Singapore it is!

“The world is a book and people who do not travel read only one page” I so much agree to this line. Travelling gives us another view of life; it helps us know ourselves better. When we travel with people we love, whole experience of travelling goes to next level, our happiness doubles. If I have to tell about my definition of perfect holiday, it should be a combination of relaxing and sightseeing both. I don’t like going out and spending all the time in my luxury hotel only and I also do not like doing sightseeing on someone else’s pace, it becomes hectic and less fun that way.

I have travelled places mostly with friends and my husband. With my parents I have travelled only when I was very young. As I grew up, due to my studies and other classes we never got chance to have any good holiday together. When I got to travel abroad first, one thing which I missed the most was my parents. I wanted them to see and experience everything that I was doing. From that time itself I have this desire to take my parents on a holiday abroad. I want it to be a place which is different than our country (which we have travelled together many times) yet similar. And after travelling to Singapore, I feel that’s the answer for me.

I would like to take my parents to Singapore, which is a great travel destination. Singapore is the microcosm of Asia. It has something for everyone. I am sure my parents will admire the kind of discipline about cleanliness people follow there. Wide roads, flyovers and well planned city, it is so much fun to drive around in such place. Sentosa island is most famous place among tourists in Singapore. Famous Merlion Statue is there, and there are many other highlights like the Underwater World which I am sure will be something my parents have never seen before. There is this very fun place Dolphin Lagoon, where they conduct dolphin shows ( the kind of tricks they do will make them clap their hands in joy :) ) Last time when I was there I tried taking pictures of same but failed to capture those fun moment well, now when my mom dad will get to see it in real my joy will be doubled by seeing them happy. And now with Disneyland and universal studios also being there, I am sure I would love to see my parents relive their childhood J

Signapore also has China town, which is good to give one a feel of being in china, so I would like to take them there as well. And nothing gives more pleasure then to find your own culture and people in another land, so trip to little India will be there on my list as well. I would do lots of shopping with my mom there and will help keep my dad in updating his travelogue ( he has this habit of noting down some details of new places he goes to for future reference ;) )

All this and so much more is there in my mind but planning trip in real is not as easy as lying on the rocking chair and day dreaming. It is so much of work and efforts but who has time to plan for a break ;) yes the irony of our generation. To rescue us there are these online travel planning and booking sites available. And if it is from a reliable source then it’s like the cherry on the cake. Yatra is one such site which I trust for travel panning and booking. After all with ease of planning the travel the fun and happiness of the travel is also important. When we pull out some days from our busy schedules I don’t want to scratch my head about where to go and how to go. I want someone else to take these headaches of mine and let me have happy time with my family. Long talks, lots of food and laughter, some nice locations and lots of shopping this is what makes a trip memorable and make us happy travellers. So when I will travel to Singapore with my parents I want all of this, so that we bring back lots of lovely memories as Happy Travellers.

PS: wrote this post for Creating Happy Travellers contest on Indiblogger by Yatra.

Fun Memories of Cow dung

You ask someone from our generation to pick cow dung and you will see weird faces and many excuses and I must confess that I am one of them too. I am not at all found of this smell but somehow I have some good childhood memories associated with this smell.

Hindus worship cow and they consider all her by-product holy.  I have seen the cow dung coming inside my home and all the way to our Puja room during all Pujas and hawans. However I never used to take the responsibility of bring cow dung home but the place from where we used to buy cow milk had plenty of this. My parents believe that fresh cow milk is healthier then packet milk or carton milk so they found out a milk man near my house who had 8 to 10 cows and buffaloes and used to sell fresh cow milk.

This place was just ten minutes walk from my home, and we used to get milk from him in evenings. Days when my dad used to be busy with other things I used to walk with my mom to this place for getting milk. That place had a mixed small of milk, cows, cow dung and the grass. It was not pleasant smell but I use to enjoy going there as there I used to get lots of time to chit-chat with my mom, and my siblings were never there to disturb us :) . Later My Nani (Maternal grandmother) also started buying milk from same place on my mom’s recommendation.  And I started enjoying my time at the milk man’s place even more because I used to meet my Nani there. Milk man used to start taking out milk only when all the customers who buy milk from that particular cow are present there, so that they get fresh milk. As a result we had to wait there for 20 minutes every day. There were few more kids who used to come there with their parents, and some of us became friends. Because of all this the not so good smelling place became a fun place for me.

When I grew up bit more, I started going to that place with by younger brother and sister. We used to play some games on our way and used to talk nonstop about school and friends.  It was so enjoyable that we never said no for going and getting milk from there. Sometimes if mom asked only one of us to go still we all used to go together as it was very entertaining for us.

Now I live away from home, and due to lack of time I prefer buying packet milk only. Still whenever I see places where they sell fresh cow milk the smell of cows, milk, and cow dung makes me feel nostalgic. It takes me back to my fun childhood memories. This not so good small reminds me of very good times I had with my Mom, Nani, friends and siblings at the milk man’s place. I am sure all the people who see me smiling near a heap of cow dung will think I am mad but I don’t smile because I am enjoying the smell, I smile for my good old times which I associate with this smell :D


PS: I wrote this post for "AmbiPur smelly to smiley" on Indiblogger.