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Thursday, February 2, 2012

February

It is February.

Yet another Kolkata February.

Contrary to popular belief, February in Kolkata typically means spring. No, this spring doesn't erupt in colourful blossoms. It doesn't do anything with the cherry trees either. Your skin starts to get that soapy feeling when you climb up those steep metro stairwells, and though the prickly heat commercials with rugged looking brambles superimposed on children's bare backs don't air on television yet, you start to anticipate the summer already.

The air is full of that smell of goodness-knows-what flowers (my knowledge of botany is absolutely appalling) - but you know the smell I'm talking about, right? It's not sultry yet, but still, still you can sense the advent of summer, and the last remnants of winter trying to ward it off. And you still wake up with a mild headache and sore throat if you had kept the fan at full speed all night.

The blankets and woollens have disappeared: but the sheets (that usually get recycled as wedding gifts unless used) are still out, and out in great numbers. And the Sun, though not quite enjoyable at two in the afternoon, is at its most pleasant in the early mornings.

It's season-change time, if you know what I mean. And even though there are a few coughs and sneezes, sensing the Kolkata January melt into February in unassuming delight is an experience that can only be earned over years. And I've got over three decades of them.

Of all the Februarys in the world, my city has the best one. Nothing, absolutely nothing can match the journey home from the market at eight, nylon bagful of vegetables and fish in hand, on a Kolkata February morning trying to figure out who the murderer is in that Agatha Christie you had left unfinished last night as your experienced feet trace their way home out of sheer experience.

And then, did I mention the Book Fair?

Sigh.

13 comments:

  1. Very evocative...but I happen to think that February in Bangalore is very reminiscent of February in Calcutta...except for the humidity part.

    Another post about the Book Fair?

    Deepa.

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  2. Yes, I can see why you would be thinking of "Kolkata in February" right now... But surely your company gives you some holidays, when you can roam around with your daughter in "Kolkata in February"? And I take it that brambles aside, you're reading an Agatha Christie at present?

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  3. bhalo - tobe ekon feb e to motamuti bhaloi thanda thake!! may be sesher dike orkom gorom gorom feel hoi.

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  4. khub bhalo laglo....
    kintu, aaj chhilo Feb 2, thhanda achhe besh....shoityoprobaher-o prediction dilo news e... :)

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  5. Khub shundor! And in novels this "it" of Kolkata February is expressed as..."ebochhor sheet ta taratari chole geleo, haway ekta thanda bhaab kintu majhe majhei ter paoa jay, bishesh kore ei shomoy ta, jokhon diner alo mlaan hoye furiye aashleo, shondhe ta thik name na. Nondini tai coffee-r kaap ta baranda-r railing e rekhe, shaal ta aar ekbar bhalo kore joriye nilo. Aar tokhoni or mone porlo Bablu-r kotha. Firte deri hobe bole gaychhe, gorom jama-o nilo na shonge, ei season-change er shomoy ekta kichhu badhiye na boshe..."

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  6. a simple post on simplicity.
    very refreshing.

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  7. Khub nostalgic hoye porlam ei ta pore ... kokhono bhabi gorom kaal e jaabo aam er season e, kokhono bhabi sheet e jaabo nolen gur er shondesh er khNoje ... abar kokhono bhabi Durga Pujo kimba boi mela r shomoye jaabo ... ekhon mone hochchey ekta gota bochor Kolkata ye thakle notun kore shob chotobelar haarano jinish gulo abar khNuje paabo !!!

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  8. my mum always,without fail,warns me of this season-change time and its collusion with cough and fever.but i experience just what you've described.i must be a romantic.

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  9. Miss korcho bojha jachhe :)

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  10. remember--
    you do not write for an audience but for ourself.
    get in touch with yourself again.
    write da.

    ReplyDelete

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