Those were the Best days of ....My Life..!!!

Whenever i think about it.. these lines from Bryan Adam song comes to my mind...

Oh when i look back

That summer seemed to last forever
And if I had the choice

Yeah, I'd always wanna be there
Those were the best days of my life...!!

If ever i had a choice in life, i would want to go back in time, going back 20 years and would want to restart from the place i had started.
Gajraula..!!
Yeah.! i know many of you wont even have heard of it, but, that place is my life. No, i was not born there or anything(i was born in Delhi). But, that is the place i grew up in.
Those innocent days of my childhood were spent in Gajraula.
Can anyone be so attached to a place? well, I am. I sometimes wonder..why is it that so many people i meet thrive to leave their hometowns - to make it big!..going off overseas..and never wishing to come back. It does is a small place, but i love it for what is it, and seeing slightest of changes to it(development), makes me feel ever proud of it, i can relate to it - being grown up together.
Gajraula is an industrial area - with many big company factories set up there. The company my father is in http://jubl.com/ , that (branch) was set up something around 25 years back.

Memories of that place are as fresh as ever. Somehow, those images never fade out.

My growing years were fun. Nothing to worry about and being in a colony (which was very safe - equipped with all those security and all). We used to just get out from our homes and go exploring, well the place always seemed so vast back then, everyday a new discovery. Sneaking away to the 'baag' (a big big garden all with rabbits, duck - ponds, rose -many other flowers included - garden, mango trees, guava trees and what not), pluckin flowers and all kind of fruits or feeding the rabbits, fearing away from the ducks and sometimes being chased by the ' maali'(in plural)- the gardeners/ keeper.
Playing out the whole day, fighting away and the next moment planning out for next big escapades ( which we seldom ever did :p).
Every sport came as a craze/season, as in, one started playin something next day the whole colony children would be found doin that...LOL.

When i started schooling (i was 3 and a half years), i was never inside the classes :p :D..Sometimes i used to be found with the Kindergarten children or Going to the convent (the place inside the school where sisters live - i was in a convent school) with a sister and getting treated with all kinds of cookies and cakes ;) :D - or playing with Bush (sister's dog :p).

My School

In view (L-R)is the senior and the oldest block, the junior wing,
(centre) - football ground and assembly area.

School days, were fun days. Being a part of the most mischief maker class of the school - we were seldom free from punishments (the whole class) - and how glorified we felt :p. Sometimes picking stones from the ground, standing on the stage and so on. It was hard leaving school - it was great too - As, I became Ms. St. Mary's for that year (my passing out year) - with everyone clicking - Oh! i already felt like a star ;) :p.

The days back home in the colony were great, summer holidays were much awaited - pool opened in the summers + our school never used to give holiday homework :D.

The swimming pool.

With everyone coming out in the open free from any worries - and with all the kids getting together and playing all sorts of games, added with we girls throwing parties on the terraces every now and then - all with stupid costumes, biscuit cakes and stuff. The best part used to be when our mothers too used to join us to play with us - Wow! that really really used to be fun.

The most waited weekday used to be 'friday'. why so?.. Well, there was this auntie - Chintan auntie, she used to have 'Bal-Vikaas classes (Sai Baba)' at her place every friday the whole year round. Oh God! we used to run to her place leaving anything we were doing - nothing seemed more important. The class used to start with 'shlokas' (holy chants) then some 'Bhajans' after thatshe used to narrate short stories, from the lives of great people, or excerpts from either 'Ramcharitmanas' or some other book. After that, she used to make us play games - chinese whisper or role plays (from the stories she had narrated to us), or sometimes even meditation, etc. Then we performed 'Arti' and leave for home with 'prasad'. We even used to maintain copies which actually were maintained by her - she had made a separate copy for every child who attended along with writing every 'shloka', 'bhajan' and 'arti' - we used to take them just so to decorate them with cut outs of images of various dieties and all.
Along with my parents I would also like to aknowledge her for making me what I am today. For making me a better soul with pure thoughts. I pity others for not having someone like her in their lives. For me, she is my 'guru'.

Festivals in the colony seemed a much big affair with people from alomost every region from india - they used to be so colorful. 'Holi' used to be great fun with us kids divided - Boys v/s Girls - and each trying to outdo the other one mad fights all with solid colors, phuggas (water-balloons) and all that stuff. And later trying hard to remove those colors - which seemed near to impossible and took quite some time to recover to our original colors :p.
'Diwali'- was too a great affair with 'Diwali Mela' (fete), and on the day - Decorating the place, previosly done huge shopping, with lights and making 'Rangoli' , finaaly getting ready - for the 'puja' after that everyone used to assimilate at the helipad for the cracker show, done with that comin back to our places to burn crackers and roaming about in the colony with friends and visiting their places.
Having completed schooling in a convent school - 'Christmas' too was celebrated by us kids - for we had such long christmas holidays so a month long planning was done - with making a group (which was usually made), collecting money and deciding the invitees - on the day visit school first toto wish sisters then coming back, decorations were done with everything - from a christmas tree, the shepherd's house with Jesus, Mary and Joseph along with the kings and fairy. The centre of attraction used to be the bonfire around which everyone gathered to get a rest from the freezing night.

Those days were the best days of my life...

I knew, that if i ever write, i would write about that place - A place that has given me so much, that has grown with me, that has made my memories as precious as ever, with those great friends, with whom ties can never break - Never had this thought crossed the mind that, One day, all this would be a memory from the past - A past that is long gone but never forgotten. A past that is so near, yet, so far away.