I miss you dear friend

Staying away from my native, here in the heart of this desert I do miss the natural boasts of my land; Retention about my childhood memories are not stronger than the aspiration for a dearer future. Future is thus a choice and what makes me choose to live in a land that is far away is the comfort of the aromas and cuisines of Kerala right here in Doha. But I badly miss one thing that I was very much used in country. The rains……I cherish the days I sang the rhyme rain, rain go away with the effect of its whole meaning, here children sing that rhyme but they are not able to understand why a child sings that song as  rain never hinders a child’s play here. Even after being a desert, rain is not totally unknown to Doha as at times it shows its face here also. But, it will never be a culture or a part of life as we do experience it in Kerala. Here, occurrence of a rainbow will be the rarest of all the natural phenomena like a solar or lunar eclipse, whereas in India it is a very common phenomenon like rain.

It will be great surprises for a person from Doha to watch a Malayalam movie where Rains are often play a vital role. The people here will never understand the nostalgia of music and cold offered by rains in Kerala. They will never realize rains as the very first friend of every school going kid in Kerala. A normal Keralite will never be able to define rain as just the water falling in separate drops. For us it is the memory of a lot of past events and melancholy. From the very first drop that gently touches the hair or cheek to the streams that originate from the head to reach the toe made each of us fell in love with rains. We cannot forget and avoid the cold and sneezing gifted by the rains in the initial days of every academic year. We can never even think of forgetting the moments of joy and excitements offered by rains. You never can hear the life story of an Indian without rains taking a vital role in his or her personal life. Whether it is happiness or sorrow, rain is there to be with us.

In the most readable instance of my very first childhood memory, I was subjected to punishment for playing in rains. Since those days, I loved to watch the knockout of rains and cherished its music closer to my heart. I still do remember the sonorous sound of thunder and frightening appearance of lightning that threatened me even in sleeping hours. I don’t remember who made the poor little me afraid of those close friends of rains. Whoever it is they could not be successful for long as I never could resist myself from keeping company with rains. We shared our lives in between the big trees, small plants, near the canals, along the green fields and even in school. The light green stains of water in the text books, the small intervals in class hours eclipsed by the music and shallow dimness brought by the rain, the wet uniforms, the long lines of black umbrellas…the sights of rains are uncountable during my childhood. I can’t even think of counting the rains that made my childhood and teenage eventful and wet.

Rain escorted me through several moments where I was supposed to be alone. The rain water washed all the pain backed by teacher’s stick for not doing the homework. It helped to hide all the tears that went out of my eyes among the people who lacked compassion. The rain provided background for my separation from many good friends as every new school year took away many of them to faraway places. The sweet and sour taste of the mangoes that get separated from the tree during heavy rains and the fishes that come out of ponds and canals with the overflowing rain water filled my childhood with a lot of excitements. Though college was a totally new experience, rain helped me to maintain my real persona in that new and much bigger world. Every mornings and evenings of the June were blessed to have a long line of umbrellas like a black river that originated from my school through the road.

At college, I realized myself losing that little girl in green skirt who wanted to throw the umbrella and tried to save each drop of water within my little hands. I was not sad at that time as even the naughtiest of my friends also became like that and pretended as if they are the gentlest person on earth. In fact, my heart desired to go out of this umbrella and enjoy the ravishing beauty of that great persona of rain. Yet, I didn’t as I was accustomed to pretension. I found it difficult to save my books from the attack of wind that brings a large crowd of water drops. I realized how it is difficult to limit the entire world to the diminished place beneath that small umbrella. All these limitations are because of me growing as a woman from that poor little baby who cherished rains. As someone said, maturity is all about losing innocence. I really would like to go back to those times, where I was not bound by any of these norms….where I had freedom to enjoy the nature and its compassion. Looking at rains, I always tried to forget the annoyance I had to face from my own people from whom I expected a lot. I could succeed in those efforts and here I am missing the character with whom I find solace while I am in tears.