Dreams Do Come True

by Radhika Tandon 

Misa Polo Club, pix from https://amalgamatedplantations.co.in/misa-polo-club/

Dreams do come true. Growing up with Enid Blyton, Nancy Drew & Mills & Boon, I dreamt of a small house with picket fences & a red slanting roof. Cut to 1984, my first home after marriage - Sagmootea T.E. Incidentally my parents pronounced it as Sagmotee T.E for the longest time.

A house, not small ( I could live with that ), the roof wasn't red ( I could live with that too ), on the whole very very acceptable. Who am I kidding, I gawked !! A huge Chang Bangla with wooden floors that creaked & let in the cold from every crevice, housing the biggest crickets & cockroaches that I had ever seen. I loved the bungalow, the rest I learnt to live with.

What begins well ends well. We were hosted by the wonderful Wanda & Deepak Erasmus. Wanda made my transition from Bombay to Assam seamlessly easy. I must admit that Rachel & Ashley ( the cutest kids ) had a big hand in it too. I was a natural fit.

Travelling on a dirt track to Misa Club and invariably running into wild elephants on the way back ! No big deal. Banded kraits in the roof, so what ? All paled against the Mali Bari with the sweetest pineapples I had ever eaten. The trees laden with guavas & a lawn full of flowers. Bliss.

Those first few years were an education by itself. I tried to learn tennis & failed. I was not the sporty kind. I learnt to read the newspaper one day late as that's when we got them. Learnt that when someone drops in for lunch on a Sunday, it's served past tea time & dinner naturally follows. Learnt that it's normal to travel 2/3/4 hours away to visit or attend a party & drive back home after. Learnt that newly married brides were not to be trusted with club catering , even if they were Hotel Management graduates & knew how to cook. I had to earn my badges.

All in all, loved every minute of it.

Meet the writer:

Radhika Tandon

Says Radhika, "I am one of those city girls who took to tea life like a fish takes to water. From concrete jungle to vast verdant greenery, who wouldn’t ? Been a tea wife for all my married life. Posted mostly in Assam with a very short stint in the Dooars. We moved to Bangalore on transfer in 2005 & have been here since then." 

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