Monsoon Days

The woman on the television tells us it’s raining in India. This means the monsoon will come to Pakistan soon. You only have to see the satellite map on television to understand the Siamese nature of South Asian weather. The monsoon starts in India in mid-June, developing from the Southern regions and spreading up to the north like a giant ink-blot over the map of the subcontinent. From there it drifts east, to Pakistan.

The monsoon always comes to Pakistan in July, and many times, my birthday, in the first week of the month, is a rainy day. I think about the Urdu word for lightning – garamchamak. It reminds me of magicians pulling rabbits out of hats. Thunderstorms in Islamabad are always sorceries, full of violent forks of electricity that split the sky into two pieces or four, illuminating the hills in dark shadow-relief against the ink night. It takes a special sort of voodoo to wreak that kind of havoc on the sky. But the wrath of the magician soon wears out, whereas the monsoon goes on for weeks and months without showing any signs of abating. It is the burst of energy of the sprinter versus the stamina of the long-distance runner.

The day of my birthday this year is stifling and hot, as the weather has been in Karachi for the last few weeks, a punishing buildup to the start of the monsoon. People have been falling ill in scores before the rains begin. They always look forward to the rain as it is said to put an end to the viral illnesses, the diarrhea and dehydration, typhoid and cholera that attack in the summer months with particular viciousness. The rain puts down the dust, stopping asthma attacks, driving the worse diseases back into the depths of the earth – a voodoo that will bring healing and prosperity to the sufferers who bear the heat like they have done every year since my grandmother and great-grandmother and great-great-grandmother’s time.

This year, the morning after my birthday is the first day of the monsoon. I wake to the low rumble of thunder, so different from the orchestral crashes of an out-of-season electrical storm. The monsoon is low-key, but insistent. The sky has been gray from the early hours of the morning. The rain in India has crossed the border effortlessly, the clouds already settled in and unpacking, like visitors announcing they are going to be here for a long stay.

Our telephone is dead before the rain even starts.

The rain begins within the hour, as gentle as breathing. The trees swell and gleam emerald green, a color that reminds me of the forests of Europe. They shine in the soft light that the monsoon sky brings, the aura of a foggy day in London, without the cold. The ground is thirsty, having waited a year for this particular drink. The flowers lift their heads to the sky and demand to be fed. They are greedy for this kind of relief.

The electricity goes out soon after the rain begins, silencing the usual hum of air conditioners and refrigerators. The monsoon always demands our attention in this way, at least for the first day. The heat in the air has broken like glass fallen to the floor and shattered beyond repair. A mighty tension has broken and at least for this time it feels as if it is powerless to come back and torment us anymore.

Small birds emerge in the rain – disgruntled koels, green and black hummingbirds, a mynah or two, chattering loudly to drown out the sound of rainfall. They hang from trees, from telephone wires, airing out their feathers, giving themselves a thorough bath and looking as if they are loving every minute of it.

Across the city, people will be doing the same as the birds, small children stripped down to their shorts, running in the rain, losing their rubber chappals in the growing puddles on the city streets. There is no greater delight to the people in Karachi than to go to the beach and bathe in the ocean while it is raining. Grown men and women turn into children again when the monsoon comes. They forget that the sea still churns a massive, dangerous undertow, or that the bluebottles are out in droves at this time of the year; that means nothing to them in the face of their enjoyment. They almost believe that death has taken the day off on the first day of the monsoon, and they jump into the turgid waters, hungering for the taste of salt water from the sea and sweet water from the sky.

The raindrops spatter on roofs and windows, dropping noisily on concrete floors and tiled verandas. The scent of wet grass rises in the air. The breeze blows through the treetops, rustling them like giant stacks of cards being shuffled over and over again. Even the hiccupping of a rickshaw making its way bravely through the wet streets and the horns of cars in the traffic sound clean and bell-like in the distance. The thunder growls again, a far-off tiger contentedly marking its territory with its insistent voice.

Duniya salam, om shanti, peace be upon you. The monsoon is here again.