The crackling of fires and the sound of laughter filled the air the night before I left my hometown. Every year, Christmas was about family and loved ones. My parents and I would visit our relatives during the festive season. Like every year, Christmas was fun, with an abundance of meat to eat. Cousins, aunts, uncles—everyone gathered around for this beautiful occasion. We would stay for two weeks, celebrating Christmas and New Year, and leave for town a day or two after New Year.
Everything was always jolly, but the day before we left held a special place in my heart. The sweetness and kindness of family shone on such days. Just before we packed our things, family members would bring fruits, vegetables, or sticky rice for us to take back home. These gestures made going to my native place a warm feeling.
When I was 12, I remember eyeing a coconut or in my native language Narikol, and my granduncle noticed. He said, “You want this, don’t you? Let me get it for you.” I was so happy to have the coconut and was excited to take it back home. That very night, all my uncles and cousins gathered around the bonfire for our last night in the village, while my Ambi (grandmother) was making hot jakep, or as I liked to call every other snack, pitha. She knew how much I loved them and started making them so I could take them back to town.
As I sat around with my uncles, waiting near the bonfire, one of them brought the hot jakep from inside, and each of us had one. It was so hot that the sesame filling inside oozed out, and I dropped it on my pants. Everyone laughed and told me to clean it up. While I went to clean my pants, I brought the coconut to show my uncles.
In all my excitement, I showed the coconut with so much joy. My uncles, being the way they were, started to joke around and hide my coconut. In the beginning, it was funny, and I laughed along, but slowly losing sight of the coconut made me anxious. When I asked them to give it back, each one showed their hands, claiming none of them had it. I felt anxious, a numb feeling creeping in; a small coconut had me all teared up. I went inside the kitchen where my mother and Ambi were and started crying, saying they lost my narikol and that everything was sad as I had nothing to take home. I wailed, tears running down my face. Instead of comforting me, Ambi joined in the laughter, her eyes twinkling with amusement. Everyone left the fireplace to come and return what was, for some reason, precious to me.
To this day, everyone brings up how I cried for a small coconut and how I was a messy eater. But things have changed; now, when families gather, there’s always someone missing, unlike back then when everyone was there. Now, those moments have become cherished memories, held close to my heart.
– Christina K sangma