Nilambur

Oh my Chai Chaiwala Bhiswajith Gosh!! You write about the Shornur-Nilambur train. Very good!!!! But do you know, that train is easily the most beautiful stretch of railways in the South? Just as one finishes the hot hot pazhamporis and the frothy, tangy buttermilk that Shornur station is so famous for, one passes the paddy fields and the mangrove forests and into the heard of Mallapuram we go. The rain has spoken volumes in the landscape and the myriad smells of self-reflection come wafting by, almost like the mustiness of the damp wooden berths. After an hour or so, one reaches Nilambur. How I wish RKNarayan had seen the station!
the little crowd gets down and walk past potted plants and into the little road in the midst of the rubber plantation that surrounds the station. One takes a very cheap auto to the town, where old shops with tiled roofs and smelling of old age and suppressed memories sell toffees imported from the Gulf. There is a little traffic of vehicles constantly going up and down the hilly terrain of the little town. The signs of wealth and urbanization rests cozily with the old-world feeling that saturates the air. One looks eagerly at shops selling wax toys and mud candle holders, famous in here. Young people walk by, the boys looking shyly at the pretty girls. The crowd nudges one slowly, as though asking one to move and not to be stuck in the mire of memory and longing.
It is essential that i be stuck there, for such is the beauty of a place that one should belong to, but doesn't.