A day trip to Ali Bagh; Amidst Sea Music
(14th
Dec. 2013)
The days after coming back from vacation from Chandigarh, had been
quite hectic, due to over-pending work at my office table, plus my bosses’ in
between question, ‘Kitna kaam baki hai
aur?’ while handing over more new tasks, putting huge pressure on my little
body and of course my little head throbbing at Rajnikant’s speed. (Sigh)
My heart would wish to go out and explore, but my body would say,” Sleep, you need a rest.” So my weekends
had gone almost doing nothing, except for two occasions; once to a Movie with
my friend Shanti and an after movie stroll at Juhu, and second, an evening
outing to Lake Powai with Deepali. Hmm. I felt myself getting so dead and
boring. Lol: P
To visit Alibagh had been in my mind since long, but couldn’t make it because
of the above factors. So, this weekend keeping everything at a bay, I decided
to go; just go. I asked Deepali, and she agreed. So nice of her to get up quickly
in the morning when I just patted her once on her forehead! Hmm
We boarded the 09:15 am Ferry from Gateway of India, which would fetch
us till Mandwa and from where we were supposed to go by bus to Alibagh. The Rs.
85/- per person they charged was incl. of the bus service as well. Not bad han!
The one hour Ferry Ride up to Mandwa was quite memorable, with the
accompaniment of seagulls being a treat to our eyes. They kept following our Ferry
till the end, showing their playfulness, which was beautiful and full of life.
Some of the kids started throwing pieces of biscuits at them, and in seconds
many of them started showing their talents, catching every piece with their
beak and throwing them in sea, so as to catch the next piece. All the people on
board were having fun and looked very happy and cheerful, which was in full
contrast to their hard, angry and frustrated gestures while in train and other
public places in Mumbai on a working day. I wondered what it would be like, if
life is nothing but a ‘Holiday’! How different then things would be! But it’s
ok as everything has got two aspects, so too has life. And we are here to play
a balancing act. Aren’t we? J
We reached Mandwa Port after an hour, and we both were delighted to
see the name Mandwa, written there, which took our memory to Vijay Deenanath
Chauhan’s village in Agneepath. We tried to connect the location to the movie,
but there was hardly any trace of what was in our memory from the movie to the
real Mandwa, the sets of the movie being the re-creations of the geniuses of
course. But we loved the village itself. It was quite peacefully located, far
away from city commotion.
It took us another hour to reach Alibagh by road, from Mandwa. Ali- Bagh; I assumed from the name that it would be a Bagh (Bageecha/garden) named after someone named ‘Ali’. But I was wrong. It was not a bagh, rather a city, which has a vast sea shore/beach, in the middle of which is located the remnants of some old fort of Marathas i.e. Colaba Fort.
We took a motor-boat ride from the beach to the fort, and walked
through length and breadth of the fort. We were walking leisurely at snail’s
pace, checking on every broken bricks and posing around, though we didn’t have
a good camera but only our mobile phones. But no issue, we were having fun
under the sun. ;-)
The return trip was beautiful and soul-touching, esp. for me. This
time as the sea gulls were not in sight, I just put my hands on the side
railings of the ferry, sitting crossed on the chair and bent my head down to
look into the sea only. My ears were all to the sea music, the splashing of the
sea water as the jetty crossed, with the background garr-garrr of the engine. The
sea music pleasing my ears, and the dancing on its tune, showing various moves
the watery waves were quite a treat to my eyes. I was so much in deep
admiration of God’s creation of magic in various forms, that I didn’t realize
how one hour of the ride ended, getting us back to the reality of Mumbai.
It was a refreshing outing, and to
say in my own words “A-Awesome”. (All smiles’ J J J)
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