To the Gangetic Plains...With Love [2]
“ ...Longed a lot for thine streets, Ich took a bath in despair blood…” A popular number from the bollywood echoed in the corridor of the women's hostel revealing the shadows of the unspoken aspirations and nurtured dreams. The monsoon clouds reached the north of the country in July, and thus brought a respite to the scorching summer. Alamelu takes bath twice in a day in dettol diluted water and washes her hair after applying coconut oil. This north Indian city is filthy, noisy, crowded and polluted unlike her serene and green village in the south. It is the first day of her training in Allahabad , and she does her daily rituals of prayer after which she takes a moist mixture of sandalwood paste and saffron powder and draws a slender horizontal line with it on her forehead beneath the bindi. A crisp yellow Poochampally cottton saree suited her wheatish complexion and a three inch heeled footwear added height to her medium stature. She looked in the mirror to se...