GOOD BYE CHILLA KALAN Imagine the hard dull bitterness of ‘Chilla Kalan’ that destroys the frolic architecture of the corn snows and freezes it into the hardness of marble. ‘Kot-kosh’ freezes the damp moisture to produce icicles, the tapering formation by freezing the successive drops that trickle from point of attachment. Walking and driving in suchlike conditions is deadly; you lurch, lose footing and break a bone or two. As if the cold is so intense that words (proverbial) freeze as soon as they’re uttered, and after some time then thaw and become audible, so that words spoken in winter go unheard until the next summer. GOOD BYE CHILLA KALAN Glaciating dark hours, stars and the moon shinning bright, are kind of beautiful ‘Chilla Kalan’ nights (oxymoron). ‘Chilla Kalan….2014’, kind of avuncular figure that cares for its charges along lines of regimented routines, turned out to be fairly calm, sober and restrained. We nevertheless experienced several blasting, frigid and frosty nights. Chilla kalan in fact bid us bye on January 31st with a Siberian night. Outbursts of chilly winds and the overcast sky did usher in the snow fall, kind of whiteout…….blow, blow, thou winter wind; thou art not so unkind, as man’s ingratitude. With the newspapers and weather websites and meteorological department forecasting moderate to heavy snowfall, true to these forecasts, in the silence of the sleep-time when you set your fancies free, pitter pattering of raindrops disguised themselves into the pure and grandfather moss. Whitening showers quietly painted roof tops, tree canopies, electric wires, vast expanses of mountains, fields and gardens, roads and lanes with snow mass. Contours, bulges, and projections carved out symbolized as if silence had a sound, and the sound was no. God’s the friend of silence. For He cannot be found in noise and restlessness, this’s when one need find God. Nature, trees, flowers, grass all grow in silence; the stars, the moon and the sun, they all move in silence. We need silence to be able to touch souls. And snowflakes, they float in the air to settle down on the ground. They’re one of God’s most fragile things, but just look what they do when they stick together. Nights peek through the frosted windows at the softly falling snow, so do the footprints from the frosted windows track the new fallen snow; such a cool, cool winter scene so peaceful and serene. Sweetly slept on the white fields of snow there creeps a little noiseless noise, born of the very sign that silence heaves. Snowfalls, snow on snow, snow on snow in the eerie silence with all it serenity. It’s then that silence becomes its mother tongue. The first fall of snow is not only an event, it’s a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of a world and wake up in another quite different, and if this’s not enchantment then where is it to be found? The snow itself is lonely or, if you prefer, self-sufficient. There’s no other time when the whole world seems composed of one thing and one thing only. One of the very best reasons for having children is to be reminded of the incomparable joys of a snow day. Snow provokes responses that reach right back to childhood. For children sugary sparkling fresh snow, as far as eye can see, is the most happening thing. They’re antsy and go nuts when snowdrops fall softly to the ground nipping at the children’s noses. The invading juvenile gang of teens, preteens, neonatal dressed in jackets and jack boots frolic about in the snowfields. For next few hours some will sculpt igloos, human figures and all that jazz. And others enjoy sheena jung, throwing snow balls on each other. In winter, with its bitin, whinin wind, all the land will be mantled with snow. A lot of people like snow. Kashmiri baby boomers and elders would rather always find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water. Imagine the hard dull bitterness of ‘Chilla Kalan’ that destroys the frolic architecture of the corn snows and freezes it into the hardness of marble. ‘Kot-kosh’ freezes the damp moisture to produce icicles, the tapering formation by freezing the successive drops that trickle from point of attachment. Walking and driving in suchlike conditions is deadly; you lurch, lose footing and break a bone or two. As if the cold is so intense that words (proverbial) freeze as soon as they’re uttered, and after some time then thaw and become audible, so that words spoken in winter go unheard until the next summer. For humans, the Arctic is a harshly inhospitable place, but the conditions there’re precisely what polar bears require to survive - and thrive. Harsh to us is home for them. Take away the ice and snow, increase the temperature by even a little and the realm that makes their lives possible literally melts away. Historically a congealing winter would mean that taps burst and water pipes force men, women and children to tumble out in droves to fetch a pail or two of drinking water. Tinkers that played with the water pipes used every possible trick to melt the frozen insides of the pipes. Pipes burst but the stubborn ice never melted. Frozen geysers, septic tanks and flush systems would force the ‘naked ape’ to switch over to ‘cave man’s’ way of fecal disposal. The stereotypical behavior of the cannibalistic Jammu-Srinagar highway is that with it closure chickens, mutton, eggs, vegetables, LPG, kerosene, petrol etcetera leave not a track behind. The black marketers and fly-by-night operators rake in heaps of money. A heavy snowfall in the ‘Chilla Kalan’ is an ensemble of phobias whether it is the hodophobia (travel), kopophobia (fatigue), scotophobia (darkness), claustrophobia (enclosed places), thaasophobia (being idle), phobophobia (fear) or panophobia (everything). As the great Sun keeps turning its face away, the earth goes down into a vale of grief, and fasts and weeps and shrouds her in sables. The unceasing outage in the deadly ‘Chilla Kalan’ nights (and kind of miss calls) bring nightmarish visions of the ‘hunting apes’ living in caves, dark as wolf’s mouth. In the howling wilderness that brings deep gloom, cuddled up in the corners of the dark cells are the scores of gloomy eyes that gaze into the ghostly shadows cast on the walls and roofs. In the company of dazzling icicles that hang by the walls of the dark congealing graves, Pheran clad grave dwellers snuggle together as snug as a bug in a rug. From a distance in the pitch darkness to ‘alien’ lofty multi-storied houses stand dead and desolate as if deprived of inhabitants. It’s the flickering flames of the lanterns/candles or the fireplaces shinning with the subdued brightness’s here and here that suggests human habitation.
Posted on: Sun, 02 Feb 2014 15:26:22 +0000