Come back to Home Again - Saturday Special Story
“Hey, it’s good to be back home” by John Denver was playing in my iPod Nano when I was looking at the road. The road was long and wide. It was narrow few years ago when we used to stay in that area when we were students. It was that time of our life when boys used to fight for petty stuffs like for girls. I could decipher that the roads have been recently widened. The sides of the roads were full of fresh stone grits, sands and smalls to big boulders. There were numerous small ditches on the side pathways. Similar was the case with the road. It looked black tar was not put properly. There were bulging gutter (sewerage) Iron covers/lids on the middle of the roads. Here and there. The small ditches on roads are of course, very common in India. I was looking at them – those long dusty, wide and unending roads. I was looking at the road and the numbers of vehicles plying on the road. The bike, bicycles, tempos, autos, rickshaw, Lorries, buses etc. were running on it making dust fly over the pedestrians on the pathways.
There were man-pulled to engine-driven vehicles, all marching towards their destination – unknown to me. All the vehicles were in speed except in few occasions when people crossed roads. Here and there. I wondered looking at them – these people – who cross roads at any point. They do not use Zebra-crossings as there are no Zebra-crossings at this juncture of the road. It is not one way road. Vehicles run from both the directions. People give signal to the running vehicles to slow down by their hands and cross halfway. Once the halfway is over, they give signal similarly to the vehicles from the opposite directions. They are used to this practice and are brave and unafraid.
I am looking at all these phenomena sitting under a tree on a roadside in front of an ATM. Today, I am aimless. I have nowhere to go and I have nothing to do. Hence, I am looking at these running vehicles and people who are rushing towards their offices, schools, colleges, and to their destinations best known to them.While I complete this task of looking at surroundings at today’s morning sitting, the iPod replays the same song: “Hey, it’s good to be back home.” The replay of the same song breaks my chain of thoughts and the state of the frozenness. Generally, the iPod songs are in “Reshuffle Mode” where songs are randomly selected for play in this form, I am told. It could be that the songs are not in “Reshuffle Mode” today but the same song is loaded twice. Okay, let it be. “I’ll listen to it again”, I told to myself.
“Hey, it’s good to be back home” by John Denver was playing in my iPod Nano when I was looking at the road. The road was long and wide. It was narrow few years ago when we used to stay in that area when we were students. It was that time of our life when boys used to fight for petty stuffs like for girls. I could decipher that the roads have been recently widened. The sides of the roads were full of fresh stone grits, sands and smalls to big boulders. There were numerous small ditches on the side pathways. Similar was the case with the road. It looked black tar was not put properly. There were bulging gutter (sewerage) Iron covers/lids on the middle of the roads. Here and there. The small ditches on roads are of course, very common in India. I was looking at them – those long dusty, wide and unending roads. I was looking at the road and the numbers of vehicles plying on the road. The bike, bicycles, tempos, autos, rickshaw, Lorries, buses etc. were running on it making dust fly over the pedestrians on the pathways.
There were man-pulled to engine-driven vehicles, all marching towards their destination – unknown to me. All the vehicles were in speed except in few occasions when people crossed roads. Here and there. I wondered looking at them – these people – who cross roads at any point. They do not use Zebra-crossings as there are no Zebra-crossings at this juncture of the road. It is not one way road. Vehicles run from both the directions. People give signal to the running vehicles to slow down by their hands and cross halfway. Once the halfway is over, they give signal similarly to the vehicles from the opposite directions. They are used to this practice and are brave and unafraid.
I am looking at all these phenomena sitting under a tree on a roadside in front of an ATM. Today, I am aimless. I have nowhere to go and I have nothing to do. Hence, I am looking at these running vehicles and people who are rushing towards their offices, schools, colleges, and to their destinations best known to them.While I complete this task of looking at surroundings at today’s morning sitting, the iPod replays the same song: “Hey, it’s good to be back home.” The replay of the same song breaks my chain of thoughts and the state of the frozenness. Generally, the iPod songs are in “Reshuffle Mode” where songs are randomly selected for play in this form, I am told. It could be that the songs are not in “Reshuffle Mode” today but the same song is loaded twice. Okay, let it be. “I’ll listen to it again”, I told to myself.
But, wait, what a song for the people without destination – for me and for those who look to be in a hurry. I hope everyone reaches home. It is indeed a good feeling. But, these people must be coming out of home – majority of them for sure. In all probability, they are not heading towards their home at the moment. But, it must be a reminder for them what to do in rest of the day. It is their wish that they would like to be at home by the end of the day. It would do them good to think of this song before they indulge in any new adventure during the day. Long and unwinding roads are good. They take us home but sometimes, they can be treacherous. Wide roads attract speeds and it invariably multiplies the chances of accidents. Not everyone reaches home, sadly.
Especially on this stretch of Naryanguda – Chikkadpally – Secunderabad, the roads are always crowded and the traffics are highly unmanaged. Every vehicle plying on the roads are crowded especially due to many colleges on the way and due to nearby railway junctions. I have seen many students hanging on the doors of big buses and trying to travel the distance of 4-5 Kms to reach their colleges. In this context, the song: “Hey, It’s good to be back home” sounds truly meaningful and with full of revelations. I realise the significance of the song and take iPod out to replay it. The songs play again “Be Back Home” by John Denver.
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