PALAKA (PLANK) Dear friends,
Recently Iposted a QA about weighing of Boxes at home with a balance and difference inweight experienced at airport. I use a bathroom scale, keep a medium sitting plankupside down over it and luggage is placed on that in a balanced manner, ensuringreading is visible and found reading is 95% accurate at airport. The legs ofthe plank support the luggage and ensure that luggage is not touching thefloor. The weight of plank is reduced from the total weight. When Iconstructed the new home in Chennai, I asked the carpenter to make fiveprocessed wood planks rectangular in size. These planks have many usesnow. I thought of writing about theplanks in general. The contents are for a time-pass reading. Gopalakrishnan22-5-2024 1. AAvani palaka Yesteryearsit was common to have 5-7 aavaniplaka in our homes. These planks were oval witha handle and mostly made of jack wood. Now too agraharam have aavanippalaka. Useswere many. For all auspicious and semi auspicious functions, the sasrhrikal willask for planks. During srardha, the bhokthas are seated on the planks. Duringkarma, the helping priest as well as kartha sit on the planks. Duringsumangali prarthanai, the sumangali pithru is represented by a 6 yards sarikept on a plank. The kanyaka dress also kept on another plank representing anykanyaka dead in the family and now pithru. Aavanaipalaki is used for this also.Sumangalies fed sits on any type of plank available now a day. If avanipalakaiis not available, any type of planks is used. Sumangali prarthanai is an ageold custom among Brahmins. There is no Vedic approval or mentioning ofsumangali prathanai in Vedas. During allauspicious functions, japams etc., planks are used for sitting of sasthrikal,and others mainly involved. Normally Brahmin homes will have planks or commonlyavailable in samooha matams in Kerala. 2. Normal planks Present daysnormal rectangular plants used in homes have many more uses. If kitchen plankis not there a plank is used to cut vegetables. On those days, it was thepractice, my late father would cut and prepare vegetables helping late mother. Therewas a separate plank for it. Not having dining tables on those days, we sat onplanks to take tiffin and meals. The planks were stalked in a suitable place.Now too in agraharam homes, Brahmins sit on planks and perform sandhya. 3. Vishukkani For Vishukkaniit is specific to use a plank, spread a red cloth and keep Krishna idol/photo, mirror,and gold chain on mirror, gold coin and konnappo, which could be seen in themirror. Other things are arranged in Uruli. 4. Saraswathi pooja ForSaraswathi pooja, a white cloth is spread on the plank, an idol of Saraswathi/photo is kept. Important books are kept. The books are taken only next day, itwas the practice on those days, no reading and writing for a day, the books arekept. Now though the pooja is done, books kept, most read or write on necessityeven before Vidhyarambaram is completed and books are taken. 5. Pooja room. Prayer isdone sitting over a plank in the pooja room if takes more time. Otherwiseprayer is done standing before the deity’s idol or photo. My note- Yesterday Iwatched a video in you-tube about Hasthinapuram. A large Siva lingam was shownsaid to be worshipped by Yudhisthira. If the facts told is acceptable divineworship was there during Dwaparayuga. 6 Chappathi plank and adappalaka In thekitchen mostly preferred is a round plank, plane and smooth on top, with legsfor preparing chappathi. Shops have readymade chappathi plank with roller. Mosthave mica sheet pasted on top of the plank. For removingstarch water from cooked rice in a pot, there was a plank called adappalaki. Itwas placed on top of the vessel; vessel slanted and kept on another slightlylarge vessel, the plank supported with some stainless steel glass tumbler. Nowin most homes adappalaki is replaced with chippil. The taste of rice cooked andremoved starch water is totally different from one cooked in either pressurecooker or rice cooker. 7. Other interesting uses. One is toincrease height by standing on a plank to mount photos, wall clocks etc., iftheir position is not accessible by standing on the floor. Most workers desire stoolsand for further increase of height, a plank over it. Most of us use one or two planks to raise ourheight to fetch things conveniently from a height. My note- Watchingthe Mylo advertisement in TV made me to remember and add the above point. Many forafternoon nap desire a plank spread with a towel over it in place of pillow andtaking nap on the floor of the hall. Mainly cooking staff desire planks inplace of pillows for lying and taking rest. 8. Nellipalaka. In the openwells in Kerala, on those days a plank made of gooseberry wood was fitted overthe spring oozing more water in the bottom. Nellippalaka will not get damagedand it was never touched. Nellipalaka is considered as bottom of the well. Nellippalakais used as idiom in Malayalam. Nellippalaka kanunnathu varae means – Till exhausting. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Thatha_Patty" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/thatha_patty/1323228922.988121.1716360451703%40mail.yahoo.com.
