As the bumpy auto rickshaw ride took me closer to my home, I gazed around, and kept noticing the striking dissimilarities between what I was seeing, and what that place used to be, a few years back. It was my once in three months homecoming, from Chennai, to the village in Kerala, where had I spent the first fifteen years of my life. I usually develop an inexplicable emotional nexus with places, but quite ironically, that never happened with the village where I was born and brought up.
“This place looks different, ma”
I exclaimed.
“Look who is being nostalgic now”
My mother’s reply was sarcastic, and I knew exactly why. She was also born and brought up in the same village, and we often discussed the evolutionary voyage of that place. She had told me how different, life used to be, during her childhood.
“There was a muddy walkway, in the place of this road”
She points to the road, sounding dispirited. She goes on and talks about how agriculture was the main source of income for everyone, the enthusiasm and warmth that floated around during the celebrations of Onam and Vishu, how families were huge, how buffaloes, cows, goats and chicken were all considered to be members if it, and so on. And then, she tells me that everything started changing since people got enticed with the opportunities that cities offered. She reminisces that there was one lone buffalo left in our house, after we sold everything else, and I get the pun, only when she adds that, that buffalo, went on to study engineering, and lives in Chennai now.
I was of the opinion that, if you live in a place long enough, you would eventually develop an attachment with it, and when you see things change, you feel a pinch of sorrow. So I put across my point pugnaciously, and try to snub her by saying that, there is nothing special in what a person feels for the surroundings that he or she lives in.
“Just look at the way people celebrate our festivals, these days. It was all about cherishing togetherness. But not anymore.”
She retaliates saying that it’s not the change, but the way things change, is what she finds admonishing. All I can do is to accuse it all on the inability of the older generation to adapt.
But now, as I look around, I realize that, I too have started to miss the way things used to be. There were very few buses in our route, and we used to tell as a joke that, once that bus passes, you can sleep on the road, till it returns after two hours. But now, the sound of motor vehicles lingers in the air, incessantly. The sprawling paddy fields, which also used to serve as our makeshift cricket grounds after harvesting, are all cut into different plots, and houses are rising, everywhere. The local primary school, has started English medium classes also. And the first three star hotel of our area has started functioning, in the nearest town.
If you ask me, I wouldn't really be able to tell you, which all of these are to be welcomed, and which all are not to be. The infrastructure development and the better living conditions can be considered as a sign of the economic development of our country, and let us hope that it is the augury of a brighter tomorrow that awaits us. Our culture and lifestyle need not remain the same forever, but the essence and soul of it should. It is important to remain true to what we really are, and to sustain our inner virtues. ‘How exactly?’ is a question that is left to each one of us.
