While listening to the fag end of this musical masterpiece from A.R.Rahman tonight, I was magically and inexplicably transported back to my childhood. When I would scale neighbours’ walls and hop over to my terrace rather than take their stairs, when we would sit on beds of gulmohar leaves, when we created ‘cork cricket balls’, when we played ‘crocodile crocodile which color do you choose’, traded trump cards, when we burnt paper using a magnifying glass, mom and I played badminton, I hosted drawing competitions for my neighborhood kids, I sat on my doorstep and sipped on Bournvita, watched Chitrahaar and Surabhi without fail. I miss those days of having so much to experience and not having a care in the world.

I guess I miss the tradition of watching the Republic Day Parade too.