Fragrance of flowers takes me back to my childhood days!

My ‘Dadi’ performed pooja every day. In the month of ‘Shravan’ she used to offer 1 lakh flowers / holy leaves to God. I remember gathering flowers of ‘Bakula’ and ‘Parijatak’; leaves of ‘Tulsi’ and ‘Bel’. Me and my sister then counted them in hundreds; thousands and kept the count till a lakh was reached. What a beautiful way to learn counting big numbers!!  

My ‘Nani’ had a garden in the backyard of her bungalow. She loved her plants and cared for them as if they were her children. I fondly remember spending Summer vacations at her place. Varieties of roses, hibiscus, and fragrant flowers bloomed in the garden. Two tall coconut trees and a mango tree stood majestically on the sides. Plucking the flowers for daily pooja was an enjoyable task. Coconuts used to fall from the tall tree at any time of the day. Nani was a tiny women but could easily remove the outer covering of the fruit and crack open the shell. The divine taste of that fresh coconut water and tender flesh still lingers! The mangoes ripened on the tree tasted heavenly. Even a half ripened mango was welcome…

Now as an adult I enjoy being with my plants in my terrace garden. Like my Nani, I just love the plants and find solace being with them. And the naturalistic learning technique that I adopted from my Dadi make my lessons interesting. Thank you God for blessing me with my Grandmas….

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