Bead Bai: Bandhani and Emankeeki details

Bandhani

Emankeeki

This historical novel is drawn from domestic and community life of Sakina evolving around two objects of women’s art. Both are of considerable social and artistic values among two culturally unalike people living side by side as separate yet in some ways inter-reliant societies on the savannah. One art object is the bandhani shawl of the Khoja Ismailis, a trading settler Asian African community adhering austerely to a distinct faith tradition rooted in Sufism and Vedic beliefs that absorbs Sakina’s spiritual life. The other is the emankeeki, a beaded neck to chest ornament of the Maasai, a pastoralist African people to whom the savannah is the ancestral home and source of their art, spirituality and well-being that Sakina yearns for during moments of torments in her life.

  Celebration of Bandhanis

Mombasa Jamat Khana Imamat Day 1963

                                                      photo courtesy Ameer Bhai Janmohamed.

Sparkle of 31 bandhanis. This picture was one among several, a collection composed by Ameer Bhai Janmohamed in memoriam of beloved Malek Chachi (Malek Bai Somji) sitting in the front row, first from the left. 

Back Row Left to Right Malek Bai Rajabali Kassam Suleman Damji, Guli Bai Jivan, Dolu Bai Jaffer Haji Mitha

2nd Row Khati Bai (Mira Bai?) Kassam Suleman Damji,  Khatun Bai Rashid, Rehmat Bai Jivraj, Leila Bai Merali Mussa 

3rd row Shahsultan Bai Mohamedali Dhala, Mrs Merali Ramji, Gulshan Badru Musa, Mrs Haji Mitha 

4th row Shirin Bai Akbar A Janmohamed, Nurbanu Bai Nasser Alibhai, Fatma Bai Ramzan Dossa 

5th row Khatun Bai Kassamali Paroo, Dolu Bai Badrudin Alibhai Kanji, Roshan Bai Fatehali Dhala, Zainub Bai Akbar Moloo Alarakhia

6th row Mrs Hami, Gulzar Bai Mansur Satchu, Nabat Bai Lalani, Nurbanu Bai Satchu. 

7th row Gulbanu Bai Husein Jivan Kanji, Muhkiani Zeinub Bai Mohamedali Rashid, Kamadiani Zeenat Bai Ameer Janmohamed, Fatma Bai Abdulrasul Gulmani           

Front Row Malek Bai Umedali Somji (Malek Chachi), Mrs Jamal Habib Kara, Dolutkhanu Bai Ebrahim Tarmohamed, Nurbanu Bai Sultan Fazal Bhanji.

(Looking for first names of those marked in blue. If you can recognize the ladies, please let me know. Also if anyone is misidentified or her name spelt incorrectly please notify me at fssomjee@gmail.com This list of names is created with the assistance of Ameer Bhai Janmohamed and Shariffa Khesavjee and continues to be updated with your help. Thank you all for your participation, ss).

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photo courtesy Karim Ajania

An example of a classic bandhani and seven diamond nose siri, the two ritual objects of
Satpanth Khoja marriage. Shirin Bai Gwadery, Nairobi late 1930s.

http://www.brickproject2016.com/2013/07/17/a-pioneering-school-teacher

photo courtesy Nizar Ramji

Rehema Bai Ramji wearing her wedding bandhani. Dar-es-salaam 1930s.

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 Bandhani in historical consciousness of 

the Ithna Asheri Khoja jamat

  "In this account of Bead Bai, several aspects of cultural commonality are also portrayed that continued to be practiced for long by the Ismalili, Sunni and Ithna-Asheri Khoja. In fact some of the practices are common to all Cutchi and Gujarati communities, Hindu and Muslim alike. One such example illustrated is the use of ‘Bandhani’ a richly embroidered silk shawl that provides for as head covering for the bride and retained as a family treasure to be  eventually draped on the coffin of the lady. This has been common practice among both Khoja Ismaili and Ithna-Asheri for long.The Ithna-Asheri Khoja went a step further as they adorned the Alam  (banner) of Hazart Abbas during the months of Muharram with a Bandhani.  It was in such high esteem that the  Bandhani  was held in Khoja culture. This custom continued until 1974 when the Ithna-Asheri community in Mombasa convened an open forum to review rites, rituals and traditions in vogue. Among the changes brought about as a result, the use of  Bandhani for the  Alam and draping over the coffin were then discontinued. Such Open Forums had no less hilarious moments as the hard-core traditionalists, especially among the ladies, found it sacrilegious to let go of the long practiced traditions."

Extract from the review of Bead Bai by historian Hassan A. M. Jaffer.

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=gmail&attid=0.1&thid=13f423e386b59941&mt=application/
Haasan A.M. Jaffer is the renowned author of The Endangered Species (2013), a book about how the Khoja Ithna Asheri jamat started to separate from the Khoja Ismaili Satpanth jamat from late 19th century onwards.
http://www.wfshop.org/The_Endangered_Species 

Below emankeeki is the widest ring of necklaces
photo Sultan Somjee

Bais of the dukas in East Africa. What are their stories?

Bais of the dukas on the East African coast. They could be Khoja Ismaili, Khoja Ithna Asheri, Memon, Bhadala of the sailor community, or minority Sindhi. Top picture: Bai is embroidering while looking after the shop and waiting for customers. Notice the meticulous display of glassware that is arranged every morning on the veranda and removed every evening.  Bottom picture: Some bais made bhajias in the evenings to supplement family income. Notice few onions, garlic cloves, ginger and tomatoes on the baraza kept ready for customers for the evening meal. See the curious children looking at me, the photographer and writer. Blow up to view interesting details.

Who were these Bead Bais of East Africa who came to Canada as grandmothers?

From the early 20th century, Satpanth Ismaili family homes spanned the African geography - the forests, grasslands, highlands, the Great Rift Valley, plateaux and deserts. Often their homes had a courtyard behind the family store and often the home-store had a small room furnished as a jamat khana. Often their home-store was on the only street and they were the only Asian African family in the area.

In the stores on the savannah, the Bais worked sorting and stringing ethnic beads. Many Satpanth Ismailis started their businesses in East Africa selling beads like my great grandfather, Rajan Nanji Pachani. Every morning he used to line fist size heaps of beads on a grass mat, sit crossed legged under a tree at the market in Mombasa and wait for the ethnic people to view and hopefully purchase some of his beads. That was around the turn of the 19th century when Rajan Lalji’s bead shop (established in 1905, in Nairobi’s boisterous Jugu Bazaar) supplied the stock to the rural bead merchants. Fatma Bai, the wife of Rajan Lalji would have been among the first Bead Bais of East Africa. So huge was the trade in beads that the bazaar behind the stone jamat khana was called Moti Bazaar. Two of the well known Bais of the bead bazaar were known as Chak Bai and Puri Bai (surnames?). Moti in Gujarati and Kutchi, the native languages of Satpanth Khoja, means a bead. So many Satpanth Khoja merchants traded in African ethnic beads that the bazaar was also known as Khoja Bazaar.

Often it was the Bais who put the beads on display panels and racks in the stores where they would sit and chat with indigenous women and men who came to admire their colourful stock. They also prepared meals three times a day. In time, the Bais sewed dresses to sell and hemmed kanga and shuka sheets as they turned the hand wheels on Singer sewing machines while sitting on the veranda of the store. They also did assorted shop tasks when the men rested in the afternoon and they embroidered pillows and bedcovers, and mended clothes. The Bais had many children, from six to sixteen, and even more, but not all survived in the African hinterland. They taught the children the sacred songs of guru-pirs and told faith stories. They made the Satpanth family home in Africa at the equator.

The character of Moti Bai in the book is inspired by the lives of the Bead Bais I had met though not specifically about any one of them.

This book of fiction is about voyaging, losing India, coming to the new land, old worship styles, imagining, politics and life in the old shantytown of Indian Nairobi. I have brought together these layered stories I heard growing up and again when curating exhibitions about the coming of the Satpanthis to East Africa (Ma aging gracefully, 1994) and then the Asian African Heritage Exhibition (2000 -2005). The material culture in the book is about women’s historical memories. That is to say, events and stories are built around articles of embroidery and beadwork, stitching and cooking; the stone hand mill, the bandhani, pictures and pieces of jewellery like bangles and the nose siri, body décor we call saangar.We grew up with stories told around artefacts.