Baba and Mehera’s Dining Room Cupboard

As many of you know, beginning on the 27th of January the roofs over Baba’s dining room, bathing room and Mehera-Mani’s mori (washroom) will be reconstructed by the same international team that renovated the roofs over Baba’s and Mehera-Mani’s rooms last March and April. Naturally, because of this construction, these rooms have to be completely emptied—an activity that has been going on for some weeks now. The most important task in the dining room is the removal and packing up of the contents of the cupboard in which dearest Mehera kept all the cups, saucers and utensils for Baba’s use. Before each item was packed thoroughly in bubble-wrap, it was photographed for the permanent record. Some of the more touching and precious items are pictured in this story.

 

An overview of the cupboard’s interior showing all the cups, plates, bowls, and silverware used for and by Beloved Baba.

 

This is a small tea cup used by Dr. Goher for giving Baba His favourite Hewlitt’s Mixture. He took this for the chronic indigestion which resulted from all the fasting He had done in earlier years.

 

In the foreground you can see small pottery watis (bowls) used by Baba. In the background is the grater which Mehera would use to grate Baba’s apples.

 

This is Baba’s feeding cup. It would be used when He was unable to sit up properly to drink fluids. You can see that through much use the handle has broken off.

 

These knives are from a set that Elizabeth Patterson had brought from the US and given to Baba for His use during the earlier days at Meherabad.

 

And this is a view of various utensils used by Baba. They were stored in the cupboard in an old aluminum ice tray. Everything was put to use in Baba’s household—even old ice trays.

 

As they didn’t have easy access to drinking straws during Baba’s life, the women mandali would improvise and use various sizes of plastic tubing. These plastic straws were used by Baba to drink fluids from this glass bottle.

 

In India it is customary to inscribe one’s name on aluminum and stainless steel vessels. You see pictured a small bowl or wati, as it is called here, that was inscribed with Baba’s and Mehera’s names and the date 1966. This wati was used by them both.

 

This is a much-used small cotton child’s bib. We don’t know the actual history, but there are many such small pieces of cloth which were used for various purposes by the women mandali for Him.

Meherazad will be closed from 27th January through 6th February for Amartithi. During that time the roof team will come to Meherazad ready to begin preparations for their reconstruction project. Meherazad will again open for one day, on the 7th of February, Beloved Baba’s interment day, and then on the 8th, the roof repair work will begin in earnest. By that time all of Baba’s precious items from each of the rooms will be safely packed and stored away to be replaced in April when the roofing project will be complete.

—Shelley Marrich for Avatar Meher Baba Trust, 28 January 2016