Laila

Long ago, I read somewhere about this social experiment. A person was so frustrated with the modern world, don't know the reason, that he came up with this idea of "machine-free day". The idea, as the name says, was to avoid using any kind of machines for a whole day. So, he went to few of his neighbours to implement this ingenious, slightly eccentric idea, conveniently on a Sunday. Things turned out bad and this experiment was a failure.

Almost the same kinda thing happened with me when the cyclone Laila had hit the south-east coast. I was home and it was my birthday too. No one expected this one (the cyclone) to be that strong. It lasted for four days. Day one, by that evening there was no charge in my pone battery. Both the phone batteries. Day two morn, all the phones in my home were dead; landline dead since day minus 43! No power all the three days. So no computer and laptop too. Everyone stayed home. By five in the evening, candles were lit. One for each room. We had enough candles in the house to last for another month but mom took out the very old hurricane lanterns and lit them. It was so beautiful! 

Days were what a cloudy, rainy day should be like - grey, cold, leaks if there are any, and wet! Somehow, my home was so cheery. No body left home, so it was always a little too crowded. No schools too, so there were always kids around. I have learnt so many new games! There was little else to do for the grownups to do other than sit around and chit chat. This time because of the "no machines for 3 days" game, the non-grownups were involved in the yapping too. I did not want to do anything else but simply sit in my room and read all the Harry Potters. And I did. It was just awesome. It feels so good to sleep in on a rainy day. So I used to be up all night reading in the candle light and sleep during the morning. Gas stove does not need electricity. So, thankfully we were all properly fed and more importantly, there was coffee anytime I wanted. No one objected!

And so many little things like that. It gave me a taste of what was like in the olden days. The days were longer. In a wonderful way. Things were slower. You get to talk to others without a million things on your head. 

No machine day! Worked out fine for me. Wonder why that guy's didn't!! ;-)