My Life and My Words: April 2019

Though it is a late post now, It was mid of March about twenty days back

From last two year I have not went out of my hometown and I was feeling like I am stuck inside a container . All I wanted to pack my bag and leave for an unknown destination ,but conceptually that was a little tough decision for me. We have got a wedding invitation at Bhubaneswar, it was weekend so I four days of casual leave from work , we stuff our luggage and headed towards Bhubaneswar.

Me and Dolon thought that it would be beautiful wedding night within that grand city and it was a beautiful wedding actually but we were facing a huge communication gap. I can not speak Oriya nor I understand it and I was surprised that only few people could understand Hindi properly. We both were feeling like we were sinking on ocean with no sign of land from any direction and somehow we survived the wedding night and on the next morning we made an uncertain plan to visit Puri and stay there for next two days. We took a cab and it was a beautiful ride of about more than an hour. My eyes were peeping out of window as we can see there were lots of tourists place, monuments, museum and natural parks that we were skipping but unfortunately we did not have enough time and it should have taken a whole day to visit all those places as well already had made reservation way back to howrah.

Finally we reached Puri and because of an extremely unplanned trip at an unknown city it was tough for us to find a good hotel rooms and we took some locals help they suggested that to stay near City Road beach which less crowded and more clean than the other beaches and as suggested we hopped in at Hotel City Plaza which is just near the beach at a Beautiful location.

Next morning we woke up early just to get a glimpse of sunrise from the horizon of sea and also my first ever walk on the sea beach. It was an amazing experience when the golden-reddish sun came out from the horizon . I dare say it was a magical experience when I stepped my bare foot on the wet sand for the first time, I remember the impressive scale of ever rolling water pressing my toes in cool sand while the cool-warm wind whipped at my ears and skin that still rolls through my mind. Then we settled down on the wet sand and had a playful hours with waves and sea shores.

Then after getting refreshed we planned to visit Shri Gaur Vihar Ashram which is about 5 KM from there so we booked an auto and contracted him for other place such as golden Gouranga, Suvadra Mandir, house of Gouranga etc. The road was so rough and unpaved but the atmosphere and location of the ashram is incredible and isolated. This is the place where Chaitanya Mahaprabhu has came during his time and mediated. This place is free for public and also have wheelchair facility so that one can can take their aged parents there. I found it very attractive with peaceful natural environment, sculptures and statues of different God and Goddess. There is a giant statue of Shri Hanuman . I found a beautiful temple of Shani Dev and different sculptures from Sri Krishna’s life and many more. It is a must visit place in puri. Then we headed towards golden Gouranga, Suvadra Mandir, house of Gouranga and spent the rest of the evening at beach with sea foods.

Next days we again booked an auto to visit Shri Jagannath Temple , one of the prime attraction of Puri. There was a huge queue and I was afraid that we have to stand in queue for hours and there were some irritating pandas but finally after standing in a queue for sometime finally we got our turn to enter into the temple. Unfortunately phones and cameras are not allowed inside the temple. We sat inside the temple for sometime and it was really charming and peace of mind. We both were lost in our own depth thoughts. The architecture of the temple is very alluring and took us back to the classical era. The times of the Lord Krishna beautifully expressed on the walls and pillars of the temple. It was created by King Anantavarman Chodaganga Deva during the 12^th century.

Then we spent rest of the day at beach and boarded our train at evening at headed back to howrah. There were much more place to visit at Puri & Bhubaneswar but we could not make it due shortage of time. On our next planned visit we must visit Chilka lake, Konark temple and few other place.

It was my first experience at sea shore , the beach and wet sand and I must say the evening at the beach is more fanciful and beautiful than morning. Believe me long walk on the beach by holding the hands of your loved ones feels more unwind and relaxed. The cold-warm breeze from the sea, the roars from sea surf and bare foots on the wet sands combines together and takes us away from the chaos of daily life. It gives us the strength of inner healing and rejoice.