5. Ear-piercing
The ears of boys and girls are pierced when they are four or five years old; until this is done they are not considered as members of the caste and may take food from anyone. The ear is always pierced by a Sunār (goldsmith), who travels about the country in the pursuit of this calling. A brass pin is left in the ear for fifteen days, and is then removed and a strip of wood is substituted for it in a boy’s ear and a peacock’s feather in that of a girl to enlarge the hole. Girls do not have their nostrils pierced nor wear nose-rings, as the Kāchhis are a comparatively low caste. They are tattooed before or after marriage with patterns of a scorpion, a peacock, a discus, and with dots on the chin and cheek-bones. During the period of her monthly impurity a girl is secluded in the house and does not eat flesh or fish. When the time is finished she goes to the river and bathes and dresses her hair with earth, which is a necessary ceremony of purification.