Rew – Of Fort and Rivers
Travel, As much as you can! When the monotony of life seeps into your soul and starts to crack you at the edges, when the drudgery of work slowly starts taking a toll on you and you start growing numb to your own self, pack a bag and leave. Just take the essentials, don’t worry, you can manage without things you sometimes think you can’t. Step out of the comfortable confines of your home and explore. There is so much to see and feel and so short a life to be lived. Never grow familiar with a set of alleys; you were not born to limit yourself to just them. Travel by the train, by the ship, by bus. Talk to strangers, be nice to them. There is a special kind of happiness you feel after making a new friend.
I have just come back from a small city in MP. There’s nothing fancy about the city, nothing to attract tourists and that’s what makes it beautiful. The unadulterated magnificence of crumbling domes, pure charm of moss covered stones which fell from some temple still thronged by the locals. There is nothing extraordinary about such places, and yet they have the most exquisite kind of beauty.
Rewa, that’s the name of the city I spent the last few days in. I crossed through rocky pastures and green fields, little dug up ponds filled with clear rainwater with scrawny children diving in and out of them. The railway station itself is a quiet, green place, much in contrast with the chaotic, dirty railway stations of many other cities.
It is a city which has only a fort to boast off as a tourist attraction, which is spread over a large area, some walls brought down by encroachments and some other brought down by trees. These walls have witnessed the freedom struggle and silently tell tales of dilapidated kingdoms, of kings and courtiers, of queens and their palaces. The city also has a river flowing through it silently from behind the fort. The river has many Ghats, some of cement while many others of stone and marble, with old temples scattered around them with intricate stone carvings.
Around the city, in a radius of 40 kms are small, rocky hills, characteristic of Gondwanaland. Along the serpentine road are rocky patches and little springs jutting out of nowhere, forming miniature waterfalls and bound by check dams at regular intervals. In the midst of these rocky pastures for cattle are paddy fields, ripe with bright green strands jutting out muddy water.
This is a simple city with simple people. The air here is fresh and it smells of the trees and forests. You can spend days here in perfect idleness, procrastinating, reading or swimming. You can pick up fruits, walking through the fields or take your bike to the top of nearby hills. This city like many other cities has little, hidden treasures which it reveals only to the curious eye. Go as travellers, not just to this city but to any city you want to and explore the beauty of the commonplace.