Mangan,-'Mon'-'gaon' -,which means a place where people meet or a place where you should not be when a war strikes,is a quaint little town in Sikkim and yet so dear to many of our hearts.It's placed strategically in a valley between mountain and hills.This town ,where most people know each other and yet now when I go home I am a stranger amidst the kids who have grown up and the migrants who have settled in.
Just as you enter Mangan ,down below in the valley there is a red-roofed elephantine house that has always made many of our hearts beat faster,it was the place where I was born,it was the country homestead where all our town cousins used to congregate during the holidays-oh what memories I have of it!It was this place where all of us siblings wove our fantasies around the large antique mirror that hung on the wall-told each other fancy stories to dozen,hero-worshipped our elder sister,wrote soppy but innocent letters to our mother who was away for a short-while,narrated stories about our school life to our father who listened with rapt attention and an element of pride-it was also the place where my brother a bookworm literally had to be chased out of the house to play in the open-field,chased ponies to dozen in the paddy field,played bang-bang ,hide and seek amidst hay-stacks,watched the handy-men literally gulp down their meal after a long day at work, in fascination.Watched chitty and chatty ,the swan-ducks chase strangers away with indifference and watched Timmy,our alsation do acrobatics in the air with it's muscles rippling,but a 'gentle oh so gentle 'expression on her face.
Just as you enter Mangan ,down below in the valley there is a red-roofed elephantine house that has always made many of our hearts beat faster,it was the place where I was born,it was the country homestead where all our town cousins used to congregate during the holidays-oh what memories I have of it!It was this place where all of us siblings wove our fantasies around the large antique mirror that hung on the wall-told each other fancy stories to dozen,hero-worshipped our elder sister,wrote soppy but innocent letters to our mother who was away for a short-while,narrated stories about our school life to our father who listened with rapt attention and an element of pride-it was also the place where my brother a bookworm literally had to be chased out of the house to play in the open-field,chased ponies to dozen in the paddy field,played bang-bang ,hide and seek amidst hay-stacks,watched the handy-men literally gulp down their meal after a long day at work, in fascination.Watched chitty and chatty ,the swan-ducks chase strangers away with indifference and watched Timmy,our alsation do acrobatics in the air with it's muscles rippling,but a 'gentle oh so gentle 'expression on her face.
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