Page 274 - Kolaj Sharodiya Review Edition

The beach was very crowded (this was a weekend as well), so decided to walk along the shore to find a quiet place for myself. In about fifteen minutes,
I did find one. I sat on the sand and observed the waves breaking onto the shore. How I wished I woke up to this sound, every day. The sea is in constant
motion. It reminds me of a poem by Arundhati Subramaniam, where she calls the ocean, “tired”. The blues were shades darker now as opposed to the
lighter palette at noon, and the white of the waves sparkled brighter. It is also interesting to observe people and their responses to the sea, the waves, the
water; one hardly spots a glum face, perhaps this is what living amidst nature does. I have felt over time that one cannot necessarily have a price tag on
happiness and joy, these are achieved in fleeting moments. A particular family was struggling to click a picture with all the four of them, the youngest
member, a girl, not more than 13, was the one trying to click the selfie, I had been observing them for a while and eventually decide to offer to click a
picture. They were immensely thankful for this and on their way back from the beach, which was about half an hour later, this girl ran up to me to thank
me again. I was very touched and also very happy. These are the moments that I was talking about just a while back. This was just a fleeting moment, but
it made me smile and the incident stayed on with me, vividly. Even amidst the multitude of voices, there was still, a sense of calm. Perhaps this is the calm
that lures me to the sea. I have always been immensely jealous of people who live in sea/ocean towns, imagine the sheer joy of having the sea at one’s
disposal! If you feel upset, go take a walk next to the sea, if you are happy, walk on the beach, if you are bored, go catch a sunset/sunrise, such endless
possibilities! But at the same time, I have also wondered, if the constancy of existence of the sea, will make it mundane or redundant? I will never know, but
the option seems very enticing. I sat there till later evening, waiting for the sun to set and the crowd to disappear. One does not have the scope to do a lot
post sunset in Tranquebar. I decided to sit by the balcony and read. I walked back to the Bungalow, thinking I perhaps needed to come back to Tranque-
bar once again and spend a couple of days more. I ended my day with a rich chocolate cake, ordered out of the restaurant at the Bungalow.

I am unsure when the pandemic situation around the world, is going to be normalized and travel will again be a possibility, but I hope it does, soon. Till then,
perhaps I will continue to travel vicariously, either through stories, travel writings or pictures, of old trips and if I am inspired as much, I might write something
more as well. Tranquebar gave me the scope to realize that one should look for happiness in transitory moments, and not chase them. And a couple of
weeks later the pandemic, reiterated the fragility of life itself, where everything else is secondary to survival. And once our survival was at stake, one realized,
the value of moments!

2 I spent many a vacation in Asansol, an industrial town in West Bengal, where my grandparents lived. And much later in life did I discover the
Armenian settlement and the Armenian Church there. My curiosity also got me to figure out that some of the staple Bengali dishes draw heavily from
Armenian methods of cooking and ingredients. It is interesting how food speaks so much about the coming together of histories and thereby, cultures.

3 I was leaving for Pondicherry the next day, a place I have been to at least four times earlier, but which still manages to fascinate me.