A Race to the finish..

Me and my husband both are adventure lovers. Be it trekking, diving or trailing through forests.. We don’t leave any opportunity to spend our vacations riding high on our adrenaline rush.

Since  we shifted to Singpore six months back, we had rather hectic schedules and so this time we thought of doing the unusual… a quiet place for a 4 day vacation. Where we could laze around the whole time. And with this in mind we went to Ubud. A serene central part of Bali.

Ubud on one hand holds attraction for being the art and culture centre of Bali and on the other boasts of ravishing expanse of paddy fields, glorious sun rises, lush greenery and calm village life.

We had perfect 3 days we dreamed of. You must be wondering why am I saying 3 when we were on 4 days holidays. Because my dear friends that’s when the adventure started…

Last day in Ubud. Like everyday it was a bright sunshine morning. After having a scrumptious breakfast and dillydallying morning. We packed and checked out of the hotel at 12, leaving our luggage at the concierge to be picked later. Well..we had 4 more hours before we start for the airport.

So we decided to stroll around the market one last time…have lunch at our favorite restaurant and leave. Once there, as we were happily clicking, trying to capture as much of the enigmatic Ubud as possible we came across a board… 

Spa Bali… 90 min of rejuvenating Balinese spa… 

We looked at each other.. we looked at our watches…. we were tempted to indulge in that luxury! 

We did the math…  It was 1:50 pm we had 2 hours. … 90 min spa still leaves us with 30 min for lunch. And we went in.

We went in at 2 and came out at 4:00. What? Where is the half an hour for lunch?

While we were contemplating how to have food we saw our driver frantically waving at us from the other side of the road. We rushed to him and quickly got into the car. And then we dropped dead…!!

A loooong procession of some ceremony had jammed the whole road….well the only road..!

We slowly moved towards our hotel and somehow managed to reach there at snail's pace, in 30 minutes. A distance of not more than 5 min.

Anyways, we dumped our backpacks into the car and hopped back in. By now we became quite anxious because the airport was one and half hrs away from us and our flight was at 7:00. … 

Again we looked at each other and at our watches.. it was 4:40pm ..we were tempted to screeeaaam..our lungs out…!!

Left with little choice the driver took another less traveled route through the villages, narrow  winding road that did not allow us to drive at more that 40 km per hour because of sharp curves every now and then.. but atleast we were moving.

After a painfully long and slow drive of one hour during which no one spoke and I was continuously cursing the Bali Spa in my mind….which no longer seemed rejuvenating, we finally hit the main road toward the airport. 

It was 5.40 pm.

Our driver was Racing towards the toll bridge..the road was clear.. airport was still 30 minutes away ..but if we drove like this we should reach just in the nick of time... everything seemed fine…and for the first time in last one hour forty min we sat back, relaxed and noticed the beautiful,blazing crimson sun set at the horizon ….. 

As fate would have it..this was the calm before the storm. Just as we passed the toll and hit the main road all hell broke loose.The traffic was pouring in from all directions it was like a sea of vehicles…and they were not moving beyond a point.It was the longest traffic signal...!!

Now we panicked. What the hell ! As soon as the light turned green, the traffic moved once again we were sitting at the edge of our seat…giving directions to the driver… "overtake this car…move on your right…go go..go..go.."

Our driver kept on maneuvering on the road until the traffic reduced and were just 2 min away from our destination. We pulled out our passports, tickets...….back packs on the shoulders … and the moment our taxi stopped at the departure terminal we jumped out..  and ran as fast as we could… of course we left the taxi fare and a generous tip on the seat…

Final leg of the race. We were just praying out loud,"..dont fly don’t fly …" ran through the entrance … spotted a Singapore Airlines staff.. we asked,"..flight to Singapore..at 7..?" She pointed in one direction…without waiting another sec we dashed …to the end of the huge hall and what what did we see..? Few people in the dimishing queue and counters closed. Oh My God..!! We missed the flight..!!

But No....!! Something was missing… there was no sign of Singapore Airlines. We looked around..found another staff and asked for the check in counter..and we had to sprint allllllllll the way back as the check in counter was right next to the entrance….

With bags of atleast 20 kgs each..we reached the counter …huffing and puffing … literally begged to the girl… we could not afford to miss this flight. She checked us in but with a warning and a soul grilling glare.

 We ran…making our way through the immigration and the security check …we had to find gate 1…the laast gate…

"Run.. run.. run…"we were telling each other.

With heavy bags… no food and all the nerve wrecking anxiety…we finally reached the gate …and we heard the most reassuring smile and the most beautiful words in the world.. "Welcome to Tiger Airlines… Have a good flight…"

"Phewwwww….Yes we will…Thaank you..!!!!"

Memories in the backyard … !!!!!

  

Imagine if we had a time machine… and we could go back to that one happy, really happy period of our lives.That would be an incredible experience.

 Though not in reality but in imagination… I invite you all to take a ride with me..through my memory lanes..to the most cherished period of my life..my childhood.

Having a huge family has one big advantage…..cousins…!!! And I have not 2 not 4 not 6 but 14 cousins. I am the 8^th born. My most vivid and precious memories are those of summer vacations with my cousins…my buddies.

My big family had a big house to match… a home to 30 members besides 10 servants and not to mention 8 pets,cows and dogs. I remember at one point in time we had two pairs of Rabits too. Across the front of our house was the beautifully manicured lawn that boasted a variety of fragrant flowers, delicatae creepers and colourful crotons.

To top it all we children had painstakingly converted an expansive open area adjacent to the kitchen garden into our play field, given our love for Cricket and Badminton.

Never having to go beyond the high walls for any kind of sport I now believe we could have easily registered the place as a small township..!!!

Although we cousins were quite proud of our playfield but there was one place more special than that… our backyard Orchard.

Come summers, and we would be squealing with excitement because now we could play , every single day ,to our heart’s content in the orchard…

 Summers of north India are known for long lazy afternoons, strong hot winds called Loo— the name quite amusing in English. And a daily ritual of afternoon siesta for our elders. That is when, we kids would venture into the long tapering gallery of the house leading to the backyard.

I can still feel the peeling flakes of the rusted iron gate  which would creak open into greens of all imaginable shades…

Fenced with the thorny bushes of delicious Indian pink berries called Carandas on one side and lined with profuse sweet lime bushes on the other, our orchard would welcome us into its soft green bed and lush green trees….As if it kept waiting for us all the year round…!!

Once in the orchard, we the older kids would run and climb on our favourite trees. We were all tree climbers be it a mango tree, or a fragile guava tree or the tall Java plum tree… my favourite  was the magnificent mulberry…

While we would be busy plucking the mouth watering fruits, my younger cousins would go rushing towards the tyre swing hanging down the massive Banyan tree.

Sometime we were the birds perched on the tree tops… singing …and sometimes we were like Monkeys… swinging on the branches..making faces at each other…being the nautiest of the naughty.

Led by our Leader, my eldest brother, our ideal, we would all go searching for honey combs, or the ant hills and stare at them for the longest time.

Amidst this fun, frolick and laughter ,our most delightful activity was building a tree house atop our gigantic neem tree. And we were innocent enough to dream we would live there forever.

Racing to the finish or jumping in the puddle, trotting on narrow boundary wall or foraging for bird nests, we were never tired of being in the orchard.

 We just hated being called inside the house when the sun would set at the horizon, the dusk would slowly creep into our orchard and we would have to say bye bye to our twilight games for that day.

That place even today, when I am thousands of miles away, it triggers a surge of emotions in me…I can still taste the tangy lemons and carandas in my mouth…I can still hear the tweet of the birds and buzz of the bees…

That place taught us to be full of life and zest… That Place taught us to seek the unknown and enjoy the adventure.

Above all it bonded us for life as it gave us memories we all most cherish.

A speck of grain..!!

Times when you are but a speck in a desert..
Lost and found like every other cohort..
Screeching silence kills every sound..
Till you remain nothing but a particle on a mound.!

You sit there watching helplessly..
The caravans going past..
Dreams of yester years..

And the shadows they cast..

How long the winds will hold me..
If I do not fly..
Before long I should realize..
My limit is the sky..

Come alive you speck of grain..
And stand tall where you sat hopeless..
Look around and you will find..
You just added to the height of the mound nonetheless..!!

..with spirit of a wanderer and lust for life... never letting it go or holding too tight...i walk on a thin rope...from one dream to another..hopping from hope to hope...savoring each moment ..enveloped in the surreal... carrying the mortal me ...!!

Its like a painting outside the living room window. This is mid of November and I can feel winters creeping into my house with the morning sun. Sipping hot ginger tea by the window, sunrays kissing my face, I would have loved to loose myself in its embrace and get soaked in its warmth. A regular tete-a-tete with the mornings.
This seems luxury, now that more worldly things occupy that space.

Look back and they are not there anymore. Look ahead and you feel reaching there may take forever. So you stick yourself to this very moment !
Filtering through bizarre memories, some pictures tend to stay for life,as you may have felt but in fact nothing is forever, even the same memory, same picture does not remain the same. It changes they way you change, the way your opinion changes. There comes a  time when you start accepting as usual which was earlier unusual.
Nothing holds on, nothing remains and then you realize you will miss this moment if you wont live it, the way it is right now, as it will change the very next moment !