Quite unlike the usual flurry of activity, the marathon visits to the homes of relatives or friends and the unending travel that characterise our summers, we recently spent a fortnight swapping the city chaos for a slower pace of life in the tranquillity of our ancestral home, tucked away in a small village in southern India.
The house, over a century old and built in the traditional architectural style, has well-lit rooms with wooden ceilings, old fashioned light and fan switches and a creaky old, wooden staircase leading to spacious rooms upstairs. It offered a great connect to the refreshingly green outdoors and the fresh air. Also, having arrived at the peak of the monsoons, we were surrounded by the constant symphony of the rains, sounding like gentle humming sometimes and working itself into a deafening crescendo at other times. Since the house was without connectivity and the television reception was faulty due to the weather, we seemed set for a complete digital detox as well. The children were far from pleased at the prospect of spending their holidays without their favourite television shows and computer games and I was no less apprehensive of the boredom that was sure to ensue.
However, surprisingly we were quickly enchanted by the ways of rustic life. The children were thrilled about drawing water from the well for a refreshingly cool bath every day, refusing to use the shower instead. They watched with glee as colourful birds of varieties never seen before, were spotted in the lush garden around the house and they enjoyed watching them drink and bathe at the little tub their adorable great grandmother thoughtfully kept out for these little visitors every day. Most of all, everyone looked forward to the wonderful mealtimes bringing the entire family together to relish the dishes she had perfected over the years and still preferred to make on the traditional stove with fresh vegetables and herbs picked by the family from the backyard garden.
The mornings were spent doing chores around the house and during the intermittent respite from the incessant rains there would be short errands to be completed, a visit to a neighbour’s house or a walk through the vast fields surrounding the house. The children discovered new sources of adventure and fun and soon made new friends, playing hide and seek in the various nooks and crannies in and around the house, or at other times simply exploring the large house or rummaging through the old suitcases stored in the rooms upstairs.
During the lazy afternoons, neighbours or relatives visited unexpectedly, a part of the spontaneity and warmth of rural life. The conversations easily extended into the evenings over cups of tea and snacks. We listened as spell binding tales unfolded, at times offering us glimpses into the life in the past and amazing us with the wisdom of tradition and the charming simplicity of the life of yore. Soon, no one missed the television as we were all immersed in lengthy family discussions, a lot of reminiscing and the loud laughter that frequently reverberated through the house. As the days progressed, we felt less and less overpowered by the need to check Twitter and Facebook and slowly learned to disentangle ourselves from the constant pressure of the never ending to-do lists. The time to pause, reflect and to be present in the present moment as well as the wonderful family bonding was a great opportunity to rediscover ourselves and the immediate world around us.
However, though overwhelmed by the serenity and calm offered by life in the village, we were certainly glad to return to the comforts and the pulsating energy of city life and one of the first things we did on returning, was of course, to check our smartphones and mails, to stay updated on the latest activity we had missed in the lives of our friends and acquaintances. Soon, though we were once again immersed in the demands of our busy lives, it was certainly reassuring to think of the solace offered by the ancestral home and planned to revisit the opportunity to rediscover life in the past, to reconnect better with the present and recharge to face what the future holds in store.
Fyna Ashwath is a journalist based in Dubai.
