Have you ever seen Bidis used as agarbattis ( incense sticks) ?
Or have you ever seen fishes smoking like our ‘Khan brothers’ in movies ?
Yes I saw it at Calicut beach and captured the moment for a pukka evidence. Here in the picture you may see a boat with one fish smoking smartly on the wood and other lying on the floor.
On the same wood block I sat for sketching 2 hours ago, before the boat went into the sea for fishing. The black old fisherman with one company took the boat into the sea and came back with big fishing net entangled with big sea crabs and several variety of fishes. They took this specific fish first out and lighted one bidi and then put it into this poor fish’s mouth. A fish uses its gills and mouth to breath. And a bidi is securely placed in its mouth, in its normal process of breathing, it became smoking. It seems to enjoy bidi. No jumps of the fish or any movement.
The poor fisherman is at least honest to his agarbatti, unlike we corporate civilians who use smoke ( oh sorry fragrance ! ) of Chandan and Mogra to offer God and enjoy the smoke ( again sorry, Oxygen! ) of cigarettee for enjoying self. For the fisherman as per customs , it may it be a aggarbatti offering to the Sea God.
Anyway the fish remained alive for long and enjoyed the smoking like all my friends, who prolong the tea time with smoking . Who says smoking shortens the life ? See the other non-smoker fish thrown down in the little water at boat’s bottom water left the world early and could not see his friend smoking so nicely.
What strange customs we do have in India as well as around world ? I was equally surprised to see costly liquor bottles offered to Gautam Buddha at Tibbetan temple. Anyway these customs are being followed since ages and deeply entangled with faith. These are all lovely customs around us, many of them can be adpoted, if one wishes !
Anyway its a beautiful world, that can be observed only after travelling wide.