#258 Punjabi Tragedies, Diaspora Memory, And The River Of Lovers

We trace four legendary Punjabi romances to show how love collides with honour, caste, and control, and how songs keep grief alive across borders. Instead of selling fantasy, we read the system that turns desire into danger and memory into resistance.

• Why folklore carries culture, norms and taboo 
• Music as the archive that crosses borders 
• Mirza–Saihba re-read through honour and blame 
• Sohni–Mahiwal and the terror of nightly crossings 
• Sassi–Punnun choosing belonging over bloodline 
• Heer–Ranjha, renunciation, and the cost to women 
• Diaspora meaning-making and reframing tragedy 
• Why we still sing denied love and what it reveals

Thank you for listening, you can hear Ravia every Thursday on 97.9 FM or through our live-stream at www.theuniversalradio.com

IG: @theuniversalradio

Transcript

Setting The Stage For Love Week

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Hey everyone, happy Thursday. It's Ravia, and I'm back on the Universal Radio Network. I am so happy to talk to you guys today, be here today. And it is love week as we you know we're getting closer to February 14th, Valentine's Day. I feel like I'm seeing a lot of love. I'm seeing like hearts and themes, and you know, all the restaurants are booked out for dates, and it's it's an exciting season, but you know, February always does something to me. It has me feeling some type of way. Like I love love, I love my friendships, I love celebrating love, I love celebrating softness, romance, desire, all of it. And listen, if you're single, heartbroken, or tired of the, you know, happily ever after narrative that you feel, especially around this season when it's like roses, proposals, performative, capitalistic, hallmark, all that stuff. Sometimes it's really real romance. Uh, today we get to brace that bubble a little bit because we are gonna talk about love. But we're gonna talk about the most famous love stories that are tragedies. And I want to say this clearly: like, there's nothing wrong with loving love. Well, obviously I think that, but there's nothing wrong with being exhausted by it too. Like, I love romance, I love intimacy, that's all fun. Like, and I love celebrating love in all its form, not just romantic or partner love, not just what's socially approved, but I know that Valentine's, you know, the Valentine's culture, I guess, can feel a little bit isolating, especially when it's being marketed as like something shiny, simply attainable, and you know, partner specific. But stay tuned with me, and I'm not gonna be selling you a fantasy. I'm gonna be telling you the truth, or a version of it. And I get to talk to you about folk stories and oral histories that are now being recorded in reference in pop culture and beyond from the region of Beat Punjab, that that area. There's some from Sindh, some from Gadrath, so you'll get to hear all of those today. Let me tell you a bit about folk stories. So, folk tales and oral traditions significantly shape the cultural essence of any place. So, folklore holds informal knowledge about societal customs, traditions, beliefs, norms, taboos, rituals, and it's, you know, it's communicated. Like folklore can be anything from language, music, dance, symbols, signs. Those all kind of make up the genre of folklore. And sometimes when you think of folklore, you think of, okay, well, Taylor Swift maybe, but also you think of like the Brothers Grimm and you know the stories you hear growing up about like Cinderella and all the dis that got turned into Disney, all of that stuff. But what folklore does is it encapsulates the shared experience of a community. And today I'm gonna talk about the Punjabi community. So they are known as like, you know, they're they're metaphorical devices. They teach you things about culture, they're rhetorical. And I read this study called Rhetorical and Metaphorical Devices in Punjabi Folk Songs, a cultural and linguistic analysis by researchers Atik, Abbas, and Salem. And they argue that the folklore, the study of folklore has been sidelined mainly due to the influence of colonization and capitalism, or it's been turned into something in the Western realm, anyways, that is like severely capitalized on and kind of creates these caricatures sometimes. But in the context that Atik Abbas and Salim are talking about, they are talking about folk Punjabi songs and how that stuff has been, you know, not centered, not really studied. And today's my effort in doing that. I do see it coming back through recent song releases, but my effort today is to bring a bit of that into our into our psyche, you know, and grow underscoring the growing importance of its exploration. These researchers they explain how delving into folklore often emerges as a unique inquiry into the fundamental aspects of human existence, positioning folklore at the core of humanist experience. So, in essence, folklore mirrors the quintessence of humanity, and it can offer us a unique insight into ourselves, our cultures. It translates unwritten and orally transmitted traditions, and they serve a sturdy framework for navigating uncertainties and ambiguities that are encountered in society. Like folk life, folklores, kind of shows and nurtures the development of a culture. It shows you, oh, in this story, someone else did this, that was bad. Someone else did this, they were punished, someone did this, they were rewarded. What choices do they make? What cultural mories do people follow? So I'm going to continue talking about the importance of folk songs and get yourself a nice warm drink. Get ready for story time with me, Rabia. So I always think about South Asian love, and I always think about how at its core all the stories I've been told have told me it's not easy. We are talking about folk Punjabi love stories today. Kind of, I say Punjabi love stories because I've heard the one, the versions in Punjabi, because that's the language I speak and understand. But I do know that these stories are told across Persia, across Gujarat, across India, across Pakistan. And I think these love stories serve as warnings. They're tragedies, they're so sad. And there's stories where love doesn't conquer all. Like, I think about all of the fun rom-coms I watch where it's like, these stories are not rom-coms. This is like, like, this could almost be an anti-Valentine's Day episode. Like, love is interrupted, punished, controlled. It's cut short, people are killed. It's like, you know how we think about how there's like a Romeo and Juliet? Like, trust me, there's at least seven major ones. Uh, and depending on the region, language, and oral tradition in South Asia, there are seven, but today we're gonna talk about or. And I we didn't realize, but many of us, and maybe you did too, but from my experience, like many of us grew up with this, like these stories surrounding us without even being formally told them. Like, I grew up with the framed picture of Sony Maywell in the in my home. And so this is this is one of the stories I'll be telling today. It hung there and I no one really told me about it. And I just thought, like, oh, they're like, you know, a man and a woman, and then there's like a pot and it's raining. Uh, and then I learned. And then I, you know, and then it comes up in other ways too. Like I was listening to this Garnagula song, and um, what is it called? But but the song he says, Tuagi kuritkare utte tarke. Like, will you, would you cross the Janab in a clay pot? Tuagi kare deute tarke. Sorry, I just didn't that weird. I mean, he just assumes, like, you know, it's like it's just one of those things where it's like it's a reference, and if you get it, you get it. Because it is a folk cultural story, it is woven into our art, our culture, and you know, the things that you say, even this like the sayings that we have. So, like, I I think about like when someone, you know, a boy gets his uh ears pierced and Punjabi, they'll be like, Ranja Bone. Like a reference, you know, it carries like centuries of meaning, that that one sentence. So these stories aren't just relics, they're active. And tonight we're gonna sit with four of them. So I'm first gonna give you Heed Ranja, probably one of the most famous ones. Then we have Mirza Saiba, Sony Mehual, and Sasi Bonu. And I don't want to romanticize their pain, but to understand why this pain is what made them unforgettable, we are gonna talk about it. Before we explain anything or get anything into, I want to make something clear. Folk stories survive because of music. And that's what we talk about at the Universal Radio Network, at least I do. And books help, of course, classrooms can help, sure, but music is the factor that I believe has kept these stories alive and the oral tradition alive. Because honestly, I hear a song, I'll remember it. These stories weren't always meant to be archived traditionally, but I do believe they're meant to be felt because they're sung at weddings, they're whispered at night, like you know, when you're told bot from your bibli, you hear it. They're passed down through voices that cracked and trembled with emotion. And music is how memory survives migration. Well, one of the ways. And it's also how stories cross passports. I mean, how they cross borders. Uh, do stories need passports? I don't know. Well, that's a that's a hot topic for another day. But in the song uh Harsleep Gar sings Hij, you're not just listening to her retelling the story. And in so many of these songs, you're listening to the grief that's been rehearsed and passed down for generations. It, you know, and in songs Simren Gar Dudley sings Saiba. She's narrating folklore, but she's doing more. She's interrogating the perceptions we have of Saiba, the power, the gender, and the control. Like, what are those things that we're all dealing with? And those things we'll we'll unpack today that I'm so excited about. And it's something else is worth noticing is that these songs rarely give you the full plot. They don't spoon feed you the context because especially because they're one of those, those things are like allegorical, right? Like people know about these things. But I think in the diaspora, sometimes we lose that because we weren't given the same uh folk tradition, traditional, like library of people and stories to get to understand our world from, right? Like that's something that we have to sometimes um reach out for and find because uh older generations or people born in our you know homeland, wherever that may be, might have a better understanding of that. But in at the end of the day, even if I'm telling you these stories today as your first time hearing them, the emotion is gonna land in the same way. And now when you hear these songs, you'll be able to unpack these. I'm gonna get into the story of Mirza and Saiba, who are a traditional folk story that come from the region of Punjab in South Asia. And this story is often framed as a romance gone wrong. But that framing misses something crucial. This story isn't about bad decisions, it's about like crazy impossible conditions and society. The T is that society is the problem. And that is a through line throughout these stories. So uh, you know, not not to jump the gun there. But Merza Saiba, these beautiful folk, weren't strangers who fell in love at first sight. They were childhood companions, they grew up together, their intimacy was rooted in familiarity. It was, you know, there's stories of them like, you know, being kids together, and they were, you know, longing for each other. And and the story, the story goes that society at the time couldn't tolerate their longing. And they couldn't tolerate that closeness, like because it was like not by their permission. It wasn't, you know, he wasn't the guy that they that Saiba was gonna marry. So the story goes that Sayba's family decides that she's gonna marry a fellow named Daher Khan. It isn't because Mirza's, you know, unstable or dangerous, it's because Mirza exists outside structures that guarantee control, class, lineage, and honor. Very important there, right? And so Saiba is removed from him, not for her safety, you know, like obviously, but for reputation, for honor, for societal clout, I guess. And Mirza's response was immediate and visceral. He rides all night to reach her village. He does not sleep, he does not pause. And it's just the the way the story is told is it's a devotion fueled by desperation. This image is him, it's a lover racing against time, and it appears again and again in South Asian folklore. And because it in a way, time itself is the enemy. The time you have with one another is so precious. So, this racing against time, trying to get to your lover, you'll you'll hear a lot about that today. So there's uh through a series of events, you know. I can't I can't tell the full story today because there's just so much we have to get to through, but another time maybe. But they, you know, through a series of events, him and uh, you know, he gets Saiba, and they are they're making their escape and they make it away, and they're running away from her brothers. And because her brothers are the ones that were the like, you know, they're like they're trying to save their sister. They're like, you know, someone's taken our taken our daughter, they're this is our honor. So, you know, back in the day, like you know how in Bridgerton and like season one they're having a duel. This is essentially what happens. I'm not saying that Bridgerton said saw Mirza Saiba and said copy paste, but someone could look into that. But under a tree, Mirza is resting because there is a long, long way. And this is they're traveling for a long way, and he's traveled throughout the night the night before, and they're resting for a bit. There's like I've seen all these pictures and paintings where he ties his horse to a tree and they're resting there, and and and you see that it's this moment before tragedy strikes. This is where Saiba's story becomes devastating. So she knows her brothers are going to follow, and she knows that Merza is a really good archer. Like he is Katniss Everdeen times 10, and she knows violence is inevitable, and she faces a choice that countless women and people in relationships are forced into allow bloodshed or disarm the person you love to prevent it. In a sometimes what people analyze as a hopeful, naive move, but it's been analyzed in other ways as well. She breaks his arrows. She takes them and she snaps Mirza's arrows, disarming him. This act has been debated for centuries. Was it betrayal? Was it foolishness? Or was it an attempt to protect everyone involved? And I think there's, you know, some some somewhere in between that. Like that there that where the truth lies. So Saiba was not choosing between good or bad. She was choosing between bad and worse. There was like, you know, she's running a an analysis, uh, a risk analysis, may I say, on this. She's saying, if Merzo fights, he's gonna kill my brothers. The blood and guilt would follow her and her relationship forever, forever. If he didn't die, then if he didn't end up, you know, killing them, then her brothers would kill him. And what's the point in that? And that's exactly what happens. But she thought maybe he won't, you know, she thought maybe he won't be killed. And when her brothers arrive, Mirza is defenseless. He is killed instantly. And that is Saeba's worst fear. Sayba is overcome with grief and horror, and it's said that she ends her own life with the same arrow that Mirza's life ended with. And no version of the story ends safely, which makes it painful. And I think that's why this choice is important, because that's why the story continues to endure. Now, don't say I didn't warn you when I said today was gonna be Loki and anti-Valentine's Day episode. I just am going through the story I just told, and it's it's tragic, and uh, hate to break it to you, but it doesn't get better. But we're what we're gonna do right now is get into the Mirza Saiba story and into a shift in perspective that I've seen and maybe even other artists have kind of unpacked is the perspectives on the story of Mirza Saiba. Okay, that that this is a lot, you know, this is a lot, but this is a folk story, and it is, and naturally there's, you know, teaches a lot of lessons. And for many generations in perspective, Saiba carried the weight of blame. Her decision was scrutinized, her fears mocked, her intention is like ignored, like modern artists, I think, are changing that narrative in the forefront, but it's you know, it's almost like a the story's told as like a, you know, like this is this is what you don't do. You don't run away because that's a bad, bad thing. But Sermonkar Dudley's interpretation of Saiba refuses to frame Saiba as naive or weak. Instead, she places Saiba squarely inside the violent social system obsessed with idd, honor. Uh, and that is preserved through things like control, surveillance, punishment, la la la la la. In this telling, I know, great stuff, right? But in this song, what uh what Simran does is, and and she changes the story, is that Saiba is not the tragedy. Mirza's story is not the tragedy, and even her brother's actions aren't the tragedy, the system is the tragedy. And Argent Delon's song, Danabad, goes even further. He interrogates the obsession with Saiba's choice while ignoring the context that made that choice inevitable, and also understands that, hey, Mirza was just tired. Like, Dan Nabad is so dur. Like, it's not Mirza's fault, it's not Saiba's fault. And in this song, he also questions why women always are expected to carry the moral burden. Why is her attempt to reduce violence framed as betrayal? It always framed as betrayal. I imagine it can be in some ways. But he reminds us, so Argentillon in this song reminds us that Mirza's nap is often portrayed as careless, as but it was exhaustion, you know, the Ra was just that long. And that Nabad isn't just a genus, is not just a dense destination, but a symbol of distance and closeness to their happily ever after, right? And then he, you know, like he connects these stories, like I said, to Sony Mehual, to Laila, to Majnu, to Yusuf, Zaleika, different geographies, different times, same outcomes. Unfulfilled life, love becomes immortal, not because it was just because it was pure, because I do believe it was pure, but because it was denied. Like that's what sucks, right? It's a denied love that we mourn. And the reframing of this matters, and I think it matters in the diaspora, because these aren't just old stories. They echo in our modern conversations, in people not letting people date certain people because of certain things a person can't change. And I don't think that Saiba was reckless. I think she was trapped by a system. Do you know the five rivers of Punjab? This is a quiz, pop quiz. Do you guys know them? Alright, who's gonna say them right now? There's one, two, three, four, five. That's that's my clue. Okay, did you name them? Okay, one of them, number one. I'm gonna go Sudlej. Did you get that one? Number two, Beas. Number three, Ravidria, Ravi. Do you know that one? Number three, Jhelam. And number five, the river of romance. Can you guess it? Janab. That is where I'm taking today is to Janab. The river Janab is one of the five rivers of Punjab. So it now sits between India and Pakistan, but its journey starts in the Himalayas and the Himalayas, and it flows through Kashmir into the playing of Punjab, and it's an integral part of Punjabi literature and folklore. The story I just told you about Ranja and Heer, uh, they were also near this river. So that's why it's known as the river of romance. And the story I'm gonna tell you now is literally takes place in the river. Like in Sony Mehiwal is the river romance, and it is it's such a place of like timeless love epics of Punjab. Like it's coming from there. But Sony Mehiwal is the is the one I was talking about at the start when I said we had a picture of Sony Mehuel in my house. I just didn't know who they were. Um, you know, it was it was it's a haunting, it was a haunting picture. It was dark, you know, it's raining. There's two figures, two like a man and a woman, and a a pot, like a kara. Uh I think it's called a matka. I don't know what's called in other languages, but a clay pot essentially in the picture. And it it's a haunting picture and it's a haunting story. So Sony Mahiwal is haunting not because of its ending, but because of the way it's the repetition. I think I think that creates kind of like this this like lead up to it that's kind of scary. So it is, it is like this love isn't expressed in like, you know, one big romantic gesture. It's it's over time, and it is expressed through facing deadly risks night after night. So we're gonna start with Mehiwal, who's also known as Meza Isitbeg, and he came from a wealthy merchant family in what was Turkestan. Or he was a merchant, wealthy merchant, who knows. He was driven by a quest for beauty and pleasure, he embarked a journey to India, where he encountered what they call the enchanting land. And he actually visited the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan and presented him with extravagant gifts. Izith Beg was accompanied by his caravan and he was beginning his journey back home. He passed through Punjab and after Lahore, they camped by the Channab River near Gujat. Seeking diversion, or you know, trying to trying to see what's going on. He's like, how do I make money in this town? Him and his friends and his boys go to the town and they stumble upon a potter's shop owned by a fellow named Dullah. He is renowned for his craftsmanship. Among Dullah's creations, Izithbeg is captivated by the radiant beauty of Dullah's daughter, Sony, whose name means beautiful girl. She who is beautiful. Despite warnings from his, you know, his boys, his friends, the people in the village that about the allure and dangers of Punjab's women. This is this is hilarious. This I got this from somebody, that's hilarious. Is that Beg's infatuation with Sony deepens with each encounter? Isn't that funny? That you know, be beware of Punjab's woman, they say, I I didn't say that. This came from this writer who I will quote at the end of this, but his heart is captured by her beauty. Is that Beg decides to stay in Gadrath, abandoning his riches, his This caravan that's you know traveling back. And he's like, you know what? I wanna see what's up with this girl. And the following days, he, you know, goes to her shop, he buys pots, he's like, hey girl, what's up? Like, have you ever done that? You ever crush on like a barista and you keep going to that cafe and you're like, hey, hey man, what's up? I know that happened in Heather. Heat arrivaly, okay, I know that happened. But in this, in this instance, this is not Heat Arrival, Robbie. Get back to the pro mads. This is open jumpy stories. But in this instance, he goes and he's like buying pots from her, and he's like, Girl, you're so you're so pretty, these pots are so pretty. And they like become friends, they get into each other. This is Beg. They now call him Mahiwal, which means the guy who takes care of the buffaloes. And he's tasked with herding buffaloes across the river, separating him from Sony. And despite the distance, their love endures until Sony's mother discovers their secret relationship. Dang it. Girl's worst fear. I'm gonna I'm gonna say it. That was my worst fear. But she's faced with her father's anger. Oh, even worse. Sony is forced to marry someone in her cast, another potter. And it's it's pretty tragic. They're all sad. Mahival withdraws, he becomes a hermit. He's living by this like cave or like structure, small structure on the side of the side of the river, and he's just you know feeling despair. But silver lining here, weeks later, Sony and Mehival encount encounter each other. And they are both, you know, they're they're into encounter each other, but when they're both visiting holy men by the river is what you know what I read. But it this reignites their love. They're like, you know, hey, they couldn't just text each other and be like, hey man, I'm gonna be here. They had to like physically run into each other. So that's what they did. And they secretly arranged clandestine meetings. And Sony was on one side of the river again, and Mahival was on the other side of the river in his hut. And Sony couldn't swim, but she had to get across the river. And Mahival, I think he also couldn't swim, but he he he didn't he didn't get across the river. But what happened was Sony would go to his side just so that Mahival, I think, probably wasn't trespassing on the other side, I imagine. But Sony couldn't swim, but she knew she could float if she was holding a kara, so a clay pot upside down, um, with assentially becoming her flotation device. And she would use that and make her way across the river. And think about this image, right? A woman's entering the river at night, trusting this clay pot to keep her afloat. Like, I to me that's not romantic. It's like so scary. Like, I genuinely have a fear of swimming. Is this why brown people don't teach their daughters to swim? Like, ah, I don't know. If you learn how to swim as a brown kid, like good for you, because I taught myself at age 18. And and you know, I think my parents wanted me to learn, but that's a different story. But, anyways, it's still a scary thing of um, you know, Sony crossing this river at night, and she does it every night, or she does it repeatedly at least, and it's like a symbol of their love. And still, you know, they have their little moment, they like are so happy to be reunited, they're living their like best life, or you know, second best life, and still society intervenes. And their secret encounters continue until one fateful night when Sony's sister-in-law discovers the affair and she replaces Sony's pot with an unfired one. So an unbaked clay pot won't float, essentially. It's still wet, right, on the inside. Um, and it would just turn back into mud. Until it's fired, it's gonna turn back into mud. So, despite the stormy weather that night, and and she knew that the something was wrong with the pot, she's an experienced person that's been working with pots her whole life. For some reason, and this is again one of those things that's debated, she ventures into the river and the clay pot dissolves into mud midstream. And there's different endings to the story, but I'm gonna give you this one. Hearing Sony's cry, Mahival spots her and leaps into the river to save her. But both lovers meet a tragic end, and their bodies are found locked in a final embrace at dawn, washed up upon the shores of the Chinab River. Like these stories are so sad. I'm so sorry. But this is it's this is the story of Sony and Mahival. And there is, they say there's like a spiritual lesson. So some Sufi uh philosophers, I guess, would have studied that like the pot that Sony knew that she was taking, like the half-baked earthen pot that led to her drowning and then Mahiwel's death as well, is often used as a metaphor in Sufi poetry to just to describe the importance of the right spiritual guide. A true teacher is like a full baked earthen pot that doesn't let you submerge in the worldly spins and the waves and flashes. So those are just some things that I found in, you know, uh of what people learn from this and how folk song and folk stories tell us about um, you know, they give us lessons. And they also teach us about the world around us. Like the the Janab River is called the River of Lovers, not because it, you know, unites people and you know, people go on boats and they like fall in love on it. Maybe they do, but it it witnessed this longing. It it portrays and it sees and it consumes love. Like it took the life of Sony and Mahibal in this in this telling. So it it represents the divine, the political, the unreachable, and it doesn't bend to human will. But it's so there's two kind of forces in this story: the river and society, and maybe they're one of each. That's an English English class or pinabi class, actually. Thing that the thought thought process that we can follow. So I'm gonna give you some beautiful songs called Far Jan Nade, Far Jan Nade by Xelpa Rao and Nuri, and Sony Mehiwal by the Folk Turbinators. I want you to listen to Sony. The second song is so funny, and not funny because it's sad, but they're like that it literally translates to Fish, please don't eat me. I'm Sony. You don't know who I am? My lover waits for me. Like, just listen to it, enjoy it. There is there's true joy found in these songs, and it is a very folksy song, so I hope you enjoy. We just listened to a story about Sony Mehiwal. I told you the story, and that story would take place on the banks of the Chinab River. My next story, however, is going to be taking place in the desert. I mean, it starts off by a river, so I'm just thinking about how nature and landscape play such a significant impact on the stories we tell. So let's get into the story of Sasi Bunu, a love that walks the desert. So, Sasi, the beautiful, beautiful child, was born into royalty, marked for death the moment she arrived. Abundant said, This girl, she's not gonna do good. She was the daughter of King Adam Khan of Bambur, long awaited after years of childlessness. But joy turned to fear when astrologers declared that the child would bring ruin to the family's honor. And of course, you know, you know how the story goes. Prestige matters more than blood, and so Sasi could even, before she was even named, actually, the king ordered that she sealed in a wooden chest with a Taviz was tied around her neck by her mother and set adrift on the river. And in this case, unlike the last story, the river is not what kills her. The chest with her in it as a child, as a baby, was found floating by Adda, a washerman, a topi, who was believed that the child was a curse to him. And and there was not a curse, sorry, she was not a curse, it was a blessing. She was a blessing, oh goodness. And he took her home, raised her as his own daughter, loved her without conditions, and Susie grew up far from the palace, shaped not by silk, power, jewelry, but by humility, care, and community. Years later, fate circled back, as it seems to do, hey? Since the king was still childless, he decided to marry again. And in the process, he heard rumors of a washerman's daughter whose beauty was said to be angelic. I know this sounds like it's gonna get gross, but keep keep listening, okay? He was curious. He summoned her to court. He's like, Who's this hot girl that's the washerman's daughter? And when she arrived, she was still wearing the same thaves placed around her neck at birth, and he recognized it instantly. And truth collapsed the room. His lost daughter stood before him. She was overcome with grief and longing. And the royal family begged her to return to the palace. Like Loki, dream life. Uh, anyone want to tell me I'm a princess and I need to return to the palace? Tell me. That would be great, too. So, and they're like asking her to reclaim her place, like, please come back. And she said, No, uh, she refused. She chose the home that had raised her, she chose the father, the man who had saved her life. And in that choice alone, she becomes this radical figure, a woman who refuses bloodline and power in the favor of love and belonging. Because who would do that? That's dishonorable. That's not, you know, that's not social climbing. And in this world that Sussi inhabits, um, then like in that space is when Bunu enters her story, her lover. Bunnu is a prince from Kech Makran, son of Mir Horkhan, the powerful ruler of the Baluchi tribe. When stories of Sussi's beauty reach him, he disguises himself as a traveling trader, entering Bombur with a caravan of musk sellers. He's like, You wanna smell good, come to me. And the city fills with fragrance. Sassi comes to see, he's like, and when they your eyes meet, uh, the world rearranges itself, changes history. They see, you know, it's described, like they see each other in everything, a very poetic way. They're in the bird song, in the water, in the air. But of course, this is this is a folk story and they're not left alone. And believing that Bunu was to be a lowly washerman like Atta, Sassi's father tests him and ordering him to wash sacks of clothes. Bunu fails miserably, tearing fabric meant for skilled hands. Quietly, Sassi fills the pockets with gold so no one will complain. And the people side with love and they kind of go for them. They're like, hey, this is exciting. So uh the wedding is agreed upon in one-one condition. Bunu must stay in Bombour and he must give up his world. Back in Cage Macron, Bunu's world, in his in his family's world, his family's furious. The prince is becoming a washerman, unthinkable. And his brothers travel to Bombour to attend the wedding, you know, like they're like, Yeah, we're gonna come to this wedding, wink wink. Um, they celebrate loudly, and then obviously, as as as these stories go, they betray him. They intoxicate Bunu, throw him onto a camel, and send him off to Iran. They literally like tie him up, strap him up, and they're like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, bachelor party, yeah, yeah, Jago Night. Send him away in the morning. Sussi is alone. She doesn't wait. She she runs. She's like, Where is Bunu? I need to find this. I know who did this. She is barefoot and she's described she's as barefoot running into the desert, madly, calling his name, bleeding, burning, relentless. In her search for her Bunu, and even nature is against her, and like she's trying to follow Bunu's path, but the wind has removed all the footsteps, the sun is too bright, and the sky is, you know, not on her side. And and she's she's on this path, and a shepherd, apparently, is on is is somewhere in the desert, and he offers her water, and then he tries to violate her. And she does the only thing that she thinks to do, and she prays. And it is described that the earth opens and the desert swallows her, and Sassi becomes forever a part of the desert. That's where her story ends. But I don't think that's where it all ends. Banu is finally escapes his family and returns, and he only finds her dubata left where she was, and he begs God for reunion, and he's like, please, I just want to be with my love. And once again, the earth opens and the desert takes him to. And now they're united where no one can separate them. This is the story of Sassi Punu. The curse that damaged not just Sassi Punu's life, but also the entire village. The curse that, you know, there's a curse that was put on Punu at at a point in the story. It is, it is what symbolizes the authority and inevitability and of like what happens in the story. There's a timeless love story of tragic life, of tragic love. And, you know, a beautiful princess and a gorgeous prince fall in love, and there's so many ups and downs in their tales. And this tale emphasizes that genuine love is resilient and can and can overcome any challenge. And it highlights Punjabi culture's conviction in the immortal strengths of passion and sentiments. It is not just a story of romance, but of endurance, of waiting, of searching for someone you lost, of a refusal of losing love, and of love so determined that even a desert cannot stop it. A love that presumably is united in a desert afterlife. That's the story of Sassi Purdue. And up next, I have He Ranja, the long-awaited story of He Ranja. Have you watched one of those like remakes of Romeo and Juliet? Like, I love those. They are so fun for me. And like the one with like the cars and Leonardo DiCaprio. Well, this isn't a remake of that, but it is a story that follows a similar pattern. Like many of these two, a tragic love story. He Ranja is what I'm gonna be talking about today. And it was, you know, told in so many different spaces, but one of the most famous uh retellings and and a poetic version was written by Wadis Shah, who's a magnificent, magnificent and well-known poet and writer, who's and the story spans distance and culture. It is about a beautiful rural maiden named Heer and a charming traveling singer named Ranja, and they fall madly in love. Their love story is not just about love, it's about perseverance, questioning family customs, and breaking social boundaries. Their unbroken tie represents the Punjabi people's tenacity, loyalty, and resolve. And the story of Rhi Ranja embodies Punjab's unwavering spirit, devotions, and selflessness, but also the social boundaries that are in place in Punjabi society at this time and that continue to stay today. Here is the story of Hij Ranja. Hij, also known as Izitbi, is an extremely beautiful woman, born into a wealthy family, while Tido Ranja is the youngest of four brothers and lives in the village of Takhthazara by the Jinab River. Again, Jinab River mentioned in rural Punjab. What was in the water, hey? That someone's probably asked that before. After the death of Ranja's father, Ranja has a quarrel with his brothers over land, of course. Surprise, surprise, hey. Uh, and he leaves his home. In Warisha's version of this epic, Ranja leaves home because his brothers' wives like refuse, his puppies are literally like, I'm not gonna give you food. They're tired of this man eating the labor of their husbands, which fair honestly, like, at least share the mental load, my guy. You're just playing a little bun city or little flute and walking around. And eventually he arrives, you know, he's kicked out, he's like traveling around, and eventually he arrives at here's village and falls in love with her. Their first encounter is really funny. He's just like asleep on this couch and she and she's like yelling at her guard because she's like rich. She's like, Who's this dirty guy sitting on my on my freaking munjaw? What is uh what is this disgusting man? And then he opens his eyes, they fall in love, and here we go. And here's father offers Ranja a job herding cattle. Ranja routinely plays the flute and he's in the and you know, he and he's like, you know, trying to get that riz on and like get her get her into him. And then they they end up starting, you know, as all these lovers do. They start to meet each other secretly for several years until they are caught by hear's envious uncle, Geddo, and her parents, Jujuk and Malgi. He is forced by her family and the local Malgi to the local priest, I guess, to marry another man named Saida Kera from the Kera clan. Um, and Ranja is left heartbroken. He is playing his flute, he ends up wandering the countryside alone until he eventually meets a jogi, an ascetic, uh, you know, a jogi, I don't know. Uh, after meeting this guy, his name is Gorknath, and he is the legendary founder of the Kanfata Pierced Ear Sect of Jogis at Dilla Jogiya with the hill of ascetics. And this is so interesting to me because, like, this is where like the ear piercing and association with like like you know, this guy's like just a Ranja comes from. This is literally from the Kanfhatta Jogi. So the this is where that that term comes from. That was funny. And his piercing his ears becomes he becomes world-renowned for that later, but he's renounces the material world in doing that. And while reciting the name of the Lord, he wanders all over the all over Punjab, eventually finding Here's now marital village. The two return to Hugh's village, where hear's parents agree to their marriage. Yay, right? Though some versions of the tale state that the parents' agreement is only a deception, so like there's different tellings of this. On the wedding day, Gedo, Here's uncle, poisons her food in order to punish the girl for her behavior, for marrying, having a second marriage, and you know, bringing dishonor to the family. Hearing this news, Ranja rushes to the aid of Hear, but it's too late, as she's already eaten the poison-laced food and died. Heartbroken again, Ranja eats the same poisoned food and dies by her side. And there are many paintings and photos portraying Ranja holding He after she died, similar to that scene of Romeo and Juliet taking the poison just minutes after each other. It's quite a poignant and you know heart-moving moment. And he and Ranja are supposedly buried in He's hometown, Jiang, which is now in Pakistan. And apparently a lot of love-smitten couples and and others often pay visit to their mausoleum, paying an homage to their love story. Let's talk about Heed, baby, and I'm talking about He from Hiranja. So I always think about Hiranja as the like iconic love story. And I just see like there's so many songs about them, like as you can see, interspersed throughout our program tonight. Like, I've just had like heer, Ranja, Ranja, Heed. How many times can we come up with it? But it is one of those timeless love stories. And when we talk about Heer herself, I don't think she's just portrayed as a lover. She is portrayed as a woman that is surviving a system that refuses to let her belong anywhere. And that's what makes her timeless. And in the song we just played, Gerdasman sings, Name mapeanaki, name sareandihoi. He isn't talking about romance, he's talking about the displacement a woman experiences, especially in a patriarchal culture like the Punjabi culture that the context of the story takes place in. He does not kept by her parents, and she's not claimed by her in-laws. She exists in between, you know, she's suspended in this temporary conditional space. And this feeling has a word that so many of us recognize instinctively, and especially as women, when we talk to our mothers, we talk to our friends, our family about this, there is a sense of a duty where you're being undone. And it is that because you don't belong the way you once did with your family, and you don't belong the way you did before with your in-laws. There's this incompleteness, this unfinished unsettledness. And that's taken to another level with Heed because she is killed before she even marries the love of her life. And I think for women especially, this feeling is not abstract, like this feeling of undoneess, aduri. In patriarchal systems, a woman's belonging is always dependent on a man. Before marriage, she belongs to her parents, after marriage, and you know, her father, actually. After marriage, she's expected to belong to her husband's family. And what happens when neither space truly holds her? Here's tragedy isn't that she just like loses Ranja, it's that she doesn't have a home, and so many women experience that, and maybe that's why this story holds holds people in a way that that others don't. And even before love enters a story, Here's autonomy is fragile. Her beauty is admired, it's controlled, and ultimately weaponized against her. Her desires are considered dangerous, and her voice is treated as something that's like negotiable. When she's forced to marry Said Dakera, and in the justification of honor, of ijat the vidjat's stability, reputation, none of these concepts protect he. They just protect the system that restricts her and restricts women. And this is why he resonates so deeply across generations, especially among women in the diaspora. Because displacement doesn't always look super dramatic. Sometimes it looks like never fully fitting in anywhere. Maybe that's something that people experience in the diaspora. I know it's common, but I'm not saying everyone experiences it. Sometimes it looks like being told you should be grateful while you're quietly grieving what you lost. And I think that's a universal diasporic experience. In the story of Hididanja, here's stories, here's pain is loud. It's it's not loud, sorry. It's it is Loud in a way, but it's enduring. She's not allowed to choose freely, she's not allowed to stay, she's not allowed to return. And yet, she's remembered. And I think that contradiction is at the heart of Hiranda's story, and society silences her in life, but immortalizes her in death. And it denies her agency and then romanticizes her suffering. And when we hear here today, especially in the voices of Gurdasman or her sleep carp, we're not just mourning like a long-lost love, we're mourning the cost of womanhood under constraint. He becomes a symbol, not of ideal romance, but of this like emotional grief that she's put through because of the system that she's in. Did you know that all of the songs that sing about jogis are singing about Randa? I didn't know that. I learned that in my research uh for today's show. Oh goodness. So I'm gonna talk about Rhonda, our jogi, and his story is often framed of devotion, which it is. And I think it's about his devotion and his transformation. And he doesn't want to lose heat. He, you know, loses his place in the world, he's kicked out of his home, he's restless, he's navigating his family conflict, he's no, no inheritance, no, you know, he wanders, but he still is finding that like sense of belonging somewhere. And when he finds heed, I think he finds that sense of belonging. And then when he is married off to someone else, Ranja doesn't mourn. He renounces, he, you know, pierces ears, goes to the gunfart, the ascetics. He's he becomes a jogi and he starts, you know, chanting God's name through the villages. He's having this spiritual awakening, he's trying to find, find God, find God. And I think there's these like symbols of him, of him wandering, of him, you know, with his flute and his earrings. And centuries later, like a man wearing earrings is still called Ronda because it's like, hey, you're you're just some lover boy. And it's and it I think it's cute, maybe, but it becomes like this visual shorthand almost of like love. But then at the same time, when you think of Ronda, you think of heartbreak. So you hold those two things together with that. This is one of the most fascinating cultural transformations in South Asian folklore, is when when like loss and something like that become style, and then it becomes like a grief. Like, you know, it there's there's like a darker underlayer under these things, but that's not always talked about. And maybe, maybe it's not, maybe it's not that deep, right? But sometimes it is. And Ranja is allowed to leave everything behind, he's allowed to disappear into spirituality. His suffering becomes noble and sacred, even. And this is contrasted with Heed. He gets, you know, renunciation, he he can he can do whatever he wants, but she gets restriction and she gets killed for doing what she wants. And he becomes a symbol of devotion, and she becomes a symbol of sacrifice. And but I think in both cases, Ranja and Here are not free in their own ways. They both have this unresolved longing. And even for Ranja, he has this unreliabl unresolved longing where he's seeking heat, even as a jogi. He's carrying her name. Is and this transformation doesn't help like heal him necessarily of him like, you know, becoming the spiritual person. It reshapes his pain. And I think finally at the end, there's like, you know, when they're when they are meeting their ends, there's they're like, there's joy in the moment, there's a sense of urgency, but there's no time, no space, no safety. They want to get married and they want to finish this, right? And I think this is what where Ranja's devotion eventually, ultimately, leads him back to the same world he tried to ex to escape, which is which is unfortunate. Like he's he is poisoned and he chooses to to die beside her. And it's not like a romantic gesture, but it's almost like a this like he realizes like there is no life available to him without her because he spent years roaming the world to look for her. And I think the story tells us that grief doesn't always end. Sometimes it becomes a lens through which life is lived. And that's why I think his image persists, not because we admire suffering, but because we recognize it and we see the beauty that can come to it and the emotions that the story gives us are precious. Some of the stories that I told today are over four or five hundred years old. And I'm curious, why do we keep singing these stories? Why do we keep talking about them? They keep showing up. It's like, why did generation after generation do artists return to the same endings, the same deaths, same heartbreak, loss? I do you think it's because we enjoy tragedy? Like, I don't know about that. And I believe because these stories tell the truth in the few ways that others do and share the pain and that longing and suffering that sometimes is felt alone, especially if you're a South Asian kid, you can you can see that in the stories how they can't tell anyone about who they're in love with. And once they do, someone does find out that they are in fact meeting, they're having these clandestine meetups, literally the world comes crashing down on them. So this becomes one of the few ways that these folk stories end up becoming red herrings, end up becoming symbols and stories and teachings and places for comfort for the diaspora and for anyone that falls in love. And these stories tell us that love isn't always rewarded, obedience does not always guarantee safety, and doing, even if you think you're doing quote unquote the right thing, it can still mess things up for you. And these stories survive because they articulate the realities that's that are silenced. So, especially, like I said, in South Asian culture where family honor sacrifice are idealized without interrogating into who pays the price. Notice something important. Almost all of these stories involve women whose desires are treated as dangerous. He, Saiba, Sony, Sasi, their love is framed as disruption. And so is the men's love at the same time. Because sometimes it's not about the women, it's about the caste difference. It's about them making a choice, it's about parents not having control. And it's about a child being rebellious and not having controlled, and it's something that needs to be corrected. And as all of these lovers suffer, their suffering is normalized. And these folk stories, in a way, become a process of that normalization, which is wild because to this day I hear stories of women or people in love not being able to marry each other because of religion, of caste, of, you know, it not being a love marriage is scandalous. And to speak about injustice without naming it directly, I think, I think is difficult. So I'm glad that we got to talk about that today. And we are able to talk about the grief that these stories have, even and and confront them a little bit. And I think music in a way becomes like a safe container for all this truth. So when an artist sings about heat or saiba or ranja, they are not just performing like a nostalgic, you know, callback allegory or one of those. Uh, they're reopening a conversation about choice, about autonomy, about consequence, about society, about how things have changed, about how women are judged or not judged, or how men are judged. That's these are the story, these are the stories that these songs tell. And I think that evolution matters, that these stories don't belong in the past. They belong to anyone who has ever loved under constraint. Anyone who's ever loved, period. And anyone who's been told to choose between desire and survival. And anyone who has to negotiate that, like being between that love and fake fear is not an easy place to be. And these stories provide you that comfort. And I think they remind us that heartbreak is not a personal failure. It's often systemic. It's often there is the effort there. If the effort is there, it will be put in into the relationship. But the sometimes the circumstances, the the culture, the society, the whatever don't allow it. So remembering these stories is important. As long as their names are sung, they are not erased, as long as the stories are being told. I think they try to signal us to the issues in the system, and that, you know, we can we can do that, do with that what we will. And every time an artist resings their pain, it becomes a form of like witnessing, where like the way the Janob River witnessed Sassipunnu, the way that like, you know, we are witnessing this pain and this love is is important. And I think it's political too. So this Valentine's Day, this weekend, whether you're deeply in love, quietly grieving, or somewhere uncertain in between, I feel you. I want you to know this. Your love does not have to be perfect to matter. Your heartbreak does not have to be hidden to be valid. And even if it is hidden, it also is valid. And your longing does not need a resolution to be worthy of a song, but I think it probably you could write a song about it. We could try. I think a love that refuses to die becomes a culture, and that's what these folk stories are telling us. And this culture is reteaching us what society has tried to forget. A rebellious child isn't always a bad one, right? Like that's something. And I don't think that I think that because they live in our memories, I think that's important. Because memory is powerful. Thank you for listening. This is Ravia. Have a great evening. I'll see you next Thursday, and we will keep turning it up.