Meet the mattress fluffer

We were standing at the highest point of the Worli settlement, looking over the fortification to the village below when my Hero heard a curious noise. It was a kind of twang, and looking down there towards the pink coloured temple, he spotted a man who appeared to be beating something (someone?)

Time to get the old zoom in going and take a closer look, though as soon as he heard it, our guide KP knew exactly what was going on.

"It's the mattress fluffer" he said, explaining that he uses a kind of gadget with a long wire, which makes the twanging noise and signals his arrival in a village by plucking the wire to alert people that they can bring out their mattresses for restuffing.

Well, come on....KP might not have known us for long, but had already gathered that I need to know more about these things, that looking from a distance is not enough and I need to go and take a closer look.

Here the mattress fluffer is usiing the pinjar to aerate the cotton mattress filling, which has become compressed over a period of time.  He's working from his right to his left and it's easy to see the difference he can make with this simple gadget.  Once he's worked through the whole pile of cotton, he'll restuff the mattress and sew it up again.  

(Now I'm home, I can add the short video I took of him working)

India offers career opportunities beyond those we can ieve magine.  Except, according to this YouTube video I just found, this particular profession doesn't offer the most promising future, sadly. 

The twangy sound of the gaddawala's instrument may soon fade away. Back in the days before coir and foam mattresses, pillows and mattresses were stuffed with cotton. And when those mattresses became lumpy, the mattress fluffer would drop by with his 'pinjar'.

How lucky we were to have met him.