A travel to the past and the present !

"A person without travel is like a book without pages"

So much true !!

Travelling to new places , finding new things about their culture , trying out local delicacies ,....Ohh !! what great pleasures are hidden in travel .

As a child , my dad who's been always interested in travelling had taken us to various places in India. I still remember the trip we made to the North India , covering Darjeeling , Siliguri , a little bit of the Nepal border too . , along with Calcutta (It was still being called like that instead of Kolkata) . It was the most memorable trip we ever made as kids , along with 4 other families. I was 8 years old , while my younger brother was 6 . I still can't believe , my brother at that tender age , being the adventurous kid he was, had tried out rock-climbing at a foot-hill in Darjeeling . Me, being the quieter child just had fun watching him scale the hillock.
I also do remember the vast and immensely green tea gardens in Darjeeling . Oh ! What a treat to watch ! It was just a pleasure to watch the women in their local costume carefully plucking the tea leaves , quietly singing their cultural songs , only with a mild sense that these tea leaves are almost world-famous . The ladies employed in those tea gardens were so oblivious of their hard work , ..it just appeared as a natural thing to them and to us spectators too. We had fun wearing the local costume for a photo-shoot there. I was thrilled to see my mom as a tea-woman , who otherwise had always been in sarees.

There was this train ride we took from Darjeeling to Siliguri. It was definitely worth a ride. The traditional steam-train rides are definitely missing in this new millennium and I feel sad about that .

Then came Calcutta ...the city with so much of a hustle and bustle...it was just impossible to stay put in that city teeming with millions. We visited some of the many museums scattered all over the city . I still have a clear vision of the Dolls museum we visited there , and was so enthralled on seeing so many dolls and toys at one place . I was instantly transferred to a dreamland , and felt like "Alice in Wonderland" .

All these memories have been so good to recollect them over the years.

Post-marriage , due to my hectic college schedule , we couldn't make a honeymoon trip immediately (an issue which surfaces up each time we fight ..hehe) .. So , to make it up , me and my husband made a trip to Ooty ,the romantic capital of the South India , in our second year of marriage. It was definitely a memorable one ...and one thing we realized was that the place we visit as a couple has very little importance . We had a ball of time lazing around , having great food and checking out the local places in and around Ooty for a stretch of 4 days.

Then came the rain ...i mean , then came the kids !!

What to say , when the kids are present , we realised another important thing . The place we visit is utterly important. Otherwise , it was just a sheer waste of time , money and needless to say, effort !

The first trip we made with my first-born was to Thailand with another couple , who had a girl-child as old as Tej. I was actually very skeptical about the trip from the beginning , though my husband was just beaming with excitement over the trip . I wasn't too sure about our enjoyment in the "Land of White Elephants" with 2 cranky toddlers in tow . I was just hoping for everything to be OK . As it turned out to be , It was more than OK and we had a great time , despite some ocassional tantrums from the two kids .
The flight journey was a saviour . It was just an hour and a half from Singapore to Thailand , and it had definitely helped us enjoy the trip .Had it been a longer one , the kids who were already wailing their lungs out (because it was their first trip on air) would have driven us crazy .
Thailand is one charming place , full of new things to discover . Be it the traditional Thai massage , or the world-famous local cuisine , or the various one-of-a-kind shows. Me and my friend had a wonderful time with the Thai milk massage for one hour ,while our husbands were baby-sitting the toddlers . The massage had done wonders to our mommy-minds , which only needed relaxation amidst the hectic trip with the kids . Another hilarious incident was a trip on a small steamer boat to an island , Phi phi island. The onward journey was manageable , but post-lunch , after checking out the tiny island for a couple of hours , the actual trouble started . We being vegetarians (the other family was Jains..so u could imagine our diet ! ) had this famous Thai Green veggie curry . The food was served hot and it was very delicious ., but little did we know what trouble was in store in our return journey . The boat's rollicking movements had done wrong justice with our food , and all of us had to just vomit the whole of our lunch into the plastic bags we were already provided by the boat people who already knew how well the travellers would adjust to the boat movements . Needless to say , Thai green curry came out as it went into our tummies and we still laugh over our once-favourite curry. Yeah , we dont have it anymore ....as a reminder of that infamous mishap in the boat .

The next trip we made was with both our kids , when my younger son was around 10 months .This time , it was the "Truly Asia - Malaysia " . We decided to do it on our own and set out to travel only with our kids ., sans any outside company . There was this Mini-Vegas there , called Genting . It's a high-spot destination for casinos, entertainment rides etc . Though we couldnt take any ride together as a couple , bcoz of one baby-sitting while the other went on , we had a fair share of enjoyment in that mini-vegas . My husband , who was interested in watching the casino , had to go in the middle of the night , while we were sleeping .,because of no choice . Though the trip went on fairly well , we still regret doing it on our own , because a company with another family would have made a big difference , maybe allowing us to have some of our couple-time !

This has been Asia for us .

Coming down to the western world , California has been a wonderful place to explore the National parks , zoological gardens and some local parks. But all the trips we've made have just been a day's trip , not more than that ! We are yet to make major road trips with these kids in this part of the world . But , for now , Anuj being in the "Terrible Two" stage , I would prefer waiting until the next year to make an enjoyable trip , rather than actually travelling with him , and cribbing about his constant crankiness .

However , be it a day or a week , travelling with kids is always a huge task , filled with planning the hotels , transport , packing and stuff.
We , as a couple , divide the tasks , with my husband planning out the hotels , while I do the packing . If it was the other way round , we would be staying on the roads waiting for a hotel confirmation , with my kids missing their baby food. So , its better we do this way ! It saves us a lot of time and energy and effort !

Europe ?? Naah !! That can wait until my kids are ready to stay with someone else while we complete our long-postponed full-fledged honeymoon trip . I hope my hubby is listening !!