After a trip to Pune, it was time to head home and enjoy some relaxed time with the family before heading back to US.
Visiting home is without doubt exciting and at the same time, it tells you what you are missing in your life. Visiting home just once makes you realize how beautiful and simple the life is and I often think about the simple times I grew up in and with simple things.
This trip to home was special because in a couple days we were about to leave for Vapi, Gujrat, visiting our youngest uncle and his family. It was a logical decision to visit him since he lived a few hours away from Mumbai Airport, from where I was about to fly to the states.
When I reached home, the first thing I did was to have home made good food. My mom had made Poha for breakfast and I loved every single bite of it. As I had only a couple days left before leaving for my youngest uncle’s place in Gujrat, I decided to visit my grandma’s place who used to live a few minutes away from my parents’ place.
Grandma’s place is the one where I spent my childhood. We grew up in that house, so certainly, it holds so many sweet and lovely memories. Every time I visit that house in Patansaongi, I try to relive lovely moments that I spent as a child there. I make a point to visit every single room in that house and try to find different things I used to play when I was a kid.
I know my sisters and cousins hate the fact that I am my grandma’s favorite grandkid, so when I visited her, she was kind enough to cook an entire meal for myself. It is her way of showing her love and affection towards her grandkid, who lives in a faraway land. The food was tasty and more delightful because of the fact that she took extreme care while preparing it and I love her for that.
After the meal, I bade my goodbyes to her and took one last lap around the house and captured a few pictures.
Post lunch, it was time to head home and go through the family photographs – which is a ritual every time I visit home. I like to go through my parents’ wedding album and our childhood photos. I love reminiscing the past and indulge plenty discussions around it.
Before I knew, it was time for some relatives and friends to show up at my place to meet me and have some delightful conversions. I hadn’t had a chance to meet everyone during my India visit, so I appreciated everyone who took time out of their busy schedule to come to my place and meet me. It is one of the reasons why I love going back to my hometown and meet all the lovely and wonderful people there.
This made the evening go much faster that I almost forgot to pack. Thankfully, my Mom helped me a lot packing many things. Also, we were going to stay at my uncle’s place for a couple days, so we had plenty time to take care of packing.
Before I called it a night, I was coming back from a friend’s place when I caught the local kids and adults playing a game of Kabaddi – an Indian contact team sports played in the Indian Subcontinent. I spent roughly 5-10 minutes, observing a few plays, before heading back home and calling it a day.
It was a good day, the one which is still etched in my memory.
Next stop – Vapi, Gujrat.
stochasticity 