Meet the
man who created a forest!!
We have heard of people planting
trees, we have heard of people maintaining gardens but have you ever heard of
someone creating a forest?!!
Take a diversion from Koyilandi to Naduvannur
(about half an hour in bus) and then to Thiruvode (3km) you will reach house of
retd. school principal Mr Padmanabhan (popularly Padmanabhan mashe). He has done the incredible that too on his
own, not any support from any agencies nor even his children. It started in
late 1950s when he was doing his graduation, he explains, there was talk of
Kuttiyad hydroelectric project, he and his friends decided to trek the forest.
The experience of walking through the forest stayed with him. Later he inherited
little piece of land, a somewhat barren land of 3acres. What began in 1980s is
now a little thriving forest that has amazing variety of flora and fauna. He
pointed to me many plants and trees that are becoming rare, and its medicinal
property. He indeed is a repository of immense knowledge. There are about 45
species of trees alone. I even saw butterflies that i haven’t seen before, not even
in Western Ghats. What was charming was his enthusiasm. His concern though is
his forest; he doesn’t really know what will become of it after him. What is
also shocking is that despite these efforts there has been virtually no support
from the authorities.
This effort is something very
unique and rare. We must salute the dedication and hard work of a single man
who created a thriving forest from nowhere. It should be part of school
curriculum.
(You can reach Padmnabhan mashe
at epnsajina1939@gmail.com)
Meet the enigmatic Yashoda amma
Not many people know that Thalaserry is the birth place of circus in India.While I was in Thalaserry about a
decade back (i was cycling from Udupi that year) I met an elderly lady who used
to do dare devil bike riding in circus. Those days there weren’t blogs, I wrote
about her in my dairy. I did search for her but just couldn’t locate. Instead I
came across Yashoda amma. A remarkable lady, charming as ever at the ripe age
of 85. She joined the circus because the legendary Keeleri Kunhikannan knew her father and
so he after much apprehension agreed. She explained that it was her insistence
that did it. She wanted to see the world. Very soon she was popular “I was very
stylish and good looking”, she had reasons to be proud. She found her way into
magazines in Russia and so on (in early 1940s she was getting popular in Karachi!!). Her eyes glitter as she relates her heydays “I
even got anonymous letters” “some even threatened to kidnap me!!”. Her daughter
in law who stood nearby made faces when she related these but Yashodamma was
not going to be distracted or dissuaded. She explained that she did trapeze,
double, even triple...even ‘elephant bottle’, wherein she was carried by elephant
on the trunk. She travelled the world, and lived in luxury. Those were the best
days of circus industry. She was pampered and she loved it. Later she married
one of the colleague, and so “now i am here where i am”, pointing to the
squalor life she was reduced to, she shrugged. “Now I am fighting disease”, she
has got quite ill recently. I thought she still was remarkably agile, with
excitable expressive face (that believe me was flirting!!...how much i wanted
to hug her!). She even went to meet her daughter alone on a train to Mumbai two
years back, explained her daughter in law, who couldn’t help not having
admiration for the old lady. It came reluctantly but it definitely was around
the corner all the while. Yashoda amma dabbed her face instinctively and looked
extremely excited when I said I wanted to take her picture, there was
underlying charm in the way she dealt. She was like a bird trapped in the cage
of her body. The bird that has soared high and from her little perch has seen
all that the world had to offer. Maybe the little bird wants to fly more,
trapped in the emaciated cage, it may break free one of these days. There is a
beatific smile that plays on her lips, it seems to leap into a world beyond...god
bless the remarkable lady. 
