Swarna was bewitched by aeroplanes. She would often stand under the open sky and watch aeroplanes zoom by, leaving silver streaks like slugs. It looked so minuscule from where she stood that she was confident she could trap it in her fist. Her father told her inside it there were like hundreds and hundreds of people, but it seemed like a big joke to her. She had seen pictures of aeroplane but never travelled in one. For her middle class parents train was the favoured mode of transportation. We can not afford four plane tickets, her mother would say. Then one day her father, whose office was now very near the airport, told Swarna and her sister Swati that he would take them to see an aeroplane. You mean actually see it, from close quarters, she squealed. Swarna picked out the best dress from the cupboard, an egg yolk coloured yellow lacy frock with matching ribbons. Her father gave a booming laugh, that shook his jelly belly, it is an aeroplane not a human, you silly girl, he said. But Swarna wanted to be in the best of finery, no matter what her father said. She walked into the airport , jingling with excitement, her father had got some special tickets which would allow them to stand behind a big glass wall and watch the activities as they unfold in an aerodrome. She pressed her face on the glass wall. Her nose flattened like a pancake, as she stood their transfixed. It was ginormous, yes it was. She had never seen anything so huge. She always thought elephants were big, but this was much bigger than elephant. How could someone possibly make this? Her young mind couldn’t fathom. Painted pristine white and cherry red, with small windows one after another, doors and wings, it was exactly like the picture in her books yet nowhere like it. The aerodrome was a buzz of activity as workers were loading luggage are loaded into the plane, there men in uniforms, walking around with notes on clipboard. Swarna looked with mouth agape as one by one people took the stairs and was consumed by the metal body. Her father was right. It could actually fit more people than who turned up at her aunt’s wedding party. As the engines revved up, making its way to the runaway, Swarna and her sister wanted to run behind it, with their arms flailing in the air but was not allowed.
As she sat in the bus on her way home, unaware of the chaos around, she thought about the seven wonders of the world her father often told them. He told her one of the wonders was in their country, and when her sister was a little older, he was going to take them there. But the others are beyond my reach, he said. May be one day you can take an aeroplane and visit them all. And Swarna definitely wanted to do that. Her father said that they lived in a small city, and sad but true but many people didn’t even know it exists. But she didn’t care as today in this small city she had seen the wonder of wonders.
Daily Dose of Shilpi 