My mother-in-law was an amazing lady. She lived life to the utmost, enjoying new experiences, finding happiness in making new friends, learning new things and generally living life to the fullest. She was multi-talented; cooking, embroidery, singing and playing the violin were among her hobbies.Age was just a number to her. In her sixties, she regularly played badminton with women half her age. She always dressed smartly and never shied away from adventure.
When we visited Hanuman Gundi falls near the Kudremukh National Park, we were all content to view the grandeur of the falls from the ground. But she had other ideas. She wanted to climb on the rocks and play in the water on the top of the falls. Many youngsters were doing this, and she coolly followed them while the rest of us, her husband, son, daughter, myself and the grandchildren, were gaping at her!Another time, when we visited the ruins of Hampi, we were shown a secret chamber where the king received his secret emissaries or spies. It was dark and spooky and I peered into it with awe, having no intention of climbing down several dingy steps to reach it. But mother-in-law was made of sterner stuff. “Let’s go in”, she said and began to climb down! I was glad we did because the room was tiny and when we imagined the secret conversations the walls had witnessed, it was thrilling!
Once, when she was almost eighty, mother-in-law was travelling from Bangalore to Kabaka Puttur with my co-sister. Kabaka Puttur is a small station and the train stops for just two minutes. The platform was also very small in those days so when the train stopped, their bogie, being at the back of the train, had no platform. They had to get down onto the grassy wilderness. My sister-in-law jumped down onto the grass and urged mother-in-law to walk inside the train to the front in order to get down on the platform. This she did but by the time she reached an entrance facing the platform, the train had started again!
A group of young men standing on the platform saw her hesitating and shouted encouragingly to her. “Jump, grandma! We’ll catch you,” they said in Kannada. So even as the train gathered speed, she gathered her courage and jumped! She landed completely unhurt. The boys caught her expertly as though catching grannies jumping off running trains was something they did on a regular basis!