Homesickness amidst deep waters

Few days were remaining for six weeks' training to end and lecturers had finally sensed our sentiments allowing frequent breaks in the schedule. On one such afternoon, my bengali colleagues planned a boating trip to the famous marble rock region of the river Narmada. It was full moon day - ideal for boating. They were ready to leave and asked me to join at the last moment and i jumped into the autorickshaw to spend my evening at an unseen before place.

One auto rickshaw to accomodate six guys, not much comfortable to sit but the distance wasn't much so the pain was over soon ! Climb down the stairs and here it is, another look of the Narmada, flowing very calmly between marble rocks declaring that the depth is lethal in this part. As usual there was a tea session on the bank and then we hired a boat to feel the thrill of getting up-close with the dangerous river for half an hour !

Even after being informed that the water i am sailing on is about 300 feet deep, i was quite relaxed and busy capturing images with the full moon in background. Only other thing to do was to listen commentary of the part-time guide whose main job was to sail the boat. Most part of his speech had stories about films shot at the rocky location.

My mobile camera was not good enough to capture images/video properly but still i managed to capture a video with the boat-driver cum guide's commentary and some images of myself. Half an hour later we were back to the bank and began our shopping of the exclusive local items. After searching and bargaining in many shops, i bought one ash tray made from marble rocks for just 40 Rupees and a pair of ear rings for 30 Rupees.

Buying those ear rings was the sign of my everlasting optimism that i'll find someone very soon to gift them before they lose their cheap quality colour. Actually it was hard to quit the shops' area filled with many bengali girls and women and maybe thats why my colleagues were in no hurry.

Anyway they made up their minds somehow and we proceeded towards our irritated driver. The same rickshaw and the same broken roads but with two different feelings - homesickness and sickness of going back home - we started our return journey.