Barapani Diary 

My job as an air traffic controller needs me to be posted at small and very small practically non-existent airports for a certain duration of time. In year 2011, one such posting led me to Barapani, an airport around forty kilometres away from Shillong. An entirely different world where from around thousand arrival departures at Delhi airport there was a lone flight to control, that too the flight played truant and missed our airport many days! In the place where my toddler grew up amidst nature, I read, wrote, introspected, reflected, and missed my husband at times!

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‘Life in the Hills’ (Part 1)

Again the time of the year when every Bengali yearns for his home…the homecoming. The Durga Puja. I watch from my tower as the tiny ATR offloads its passengers and reloads itself fully, a rare instance..as most of the days the half-empty ATR takes off in the air from the deserted airport. A longing to be home..away from this land locked island…I breathe away my wish in the gusting wind engulfing the tower and gather my things together to go down, winding up the day’s job after the lone plane of the airport takes off.

Few official letters, routine replies, routine data entry into the computer..routine jobs..routine smiles but outside office premises nature greets you with her open arms..some days a rainbow would glisten in the fresh rain-drenched sky..some days the cows would bathe in the water-logged fields..nothing routine about this world, a silent world..content with its simple undemanding dwellers..dwellers who haven’t robbed off all the wealth from her, dwellers who have guarded her, protected her against outsiders, cherished and coveted her and chose to live a quiet merry life..life within these hills.

Tomorrow is the local market day…a colourful market with so many facets..a day when the village is busy with all the hustle-bustle..village roads are full of vehicles…a day for whom I’ve learnt to wait whole eight days….to get my fill of fruits, vegetables and fish for the week. It is almost like a festival for the villagers and soon I was caught in the spirit as well.. happily munching pineapples and oranges with the deadly local chilly powder with my colleague, packing different types of sweets available fried in God-knows-what oil, missing altogether two/three hours of office… looking forward to the fun day ahead.

Happiness has a little price to pay, this colourful market with fresh vegetables, lures me..makes me plan my entire week ‘ food programme’, strange but in this land where a proper grocery shop isn’t available in the nearby four/five kilometres, no goodies, the vegetables are refreshingly fresh and seem garden plucked.

I load my bags with vegetables, goodies, and toys for my toddler..look around for some lift, if anyone is there with a vehicle..try to shove in the overloaded bags..and don’t mind walking the lovely stretch with a packet of pineapple in hand and my dear colleague accompanying me.

<Excerpt from my more than decade-old diary during my one year posting at the God-forsaken airport named Barapani. A year when I and nature had been this close… where we had rendezvous for hours. Barapani was my tryst with nature!>

Soma Bhattacharjee

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