A Raga, A Storm, A Memory

I have always carried this oddly specific wish that one day a stranger would stop me mid-day, look genuinely curious, and ask, “what is the most surreal thing you’ve ever experienced?” I have rehearsed that answer more times than I can admit. Some moments are just so heavy with magic, it feels unfair to not share.

This is that moment.

When I was about fifteen, I was in Varanasi during a time when one of its most extraordinary traditions was unfolding. Every year, a temple hosts a 6 day Hindustani classical music festival where artists from across India and the world gather to perform. It begins at 7 pm and continues till 7 am, music flowing through the night At that age, the idea of being awake all night felt thrilling enough. I did not know I was about to witness something that would stay with me far longer than the excitement of lost sleep.

It was around 12:30 in the night.

On the stage was Niladri Kumar, playing Raag Malhar. I knew, almost in a textbook way, that Malhar was associated with rain. I remember leaning slightly towards my father and he whispered it again. “A raga that calls the rain.”

The crowd was dense but strangely calm. Some people were asleep, wrapped in shawls despite the heat, some were gently nodding to the rhythm, half present, half somewhere else. I was wide awake. Watching.

He had his eyes closed and was completely absorbed, as if he was not performing for us at all but offering something to something unseen. There was a kind of devotion in his posture, in the way his fingers moved, precise and surrendered.

Fifteen minutes passed.

The air began to shift.

At first it was just a faint breeze. Then the wind grew stronger, deliberate, like it had decided to arrive. People started looking around, adjusting their seats. Another ten minutes and the wind was unmistakable.

And then it began to rain.

It poured. And by pour I mean it rained cats and dogs.

This was peak summer. Forty degrees. A clear sky all evening, not a single cloud in sight. And yet there we were, drenched in sudden, relentless rain. I remember sitting there, completely still, trying to process what I was seeing. It did not feel real.

He did not stop.

He continued playing, soaked, unbothered, as if the rain was part of the composition, as if it had always been meant to arrive at that exact note, that exact second.

I do not know how long it lasted. Time felt irrelevant. It felt less like an event and more like a moment that had folded into something larger than explanation.

Even now, it comes back to me in fragments. The sound of strings, the sudden wind, the disbelief, the rain that should not have been there.

Right now, I am sitting down south, writing this as the thunder of Southwest monsoons roll somewhere in the distance and the monsoon edges closer. And for a moment, it feels like that night never really ended.

Good night. :)