Deja Vu

I love the first snow of the season…It’s like a deja vu of the first rains back home. The glitch though is, it doesn’t smell as divine as India’s wet earth.

Last year was my first winter, after just four months, in New York. And, being from a tropical country like India and a humid city like Bombay, the snow thrilled me to no end. I celebrated — went out and danced in the snow with snowflakes falling on my face, the cold biting my skin and most of all, I indulged in a frolicking snow fight with friends. I could well have been singing ‘Raindrops keep falling on my head’. Only, these were snowflakes…

Something similar happened today. As the skies burst open, my feet suddenly had a life of its own. I was walking with a lilt in my gait and looking towards the sky, as if waiting for the snow to lash my face. Of course, that didn’t happen. Snowflakes don’t lash your face as passionately as raindrops do. At best, they can give you a frostbite…

As I was enjoying my walk from office to the subway, I was happy about my happiness — a feeling that New York doesn’t evoke in me oftentimes. But then, I had this sudden craving for cutting chai, butter makka and garma garam bhajiyas…Of course, those cravings remained just that — cravings.

I correct myself here.

I love the first snow, but I live for the lashing rains of Bombay. The smell and sound of butter on a garam bhutta, the cutting chai from the tapris and the taste of freshly made bhajiyas on my already scalded tongue. I love the passion of the rains, the salty spray from the wild Arabian Sea messing with my hair and of course, the smell of my earth. The smell of India.

Thoughts as of: December 16, 2008.