Throughout my childhood days in Kolkata, I had experienced that the Bengalees were nothing but travel-bugs. Not only the Garomer Chooti(Summer vacation) and Pujor Chooti (Festival holidays) but also whenever they could manage even a short time span, those bugs used to just leave their home and flock towards holiday destinations
with their own families or in groups.
The hot spots were Puri, Chandipur etc. in Orrisa, Digha, Darjeeling etc. in West Bengal, Hardwar, Rishikesh, Kedarnath, Badrinath, Kousani etc. in U.P., Simla, Kulu, Manali etc.in H.P., Amarnath in J.K., and Delhi, Agra, Rajasthan.Towards the south Pondichery, Kanyakumari.
Bombay to Goa or to Pune and Aurangabad was another favourite menu in the travel-card. I just can’t recollect from my childhood memories the other names of the places they actually used to visit in and around their state.
My neighbours, relatives, or class-mates used to narrate me about their travel itineraries two months prior to their journey and their rich experiences after their return and that often lasted for at least a month! I always used to think what immense urge made them drive out from home and so much outer bound?
My family though Bengali, was just the opposite because there was a lack of time, finance and mostly lack of inclination. But I was somehow infected by the urge and in due course of time that converted me into a qualified mountaineer at the age of eighteen.
My area of operation was high altitude which is usually not an area for the travelers but the trekkers. Delhi was my epicenter in the northern India for moving to places like Uttarkashi, Manali, Joshmath etc. etc. prior to setting the base camps and crossing the snow-line and after almost every venture I never missed to be at Hardwar to spend a couple of beautiful evenings at the bank of the Ganga (The Ganges). Believe me or not, en-route I had seen those boehemic bugs flocking the places irrespective of age, status, financial background and linguistic barrier. Even Nepal, Sikkim and any remote areas of the north-east, they were found grazing!
At the age of 23 years, I shifted myself to then Bombay in Maharashtra managing an employment. I kept my extra curricular activities rolling on and finally planned to settle down 200 kilometer away at Pune getting married at thirty and retiring painfully from the adventure sport. But I made it a point to take out my family-members around at least twice in a year with the mantra in mind that small tour is beautiful, nearby places are less exhausting and expensive and unknown spots are simply superb!.
So I did not see those bugs literally thronging for quite some time. But a few locally settled were spotted at Lonavalla, Khandala, Alibaug and almost in every tourist places of the state on every trip. Later after a little financial stability, I changed my mantra”…. let us enjoy the popular, at least a night or two away from sweet home”.
On such a yearly trip to Aurangabad we were just waiting for our dinner to be served at restaurant. I was surprised to see eight other Bengali families in the dining room out of eleven tables. Except my family, all were from that City of Joy and other areas of that Marxist state. Almost everybody looked at each other with oblique or straight grins, a few of us just could not resist our temptations just to get an introduction of each other followed by some effort of citing out references of locality and people we knew around each other’s place of stay in the native .and finally “see you, have a nice time, enjoy and good night”etc.etc.
Following morning I planned for the visit to the Ajanta caves. Early to start and early to finish was my principle which I taught my family members to avoid boiling up in the afternoon-heat and accordingly when we actually reached Ajanta there was hardly any rush but a fewest heads.
After we finished coolly and were on the way down, we came across the upward rush, some sweated, a few exhausted but all enthusiastic in the rising mercury. But I was in a state of confusion thinking where exactly I was! Was it Aurangabad in Maharashtra or a place of tourist attraction in my native Bengal, I questioned myself seeing a swarm of …Bongs here, Bongs there and Bongs Bongs everywhere!
Well I met Mr. Das, a goldsmith of Howrah, in his late forties who had come out for the first time.Mr.Chatterjee, a professor from Uttarpara informed that for last thirty years he had been in the addiction of touring and that was his second visit to Ajanta. Mr. Sen from Dhakuria was a C.A., his profession included hurricane tours from Kashmir to Kanyakumari and from Ambala to Agartala but it was mandatory for him to reserve some days in a year to travel with his wife and children for the past eight years. Sixty years old UncleBose from Dum Dum was reluctant to take a duli (a small version of palanquin) to go up when seven of his family members insisted for the same. He was annoyed though he really needed one. When I interfered, the retired Indian railway employee told me that his age was a big burden for others of his family but not to himself and it was demeaning for him to take help of a duli. He didn’t take one even to Hemkund Sahib in the Himalayas in the previous year and never in his twenty years of India tour before retirement! I saw Mr.Lahiri of Vashi, New Bombay arguing with the guard in fluent Marathi when someone from the crowd flashed a camera but the guard mistakenly challenged him. Mr. & Mrs. Pal of Dehradun were guiding Mr. & Mrs. Chetri of Pokhra, Nepal in Nepali. I met Basak, Mukherjee, Ghosh, Bose, Mitra, Jana & other families.
My intention was to come down fast and to go back to the hotel at Aurangabad early and to meet a few of my local friends but I could not as I was enjoying the whole episode too much.
Well my wife and mother reminded me and I needed to speed up forgetting my curious journalist- job. I met Mr. Dutta of Gwalior explaining about Ajanta to his non-Bengali wife in Hindi. I continued meeting others too. Suddenly I felt an urge to response the nature’s call; I asked my father in Bengali whether he knew the loo. Someone else answered with a generous smile“Oi dakhen niche, poriskar aar bhalo bathroom, eikhan dia sidha choila jan”(look down there, good and clean one, go straight from here) .He was Mr.Saha a twenty-one years old student from Kumilla, Bangladesh who was making a short trip to Ajanta and Ellora while visiting his sister’s place at at Bhusawal. Later at the base, I realized that it took double the time to come down than my total ascent time!
The united sounds of the Bongos were quite enjoying. I could not come back to my hotel in time but the commitments to meet my friends were fulfilled!
