LONG BEFORE IT WAS fashionable for Indian women to travel, my mother was traversing the length and breadth of the country. From trudging alone in buses across states, to travelling in delayed trains with three kids in tow, and getting a broken car fixed in the middle of a jungle—she had done it all. Even when her ageing body restricted her mobility, she continued to travel in ways only she could: in sleeper trains, tempo travellers, local buses, rickshaws, and what not. It was only fitting then that I chose to celebrate her life and grieve her death by travelling to a far off land despite the pandemic that took her.
I lost my mother to COVID-19 in October 2020. Her passing was not entirely unexpected but was as hard to come to terms with as anything can be. Our entire clan’s life was centred around her, and now that she was gone, we all felt orphaned and abandoned. That we were infected with the novel coronavirus just weeks afterwards meant losing the little emotional strength left in us. As days turned into weeks and I saw grief engulfing the family, I knew I had to do something. And so, after our quarantine periods were seen off and the infection dealt with, I decided to take a road trip with my two daughters, husband, and father to the Chettinad region of Tamil Nadu from our home in Bengaluru.
This story is from the November - December 2021 edition of Discover India.
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This story is from the November - December 2021 edition of Discover India.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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