As members of State College’s robust Indian community well know, yajna is a Hindi word which, according to one definition, can refer to “any selfless action performed with integrity, such as offering food, paying respects, or contributing to others’ well-being.”
I heard the word for the first time at the home of Manisha and Nilesh Patel, where 100 or so members and former members of the local Indian community gathered to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Story Hour. The event was yajna to the max.
Story Hour was originally conceived as a way for the five Indian families who lived in State College in the 1970s to acquaint their children with the oral traditions of the land their families had left behind – and through the stories, learn their culture’s values.
For the next half century, before ever-larger groups of children and their parents — and now, in some cases, before the children of those who were children decades earlier — Ganapati P. Patil (two years), then Ashok Gandhi (38 years) and now my friend Krishna Jayakar (10 years and counting) delivered versions of ancient Indian epics in which the gods and goddesses interact with each other by phone, text and social media.
The tone, in other words, is anything but solemn and the stories are anything but monologues: The children are invited to ask questions and the tellers ask in turn if anyone knows the meaning of words like insecurity or impurity.
“What are boons?” one boy asked at a recent session. Another asked, “What does ‘pious’ mean?”
I attended my first Story Hour more than a decade ago, during the long tenure of Mr. Gandhi. I’ve searched my offices at home and on campus, in vain, for the notes I took that day. What I remember is that Mr. Gandhi began the session with a look back at the previous week’s Penn State football game and by asking the children to recall where the story left off at the end of the previous session – which they did (would that my students were as attentive!).
I also remember that there was a lot of laughter.
As Sindya Bhanoo put it in a published reminiscence, “he (Mr. Gandhi) breathed life into ancient mythology, making it appealing to preschoolers and high schoolers alike, and our parents, too.”
The storytellers also made sure their listeners understood that these ancient tales of gods, goddesses, sages and demons, with their pride, their anger, their greed and their power lust, are stories about us. In case the kids missed the moral at the end of a recent Story Hour, Krishna made it explicit:
“Wisdom and compassion can defeat pride and anger.”
In an aside probably meant more for the parents than the children, he added, “I’m not making any kind of commentary on politics here.”
The sessions, with everyone seated cross-legged on the floor, begin and end with a sung prayer. And then there’s food, lots of it. “The fruits of love,” Mr. Gandhi calls it. Yajna.
“Everybody needs nourishment,” he told the gathering at the Golden Jubilee last month. “Here it is nourishment of the mind.”
The only story told at the Golden Jubilee was the history of Story Hour itself. Then, instead of an oral telling from the Ramayana, the three storytellers turned it over to 29 dancers, ranging in age from toddlers to teens. Under the direction of Ramkumar Dhandapani, with choreography by Lakshmi Ramkumar and music curated by Tejashwini Ramkumar, the costumed dancers performed the story of Rama’s rescue of his wife Seetha from kidnapping, and his coronation as King of Ayodhya.
Two weeks later, it was back to oral storytelling. “Day 1 of Year 51 of Story Hour,” Krishna announced, to applause. As usual, there were first-timers, whom he asked to introduce themselves and their parents. One or two of the kids did so. The shy ones deferred to their mom or dad.
Because it was Ganesha’s birthday, Krishna began with the tale of how the god got his elephant head. Next came the story of the demon king Mahabali and “the little fellow,” Vamana, whose trickery sent Mahabali to the netherworld, thus restoring cosmic order. Last, he began the tale of Nachiketa, who asks the god Yama to tell him the secret of death.
“This is the story of a great sage…” Krishna began.
Among the themes this time, he later explained, are the difference between true and false generosity and the dangers of excessive pride and ego.
“We don’t tell the stories,” Mr. Gandhi told me afterward. “The stories tell us.”
I am not a member of State College’s Indian community, obviously, but I keep going back to Story Hour in part because the hosts always welcome me so graciously, but also because, at a time of surging intolerance of immigrants, it is hard to imagine a more vivid demonstration of how much richer American culture is for the presence of all its constituent cultures.
Plus, I gotta say, the food is fabulous.
