The Rathyatra Tales - I

My son has been pulling a ratha since the time he could walk. I think he was around thirteen months when we bought him his first ratha. The next few years saw the rathas gaining in height as my boy grew taller. A single-storied ratha gave way to a double-storied and then to a triple-storied ratha. But never did we imagine that on his fourth birthday, he would not be pulling a toy ratha,but witnessing the mammoth Rathyatra at Puri, Orissa.

The single-storied ratha

We usually steer clear of such occasions as we do not consider them safe.The unmanageable crowd, the risks of a stampede, the oppressive weather and to add on to it the very idea of traveling with a child is quite cumbersome. But this time it seemed that the Lord had chosen us to experience this festival. 

A few days prior to the festival, our mental block towards such events gave way to an eagerness and excitement which was otherwise unthinkable to us. I think the stories about the festival infused in us the much -needed enthusiasm. The passion and fervor of the locals can also be quite contagious. 

But there were too many obstacles. 

·         <The boy went down with a severe bout of sinusitis. On the eve of our departure he ran a very high temperature accompanied with severe nausea. After a nights ordeal, we reached Puri the next morning too tired and exhausted. But thankfully the boy had no fever.  

·        < Our train tickets got confirmed three hours prior to our departure. But that did not deter me from packing for the trip.



The boy out with his ratha

·        < Hotel reservation remained unconfirmed owing to the huge rush of tourists there. On reaching Puri we had to do spot booking.

·         <On boarding the train we learnt that due to excessive rush of passengers, we had been demoted to the next class. We were not used to the kind of crowd in our bogie; men listening to raunchy numbers on their cell phones throughout the night, a saffron-clad sadhu baba who refused to vacate the lower berth despite my pleas of traveling with a child and a group of middle-aged men who had no other work but ogle from the upper berth. The train halted at each and every station with people boarding all through the night from various odd stations.

·    

      After a sleepless, uncomfortable and troublesome journey (imagine me and the boy fitting into a narrow upper berth) we woke up next morning to find the sun shining bright and the train running an hour late.
   

      (Contd.)