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Published: November 21st 2007
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In the late morning hours I am finally on my way up towards the Arani Mansion. It has been 22 years since we left Ooty, India's "queen of hill-stations." In the crisp cold air and bright Ooty sunshine, I walk up the hill pass the old college, the large playing field, and the famous stone house, the first house constructed by the British.
As I get closer I take the detour along a windy path that passes through a small village and lots of vegetable crops. Even as to this day children stick their little heads out of their houses to greet the by passers, as they used to, with familiar phrases like, 'good morning,' 'what is your name, 'hello.'
In 1980, a group of 80 mainly Iranian Children of Bahai background left Iran in the climax of the revolution to join a South India boarding school, my brother an I being part of the group. We converged on this imposing colonial style house that once could be seen right from Ooty center, the Charring Cross. Arani House used to be the lone building way on the hill top surrounded by terrace farms, which grew mainly carrots and cabbages.
The detour to Arani House throught the small village.
Houses of the greeting children on the left and the vegetable crops on the right. But now it appears camouflaged by many other residential buildings that are gradually replacing the farms. Terrace farms are seen in every corner of the city. In fact residential houses and terrace farms still coexist, but this the changing fast, as in the case of the Arani family.
Ooty is the land of vegetable production, all sorts of vegetables are grown here year long. This is so because the Nilgiri soil is very fertile and the place gets more rain than Seattle itself. Once the lush forests are deforested they are either converted into terrace farms that grow vegetables or turned into tea platntations.
As I enter the property I look for an older man with a large belly, wearing a while lungee. This is how I remember the owner of the estate who lived with his family in a separate house on the premises. As I approach his house, I notice two large glass flower nurseries. His sons who are working there as I enter initially dismiss me as a tourist who has lost his way. They become very friendly and exited as I tell them the purpose of my visit. I gather that their father has
since died, and that his sons Nagaraj and Santosh now carry on the fort, but in their own style.
He says that the labor costs have gone up and growing vegetables is no longer profitable as, say, real estate, flower business or dog breeding. Yes, the two sons of the famed agriculturalist now import rare pure bred dogs and breed them in their backyard. Half of all the pristine and fertile terrace farmland has since been sold to developers. He takes me the back and shows me a monstrous German Shepard, whose bark makes his little concrete/iron jail vibrate. The puppies of the German Shepard, he says, can fetch rupres 1 lack, $2500.
He was 25 at the time we settled there. He well remembers the clamor and energy of the 80 Iranian children playing about the fields, and entering the terrace farms, often looking for lost cricket balls. He also smiles as I remind him of the day that a group of us raided the cabbage farm below the property, indulging in all the fresh cabbage that we could handle.
As I still remember it now; it was a weekend sunny afternoon, and we had gotten
pretty hungry after playing in the field all day. Dinner was not on until much later. So, at the instigation of my older brother, a rebel at the time, a group of us crossed the school boundary and jumped into the cabbage fields. We pulled out one cabbage after another, and ripped them open; with an amazing appetite and tremendous excitement, we ate, and ate. We continued to eat until we were spotted by the same son with whom I am now conversing.
He called his father immediately who dashed into the field and saw us. His father then went straight to our Principal, the master disciplinarian, Mr. Borhani. On finding out Mr. Borhani came directly to the field and grabbed a few of us by the shirt pulled us right into the school hall. All 6 or 7 of us were lined up in front of his office like the scene from the film 'Usual Suspects'. He paced back and fort looking each of us in the face and uttering words like, "what on earth do you think you are doing, disrupting the fields and stealing cabbages from the land lord." Two of us got the slaps. A
The Playing field
On the way up next the college. The stone house is hard to see here at the end of the field. close friend who now lives in the Bay Area was one of them. To this day he remembers the jolt of that slap, and has no appetite for cabbages. I got a small push on the forehead and my head gently hit the back wall. Our punishment for the misdemeanor was no allowance money for the weekend and no dinner for the night.
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