MEMORIES & THOUGHTS!

Chapter 3. The New House!

We moved to our new house.

Our new house is on a hill. Its a pretty high hill. A road has been made through the centre, probably by dividing the hill into two parts.

Our house is on the right side and is surrounded by roads all around. In the North there is a junction with a river and our house is at the diagonal South..

On the left side and on the front there are main roads and on the right and back sides there are private roads. Beyond the private road it leads to the valley of the hill.

So it is just like an island surrounded by roads.

There were only two houses in the hill. Ours on the South and another one in the North.

All the other area were sold as plots, but they looked like really open bushy area.

The new house was new in all aspects I could remember.

It was white! Fresh smell everywhere. Plenty of rooms, there is a car porch, there is a terrace which was really new gift.

I really liked climbing up and down through the stairs. I could even be adventurous by climbing two or three at times. I would jump to the ground from the fourth or fifth step and would stand triumphant myself!!!!😆😆😆😆

The courtyard was big enough to have a 200 m race around the house . I would run around without any sandals. The pebbles would be prickly and at times they hurt.

There was our own area to explore, around the courtyard. There were lot of plants: some big trees, some small. Parents had planted trees in the plot long before the house had been constructed. Mom had also started planting garden plants around the house. They all bore pretty flowers. She is a plant lover!!

There was a cashew tree on one corner. Its first branch division was pretty low enough for me to climb, and I would climb and stay up enjoying the breeze.😊

In later years, with my sister who was born in our new house, I used to make hut in the shade of cashew tree and stay there. She is much younger than me.

There is a well with a fish in it. It would come up when we called it with a peculiar sound. It was pretty big. Elders said it was "Chaeru meen (Bral fish). I just recognized that it has a long name- Bull's eye cobra headed fish.😮😮.

Beside the well, there was a mulberry plant. It gave really adorable fruits. The juicy, blacish-purplish fruit. That was a new feeling for me. I awaited for fresh fruits to ripen. I would look for ripe fruit every day.

I had heard somewhere that silk is made from silk worms, whom eat mulberry leaves only. I found one day, certain small insect eggs under the leaves beautifully arranged in a particular pattern and thought that it may be silkworm eggs and silkworms were going to hatch out, and would check every day to see them coming out. Those were really some butterfly eggs. I did not see the caterpillars coming out, but only the broken eggshells later.😁😁😁.

I was disappointed a little bit😇😇.

Even though, I didn't understand how is silk made from a worm and how silkworms make silk🤔🤔 ???

There was a Gandharajan plant ( Cape jasmine) just beside the mulberry tree. I came to know about it for the first time and adored it very much. I loved the fragrance. It just became, like a very dear person to me. Everyday I would go there looking for freshly bloomed flowers, to enjoy its fragrance. I could tell fresh and old flowers by smelling it.

Hmmm....You know? That's a great quality in a four year old😉😉😉!

Beside, there was a lowly growing Guava plant on which we kids enjoyed climbing. We were like monkeys, hanging in trees, swaying the branches.

The plot just above ours was a tapioca plantation. It looked like a dense, dark, silent forest. On looking into it from our place there was no light inside the place. Only darkness. I would think how are the workers walking inside it. I didn't really admire that place due to the thick silence hovering over there. Too much silence and darkness was scary for me!

There I found a certain thing I had seen earlier, but in another version-' a mouse trap'. It was made with two heavy stones, ropes, a platform and I would be thinking everyday, how this thing would be working!

It was explained to me later by someone that the principle is same as all traps. Here, it will crash the rats to death. Easy disposal. That's it!

The other areas were very pleasant and explorable. There was an old local variety of mango tree( nattu maavu) at the top of the hill. In the evenings, mom, brother and me used to go there, and the aunt and kids from the house at the other side would also come there. Adults would have their talks, while kids would play around a lot. The boy kid was elder than me and the girl, younger. She would stay with her mom.

They knew many things that I had never even heard of.

I first saw a touch-me-not plant there. The boy told me that while someone touch, the leaflets will fold.

Surprised !!

I did it many times upto my satisfaction 😄😄.

I saw ladybugs for the first time there. They were not red as the globally presented ones, but orange. Later when I saw toys and pictures of the rex variety I would pity the orange ones!

Why were they not recognized 😔???

I had noticed that, there was a sort of grass's seeds stuck in all our clothes and seeing that mom asked me to pick it all by hand😓.

It was fun at first, and next day he told me that it was called "sneha pullu"-'love grass' is a fun translation😁😁😁( Spanish needles ), and it will come with us if it liked us😄😄😄😄. Later on my love towards the love grass became dislike, as it was tiresome to pick all the needles out🥵.

He taught me to make bubbles from touch-me-not leaf sap with the tube like structure from a grass.

Hoh! He knew many things.

His grand father had made him a handy canon with bamboo, which can really shoot with a sort of berry fruit which is the canon ball.

Grandfather made one to my brother too. I also asked him to make one for me, but he did not. I hated him for that.😡

My brother used to shoot me with that and the friut really hurt🤬🤬🤬.

In those days there were no TV in every house as it is today, or Telephone.

They had TV.

We used to go to their house to watch Sunday movies.

There was a serial named 'Giant Robot', story of a flying Robot and human kids as friends. Can't remember the story, but I really liked to watch it.

I think it played before the movie.🤔

I got really scared a day when it was the movie ' mortuary '. It was so creepy for me. The light effects and sound, the acting...everything.

We had to walk back home at night, through the top of the hill which was a little bushy. Even though that was adventurous before, that day it wasn't. It looked more dark and plants brushed against my hands....I cautiously kept up with elders..

The nature at that time became monstrous.

Big plants would take the shape of beasts, creepers would spread out their arms.....I would look at them with all those effects given by the movie...

What I usually did in such situation, that was, walking in that way earlier, is that assume that I am very strong and just go. I may think just let things happen. I'm not going to get scared.
A sort of fortitude comes to me and I'm ready to fight.

Here, it did not happen.

Somehow I followed mom and brother, looking around for ghostly shadows. 😱😱😱😱

😄😄😄😄

Not very late, we too got a Television at home. BPL, color tv!☺️☺️