Dilli ki sardi...

A very “sidey” song kept doing the rounds in my head today…
“…something something….pyar tera aur dilli ki sardi….”

Dilli ki sardi. Am sure there are delhiites that are freezing this season, but one thing I miss most in the otherwise pleasant climes of Mumbai is the famed dilli ki sardi. The feeling of the soft chill enveloping you, when you are wrapped up comfortably all round and your nose braves the cold all alone…the feeling of breathing in chilled air and talking in warm clouds…the languor of early mornings when you are stuck to the soft hollow your curled body has created on the mattress…knowing full well that a one inch deviation in your toe position will bring you back in contact with the icy fingers of the snow queen…

It has to be winter outside if you really and truly want to experience how alu paranthas and butter taste…It may be my imagination, but I have always wondered why gulab jamuns taste sweeter and samosas crisper in the late winter sun..(this particular mystery of the universe was researched well and often in the college canteen, and pored over over endless cups of chai..)

And winter weddings….oh! the sensation of trying to cleverly disguise shivers as exuberance in talking and dancing, as you become more animated in your effort to ward off the cold in the open spaces where weddings mostly happen…because, of course, as a cousin of mine, a style diva in her own right once put it, “honey, you can either be warm and comfortable, or fashionable!! Which will it be,,” A sitter, eh! Ha Ha!

And lohri…Oh beautiful, wonderful, warm-with-the glow-of–the –firelight lohri….
How I have missed the lohri of my backyard these past some years…the biting cold, and the run up to the bonfire, the whole family doing parikrama of the fire, rewaris, moongphalis and yes, even popcorns galore…the inevitable menu of tadoori rotis and mah ki daal that my dadi made…and chacha regaling us with sundry stories late in the night till the embers glowed. Nothing, but nothing can beat the sensation of warming yourself against a fire…all the heaters, blowers and electric blankets of the world can go take a walk. Give me my kangadi any day!!

Bangalore mein ek baar ek lonely soi lohri manayee thi…just to keep the tradition alive, had collected some twigs and lit them up and offered popcorns..and thought of my daadi. I never miss her more than on lohri. And the Bangalore lohri was even more miserable as no one there knew what lohri meant…

Mumbai mein to aisa bravado kiya hi nahi. Collecting twigs has to be a joke in this concrete city..

Sundar mundriye ho,
Tera kaun vichara
Dulla bhati wala..
And so on will the urchins sing, asking for blessings (read money!) from every household…

Family bonfires are rare, so community bonfires will burn. Dhols will sound in all directions in Chandigarh..and delhi..and jammu..
And a tiny little bonfire will glow in a compound in Mumbai !!!

Lohri is on 13th Jan every year.