Bada Din

Gone are those days when, on December 25th mornings, we used to wake up and see snow all around us. This used to be a celebration day because just a day earlier, school kids used to get their results (especially in government schools).

Hi, I am Inder Singh Thakur, from Himachal Pradesh, India. My hometown is Solan, on the Chandigarh-Shimla Highway, just 45 Km before the Queen of Hills and the Summer Capital during the British era. The view of snow-capped mountains all around is my childhood memory. In a simple village, reasonably far from the main city, snow was not a reason for joy; it was a reason for a difficult life. There used to be power failures, and oil lamps were the source of light. We had to store firewood where it wouldn't get wet because then it wouldn't burn, and even drinking water would be something difficult to get as the whole water would turn into ice.

Still, we celebrated it. The celebration was a whole-day process. The whole family stayed in the kitchen (which was a reasonably large room to accommodate everyone) with a chullah. Firewood burned the whole day, turning snow into water and keeping the kitchen warm for everyone. The kids of the family had a special work to do; their work was to peel off the thick skin of the pumpkin after cutting it into pieces, extract the seeds from the pulp, and then cut it into smaller pieces. The next stage was to boil the small pieces, and kids were on the second phase of the project, i.e., prepare masala. The task included peeling off garlic and then crushing it in a Kundi sota (Mortar & Pestle) along with anardana (dried pomegranate seeds), coriander seeds, fenugreek (methi), red chillies, and... I don't remember what all was there.

At the same time, we also used to put the extracted pumpkin seeds on a tawa (griddle) to roast it so that once we finished making masala, we could eat those seeds.

Well, our work was almost over, so we kids would start playing or go to elders and ask them to tell us stories about one king and his seven queens or a monster whose life was in a parrot in a cage (which I don't remember at all) or sometimes even study if it was still not dark outside. We even used to get the boiled piece of pumpkin to eat.

The elders then used to cook “Meetha Kaddu” (Sweet Pumpkin) and namkeen kaddu, and Kukdi ki roti (makki/corn chapati) which surely took its own time. And by dinner time, everything was ready. The whole family used to feast on meetha kaddu and then one or two Kukdi ki roti with namkeen kaddu depending on their appetite.

This was the way we used to celebrate "Bada Din", i.e., December 25th, almost every year. I am sure that not everyone was aware of Christmas, and everyone will have their own childhood memories.

Well, I am not against celebrating this day as Christmas, but why have we stopped celebrating the "Bada Din"?