started, I reached to her and

(08:16):
held her hand. Everything else faded away. I actually forgot
all about exchanging the photographs until in the middle of
the show, my girlfriend handed me her picture. Excited, I
took out my photograph from my pocket, but just as

(08:37):
I was about to give it to her, the audience
started clapping loudly. Apparently I had picked up the wrong moment,
and in a feat of enthusiasm, the person next to
me jolted my elbow. The photograph slipped, and as it
left my fingers, it spun down over the side of
the balcony. I peered over the railing to see where
my photograph and landed, and then, my absolute shock and horror,

(09:03):
the photo fell right into someone's lap. Not just any lap,
but the lap of my very own mother, Mamma. As
it turns out, my mother had also gone to the
theater that night to watch Ramneela, and as fate would
have it, she had decided to sit in the lower

(09:25):
seats right under the balcony where my love and I
was sitting. My mother picked up the photograph and realized
the boy in the picture was me. She then turned
the photo over. I should mention my first love letter
had gone so well that I had decided to give
my girlfriend another poem on the back of my photograph,

(09:46):
this time another song from another film Chandan Saber, then Chanel.
On the flip side of the photo, I had poured
my heart out. Your body is as smooth as sandal would.
Your smile is so beautiful. Oh world, do not blame
me if I fall in love with you. Lovingly, Yours Janopamma.

(10:13):
There was no way I would be able to talk
myself out of this one. Not only was the photographic
evidence in her lap, I had signed it as well,
and my mother looked up to scan the faces in
the balcony. As soon as I saw her left her
chin up. I tucked back over the railing and dove
to hide behind bj who of course was on the

(10:35):
date with me just a few rows behind us. That evening,
the line, Oh Mother Earth, split and hide me in
your womb was delivered by two people, the heroine of
the place, Sita and me. For quite a long time

(10:57):
after the play ended, I wandered around here and anywhere
to put off going home. Ultimately I had to go
back and face the music. When I arrived at home,
it was quiet, too quiet. I walked in the door
and saw my parents sitting. It didn't seem like my

(11:19):
mother had told my father, because he barely looked up
when I walked in a little bit too. Where have
you been better, my mother asked, casually, examining her hands,
which were folded one over the other in a lap. Suspicious,
I said, oh, Mama, just just walking around. Ah, I see,

(11:40):
my mother said, I was relieved. She was going to
pretend like nothing had happened tonight. She turned her back
to look at my father. M hmm, do you smell that?
My father looked confused. What do you smell? My mother responded,

(12:01):
sandalwood and moved her fingers over so slightly so I
could see the photographers underneath her. And I've been trying
my whole life to recreate the drama my mother created
in that moment. Needless to say, I did not pursue
a career in poetry, probably the best outcome for everyone's sake,

(12:26):
Ladies and gentlemen. That was the last day of my
first love. However, this next story is very poetic. It
almost feels like a long lost chapter from the Odyssey.
It also involves unexpected things falling out of the sky.
But don't worry, I won't attempt to turn it into

(12:48):
one of my famous poems. For you in a small
town of Law Union, Honduras, there is a mysterious spectacle.
It happened once or twice a year, usually in the
early summer. It starts with dark, puffy clouds gathering on
the horizon. Winds begin to blow, thunder starts to crack,

(13:11):
and then a torrential storm dumps buckets of rain and
everyone must run inside their mud brick homes and take shelter.
And that's when things become strange. That's when it begins
to rain fish. The event is called Yuria their paces

(13:33):
or the rain of fish, and it has been happening
in this region of Indura's for the last two hundred years.
After the wind and the rain subsides, the people of
Flower Unions step out of their homes and gather in
the nearby pasture. When they arrive, they discover hundreds of

(13:53):
small silver fish flopping helplessly in the grass. And it
happens this way every year. The fish are collected and
shared with the entire village. The community is far from
the sea, and for many of the people in this
Indian territory, it is the only time of year they

(14:14):
are able to get seafood. It sounds unbreevable, right but
it's not as unusual as it sounds. This isn't even
the only example of fish rainstorm tornadoes are known to
slurp up entire ponds and then deposit the frogs and

(14:34):
other swamp creatures on the ground, sometimes landing right on
the heads of unsuspecting bystanders. Water spouts, which are basically
oceanic tornadoes, are also known to suck up fish and
dump them inland. But what makes the uva their paces
so different from other fish falls is the consistency. The

(14:56):
event seems to occur like clockwork every year. It also
feels extra fantastical because no one has ever actually seen
these fish fall from the sky. Because of the storm's
great intensity, villagers have to stay inside throughout the duration
of the rainfall, so the fish seem to just magically

(15:19):
appear in the field once the villagers emerged from their homes.
The villagers see the annual rainfall as a holy demonstration.
A local farmer told The New York Times, it's a miracle.
We see it as a blessing from God, as the
story goes, the annual blessing first began in the mid

(15:41):
eight hundreds. At the time, the village was experiencing a
severe food shortage, a Spanish missionary named Father Jose Manuel
Superana prayed that God would end the suffering, and then
the answer to his prayers fell from the sky. It

(16:01):
was fish, and it was delicious. Now villagers hold an
annual festival in Father sub Runners honor believers, parade effigies
of the priest down the street. As The New York
Times reports, young women compete to be elected senorita uva

(16:22):
their paces miss fish Rain. The winner of the pageant
rides a parade float dressed like a moment. Of course,
religion isn't the only way the phenomena has been explained.
Scientists have some theories too. Some scientists think that the

(16:42):
fish are being lifted by strong water spouts over the
Atlantic Ocean, which is approximately two away from law Union.
Another theory is that these fish aren't falling from the sky,
but rather rising from the earth. Some scientists leave that
these fish actually live underground in rivers below the village,

(17:04):
and the heavy rains caused the fish to bubble up
to the surface. Regardless of where the fish actually come from,
for the people of law Union, the event is a
way to celebrate the community's values every year. It's customary
for those who gather the fish to make sure the

(17:26):
feast is evenly distributed among all of the families. Everyone
shares the bounty, everyone gets a little piece of the miracle.

(17:49):
That's it for today's episode. I'm an open care, Be
kind to yourself, and thank you for listening. Pump Cares

(18:09):
is a production of I Heart Radio. I'm your host
a pump Care. Our executive producer Is Mangis, Senior producer
Julian Weller, Associate producer Morgan Lavoy. Sound design and mixing
by Julian Weller and Dan Bauza. Music by Aaron Kaufman.

(18:30):
Production support from Emily Maronoff and Mary du Writing by
Lucas Riley, Matt Riddle, Margon Lavoy and Julian Weller. Lucas
Riley and Matt Riddle are our story editors. Thanks to
Skin Paru Hermandy Suza, Godwin Amana, Sidium Studios, Cornel Byrne

(18:50):
and Bob Pittman. It was not a good poem.