Creative Non-Fiction

Deep winter. Dehradun. I’m five years old. Papaji, my grandfather, is collecting glowing embers of coal from my grandmother’s chullah (earthen stove) in the courtyard. He’s using a pair of old iron tongs, no bigger than his large farmer’s hands, to...

Born of Punjabi stock, I've inherited the following traits: 1. An innate urge to use made-up, superfluous, and rhyming words. For example, kee laoge—cha, sha, ya paani, shaani? (What would you like? Tea/shea or Water/shawter?) 2. An involuntary...