Mountain Fruit : Kafal
If you go to the mountains of India, then probably your first choice will be the hills of Garhwal (Mussoorie), Kumaon (Nainital). It is inevitable that mountains or snow are visible in the mind. If you are a resident of plain area then your mind will be forced to wander till the month of June comes. Then I feel that some days I would swing in the lap of the mountains.The month of June is going on. What I am writing today in the era of this pandemic was possible only because of Corona. It's raining outside; Lockdown also means lockout. I am presently in Rudraprayag district of Uttarakhand which is my birthplace. As soon as I ran Facebook, I was so fixated on Kafal's post that I am so lazy that I could not taste Kafal.Then I contacted a childhood classmate of my village near me. He got ready. Actually it is about 2:30 hours estimated distance from my home to pick up the kafal. Which will make me stand near the banana tree. Due to lack of favorable conditions, I could not say it. After a few days, again a person from my family tried to wake up at 6 in the morning.The eyes were not ready to open. At the same time, I was also in the throes of avoiding it. Get ready and go. In this journey, three people were on two scooters. I was the only driver. On reaching near the banana tree, stopping the scooty and tasting one of the nuts of this year, the mind was delighted. This was just a demo only. The journey starts ahead. Then we left for the forest.Our guide Praveen, with whom I became an uncle in relation (Relation). Praveen is a knowing young man who guesses the fruit is juicy. He is perfect in deciding where it will be easy for us to extract the fruit. He was expecting from me that you just fill the box with bunches of kafal with ease. Suman who was the other one with me on this journey. He and I knew little of this work.Believe me, I felt so angry when I wanted to see the box filled with every grain. This was the first experience of packing kafal in a box. Breaking the kafal and filling it in the box was an occasion to show his restraint. which is only for me; Usually the challenge was to learn new.
We were less interested in filling the box while more busy in eating. Somehow we met our quota.We finally won this battle of breaking and filling the utensils with great leisure. Fatigue had completely broken us. Nearby Kafluye (who had gone to the forest to pick fruits from home) acquaints us with a water bottle. Who were women of very helpful nature. Now there was a lot of climbing to hold the bag, which is a difficult task for me. Obesity is at its peak which is painful for me.