Being the only child of my parents I have many rights and few duties too. So, to fulfill my 90 yrs old father’s desire to take him to my late mother’s city which incidentally is also close to his heart since the year 1960, I landed at Hyderabad, last Saturday. And I’m happy that the city, which holds a history of pride and cultured attitude, continues to buzz with high tech business and glaring traffic through all times of day and night.
After the 1947 Indo-Pak partition, my grandparents moved out from Lahore and almost 2 years later, they came to Hyderabad, their final destination. My first active memory recall is of my time spent in the lanes of Marredpally with my other cousins who lived nearby.
We have been invited by my entire relatives to their homes. They make space for my father and me. They look after each and every detail of his physical and emotional comfort. I must compliment for the love and care showered upon my father, who is now forgetting things.
I feel touched when hosts open up their homes for the guests. I remember how being the only family residing in the capital, guests literally poured into our tiny two bedrooms house. It took me years to even identify which pillow or which bed was mine. The kitchen ran 24X7 and everything else was on the house.
It was the time when families didn’t take permission to reach you and felt free to arrive when they felt the need. The time when women did not hesitate to snatch the broom to clean the rooms, took pride to wash their clothes and cook tasty meals in a jiffy. I loved to go India gate garden in DTC bus: every year we went to the zoo, the dolls museum, lodhi garden, purani dilli or race course and chanakya movie halls. We shared horror stories all night, slept on the terrace with earthen pots for cold water, fanned each other with newspaper and slept without electricity. We waited for our turns to answer nature’s call. We sat together, laughed aloud, ate and slept on the floor. We were grounded with high spirit.
Years have rolled by but my home still carries the same tradition of being a place which is open to receive our people at any time. I feel blessed to welcome my friends and family.
All these years I underwent many emotions, all kinds of personalities came, stayed and left. Some came with a defined goal, and few came as if to teach me a lesson. A few took away a part of my soul in the process. At times I felt relieved when some left. At other time I never wanted some of them to leave at all. Whoever came left an impact on me. I have grown larger and have shrunk many times. Each time, I gave my time, made space, and shared my moments with the new entrant. Each one of them boarded and alighted as per their schedule and every time there was a shift in my time and space. I held the moments, shared the vibrations, fine tuned the frequencies, dissolved and evolved. I shifted my shape and created new realities with each new soul at the given time and space.
I wondered how I have attracted so many people in my home.
Does each reflect my other self or does each one complete one story to transform my journey?
I know that guests are the messengers of god and hosts are the caretakers of the temple. I thank each one who hosted me in their homes, sharing their space and opening their hearts to us.
I thank each guest who chooses to visit my home. We stand blessed!
