THE LIFE OF A ARMY PERSON'S DAUGHTER

Hey Guys,

This is my first blog and I wanted to share some experiences of my life, that is, THE LIFE OF A ARMY PERSON'S DAUGHTER.

Whenever I make any new friends and inform them about my Army background, the first question they ever ask is not about the medals or the uniform, it is almost always about the BOXES we use during our travels, A TRADEMARK OF ARMY LIFE.

As kids of an Army person, our father, our lives were ruled by strict discipline and more then plenty room for our mischiefs  and shenanigans.

In this blog I'll be sharing  my journeys of the various postings, shenanigans and few family trips I went on with my family. So lets get this started.

My earliest memories are of Alhilal Cantt, Himachal Pradesh.

Our quarter was in a remote area surrounded by forests on all four sides. I still can feel my fascination right now when I got to know that bears and leopards roam outside our homes, in our courtyard at night. Wild animal sightings were quite commonplace and we got used to it in no time. 

There was one theatre in the whole cantonment which was a kilometre away from our quarter in the forest.

Movies, Plays, Family gatherings were conducted at this theatre. I would have been glad to tell you the theatre's  name, but the sands of time submerge even the most wonderful memories.

In the mornings, we use to find rabbits loiterings on the grass in our courtyard. Enjoying a breakfast of wild fruits in the presence of rabbits was amusing.

Our school was half a kilometre away. Basically it was barracks which had been turned into a Kendriya Vidyalaya on an uneven ground. The Secondary building was atleast 10 feet above the primary building. Moving from the primary building to the secondary building for morning prayer was our routine physical training. 

During lunch break we used to run towards home from under the fence through the forest. My little brother's school was at another half kilometre, this was our evening playground. This evening playground once set a bull running after us, let me elaborate on this. 

Once we had went to play at my brother's school along with our neighbourhood fellows, there was a large herd of cattle grazing on the grounds. While we were playing we somehow managed to upset their guard bull, I suppose. And in order to scare us away it began moving its horns. We fled the scene at full speed. After this incident whenever I see another bull I am always reminded of this one.

Let me mention our Shimla trip or Dharamshala trip, till this day I am confused about what I should really call it. In late January, I don't remember which year, we set out on a trip to Shimla to enjoy our holidays. After a long road that twisted and turned like a Sidewinder snake, almost vomiting out our morning breakfast several times on a single stretch of road, we finally reached our destination. Only to find the most of the snow melted and absent on the grassy slopes.

After a little deliberation, we decided to head towards Dharamshala, once again on the twisting, turning

road. Upon reaching there, as is the global ritual we snapped photos with our old reel Canon camera, reclining on the cold snow. Moving up towards the peak we helped ourselves with chanas, ice golas. Around half of us reached the peak and began throwing snowballs on the rest of us who had fallen behind. Those of us who had fallen behind, including me, were taking our own sweet time throwing snowballs and snapping photos, basically reason we fell behind.

While snapping photos I slipped on the snow, or was it ice?, and almost broke our camera grabbing two more to accompany me in slipping on the snow.

As the evening struck, we headed downwards to our vehicle.

In the days gone by, we never realised that the time of our posting had arrived. Packing everything in our trademark ARMY BOXES, I felt a rush of different emotions, sorrow of living the quarter we felt was our home, our few friends, the new excitement and happiness of moving to a new place, we had only been increased what had been told to our father from a colleague of  the beauty of our new posting.

The posting was at the Embassy of India in Bhutan

TO BE CONTINUED.........