Made in Humane Club
Dad woke me up early. We quickly bathed with cold water and got ready. Later, we were setting out kumkum, chandan, bhasma, and haldi, separating them. While listening to Guru Swami, I accidentally poured some bhasma into the chandan. Srinivas assured me, saying, “Oh, don’t worry. It’s fine. It will be mixed up.” He mixed it, and everything was okay, but I felt really bad about my mistake.
Note to self: Remember, you shouldn’t feel bad. Always think and not fear.
Next, Dad and I did namaskar to Guruswami and gave him dakshina. This is a sign of gratitude that we give to the Gurus.
Darshan failure again
Once all the material was ready, Guruswami got all the kids ready and asked us to follow him for another darshan. Guruswami already knew so many people. He took us to the office of the head priest. The head priest took our offerings and gave them to Ayyappa. But today too, the police were not letting us take the next darshan.
Soon, we realized the reason. It was Ayyappa’s birthday, and Ayyappa was supposed to descend the mountain on an elephant and take a bath in the Pamba nadi. Hence, the darshan was closed.
So we went to a spot where we had to break the coconuts. With all our might, we threw the two coconuts from the irumudi.
The Descent
After that, Guruswami and Kumar went down via palanquins. We had decided to wait for Mahaksh and Venkat at the coconut breaking spot, but we decided to start the descent and wait there. We saw a black monkey swinging along the branches.
Some of us get lost
Somehow, Mahaksh and Venkat went ahead, and we lost touch with them. But at least we were together. We were wise old Srinivas, adorable Pradnya, Mister Serious Pranad, my dad, and I. But then, suddenly, mister serious Pranad disappeared. We asked Srinivas whether Pranad had a phone or not. Srinivas said yes, but he was not sure whether Pranad was carrying it or not. Dad cracked a joke. What if we ring that number, and what if Pranad’s mother picks up? Srinivas said, “That would not be advisable as she would scold me, she is my big sister.” I made a mental note. Elder sisters do scare younger siblings. Vasu, look out.
We kept looking for Pranad but could not find him. When we reached the foot of the mountain, Srinivas spotted Pranad with his younger brother Mahaksh. The story was revealed, Pranad had met with his younger brother Mahaksh, who asked him to race with the palanquin of his father. Pranad did so, and he came first at the foot of the mountain. My dad cracked a joke, he said, “From now on, your nickname is BULLET IYER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
The treacherous descent?
The descent was harder than the ascent. Because it was raining in the ascent while it was hot hot hot in the descent and gravity was pulling us down, so we were going fast and due to that the stones were pricking us harder. We had to make sure that gravity does not pull us down so hard that we slip and roll down the rest of the mountain. Throughout the descent, Dad’s leg was aching horribly. He would limp and walk like 85-year-old Guruswami.
Once we were almost at the bottom, my foot started aching. Despite Dad’s pain, he picked me up and walked down.
Ayaapaa came down for a bath
Once we were down, we saw that Ayyappa too had come down on his elephant.
Uh oh
We walked to the Pamba. Once we reached the Pamba, my dad set me down. We went to have a refreshing drink of orange juice. I made a mistake; some of the orange juice spilled when I was given it, and it fell on Pradnya. She started crying as she was afraid the juice had spilled on her dress. She was feeling sticky. I felt very bad. We went down to the Pamba and cleaned her up with a cloth.
Leaving Pamba
We went on our way to a petrol pump station where everybody was to meet. We were just in time. Our fellow group of devotees was going to start the car. We quickly got in, and off we went to the place where the buses were parked. I noticed that one of our fellow devotees’ hair had become pink!
After the car ride, we sat in the tempo and then went off to Nilekal and Pala. Once at Pala, we stopped again at Ambadi restaurant, had banana flower sabji, mango curry, payasam, and curd. The banana flower sabzi was a little bitter and spicy, and the mango curry was sweet and peppery. South Indian food is not just about idlis, dosas, and vadas. It is also about curries, sabzis, rice, and medicated water. We then went off to Kochi.
Kochi
When our bus stopped there, we—Srinivas, my father, Pradnya, and I—all four sat in a rickshaw and went to the metro station. At the metro station, we boarded the metro and set off to MG Road in Kochi. This was my first metro train ride. Both Pradnya and I were constantly looking at the view of the city from the metro. It was so high that we could get a good view.
Once we reached there, we took another rickshaw to a hotel. Venkat had found us a nice hotel which is only a small walk away from Kochi port. We could see the port nicely.
The Marine Inn
In the hotel, Pradnya and I played a small game of tag and then went up to our rooms in a lift.
We played around and saw that there were sheets of paper in the room. We immediately started to draw Ayyappa.
At the beachfront
We set out to explore Kochi. We went to Bharat Coffee House first. We had a ghee roast, a paper roast, and some coffee. Next, we went to the Kochi Port, saw the sea, and observed how deep it was. Pradnya and I were hoping that there would be a beach where we could collect some shells. However, that was not possible as the waters here were deep, and it was a port.
My dad explained the difference between a port and a beach: A port is where sailors anchor their ships. A beach is where there is sand and water on top of the sand, so if sailors try to anchor their ships on a beach, they would get jammed.
We got some ice cream and started eating it with the salty breeze caressing our faces. My dad got 3 boxes of grapes and was chilling with his favourite fruit. The grapes were there till the morning when he finished it up. Dad asked me, ” Do you want me to throw you down in the water so that you can check how deep it is?” I said,” No way!”
We went to a shop that was selling spices. We tried cinnamon and lots of different peppers. green. white. black. Dad bought some. The cinnamon smelled sweet. The pepper was nutty and slightly spicy. It made mini explosions in my mouth. We even bought papad of different flavours like guava, mango, and raw mango.
Gratitude
On our walk back, wise old Srinivas told us a story about gratitude. We learned that we should always be grateful for what we have; only then will we get whatever we want. My dad told me that I should have been grateful for what I had, that ice cream, instead of asking for some chewing gum. I agreed and said yes.
Back at the hotel
After that, we went back to our room. At the hotel, we realized that Dad’s foot was aching because there was a thorn inside. Srinivas removed a thorn from my dad’s foot, but my dad’s foot was still aching. Dad dozed off.
To spend time, Srinivas taught me a memory game. He taught me how to memorize some lists and how to remember things like buying a brush, toothpaste, or a cup. I took notes from the memory game
Pradnya and I had a slumber party. We were drawing and phoned for more paper and got some from reception. After that, I showed Pragnya how to draw a house. We drew for some time. Srinivas said that the tiger in my drawing was bowing down to Ayyappa, or in other words, doing a Namaskaram.
When we noticed that it was 11:35, we realized we had started at 10:00. Then we agreed that it was time to sleep. I quickly put on another T-shirt of my dad’s as I was feeling cold. We switched off the light and tucked into bed.
That night, I got a kick from Pradnya. That kick went right into my stomach, and I woke up thinking, “Wait. Who did that?” I saw that Pradnya was sleeping. I don’t know, she was moving around a lot; then she turned to the opposite side of the bed. Meanwhile, both of our dads were crouched in the corners while we were taking up extra space. After that, I slept.