B899 Kaveri Vihar NTPC KORBA

I remember my days at B-899 most vividly. Infact thats the best part of my childhood. We had a two bedroom house on the ground floor. There was a decent space at the backyard, having a small garden, a cemented portion with cloth line and, also a water-pool for water storage at the corner. Mom always wanted to have a kitchen garden there, but I guess she never had the resource and time for it. There was a very big Mango tree which was unlike others as the trunk of the tree was not so broad considering the fact that it was old enough. Also, it never bore fruits. It created quite some shade on the house. There were banana plants which were seasonal I think. and, there was a basil plant. Our bathroom used to have a window overlooking the banana plants. There were other shrubs as well, which were not that significant. There was a narrow drain dividing the whole area into two, separating the cemented part from the garden. The mouth of the drain was usually closed with a piece of brick to stop the cats and dogs from sneaking in. Though cats used to manage to climb on the tall boundary wall and enter our premises. The used utensils were kept near the water hole. The servant used to come twice a day to clean and she used to wash the utensils and cloths in the backyard.
There were two bedroom. It was strange that we used to sleep in the larger bed, though both of us were very young and small too. Mom and dad used to sleep in the other room, in the smaller bed. The room has just the double bed and one alna, to keep the clothes. We used to always keep it in a mess. It had in-built wardrobes on the wall and other opposite side was all windows, overlooking the backyard. The wardrobe had dad’s clothes mostly, with some shelves messed with our books and mom’s papers. The lower long shelf was the place the deities idols were kept and was used for praying. The walls had a very light sea-green color lime-wash with white ceilings. We had to put the mosquito net on bed before we sleep. Usually dad used to put it up for us, we used to help him. That was very exciting thing for me as a kid. I would jump on the bed to reach that corner nail to hook the net. Gradually, I grew taller and I could reach it just be standing straight. That was a cute scale for me to measure my growing size. This room was colder, especially in winter nights. So mom-dad used to sleep in this room in winters. We would move to the other room in winters.
The other room was smaller I think. At least it has smaller bed. And smaller window and smaller in-built wardrobe. It has an extra shelves beside the window where didi used to keep her books. There was a dresser. It was my favourite piece of furniture in the house coz its platform was of my size. The mirror stretched up high but there was a sliding glass drawer below. Eventually, I had a contribution for breaking those glasses and as long as I remember, mom never got those glasses back, so it used to look open shelf. It was more of my play-space than mom’s make-up space. The top used to have a tray with vermilion box and one lipstick which mom had, two combs, a talc case, a talc bottle. More often there used to be more talc on the ground than on body, making the floor very smooth and slippery. There was a steel almira also, grayish-blue in color. I used to play in this room mostly. Infact I used to like the bed of this room, it had a soft mattress. The lemon-yellow color walls glow brighter with the sunlight in the afternoon. I used to love this room in the winters. The two rooms opened to the dinning space, which had the four seater dinning table pushed to the wall on one side and the refrigerator. This room was absolutely in the middle. The doors to kitchen, living room, bathroom and backyard also used open from this space. There was a wooden trunk at one corner, which used to be covered with a think carpet-type rug.

The kitchen was the last of my territories. It was not very attractive either. I just remember it to be very small and dark part of the house. It had a darker corner, underneath the sink, which always seemed very creepy to me. The apartment was on the ground level, with a gated hedged boundary. The iron gate opened to the garden and a walking path cemented and carefully bordered with brick and small shrubs. The garden was ordinary but had some exquisite plants, which I dint realise till later years of my life in city. The straight pathway used to go to an elevated porch with two steps. There was a rose bush on the right side. There was a window too, which was the window from the dinning space and we used to use it to check the visitor. It was convenient and safe. The door to the living room was on the left side of the porch, which used to open outside unlike most of the main doors. We had a TV from the time I remember, in fact, the first one in the neighbourhood. Actually, we were the first ones to have a phone also. This phone was placed in the stool in the living room and was the connection within this colony and power plant offices. There was a wooden sofa. I do remember the time when this sofa was brought home because the cover had lots of name slips we used to put on the book covers. But I cant remember what did the living room look like before the sofa came in. One wall of the living room has a in-built show case where mom had kept all her souvenir. I remember, there was a german silver peacock. Eventually every year there used to be the prizes and cups to add into them. The most visible of them was the big cup didi had got for standing first in the drawing and painting competition. There were many eagles of different sizes.. all of which were our prizes. Didi used to get many prizes every years and I too had quite a few contribution in gathering caseroles and eagles at our place. There was this strings of shells which used to be hung from the top of the in-built showcase and hung bordering the showcase, making it look rich.

The favourite part of the garden was the guava tree at the corner, almost overshadowing the apartment next door. I used to climb on it and sit on the wall of the apartment or on the branches and used to imagine myself quite like a warrior. The other favourite was the bougainvillea bush on the left side of the garden, which used to have such pretty flowers all season through. Earlier there was a kalamonda plant too in the same place, which used to have lush green leaves and deep yellow flowers. It would entangle with the bougainvillea and look fantastic with vivid colors. The rose bush used to bow down with white small roses in winters. There used to be hundreds of them together. I also remember that during autumn mom used to plant 7o’clocks and 9 o’clocks flowers and I used to be so happy looking at them smiling right on the clock’s tick. There was a cactus also which had grown so huge and thick which sharp thorns on the edge of the leaves. Can you believe it after 20 years, I saw the same cactus on the way from San Antonio Natural caverns and I have clicked its picture too!

The good part was that there was an empty lot in front of our house. The space was quite much to have a volleyball court with the peripheral road. Though there was no court, it was covered with loose mud and rubbles and we used to play there. There was the peripheral road too and the other houses were around this space. The space was more often used to be parking space for cars and jeeps from dad’s office, especially later at nights. That was quite a pride for me, as there was noone in the neighbourhood with any four wheelers. Dad also had his own Scooter, Vijay Super, dark green in color. He used to park in the our pathway inside the gate. Didi had a cycle too, which was a prize from mom when she stood first in her grade five. It was hero ladies bike, black in color and had a carrier in which I used to sit sometimes to go to school with her. When it was bought, I was too little to ride it. I could hardly sit on its seat and reach the paddles. That was also my meter to realise how I am growing. It was quite fun to be around it especially coz it was didi’s. I remember my days in that house so vividly.
I remember the one Holi which was so much of fun. I think didi was in class 9 and i was in five and all her friends and classmates had come home and played with colors and water. It was one desire to play holi that ways with my friends when I would go to class 9. Unfortunately, I never had such enthusiastic friends ever, not in class 9, never later either.
Anyways, I used to love autumns in that house. Actually I loved autumn everywhere. But the very thinking of autumn gets me that fragrance of flowers and the not-so-hard sunny morning. It used to be pujo time and we used to wake up in the morning and go out to pluck flowers for the pujo. I don’t remember the year, but once even didu was there. It was always the best time of the year when didu used to be home. After the pujo, I used to direly wait for diwali because the in-between period only meant finishing holiday home-works and nothing more. Especially when I never wanted the pujo to end.