A small tin of money was passed around. Rohan’s heart hammered against his ribs. He had no money, but he had his pride. He was rooting for the underdog—the red one. The fight was brutal and short. A flash of feathers, a sharp kick from a blade-tied leg, and a silent, dusty fall. The red bird had won. A collective sigh, then cheers. Kaleem Bhai, laughing, scooped up the winner and offered a free nihari —the slow-cooked stew—to the men who had bet on him. The smell of the stew, rich with bone marrow and winter spices, mixed with the fog, creating a scent that Rohan would remember for decades.
Rohan considered this. “Then we’d never have to go to school. We’d just eat peanuts and look for shamians —those winter butterflies that come out of nowhere.”
They ate it in the courtyard, the sigri glowing a soft orange between them. The fog was a memory now, but the cold remained. Rohan looked at his father’s tired face, at Amma’s gnarled hands, and at the stars beginning to prick the clear, cold sky. winter time in india
His day began not with an alarm, but with the sharp, sweet smell of burning eucalyptus leaves from the sigri —the small charcoal brazier—that his grandmother, Amma, insisted on keeping in their courtyard. The winter sun, a weak, orange disc, struggled to pierce the fog, offering little warmth but a great deal of beauty. Rohan would reluctantly peel himself out of his layered blankets—a old razai so heavy it felt like a hug—and shuffle to the kitchen, where the sound of Amma grinding spices was the city’s true morning anthem.
After his father left on his old scooter, its headlights two weak yellow eyes in the fog, Rohan’s real winter adventure would begin. He and his best friend, Sameer, had a ritual. They would meet at the corner bakery, where the owner, Mr. Agarwal, would just be pulling iron trays of khari biscuits and flaky samosas from his massive oven. The heat that rushed out was a blessing. They’d buy a fistful of peanuts—still warm from being roasted in hot sand—and walk to the nearby park. A small tin of money was passed around
The winter fog over Lucknow was not a mere weather event; it was a presence. It arrived in late December, a thick, woolen blanket that muffled sounds, blurred edges, and turned the familiar city into a watercolor painting left out in the cold. For eleven-year-old Rohan, this was the best time of the year.
But the heart of the winter, the event they both awaited with trembling excitement, was the annual Murgi Bazaar —the chicken market—held on the last Sunday of December. It wasn't a market for buying, but for watching. The local butcher, a giant of a man named Kaleem Bhai, would set up a makeshift arena in an empty lot. The event was a rooster fight—illegal, dangerous, and utterly mesmerizing to a boy’s eyes. He was rooting for the underdog—the red one
The park was a ghost world. The fog clung to the bare branches of the gulmohar trees, turning spiderwebs into silver lace. The grass was crisp with frost, and their every breath created ephemeral dragons. They wouldn’t play cricket; the ball was a white phantom that disappeared in the murk. Instead, they’d sit on a cold stone bench, crack the peanuts, and talk.