Desi Dialogues

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As I looked out my kitchen window on the morning of our first snowfall and the snow on the barren twigs just looked so beautiful, it reminded me of those postcards and Christmas books I had seen growing up in India. Often, it was only those books and through our imagination that we could wonder what snow would feel like - as there was never any snow in India. The only time we would see snow was if we went to the northern part of India, in Kashmir during winter vacation, or if you were very rich you could go abroad to Switzerland.

Bollywood movies at one time were filmed in Kashmir or Simla or Darjeeling (also in the north) to show how romantic it was (unlike the hot and sultry weather of most of India) and we grew up on movies that showed the hero and heroine actually rolling in the snow to those Bollywood songs - without much winter wear (the heroine would be in designer sarees), and we wondered how they filmed those scenes. Later on, as Indian movies evolved and producers made pots of money they started substituting Kashmir for Switzerland, and that spawned an entire tourism industry as almost any married couple who could afford it decided they wanted to have their honeymoon in Switzerland.

I remember in Grade 10 in my year book I listed Switzerland as my favourite honeymoon destination.

But in hindsight, as I write this column, it just so happens that my husband and I went to Darjeeling in January for our honeymoon - a place no one really goes.

But it was in Darjeeling that I first saw snow and believe me, in minus-zero temperatures without any heating whatsoever, I did not feel romantic at all. Yes, you read that right - there was no central heating in the hotel we were staying in although it was an expensive one. Since it was off season we were given a small portable heater by the manager, who chuckled when we registered because we were the only couple in the whole 150-room hotel situated on top of a beautiful hill.

And that left us to fend for ourselves, which led us to good old Darjeeling rum and lots of extra blankets for company.

But I had seen many Hindi films and in my own romantic mind, thought I too could pose for pictures without sweaters, like all the heroines did. (I was on my honeymoon, what can I say?!) So, when we went across the Darjeeling border, close to Nepal, I posed in a saree with a beautiful scenic blue river as my backdrop. But all through these photo shoots, my husband kept giving me the sweater which I said I had no use for - and then paid dearly - because when we returned late that night - I found the cold had seeped inside my body, making me nauseous with shivers and chills that would not stop. Since it was a Thursday all the liquor shops were closed and we were out of rum. As well, with no doctor, the manager helped by giving us two more small heaters - which somehow carried me through the night.

But the icing on the cake was that the next morning we were scheduled to go by jeep to watch the sun rise over the third highest mountain peak in the world - the Kanchanjunga - in the Himalayas. As my husband debated if I was fit enough to go, I insisted that there was no way I was going to miss that sunrise, even if I had to be wrapped in five shawls and sweaters, and so, that's exactly how I went.

As we waited for the sun to rise above the beautiful snow-covered glaciers, I forgot how ill I was the night before. And when the first rays of the sun just barely hit the glaciers, it was a feeling out of this world that literally took my breath away.

As I'm now almost used to seeing snow, and my son was born here in January on a chilly winter day, I wonder how life has a way of making something that one sees in storybooks so much a part of one's daily life - as it has for me here. �And my thought goes back to the scores of immigrants who will have come from India this year and for whom this snow today will be their first, and hopefully become so much a part of their lives, as it has become a part of mine.