It was the day of making a trip to my ancestral village near Puri. The drive on the 4 lane expressway was impressive, but not the drivers who could be seen coming from the opposite way, against the tide of the one way traffic. Unnecessary roadblocks by man made barriers set up by police and animals like gangs of cows and stray dogs, were strewn around.
The foggy afternoon painted the horizon in white like a broad brush on a blue canvas. The smiling white KASHATANDI (lanky flowers on sand with a white broomlike top) waved at us through the haze. We passed through golden yellow paddy fields, the harvested ones forming cylindrical crop circles. Drove past SUANDO, the native village of Gopabandhu Das, though the meandering pucca roads under archways of coconut groves, as the banana and palm trees swayed by the afternoon breeze.
After a long time got a glimpse of rural Odisha life. Curious women and urchins gaped at us. We encountered greenish village ponds every other miles. Children were jumping on to water, while ladies bathing struggled to cover themselves as our vehicle passed by. On the village outskirts, cows were strapped to tiny poles as a bull was inspecting them for insemination.
All roads to my village lead to the conclusion that communication technology has come a long way. I saw many Cyclists and bikers in GAMUCHA and LUNGI (loincloth), head tilted with a cell phone tucked between their chin and shoulder.
I was sad to learn the sad state of our village library, which has now become defunct. Unlike the libraries in Alexandria in Egypt, Athens of Greece and Nalanda of Bihar, they were not destroyed by any outside invaders, but by the villagers themselves. All the books were stealthily stolen as neither the books and sometimes the borrowers themselves never returned. destruction of the famed libraries was seen as the harbinger of the demise of those civilizations. The decapitated village library doesn't augur well for its future...more later
(2nd and the last part of the trip to be continued tomorrow).
The foggy afternoon painted the horizon in white like a broad brush on a blue canvas. The smiling white KASHATANDI (lanky flowers on sand with a white broomlike top) waved at us through the haze. We passed through golden yellow paddy fields, the harvested ones forming cylindrical crop circles. Drove past SUANDO, the native village of Gopabandhu Das, though the meandering pucca roads under archways of coconut groves, as the banana and palm trees swayed by the afternoon breeze.
After a long time got a glimpse of rural Odisha life. Curious women and urchins gaped at us. We encountered greenish village ponds every other miles. Children were jumping on to water, while ladies bathing struggled to cover themselves as our vehicle passed by. On the village outskirts, cows were strapped to tiny poles as a bull was inspecting them for insemination.
All roads to my village lead to the conclusion that communication technology has come a long way. I saw many Cyclists and bikers in GAMUCHA and LUNGI (loincloth), head tilted with a cell phone tucked between their chin and shoulder.
I was sad to learn the sad state of our village library, which has now become defunct. Unlike the libraries in Alexandria in Egypt, Athens of Greece and Nalanda of Bihar, they were not destroyed by any outside invaders, but by the villagers themselves. All the books were stealthily stolen as neither the books and sometimes the borrowers themselves never returned. destruction of the famed libraries was seen as the harbinger of the demise of those civilizations. The decapitated village library doesn't augur well for its future...more later
(2nd and the last part of the trip to be continued tomorrow).
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