Meanderings

14 countries, 85 cities, forgot the number of road trips I have made, most of them unplanned. But there is something special about this one place in India.

It was the year of 2000, the leap century year. The only one my generation of folks will see. The best thing about the year was that we had completed our degree and were interning in a government hospital in Tumkur. That year one of the best movies in Bollywood released - Dil Chahta Hain.

Me and Lal were playing the NFS game in Rock's room one morning when Balls came by. He said he was feeling bored and wanted to go somewhere. Suddenly we remembered that I had an invitation from someone to come to their native for a very big festival in their state. Me (Meanderer), Balls (ashwin Balaji) and Lal (alwin Lal) at that moment decided to head there. With 10K borrowed cash from Dutta we headed out. The train from Bangalore was filled with people, we managed to sit on the footstand for half the journey with a litre bottle of pre-mixed coke in hand. We managed to reach in one piece to a smallish town in the state and also found a room to stay in.

The next day we headed to the backwaters of a dam which bordered 2 states. We got on to the open diesel boat that took the people into the water mass. There was a narrow passage between 2 submerged hills that took us into this beautiful artificial lake formed by the dam water. Bordering the lake is a national reserve. The greenish blue water, the elephants that were drinking from the lake, the bisons, the playful otters, OH MY GOD!!!

Then it happened, I was looking at the hills that were covered with long grass. The sun was setting and he gave a magical golden touch to the bright green blades of grass. I was looking at the hills awed at the beauty and thinking that this was heaven on earth, then the wind blew over the hills. The bright green blades of grass flipped as the wind passed through them and exposed the silvery underside of the grass blades. In one mexican wave after another the stadium of Thekady played out for us. The gloden green grass with each wave flipped and shone bright silver.

I was there in God's Own Country - Kerala. And with all the travelling I have done to date, I still believe it is the most beautiful place on planet Earth. Balls, Lal and I vowed that we would go there for our honeymoons and meet 10 years to that exact date in the same place with most probably our wives and kids.

I kept my honeymoon promise with the place. Lal went on to become an anaestetist and currently practises in Trivandrun living with his wife and son. Balls is a practising ENT surgeon in Bangalore blessed with a daughter. Guys, if you are reading this, the date is nearly on us. It will be 10 years in a few days from now when we took that vow. Do you wanna join me in God's Own Country celebrating the one thing that I have valued a lot... our Friendship???