Chennai’s citizens, fiercely proud about their urban sprawl, also have this endearing quality of laughing at themselves. For instance, Chennaigaga, a firm specialising in merchandise that dip into Madras nostalgia has a coffee mug with lines describing the city’s seasons as ‘hot, hotter, hottest.’
The stereotype of this Southern metropolis being hot and humid almost through the year is driven home but it does have its December and January. Months, that to a few of the exaggeration-prone citizens, dish out Ooty weather. Some post memes about snow in Chennai and everyone has a laugh.
Last week when the night temperature dipped and even went below 20 degree celsius, netizens went viral with some friendly admonishment of their hometown. “Look you are Chennai, not Shimla,” was one such quote. Chennai’s apparent winter, never a patch on the ones in Bengaluru or Delhi, still has its charms.
The air-conditioner can be ignored, humidity vanishes, and sweaters can be worn at times. If the latest winters are burnished with the perennial effects of global warming, in the 1980s, winters in Madras did keep the elderly and the asthmatics on tenterhooks.
The cold mist at dawn was real and women stepping out to put those colourful kolams sneezed and struggled. This was also the season when the Sabarimala pilgrims had long pujas at nearby temples, and the nippy weather would force the religious to huddle together on jamakkalams.
