LIFE IN THE FOOTHILLS
Inside the Shiny Eyes of a Young Koor (Girl).
I have shiny eyes and a chirpy vibe I’m told. Like each year, I secured good grades in this year’s board exams as well. My father is a farmer at the foothills of the Shamshabari; mother is an ideal Muslim and god -fearing housewife. I am the eldest sister amongst six siblings including a toddler brother. Books are the most interesting company I enjoy, out of the very limited ones that I’m allowed. I don’t regret the same either; people are… a bit weird I feel.
A normal day in my life is literally as full of variety, as the four seasons of a year; this I’ve observed only recently when Ramzan has bestowed upon me some wisdom and much needed patience, at the commencement of my youth.
Like the winter snow my day starts like a clean slate, with no foot impressions of negativity from any past. The blessings of the almighty allow me to be forgiving and forgetting in my nature. Like the silent nourishing cold stream, flowing under the snow blanket, I help my mother with her early morning chores. Our cattle awaits my greetings and welcomes me with a loud moo when-ever I open doors of their warm dark chambers. Like me, even they can’t resist the fresh air and the morning sun first thing everyday. They love grazing on the rich pastures wet with dew drops. The feeling while watching them fill their big stomachs from grass, and fertilising the soil in return, is as purifying & soothing as the cool summer breeze under a warm sun.
I fetch firewood from the shed and chop it down so my mother can start cooking for all. From here onwards my day takes off with the typical winter like expectations of a warm pleasant day ahead.
Schools have been mostly closed during the last few months. It’s a little disheartening as I am unable to meet a few friends of mine from another village but apart from that I also don’t have to deal with the unnecessary people I don’t wish to meet. These few hours of my day have an intriguing similarity to the beautiful melancholy of the autumns. The spare hours at hand give me immense time to be lost, on the dark humours of life, soaking up some sun on the lower foothills, overlooking our cattle. My life has no exposure whatsoever, I don’t envy the other girls who are now applying for universities at Srinagar and outside, they have been blessed with a fate richer than ours so be it. But the possibility of not being able to experience anything outside of these foothills scares me.
I’ve heard that people in the cities crave for this environment and beauty; that is why they don’t hesitate in spending huge sums of hard earned money during their brief vacations in Kashmir. I am thankful to the almighty for the life bestowed upon me.
Like others in my village I am still safe from the addiction of a mobile phone device. Some thumb taps apparently open up virtual doors, to the infinite world outside, on your palms but isolates you in return, from the small beautiful world around. People have become fake, and have shed away any sincerity in their love, just like a tree sheds its leaves in the autumns. I am a silly hopeful dreamer I guess, ever expectant of my fairy tales to come to life, just like the budding blossoms of the spring. Our maulvi sahab has warned us time and again on jummah that the almighty brings down his wrath upon the ones who have diverted from the ways of Islam on the doomsday- that is precisely what’s happening during this pandemic in the cities- is what he feels. If we fall prey to social media and western culture we shall be doomed as well. But I have studied enough science not to have blind faith in that. I don’t mean to disrespect the almighty but this is one of the reasons I never visit masjids. My ibaadat happens in my heart where there is enough light and faith.
My younger siblings never get tired of playing outside, I feel as the eldest it is my responsibility to make them study. Our books, teachers & preachers are very biased & ignorant I feel. It doesn’t take a scholar to understand this simple thing- even a simple farmer girl like me can tell that- darkness can never remove darkness, light is needed for that; and just in the same manner, hate can never remove hate, love is needed for that. I wish somedays that like the autumn trees even the people around me could shed away their scars, anger, hatred, vengeance and for once in these holy Ramadans, be forgiving & forgetting, to evolve with a new, rejuvenating & peaceful life ahead. Hence, I let the kids play.
This plague upon us has pushed us into testing times; situation is worsening by the hour in other parts of the country, but we mountain people have been blessed till now, being out of reach of its wrath. Hearing stories where the wailing family members weren’t allowed even a last glimpse of their dead, breaks my soul. All this religious discrimination, violence and hate take a side seat when pain is common. The loss of a loved one breaks us equally. I hope this autumn … ends soon, and that people grow beyond their religious differences in these testing times and realise the real enemy.
I haven’t met Murtaza in a long while. It’s anyways a taboo now at my age to be mingling with boys. Reshma is however my gossip monger who never fails to amuse me, with the peculiarities of our society, in the knack for poking nose in others’ personal matters. My mother is fortunately/unfortunately an illiterate, orthodox, god fearing housewife. She has been an abiding daughter and an abiding wife all her life, dreaming anything else was and is still a sin. She’s survived – hence obviously, the same is expected out of me. As a kid I used to nestle into her chest while opening up my heart to her every night but now there rarely seems any concern in her heart for me, apart from getting me married obviously. That nurturing warmth of the summer sun is greatly missed.
On these cold winter nights after the day’s washing, cleaning and other miscellaneous chores, I get the silent nights to myself. By the lamp I have the company of my books. I love reading fiction; an assurance that happy endings exist, is a driving fuel for hopeful shiny eyes. Sometimes reality is too hard to survive in. My cows love my stories, they pay keen attention when I talk to them about my dreams and moo excitedly when the happy endings arrive.
However in order for those dreams to come true I have started studying other books as well in preparing for govt exams. My nights are no longer colder like the winters but rather rich like the spring, full of knowledge and growth -little everyday and multiplying. My eyes like always are ever hopeful of a nourishing spring wherein the seeds of my handwork will reap sweet fruits of success someday and life in reality too- will provide a happy ending.
