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Taking the road less travelled

It is fun to explore your own city with the eyes of a tourist!  Last Sunday, hubby and I went to Marve beach in Bombay. Since our original plan for Aksa beach was abruptly dropped looking at mammoth crowd, we drove down to Marve, barely a kilometer away with rumbling of an idea that required some semblance of shape and form as we hadn’t been there before. I often follow my heart and wander at different places while more sensible people indulge in siesta! Such delightful wanderings are invariably always rewarded by rare glimpse of life.    

Exploring Marve beach was like visiting an unknown land where courtesies are very much present but just packed differently. The engagement of human interaction was warm, genuine and very comforting. This world was completely different than ours yet in some beautiful way very much connected.  Marve, mainly inhabited by fishermen community, a world of gullies, by-lanes, fishing boats and an exit point for commuters from Manori, coexists juxtaposing with swanky surrounding just a few meters away across the road swirling into myriad patterns of this effervescent city that exudes such aura of power and wealth! 

There was beautiful energy throbbing in the air with the sky changing colours and textures like stunning abstract paintings of a maestro and different hues of life unfolding all around like a big, never ending scroll; children playing in the sand making toys, their parents keeping watchful eyes and grabbing the rare opportunity of some privacy with their partners, newlywed lovelorn couples, families come for outing and enjoying home cooked meals, people enjoying ice slush, corn on the cobs, chaat and other street food, a luxury for many of them! The beach is not only a source of entertainment for less privileged, hard working people from diverse communities, but a melting pot where they share bidis, paans and individual torments that connect them through struggle for survival! 

Seeing magic of marvel in the eyes of a child who has made a sand castle, a woman blushing because her hubby has finally shown courage to hold her hand publicly; something she longs for but is denied back home due to social pressures, an ecstatic child fascinated by the rainbow colours on the ice slush and enjoying it to the hilt, an old couple enjoying Sunset feeling nostalgic, these are truly rare sights that usually go unnoticed but are worth cherishing.The frenetic cadence of our life rarely allows us to see beyond our softly padded walls but we often find our truth in least expected spaces; in the least imagined ways. Visiting such places opens one’s eyes to the privileged life we take for granted. After all, life is more beautiful when we learn to value such small moments of simple, harmless joys that most of us living in big metropolis like Bombay have forgotten long, long back. 

















Raghurajpur, an emblem of heritage arts and crafts of Odisha!!!

About fifteen km from the revered city of Lord Jagannath, Puri, there is a tiny little hamlet Raghurajpur, nestled on the southern bank of r...