Studying gets boring. Mind starts wandering. At this time, every opportunity you get, to do anything BUT study, is readily taken up. Well, that's what happened even today.

Granny was idly talking about things from her past. I obviously got interested, as i had already gotten disinterested in the books in front of me. I started asking specifics about her early life. Her mother died soon after she (granny) was born. Her father was always busy earning bread for the family. Her brothers and sister-in- law practically brought her up. Granny wasnt allowed to go to school because boys used to go there. She got married when she was so small, she didnt even know what marriage meant. Maids and other lady workers around her house used to give her tips on 'what to do after marriage'; more than half of which she didnt even understand. But she started really 'living' with Grandpa only about 4 years after their marriage. (Thank GOD!!). All the necessities of the house were brought by the men in the house. So she never need to put a foot out of the house. It was a time when girls didnt open their mouths even in front of their fathers. A small girl would veil her face when an elderly would pass.

But one thing that struck me while she was narrating all this is that she didnt look back at those days in regret or remorse. Infact, she remnisiced with fondness, the days she had lived in the control of others. The days she didnt have any say in what she wanted, or wanted to do.

I felt a strong urge to experience those moments first hand. To live the lives those people lived. Lives when going someplace far took months. When the most used form of transport was donkeys and horses. When little girls didnt go out of their backyards. When they spent whole nights playing garba in their courtyard, to the tunes played by their local 'heros'. When my granfather took months to melt, beat and mould a single gold bangle and give it the most perfect shape and design. When life was so SIMPLE, it's irresistible.

But then again, if I were to live in that era, would I have survived? Maybe yes. MaybeI would have enjoyed living as much as my granny did. The concept of fighting for my rights wouldnt even be known to me. As education would not have touched me. I would have merrily given in to what the society wanted me to given in to.

At present, though the conditions are drastically different, I so wish to go and live that era. To enjoy it. And then to pass it on as stories to my grandchildren. To give them a break from their boring studies and make them wonder about lives lived in the past. And to make them wish they could go back and live their granny's life!