My Pink Kurti

Early in the morning, even before sunrise, every child from my church would hurriedly go for carol singing, wearing their new thick warm jackets and shoes. Supposedly, that’s what we thought Christmas was all about. In fact, a week before Christmas, my small town would always be filled with people queuing up for shopping. For shopkeepers, this was the busiest and the most profitable time of the year. Those who were born into not-so-well-to-do families would eagerly wait for the Christmas season to wear new clothes, as that would be the only time in the entire year when they would get new clothing. That longing for having new clothes was every child’s dream and mine was no different.

One particular Christmas, I remember how happy I was to wear a dress which was very different from that of the others I had or any other I had seen. It wasn’t even a winter dress that could have kept me warm but I, nevertheless, was satisfied simply because it was new. The dress I had worn was a thin pink kurti with short sleeve­­s––not the kind of dress one would wear in a cold mountainous region during winter. Perhaps, that’s not even the type of clothing anyone would like to wear at any point in time in my region.

But as I recollect, the thin pink kurti made that Christmas different. Importantly, it wasn’t just the dress that made it special but the person behind it. That year my mother could not afford to buy clothes for everyone at home and I was left with nothing. And so, on the morning of Christmas, my mother’s office friend, a Hindu, offered her to take for me the only dress that was left in her shop—a pink kurti. Since my mother had no money, the friend asked her to pay her later, once she receives her salary. The friend knew that my mother needed it for her daughter. Before going to church, my mother handed it over to me and I was just as pleased as any other kid in town. 

The new dress I had got to wear that Christmas had taught me three things. First, given how different it was to all my other clothes, I was attracted to it. Kurti in particular is not a dress worn by the Nagas; it is mostly worn by people from the other parts of India. So, in receiving and wearing this kurti, I was unknowingly exposed to a whole new different culture. But in wearing it, I too was in a way being different. I suspect that my pink kurti has actually led me to appreciate and embrace differences; differences in traditions, foods, clothes and people.

Second, the offer my mother received was given by a person of another faith that had nothing to do with Christmas, while most people of my faith and church did not notice or care enough to notice our struggle. This also suggests how open people of other faiths are to our festivals and traditions, while we conveniently dismiss theirs as pagan or evil. Third, poverty was real and being poor during the most important time of the year was the hardest experience one parent could go through. While one might attribute this to the extravaganza that Christmas is made to involve, the point I am making is how poor families bear the brunt of the festivities.  

Recollecting this experience reminds me of the value of helping, sharing, and caring for one another, irrespective of religious traditions we belong to. While my Christian fellows were lost in trying to celebrate Christmas as faithful ‘Christians,’ my mother and I found its true meaning being manifested by a Hindu. At a time when religious markers are so vivid and exclusive, this story serves to remind us that Christmas is about humanity, God becoming like us, to be given a chance to experience hope. 

While Christmas may be over, its meaning will and must continue to hold us together, and by us I do not mean church-going Christians alone, but all of humanity bound by the love and hope we receive and give to each other. 

This blog has been contributed by Hungreiphy Zimik Awungshi.

Image by Manjot Singh from Pixabay