I went out for an evening walk like most other days and took the usual route starting from the 'back' gate of my apartment. I cannot help but second look at the older couple's duplex house facing the gate that stares right back at me as pictures of murder for money and jewelry (the wife, aged 70 was killed a month ago by their car driver on the 1st floor of the house, as the husband, aged 75 was working in the shed from ground-floor and could not hear her) is written all over their mourning place.
The 'front' gate leads to a congested main road that crawls with honking vehicles and muddy slush and shops of every lawless disorder leading to a longer and frustratingly slow warm up for such 'evening' walkers. Parks for walkers and joggers and people of every size and shape was something to look forward to and the 'back' gate was a sooner option to get to the park.
I took the route that my husband had explained from memory and had reached there to find there was a lot more to this 'name unknown' park than meets the eye. One can smell the whiteness of jasmine and rose garlands as the temple adjacent to the park rings its bell of evening chants and i see many exercised maamis, retired and physically fit maamas and a mixed bunch of people walk out the park. The gate that one takes to enter and exit are the same and a small wait for a narrowed way inside, opens my eyes to a wide and slightly unkempt park, which i had never discovered in my walking history.
The slabbed trail that runs through the circumference of a fairly large and circular park is dotted with wild plants, trees and benches that have friends, families and lovers in their own worlds. The serious walkers and joggers seem to sweat it out and pace faster to finish as dark and moody clouds hover from top.
It was a trial walk for day 1 for me and after walking for a while, I took a seat next to a red head, whose dye was next best to the hibiscus flowers in the park. She was easy to talk to and we seemed to hit off from the word go as she belonged to Hyderabad too, which happens to be my native and we could not get enough of it, even if we have moved to Chennai for our own reasons and have grown to like the latter in choice-less reconciliation.
It was like moving into this safety of knowing that I am still hyderabadi enough to bring back my good old self in the Telugu we spoke and I knew instinctively that i am understood and not judged no matter how broken the Telugu, or how lost I was then.
The 'front' gate leads to a congested main road that crawls with honking vehicles and muddy slush and shops of every lawless disorder leading to a longer and frustratingly slow warm up for such 'evening' walkers. Parks for walkers and joggers and people of every size and shape was something to look forward to and the 'back' gate was a sooner option to get to the park.
I took the route that my husband had explained from memory and had reached there to find there was a lot more to this 'name unknown' park than meets the eye. One can smell the whiteness of jasmine and rose garlands as the temple adjacent to the park rings its bell of evening chants and i see many exercised maamis, retired and physically fit maamas and a mixed bunch of people walk out the park. The gate that one takes to enter and exit are the same and a small wait for a narrowed way inside, opens my eyes to a wide and slightly unkempt park, which i had never discovered in my walking history.
The slabbed trail that runs through the circumference of a fairly large and circular park is dotted with wild plants, trees and benches that have friends, families and lovers in their own worlds. The serious walkers and joggers seem to sweat it out and pace faster to finish as dark and moody clouds hover from top.
It was a trial walk for day 1 for me and after walking for a while, I took a seat next to a red head, whose dye was next best to the hibiscus flowers in the park. She was easy to talk to and we seemed to hit off from the word go as she belonged to Hyderabad too, which happens to be my native and we could not get enough of it, even if we have moved to Chennai for our own reasons and have grown to like the latter in choice-less reconciliation.
It was like moving into this safety of knowing that I am still hyderabadi enough to bring back my good old self in the Telugu we spoke and I knew instinctively that i am understood and not judged no matter how broken the Telugu, or how lost I was then.
