PHOTO: #ThrowbackThursday To ‘The Land Of Clouds’

Conversing with a tweet-friend earlier today, I was reminded of my childhood days. I spent a good ten years of that in the then Bihar, one of the eastern states in India, growing up in the wild among hills! It is an iron-ore mining township, located above and among the hills of the Bonai range. Life there was fun, to put it simply. And very simple too! There were two schools – if you didn’t get into one, you went to the other; one shopping centre – anything you wanted you got there; friends and classmates meant the same thing; all the roads were our playground and the big colony lived like one big family – everyone knew everyone else, sometimes even if they didn’t want to!

And today, sitting in my warm apartment on a cold winter night in London, I cannot help but feel terribly nostalgic about those ‘Wonder Years’! Sal trees, heavy rains, warm sunshine, elephants, waterfalls, picnics – things that are synonymous with my childhood. And no better day than this to dedicate my #ThrowbackThursday post to this wonderful small town called Meghahatuburu (meaning: the land of clouds), where I spent the most blissful of times!

I took this photo during my visit with my family in 2007. This is close to the guest house we stayed in, right next to the colony – of course quite away from the main road. I couldn’t resist the call of the valleys and hills!