Wedding Dress

It was the summer vacation between ninth and tenth.  Though the school had not reopened, classes in my tuition centre had already begun.   My uncle’s marriage was fixed at that time.  After many years, it was an occasion for the entire family to get together.  But my father did not want me to miss the tuition classes as I was in the tenth standard.  So, my mother and brother went to her house at Kollam three days before the wedding.  I and my father decided to go on the day of the wedding.  The marriage was at Ettumanoor, a small town near Kottayam.  

Readymade dresses were not so popular those days.  So, I had got a shirt and a trouser stitched for the wedding.  However, I didn’t want it to get dirty while travelling in train.  So, I packed my new dress in a small plastic bag.  There is a shop near my house at Kochi, which specializes in a variety of papads.  The masala papad from that shop was liked by everyone in my mother’s house.  So, we bought a packet of masala papad for them.  It put it in the same bag. 

On the day of the wedding, early morning, we boarded the Kayamkulam Passenger train from Ernakulam.  The train was not very crowded.  I jumped on to a window seat and hung my bag on a hook above the window.  As the train was about to leave, unexpectedly, two of my father’s friends boarded the train and sat opposite our seat.  My father got busy discussing the office related matters with them.  I started enjoying the beautiful morning scenery through the window – the lush green paddy fields, chirping birds, milk vendors – it was really nice to observe all this sitting in a passing train.  After some time, the cool breeze made me doze off.  I got up when my father patted on my shoulder saying, ‘come fast, we have reached Ettumanoor’.  Since the trains stopped at Ettumanoor only for a minute, we quickly got off the train.  We took an auto-rikshaw to the venue of the wedding.  As I was getting down from the rikshaw, I realised that I had forgotten to take my bag from the train.  It was a shock to me.  What will I wear now for the wedding?

After Ettumanoor the next stop for the train was Kottayam.  Even if we took a taxi and rushed to Kottayam, by the time we reach there, the train would have gone further.  So, it didn’t make sense to chase the train.  Ettumanoor was a small town, where shops selling readymade dresses were not many those days.  With a heavy heart, I attended the wedding in the same old dress that I had worn in the train.  In the group photo, one can see me standing in a corner with a fallen face.

Few days later, my father met his friends, who had travelled with us in the train.  They said, ‘as soon as the train left Ettumanoor, we saw that you had forgotten your bag.  So, we handed over that bag to the Station Master at Kottayam and told him that two people who got down at Ettumanoor had forgotten this.  Please give it to them if they come searching!

If that Station Master had a son of my age, he would have used that new dress.  Anyway, I am sure, he would have loved the taste of masala papad from Kochi!