Have always admired the festive spirits of our country… I may or may not have been part of the celebrations myself, but even watching them from a distance has also been fascinating… and getting to witness the festivities in their very epicenter is a different experience altogether… this holi, we toured Barsana, Nandgaon, Govardhan, Mathura, Gokul, Vrindavan… together they form the epicenter of this festival of colors… the assortment of mithais (specially gujiyas) and variety of chat added their flavor to the celebrations…

Colours strewn across everywhere, water and mud all around, the places were extremely unkempt… may be because it was Holi… but not sure if they are well maintained even otherwise… I have my doubts… In the same belt, you get to see Taj Mahal, Agra Fort, Fatehpur Sikri, which are well-maintained, well beyond their means… very obvious a contrast, but I rather not get into the reasons for this contrast… I was very happy being in midst of the sanctimonious places, specially for Holi…

It was almost like revisiting the history, that part of Mahabharata where Krishna was born and taken across to Gokul… and his growing up years, his miraculous escapades as also the romantic parables of Radha and Krishna… the Guides at all these places, almost enliven the epic for you… with their flawless voice modulation, raising and lowering their pitch with perfection… either BR Chopra had heard the whole of Mahabharata from these guides before making his historic television format of the epic… or these guides have adopted all their dramatic stories from BR Chopra’s make of the epic… whatever it is, what I had read and heard as stories from Mahabharata in my childhood were later dramatized by BR Chopra and they remained etched in mind that way… only till I actually visited these places to ‘see’ how history had unfolded itself in realms of these coarse villages… now, the images of these villages, temples built therein, devotional feel and the residues of history will remain etched in my mind for a long time to come…