Even when I wanted to stay at home and play with my neighbor, my mother and sister managed to drag to the railway station with another neighbor’s family for a vacation in Pondicherry/Puducherry (whatever you want to call it). There were four children in total: my sister, two of my neighbors and me. There were three adults: my neighbor’s parents and my mother, and they were going to be joined by my father soon. All the children were younger than me, and this meant another boring vacation. The train left the station at about 6:00 in the evening and reached at 8:00 the next day morning. We played UNO in the train and our dinner was some food which we brought along from home. The next day, our father came to the Chennai railway station to pick us up. From there, we hired an Innova van to drive us to Pondicherry/Puducherry (whatever you want to...). The drive was very long, and seemed longer when I was squished into the back of the car with my sister. We had stopped at a hotel for (a really good) breakfast before driving for some more time to reach the hotel in which we were staying. The view was breathtaking.
The entrance to the hotel was like a walk through a forest. It was actually a guest house and not a hotel. There were three bungalows in the compound. One belonged to the owner, and the other two were guest houses. We were staying in the one furthest from the entrance. All of these houses were surrounded by small and thin canals in which there were hundreds of fishes. There was also a pond behind every house and there was a water snake in the pond behind the owner’s house. The owner must really like animals, because he kept four dogs and a cat as pets. I like animals too, and I changed my mind about not wanting to come only because of them. As soon as we put our luggage in our rooms and went to the lobby of the house (hotel), the other children asked the manager if they could see the dog. The manager got the well-trained dog to our house. It was a South-Indian hunting breed called the Rajapalayam and looked a lot like a greyhound. The dog was huge but I wasn’t afraid of it. My father and I were the only ones who pet the dog, even though it was my sister and the other children who asked for the dog to be brought to our bungalow.
We had lunch and spent two hours figuring out how to charge my DS (it needs 110 volts) and playing bluff with UNO cards. At 4:00 in the evening, we went to the Pondicherry/Puducherry (whatever you want...)beach; actually, it was not a beach, because it was covered with rocks and they did not allow us to reach the water. It didn't have any sand at all! So I played some catch, had an ice-cream and went with my father to a visitor center to find out more about Pondicherry/Puducherry (whatever...). Then we went to the Auro beach, only to swim. The beach was stinking a lot because the local fishermen dried fish on the sand right on the beach. I made a mental note to have a proper bath after going to the guest house, and then enjoyed the beach. Unfortunately, I was not allowed to go very deep into the water, even when I knew how to swim very well.
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| Coco on my lap |
As soon as we went back to the guest-house, we saw the cat. It was brown, black and white and it's name was Coco. I really liked the cat and it always climbed onto my lap. I tried to take pictures, but the cat was scared of the flash and shut it's eyes. I had a bath and ate my (delicious) food. In our room, the bed was big enough for only three people to sleep on and there was a separate mattress for one person on the floor. I slept on the mattress on the floor because I was used to doing this in my room at home too.
The next day we went to the Auroville visitor center. There, we saw a movie about the Matrimandir. There was a lot of information about the place in French, so I couldn't read it. Then we went outside the visitor center, where there were many stalls selling food items which were prepared from vegetables grown in Auroville. Then we walked one kilometer to see the Matrimandir viewing point. When we walked back, everybody was tired, and we went to one of the stalls to buy lemon juice. It was very good, and I had three glasses of it. When we were going to the car, we saw a welcome sign that said welcome in 13 different languages. We were able to identify 12 of the languages. We had lunch in a restaurant, and then went to Aurobindo Ashram. We reached some time before the Ashram opened, and we had to wait. While waiting, we saw a monkey that almost ran into me. Someone even tried to offer the monkey a banana. After a while the Ashram opened and we went inside. We weren't allowed to make any noise. There were many pictures of Swami Aurobindo and the divine Mother who had started the Ashram.
From there we went to another beach called the Paradise Beach. The beach was on an island and we had to go there in a boat; it was a fifteen minute ride. We saw fish jumping out of the water on our ride. The beach was the best beach that we visited in our trip. Unfortunately, there was a beach-guard who wouldn't let us wade very deep into the water. We had a lot of fun and lost track of time. After a long time, we went back to our guest house and played bluff with UNO cards again. We went to sleep after a long time.
It was the last day, and we were planned to visit the Mahabalipuram monuments built by the Pallava king 1600 years ago. There were five monuments. First we went to the main monument. It was a bit interesting, as it had hollow pillars that made music, an old lighthouse built by the Pallavas and a new lighthouse built by the British people. We also visited the other four monuments which are the Five Rathas, Arjuna's Penance (which has more than150 images carved onto a single rock), Krishna's Butterball (which was a rock that balanced at the edge of a steep drop but never falls) and Shore temples. After that we went to a restaurant that delivered food so slow that we lost our appetite. On our way to the railway station, we stopped at the very famous Sri Krishna Sweets shop to buy some snacks for our train journey. The train left in the evening and we reached home the next day. The train journey was a bit boring, but I was happy to reach home.
Note: I have decided to call Pondicherry/Puducherry (...) Pondicherry from today.
That time, the experience was horrible, as they had no anesthesia. I was only seven - going to be eight -when I had gotten the stitches last time. And it was on the same leg, just a few millimeters below my new wound. They had to get around four nurses to put the leg down as I was not cooperating. I had gotten only three stitches at that time, and this time it would be five stitches. I just hoped that they would use some anesthesia this time, and I didn't want stitches without anaesthesia.
Then we finally reached the hospital and went in. A doctor said that it would be better to have the stitches, and I was going to need them. They started by giving me four injections around my wound, and they didn't hurt much. I was guessing that it was some local anesthesia, because I wasn't dizzy when they were stitching, but I wasn't feeling any pain either. Finally the stitches were done, and they gave me a tetanus injection. They told me not to bend my leg or get it wet. I finally went back home and called my parents to tell them what had happened. I even had to take a few antiseptic tablets.
This morning there was a fight for the bathroom again. I went to another room to have my bath……again. We went to the school for breakfast, and got stuck in the long line. After breakfast, I checked the list of players to check whom I was playing and this time it I again got an unrated player as my opponent. Even if he didn’t have rating, he played really well. I had to focus a lot to keep the position equal. Suddenly I was a piece up and got to a winning position. Then I lost concentration for a second and made a huge blunder and the match ended in a draw. During the lunch break, I met the boy from Bangalore again and played a practice game against him (which again ended in a draw). Later in the afternoon, I easily won the second game of the day against another unrated player. When we had to go back to our hotel, and our chess coach did something very weird, he asked all of us to get into the same auto! There was 1 driver, 1 coach, 1 ma’am, 2 parents and 8 children all crammed into an auto that was meant to hold 7 people. The ride was very bumpy and we kept stepping on each other’s feet. After reaching the hotel, our chess coach organized a small tournament only for boys. We had to go back to the school for dinner. While going and coming back, there were thirteen people in one auto again. There was so much foot-stamping that I had a new reason for why thirteen is considered an unlucky number. The auto rides got me very exhausted, and I went to sleep before any of the people started snoring (or singing). 
This was the last and final day of our trip. We had to play only one match, which I easily won again. My total score was 5.5 out of 7. I realized that if I played the 3rd match a little more carefully and won it instead of a draw, I could have won a prize. Even my sister won 5.5 points, but the girls’ team had to play only six matches. My sister had won a prize, and my father was there to congratulate her. We had to go to the railway station in a bus in the evening, and it was really crowded and suffocating. My father had come to the station to drop us off. In the train, we had a lot of fun with two other children in our compartment. I also had time to write all this in my notebook before going to sleep. Sleeping was not easy when there was a fan right above my feet. We go off at the station the next day in the morning, and finally reached home (only to see the blue-cross chasing stray dogs in the railway station). I have to go to Chennai again for my tennis tournament in November, and I wonder how the experience will be.
I had gotten up at 5:00 am and our train reached Chennai at 6:30. Out team was four boys, four girls, our chess coach and our music teacher. Out of the four boys, two stayed really close to my house, and I knew them. Both of these people were okay; the other boy was a joker. After getting down from the train, we split into two groups. The four boys were one group and the four girls were another group. The first group went off in one auto, and the second group was following them in another auto. I was in the second group. As we went, we were stopped by the traffic police. Only then did we realize that our auto driver did not have a license. He convinced the police to let him go after paying a fine of 100 rupees. We were going along the road when all of a sudden there was a long bang - like something bursting. That something turned out to be our auto's tyre. We had to wait as the driver fixed the auto tyre.
We got ready by 7:00 am in the morning. Having a bath was a huge problem because we had to fight for the bathroom. I went to my sister's room to avoid the argument and to finish my bath on time. All the four players from our school were supposed to sit beside each other and play their games at the same time. I was on board no. 3. I checked the list of players to see whom I was playing. I was going to play a rated player, which meant it would be a tough match for me. I went to one of the class rooms to play, played well till the end, blundered and lost the game after two hours of playing. Our chess coach said that I had played very well and he thought so because I had almost beaten a rated player. All my team-mates played FIDE rated players and lost except for one of the boys who was lucky enough to play someone with a rating of 0 (which means he was unrated). We had three hours till the next game, so we sat in the auditorium and played a few practice games. I also met a boy from Bangalore, who had attended my school last year