The topic over at skittles this week is to share a summer time story. When I closed my eye and thought of a summer time story, I got this on my mind. It was slightly surprising because, I do not have a clear memory of this, and there have been so many other summers spent heartily at my grandmother’s place with group of cousins hanging out together, but still this memory seems to be haunting my mind today.
We used to have our annual vacation of almost two months every summer. Most of them were spent in Bangalore with cousins ganging up to spend time in each of our houses in turns. This one time it was different, I was supposed to accompany my mom, and we both were to travel to Rajkot, a city in Gujarat. We had my moms sister and her son, who was 2/3 years along with us, and did I mention that I was 5 
The train journey from Bangalore to Rajkot used to be for almost 2.5 days at that time, and I had no idea if it would be boring or fun. I had never that long before, and I think I was looking forward for the journey.
There are two things I distinctly about this trip.
Firstly the trains in India have a lot of hawkers selling stuff. For the first time I got to see so much of variety in food to eat. I was a foodie even back then, I was trying to convince my mom to buy me anything that was being sold, and my mom could not control her anger, also the shock at me being able to eat the stuff with so much spice, at that quantity, and still wanting more. Well I think that’s when I realized the biggest gift a human being has, the thing called “tongue”.
Second thing, is the picture of myself in my mind from the trip. I mean I can’t forget the one posture which I enjoyed so much during that trip. The trains have two windows on one side, and two on the other per each block. These windows have small extensions, which are used to close shutters, so when the shutters are open, they are like very little platforms, hardly 3 to 4 inches wide. I used to sit in this small width, and my legs were exact size of the width of the window, so I kind of fitted exactly to the window, I would sit there all day, looking outside the window.
After that trip, I did many many others to the same destination, but never was actually able to fit into the window, believe me I have tried. So I guess this is one memory I will never forget.
neilina said
I am imagining a small kid pretending to cry and convincing his mom to buy every eatables whatever bought by hawkers! Oh….So sweet!
It would be so fun na to be able to sit on that seat! Everytime, you will be getting immense pleasure with the thought of this! Really, what memories are! I miss freedom and innocency of childhood days!
Bless You!
~Namaste~
AdamsWife said
What a memory! So small you fit in the train window. You have reminded me of my only train trip. I was 18 at the time – did not fit in any windows. I had to take Dramamine to prevent motion-sickness, so spent most of the trip sleeping.
T
preethi said
very cute… the picture of a little kid sitting in that window.. will stay with me!!
Tammy said
What a nice memory! Thanks for sharing!
)
Skittles said
Thanks for sharing these summertime memories
About the window.. my mom used to have an ottoman (a large foot stool) and when I was little I would curl up on it and take a nap or watch TV. I too tried years later to be able to fit there again.. but never could.
Shannon H. said
Great memory! Thank you for sharing with us!
marja said
What a nice memory painted in so much detail. I have hardly any memories from that age.
Sue said
That sounds like a fun memory
Do you remember the scenery more or just that window? Happy HOT day! And thank you for stopping by 
Prasad said
i always remember the vada’s that i hav on trains!!! i jus lov em even now!!!
nd sigh!!! annual vacations of 2 months!!!! those r things tht i dream abt now!!!
Shefaly said
Rambler:
A 2.5 day long trip to Gujarat in summer.. Hmm. I once did a train trip from Bangalore to Delhi – all 42 hours of it. In January. And there was a bunch of noisy kids and I told one of them that their parents were so busy playing cards that if I threw one of the kids out, parents won’t know there was one kid too few. So thereafter zero noise
Anyway I took a flight back.
bluebutterfly said
fitting in .. huh …
i never fit into the windows .. but then i was never near the windows … i used to love being on the top berth …. you could see and hear everything from there … plus you could do whatever you wanted to .. not get into anybodys space !
Frigga said
If I had to ride a train, I’d probably want to look out the window the whole time too. Happy HoT!!
bluebutterfly said
i liked the window fine …..its just that when you got fighting sisters there need to a lot more windows !
Shefaly said
@ Rambler:
“poor kids
”
I can take any amount of time with well-behaved kids. But kids, whose parents think their bad behaviour is someone else’s headache, are not welcome in my vicinity for any length of time. In a captive environment of the train, noise does get amplified and the journey was very long. Besides I was much younger then with a much shorter fuse.
“…flight back?? oh man you were rich
”
It is all relative. Compared to friends in McKinsey, I was not. But for my own purposes, yes, I was quite well-off.
Tina said
what a really interesting nice memory. sorry im a little late replying. had some computer probs!