And the Christmas tree stands tall...............
I don't think there are many people who don't like Christmas? What's not there to like about a festival that is all about wishing everyone much merriness? And all that gorgeous food, the carols and above all, the colour red.Give me red.....
You know that the year will soon be over and there is always the faith that the year ahead will be better, bigger and beautiful.
I love Christmas because it is going back to childhood when there was still innocence. In the hill town that was my childhood home, there is a giant pine tree that reaches up to the sky in the compound of The All Saint's Church. It is not the needled pine tree that grows in abundance there but the deodar type, the thick branched one and every year the church authorities decorate it before Christmas. We would impatiently for the skies to darken ( and there it is dark by 4-4.30), restless and fidgety, willing the elders to hurry up. It would be siblings, friends, neighbours, almost like a mini procession, hopping, skipping, chattering and sometimes singing and wham! there would be the tree- tall, silent and twinkling. It never failed to awe, year after year. Was it better the year before? Yes, no, maybe.... There are more fancy lights someone would comment and everyone would agree. It's so beautiful isn't it, a love laden voice would say and everyone would agree. Isn't this the most beautiful Christmas tree ever, someone else would pipe up and everyone would agree. After all, what was not there to agree about the most beautiful live big tree glittering in the night?
Your childhood, they say, is always in there within you and so before every Christmas you set up a little Christmas tree in your house - artificial, made in China, glitter, baubles and all. As you set it up, in your mind you see the tree in The All Saint's Church compound and hear the carols that boomed out from the church and the houses nearby. It is indeed, Silent Night, Holy night. It is also jingle bells indeed.
They might have not let you into Sunday School, but midnight mass and early morning mass was open to all. You wanted to go for midnight mass because it would be such an adult thing to do....to stay awake beyond midnight! Arguments, tantrums, chiding and bundled up beyond belief in layers and layers of woolen, you would be finally allowed to go for midnight mass, breathing all make believe smoke rings all the way. And of course every slice of cake was just too good and if only your mother would make cakes like that.
Childhood is not forever and so you pack up and leave, to newer places, new people, new world, always looking for something familiar and you do find it, few and far in between but you do. Like Aunty Smythe (honest to god Aunty Smythe in Chandni Chowk in Kolkata, then Calcutta). Aside- there is a Chandi Chowk in Kolkata, go to Statesman house, stand in front of it, take the right road or rather footpath, cross the road that comes after it and you are in Chandni Chowk- so there! Among the myriad tiny shops, tiny by lanes that snake into dark interiors, there is one short one that takes you to an old. old building, all three floors of it, each room with tall ceilings, huge wooden doors and red stone floors.It was enemy property house and in of the flats lived Aunty Smythe ( A Bengali Brahmin from Tripura who came to the city to train as a nurse, fell in love with a 'shippie' (merchant navy man) fell in love, converted and was was soon deserted. We always tried to trap her into letting us know her real name, we never found out. She let out one huge room to working girls, my paying guests she would say. Early mornings on Christmas eve she would take out her rose cookie mould, everything Christmas Eve evening there would be piles of rose cookies on the table with a plum cake from New Market. We gave her tiny presents, don't give me big present, I can't give you expensive Christmas gifts she would say. We would nod in agreement and finish off all the rose cookies- crunchy, delicate and so delicious.
It is Christmas in Darjeeling. You troop down to Keventer's, make sure you get the best-view seat on its tiny terrace. You blow into your palms and rub it furiously to get the blood going. Everything is freezing cold. Keventer's cheerful Robin is all smiles, you order the greasiest bacon - Daju, you tell, the waiter, pick up the ones with lots of fat- and gorge. Then you drink hot chocolate, admire Mount Kanchenjunga, the fashionable youngsters. In the evenings you go to Planter's Club, briefly to say hello and Merry Christmas, shake a leg or two and down a glass of wine. The final destination is a cosy residence perched halfway on a hill and from you see the lights across the hills wink back at you, the snug charming house with the huge copper heating pipe, where someone is on the piano and Christmas songs fill the air. As the night darkens, spirited souls (literally!) sing louder than ever, and of course, several different songs at one go!
Planter's Club, Tollygunje Club, Gymkhana Club, Gaiety Club, homes, hotels, beaches, distant shores, home shores- it's album full of memories, merry memories. The child is grown up- so both the child and you would like to believe! The midnight visit by Santa Claus is a thing of the past. But you still want the cookies, the goodies and the big fat leg of ham. No more slogging in the kitchen, you simply order the leg of ham and pick it up a day before. If you are in the capital city, you troop to Steak House (13/8, Jor Bagh, New Delhi, Phone:+91-11- 24611129) a week to ten days before and place your order. You are unlikely to get anything below 4kg or 3.5kg if you are really lucky- the more the merrier you say. And for this one occasion you don't pennies, you count your blessings and thank the Lord for it.
And you know that the Christmas tree in The All Saint's Church compound stands tall; it has to, too many children have and are still praying beneath it .........
Childhood is not forever and so you pack up and leave, to newer places, new people, new world, always looking for something familiar and you do find it, few and far in between but you do. Like Aunty Smythe (honest to god Aunty Smythe in Chandni Chowk in Kolkata, then Calcutta). Aside- there is a Chandi Chowk in Kolkata, go to Statesman house, stand in front of it, take the right road or rather footpath, cross the road that comes after it and you are in Chandni Chowk- so there! Among the myriad tiny shops, tiny by lanes that snake into dark interiors, there is one short one that takes you to an old. old building, all three floors of it, each room with tall ceilings, huge wooden doors and red stone floors.It was enemy property house and in of the flats lived Aunty Smythe ( A Bengali Brahmin from Tripura who came to the city to train as a nurse, fell in love with a 'shippie' (merchant navy man) fell in love, converted and was was soon deserted. We always tried to trap her into letting us know her real name, we never found out. She let out one huge room to working girls, my paying guests she would say. Early mornings on Christmas eve she would take out her rose cookie mould, everything Christmas Eve evening there would be piles of rose cookies on the table with a plum cake from New Market. We gave her tiny presents, don't give me big present, I can't give you expensive Christmas gifts she would say. We would nod in agreement and finish off all the rose cookies- crunchy, delicate and so delicious.
It is Christmas in Darjeeling. You troop down to Keventer's, make sure you get the best-view seat on its tiny terrace. You blow into your palms and rub it furiously to get the blood going. Everything is freezing cold. Keventer's cheerful Robin is all smiles, you order the greasiest bacon - Daju, you tell, the waiter, pick up the ones with lots of fat- and gorge. Then you drink hot chocolate, admire Mount Kanchenjunga, the fashionable youngsters. In the evenings you go to Planter's Club, briefly to say hello and Merry Christmas, shake a leg or two and down a glass of wine. The final destination is a cosy residence perched halfway on a hill and from you see the lights across the hills wink back at you, the snug charming house with the huge copper heating pipe, where someone is on the piano and Christmas songs fill the air. As the night darkens, spirited souls (literally!) sing louder than ever, and of course, several different songs at one go!
Planter's Club, Tollygunje Club, Gymkhana Club, Gaiety Club, homes, hotels, beaches, distant shores, home shores- it's album full of memories, merry memories. The child is grown up- so both the child and you would like to believe! The midnight visit by Santa Claus is a thing of the past. But you still want the cookies, the goodies and the big fat leg of ham. No more slogging in the kitchen, you simply order the leg of ham and pick it up a day before. If you are in the capital city, you troop to Steak House (13/8, Jor Bagh, New Delhi, Phone:+91-11- 24611129) a week to ten days before and place your order. You are unlikely to get anything below 4kg or 3.5kg if you are really lucky- the more the merrier you say. And for this one occasion you don't pennies, you count your blessings and thank the Lord for it.
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