The sighting

Every year I visit my ancestral home at the time of our new year. It comes in April. This year was no different. I went there with my wife. My mother likes to have us with her at such times. At the dawn of the first day of the New Year she wakes us all up and ushers us to the place where she has prepared a beautiful yearly “sight” for us to view. Every home does likewise. It is an annual ceremony at the dawn of New Year. We are required to keep our eyes closed till we have seen the “sight”. It is usually set in the place of worship that we have at every home. Things which are considered the symbols of prosperity would be arranged for you to view. The effort is to convey an idea of prosperity for the coming year. We take it very seriously and religiously believe that viewing it would bring good luck and prosperity for the whole year.

But this year at my ancestral home was interesting otherwise too. All the three days of our stay was “blessed” with the visit of the lords of the earth the Cobras. They would come to our courtyard and lay there till some one of spots them and would stay and shower us with their blessings by spreading their hoods and then would slowly depart. It was a wonderful sight to see. One of them was very cute. It was a small cobra. It had wonderful spots on it and when it spread its hood it appeared like a bird spreading its wings. We have a place for worshipping the snakes at one corner of the plot in which the house stands and my mother lights a lamp to them every day. So she was worried by the appearance of the powerful snakes. She says that they would not show themselves unless there is something amiss, either to their interests or for us.

It must seem strange to some that snakes are assigned godlike qualities like this. But we believe that these snakes are not the ordinary snakes we see generally. These are the manifestations of the powers of earth and show themselves only when something goes wrong. None may believe it but these snakes, though they outwardly appear as any other snakes are unusually small in size and has an ethereal quality to them when they are seen by us. They do not instill fear in us and often appears very cute and attractive. Some of them opens their hoods without any threats being visible in the surroundings and keeps like that for hours on end.

Though I have heard of the stories of these snakes as long as I remember, I have never seen them like this before. I have seen snakes in the zoo and snake parks and even in the wild but always at a distance and as a spectator. But this was different; these snakes came quite close to us and were in the least afraid or malevolent. Their purpose seemed to be making themselves visible to us, and nothing other than that. They came every day on these three days and my mother used to talk them and offer that their interests would be taken care of and the necessary purification would be done to their place of worship if by some way it was defiled. They appeared to listen to what my mother said and wait patiently till the words are over and then slowly depart.

I know that the snakes have no ears and they can’t hear us. But there are facts stranger than fiction, this was one of them. I always had a soft spot for the nature’s children in whatever condition they are seen. Well perhaps this weakness has influenced me in writing this article, I may have added colors that was not there and was purely imaginary. But I really do not think so, I believe that I was witness to something strange and there is something in what is transferred to us by our ancestors by way of myths and sayings.

There may be several explanations to what I witnessed, but I still choose to believe in what the superstitious say.