Arunkundram?

You can see that I have called this blog Arunkundram. If you are interested I can tell you the what it is. It is my middle name, and that of everybody in my family.

Arunkundram is a village (supposedly my ancestral village, though for three generations my family has settled in Madras) in Vellore Dist., or more familiarly to some, North Arcot District. It is some 15 odd kilometres from Arcot town, off the National Highway 45. Despite its proximity to the highway, one cannot find a more typical village. I will explain later.

This place is reached by a road, which back in '99, was as bumpy as any rural road in India is. I remember travelling to this place in '99 with some of my folks.

We reached Arcot around 10:00, and the day was starting to be any typical summer day in India. It was already around 38-39 degrees C, and there was a promise of hotter weather ahead. Undaunted, we hired a rick (or an auto, if you please) from the Arcot bus terminus. A bus, we were told would soon go that way, soon here meaning any time in the next 1-4 hrs.! Talk about Indian Stretchable Time! So a rick it would be, and there were 5 of us, all adults!

Squeezed in the narrow available space, we bravely ventured out. One can understand the capacity of an auto only when you squeeze in. It is like an Amby: you load whatever you want, and the vehicle moves without complaint. I then realized then that it held true for our autos too :). Talk about 'hamara Bajaj'! (FYI: Most autos down south are made by Bajaj)

The auto driver filled some petrol, and we were on our way. He took a side road, and another side road and yet another, when we finally crossed a board saying "Arunkundram 10 k.m.". I am not sure of these numbers, but you get the idea. The road till here was pretty smooth, and the surroundings were pretty much bucolic. It was like you could be anywhere, and the same scene repeats. Row after row of fields, with someone toiling bare backed under the merciless sun, and a few bullock carts on the road, carrying one thing or the other. We would cross the odd tempo, carrying cargo or passengers, and the lone bus. I suppose this was the one would have waited for, in Arcot. Heaven knows when it would return.

Of course, there were signs of development everywhere: our road was accompanied by telephone cables and power lines, and we crossed a 110kV TNEB sub-station. Also, I could see street lights on the electric posts, so I suppose my 'native place' wasn't really native. It looked quite developed.

Or so I thought! Soon after the power station, the nice road ended, and the auto driver told us to brace ourselves. Potholes! Lots of them! There was no road worth the name. Accompanied to the sound of squeaking shock absorbers (they could do only so much), we grimly held on. I thought, so much for development! You lay a road to a village, and stop the work halfway through. What was the point? Some babu in the local Panchayant Union would provide some obscure reason for not finishing the road. I hope they have fixed the problem by now....

This road continued for some time, and finally we neared the village. The road became better as soon as we entered the village. Note: Better here is relative, meaning less potholes, but better, nevertheless. We passed an Indian Bank, a school, a couple of big houses, and many smaller houses. These houses wore the typical look: a verandah (or pyol) on both sides of the entrance, roof sloping down on the entrance, supported by two round sold looking pillars, a low entrance, and darkness beyond. However, usually these houses would have a central area open to sunlight, with rooms all around, and the entire house would have Bangalore tiles (I think that was what they called it) on the roof.

One thing I need to mention here: many of these houses had a cable TV connection, provided by an enterprising local, who had mounted a couple of dish antennas on his roof, and ran the show. I had not been to any village before, and this was something surprising for me.

Anyway, we arrived at the village square: a huge banyan tree under which sat the elders of the place, discussing something as always, a temple and its tank, a tea shop (of course!), and a few stray dogs. Typical village, was it not? This was our stop; we alighted, and went to temple, and etc. Once done, we came back to this 'square' in search of transport back, and rediscovered the tea shop. After the usual chai and butter biscuits (wah chai!), we learned that a tempo would pass by soon. It was some 20 minutes later, and my bro and I clambered aboard the rear of the tempo after helping our folks up. What a ride! Phew! The tempo driver made a mincemeat of the potholes...he just flew over them, with all of us hanging for dear life in the back. My aunt, however, was comfortably seated in the front cab, and did not find anything wrong. Lucky her :) All said and done, we reached Arcot town, and decided to grab a bite.

One of my uncles had mentioned a place called Swamy's Cafe that served good fare, though we found out that Swamy's was actually located in Eluru in A.P.! My uncle, who traveled to Eluru frequently, had probably got confused, though he denies it to this day! Anyway, we were hungry and looking for an eatery. My brother and I spotted a sign in the distance, which said 'Mani Achchagam', and the sign looked like that of a restaurant. We told our folks that there is a place ahead, and when they looked at it, they startted laughing! It seems 'Achchagam' means printing press! And we thought it was a restaurant! We finally found a place, had some nice crispy masala dosas and the ubiquitous filter coffee, and finally boarded a bus back home.

It was a nice little trip that I will not forget....