Bye, bye Coonoor

Though settled in Mysore for the past four years, we retained our Housing Board flat till recently, in the fond hope of visiting Coonoor once in a while for a few days. This hasn't happened. So we chose to wind up our establishment there and hand over possession to Ashika's family, which plans to buy our house.

Our house is the one with the closed door.

Ashika with her mother Uma, on the cement slab at our door-front.

Younger brother Anish.

Cousin Akshay.

Youngest of Ashika's cousins.

Back from school, Ashika going to her old house, two doors away from ours.
At our door, soon to be hers. Ashika's is a joint family. Living with so many cousins, uncle, aunt, and gandma has its charm as well as hassles. But then Ashika has lived in the joint-family environment since birth. We have watched her grow, from a toddler. In our Coonoor days Ashika used to spend much of her spare time with us.
My neighbour G V Raman who was guide and companion to us during our years in Coonoor and after our move to Mysore four years back we have been relying on the Ramans to take care of our affairs in Coonoor.

Mrs Raman and my wife used to move together - to the bazar, the temple, and on occasions, to eat out,Velan Ritz was our favourite. Quiet and cozy, the Velan lobby is a nice place to hang out. The Ramans and we visited Velan every other month to celebrate something or other. When there wasn't an occasion to celebrate, we invented one.
A super-size cactus at Chettinad compound,close to the Velans.
Rangoli on a driveway on Orange Grove Road,
Residential housing is replacing a tea-patch close to our house.
A view from our house-top.


Another house-top view.