I think every country; every state has some community which becomes victims of jokes. In
Mr. N.B.Nair (ANI,Delhi) has said on wikipedia that his village Chirakkadav near Kottayam is actually known as Kothazham. I am not sure of its authenticity. I have posted his article in the comment.
Some people say it is in fact Kottayam, although people from kottayam will vehemently oppose it. No body wants to be known as hailing from a foolish village. So everybody disowned Kothazham and the village disappeared into oblivion. There are many jokes attributed to Kothazham. Even today if someone commits a blunder the question asked is “Ethu kothazhathukarana nee?” ( meaning which Kothazham you belongs to?)
I think it is better to attribute Kerala’s traditional jokes to Kothazham than to any community. So I will apply some of the traditional jokes related to Namboothiries and Panickers to Kothazham besides listing the known Kothazham jokes. I may also
try to create some jokes of on my own. If you have any Kothazham joke pls. ket me know. I will publish it here.
Many of these jokes are known to most Keralites. ButI hope this is a good way to showcase Kerala’s traditional jokes to a wider public, people other than Malayalees.
All the drawings in this blog are drawn by me except for this one (mine) which was done by a reputed caricature artisit of
Enjoy … Read on…
6 comments:
Mr.N.B.Nair's article:
Kothazham - this is the sobriquet for my village called Chirakkadav, just on the foothills of Eastern Ghats in Kottayam district of Kerala. Chirakkadavu is much maligned as Kothazham, a name that has befallen on the village by default, though there is no justification.
(There is a story about the origin of the name Kothazham (am not sure whether this is correct). Chirakkadavu Mahadevan have another name as "Koovathazhe Mahadevan". This is because there is a belief that the idol of Mahadeva was come up from the earth when one old lady was digging "Koova" (something similar to ginger & turmeric ), she found blood coming from earth and she informed the people. Once they digged more, they found the idol of Lord Shiva. Bcos this idol was escavated from underneath the Koova plant, he got named as "Koova thazhe Mahadevan")
The British during their rule had changed the name of several places, as they could not twist their tongues to pronounce it. Thus Kollam became Quilon, Thrissur Trichur, Kozhikkode Calicut and Kothazham Kottayam. But, for some strange reasons Kottayam was never known as Kothazham, but this village 34 kilometers southeast of Kottayam came to be known as Kothazham, with none raising their fingers.
(Courtesy to Mr. NB Nair (Asia News International, Delhi Beauro), Author of this Article.
Hi Valsettan,
Came to know about your blog yesterday from Suniettan.
Thoroughly enjoyed reading the contents which made me too nostalgic about the good old days.
Keep up the good work.
Devan
Sharath
(dav@rina.org)
Hai
itz very happy know that there is someone to write about my village...even i know itz too late...
love this series..never knew that "Ethu kothazhathukarana nee" had such a historic origin..
I just added your feed to my favorites. I really enjoy reading your posts.
Of course, there is an amazing similarity between Kottayam and Kothazham. Possibility still exists in favour of Kottayam as I observe. In Thiruvananthapuram, there is a place named "konni". and there is a saying that, "yaathu konnikkaaran aanadey nee" (Which Konni you belongs to?)
A number of similar places might be available in other places of Kerala also if we make a thorough search in this regard.-
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