Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Of Journeys made and forgotten

I was just speaking to a friend and she reminded me of a trip we took a while back.I think it was August 2003, or later, or earlier. But mostly around that time. The time before I earned enough to get myself a digital camera. It was around this time that we, Deepthi, Archana, Rashmi, Shwetha and I set off to Deepthi's grandmother's house in K R Nagar. It is about an hour away from Mysore. We had the nicest time .Some moments are clear as crystal and some I cannot seem to remember.I will put down what I remember of those 3 days.

  We set off nice and early one morning, before 6, the train was at 6.30 am . Still sleepy and bleary eyed. The train started moving and in a few minutes, the sun started streaming in and we woke up. Well, what happenes when a bunch of girls get together and are awake and are on a journey. They talk. So we did.A lot.We laughed a lot too.loudly.I'm sure we were quite a nuisance. But hey, who cared, I love train journeys and had good company.
    The next hing I remember is that we got down at Mysore and there was a car to pick us up. The next thing we know is the car has broken down a good 20kms from our destination and there is no bus stop or any other mode of transport. We hitched a ride from a old couple who were charming and kind. We reached and the house was a one storied building, it had large rooms and was where extra rooms are added as the family grows. They had a coconut farm and large fields. I remember being fed a lot of breakfast because I was 'thin' and underfed. Well, I'm a lousy eater and I hate eating a lot. They only stopped because I looked like I would cry.
   We then hung around and spoke to her grandparents. Really nice and simple people.She also had a great - grandmother who I remember was really active at 88. We went for long walks, drank coconut water, ate lunch, slept, had dinner, played a game called 'chowkabara' till some wee hours in the morning.
   This cycle repeated for the next day, except we went to the town square and had some more stuff to eat.  I remember eating a lot during this trip. I loved the coconut groves. We hung out there, walked through sugarcane farms, ate fresh sugarcane. The sweetest I have tasted in a while. The trees looked greener, the hibiscus healthier, the air sweeter and cleaner. We walked a lot, spoke a lot (yeah yeah...i know...this is different). Were happier. Had good food. Played some long forgotten games. Tried some home made beauty products. Generally lazed around and had a great time. We visited an old temple. Lovely place, next to Cauvery and heard some legend about how one cannot hear the gusinh water because lord Rama cursed the river because the river was deafening. You really cannot hear the water inside, even if it is like a few feet away. Had a picnic too. We came back in an almost empty train and made even more noise. Found another bunch who were travelling to Bangalore and created enough din for the few remaining passengers to give up trying to sleep.
   Why am I reminiscing, is because I just want to remember the good times we had. Now that all of us have our own lives, work pressures, families. We had a darned good time. We need to remember and not push it to the recesses like a Business Law chapter (man!...THAT used to be boring). 
    

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