Us Bengalis are a curious and brave race. Me included. Our one extraordinary and defining feature is so extraordinary indeed that it does not even have an equivalent word in English. The Bangla word for it is “hujug”.
Let me try to explain it. We love our people, our friends, our adda, and so many other things which are distinctly ours. Pujo is just one of those things. We are very touchy about the subject and extremely possessive about the details. It really does not matter if you have never been to Calcutta, we assume you would know the difference between Ashtami and Dashami. And hell hath no fury as a Bengali declined a leave request the week of Pujo.
Once said leave is secured, we begin with our shenanigans which include pandal hopping, egg roll eating, balloon bursting, bhenpu blowing amidst other unmentionables like Tangra sojourns eat al.
But I digress, for I was defining hujug. Digression is also a key tenet of this precious feature. Hujug is the excitable and adventurous part of our collective psyche, which makes us as a people do tremendously stupid things like go out in hordes during an ongoing pandemic, without masks, flouting social distancing to catch a glimpse of a goddess who we will pray to later on, once we get sick.
Example Gracias of just some things which instigate, nay nurture our latent hujug:
There is a pandal like Burj Khalifa, certain celebrity will be at certain pandal for the grand opening, this pandal has the grandest chandelier, that pandal has an idol with two lions etc. etc.
Wise men say about Bengalis - The hujug is strong with this one.
