March 26, 2026

Eisha Mehtab

My nostalgia smells of chambeli ke phool (jasmine flowers), reeks of textured and untextured silver churriyan (bangles), pakoray (potato fritters, but only when it rains), unnecessarily loud neighbourhoods, childhood memories of kites in basant (kite festival), late-night drives with my papa jani when we suddenly crave some street food, the fragrance of my mother’s dupattay (shawls), and my brother’s requests to make him noodles and fries at 3 am. My nostalgia will take me to a broken bench at my university between two trees that felt like the beginning of a movie scene. My nostalgia will remember stray cats and dogs and little girls rushing to the mosque with their siparas (smaller Quran’s sections) in the street. My nostalgia echoes the sounds of my city, Lahore. Its’ pigeons. It’s colourful rickshaws. Its’ purani anarkali (market). Its’ gannay ka juice (sugarcane juice) on hot summer days that my mother would request my father to get before turning the street towards home.