Orissan countryside
As you move to Bhubaneswar from the border with West Bengal in the north you realize that the reality on this side of the planet exists of nothing more that endless paddy fields curiously patched into the small green, yellow and light-brown pieces. Palm trees, some short and some tiny-little, as opposed to exaggeratedly gigantic ones in Delhi, can be seen standing alone, in doubles, triples and lining up in the disciplined lines.
At times a house on an oasis of lush vegetation and blossoming trees arises from the green-n-yellow void. A house like one would picture when thinking of a typical rural area: made of mud, square or round in its foundation, with discordantly arranged red tiles or brown-n-grey dry grass set in a few dense layers. Now and then a water reservoir, or an artificial pond accumulating water for all sort of usage, can be seen in the fields - again surrounded by dense vegetation.
Yet then.. rock formations appear... signifying another possible form of existence. Covered with a thin green layer of vegetation but red inside, they look like masses of hardened carrot halwa fairly figured out by a scoop.
Rocks are followed by more fields... Fields are followed by the river valleys bridged by newish-looking solid metal constructions. Now the bridges are stretching over mostly dry river beds covered by not-completely-dry-after-the-monsoon yellow sand. Taking advantage of the timing major construction work is going on at the bridges which spans are besieged by workers akin to monkeys hanging there and operating their simple tools.
You get a glimpse of the rural life as well... You see men working in the fields (!!) - for a change from the North - guiding buffaloes that pull the plough. They wear vest-tops and doties - a piece of cloth wrapped around your waist - some are knee-long some just cover heaps and look like diapers.
It occurred to me how different living this life is from drawing your conclusions from whatever you can see through the train window. I imagined being a small boy with short and straight unruly hair... wearing just shorts and playing war in the fields, running away from the village and hiding in the high grass, hassling dragonflies, catching all sorts of worms and proudly bringing a few home. I imagined being a school girls wearing a light-blue blouse, dark-blue skirt with folds, two neat plaits tied with a narrow red ribbon and carrying a heavy rectangular backpack through the shady path framed by the palm-trees, then along the pond and then an odd hour and a half across the fields... I was thinking about the hazardous work and the basic lifestyles.. Joana asked the other day, "Are they happy?" In their ways.. despite all.. why not? ....
Driving from Bhubaneswar to the coastal areas of Orissa gives you yet a different picture. You move from one village to another, all covered in the lush vegetation - all in bright green color of over-bursting strength. You get to see the carriages for buffaloes on the backyards.. You get to see the man sitting in their wooden cubicles along the road - one-serves-all-the-purposes shop and preparing a pan. You get to see a boy walking among the palm trees along a pond... You get to see a woman carrying a bunch of banana leaves sized as she herself. You feel it is so wild, so unreal, however - clearly taking place there - outside the window.
and then... the ultimate reward appears.. On the way from Konark to Puri the sea emerges!.. Unannounced... Bay of Bengal.. With the first sight of the white crests of the waves, the greenish-blue infinity of the sea and the light-yellow clean sand... you feel relieved and very happy inside as if you got rid of something that had been bothering you for long.. as if you got your freedom back...
Anything might come later - small branchy firs managing to grow on the sandy ground, a bizarre kind of short but very spread out tree resembling a mythical octopus with leaves on its limps, shady forests with tall trees standing like pillars holding the sky... - it passes on on the same wave still lasting after the glimpse of the sea.
At times a house on an oasis of lush vegetation and blossoming trees arises from the green-n-yellow void. A house like one would picture when thinking of a typical rural area: made of mud, square or round in its foundation, with discordantly arranged red tiles or brown-n-grey dry grass set in a few dense layers. Now and then a water reservoir, or an artificial pond accumulating water for all sort of usage, can be seen in the fields - again surrounded by dense vegetation.
Yet then.. rock formations appear... signifying another possible form of existence. Covered with a thin green layer of vegetation but red inside, they look like masses of hardened carrot halwa fairly figured out by a scoop.
Rocks are followed by more fields... Fields are followed by the river valleys bridged by newish-looking solid metal constructions. Now the bridges are stretching over mostly dry river beds covered by not-completely-dry-after-the-monsoon yellow sand. Taking advantage of the timing major construction work is going on at the bridges which spans are besieged by workers akin to monkeys hanging there and operating their simple tools.
You get a glimpse of the rural life as well... You see men working in the fields (!!) - for a change from the North - guiding buffaloes that pull the plough. They wear vest-tops and doties - a piece of cloth wrapped around your waist - some are knee-long some just cover heaps and look like diapers.
It occurred to me how different living this life is from drawing your conclusions from whatever you can see through the train window. I imagined being a small boy with short and straight unruly hair... wearing just shorts and playing war in the fields, running away from the village and hiding in the high grass, hassling dragonflies, catching all sorts of worms and proudly bringing a few home. I imagined being a school girls wearing a light-blue blouse, dark-blue skirt with folds, two neat plaits tied with a narrow red ribbon and carrying a heavy rectangular backpack through the shady path framed by the palm-trees, then along the pond and then an odd hour and a half across the fields... I was thinking about the hazardous work and the basic lifestyles.. Joana asked the other day, "Are they happy?" In their ways.. despite all.. why not? ....
Driving from Bhubaneswar to the coastal areas of Orissa gives you yet a different picture. You move from one village to another, all covered in the lush vegetation - all in bright green color of over-bursting strength. You get to see the carriages for buffaloes on the backyards.. You get to see the man sitting in their wooden cubicles along the road - one-serves-all-the-purposes shop and preparing a pan. You get to see a boy walking among the palm trees along a pond... You get to see a woman carrying a bunch of banana leaves sized as she herself. You feel it is so wild, so unreal, however - clearly taking place there - outside the window.
and then... the ultimate reward appears.. On the way from Konark to Puri the sea emerges!.. Unannounced... Bay of Bengal.. With the first sight of the white crests of the waves, the greenish-blue infinity of the sea and the light-yellow clean sand... you feel relieved and very happy inside as if you got rid of something that had been bothering you for long.. as if you got your freedom back...
Anything might come later - small branchy firs managing to grow on the sandy ground, a bizarre kind of short but very spread out tree resembling a mythical octopus with leaves on its limps, shady forests with tall trees standing like pillars holding the sky... - it passes on on the same wave still lasting after the glimpse of the sea.
posted by Olga Tikhonova | 7:19 pm
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