By Mamunur Rahman Hridoy

Whenever I read the line "On a stormy day in my uncle's village, what joy to gather mangoes" from the children's poem "Mamar Bari", I am lost in my childhood. The past comes back, and those days were truly beautiful. The memory of gathering mangoes on stormy days in the month of Baishakh seemed to wash away a hundred sorrows.

I do not remember how many times I went to the village in Baishakh as a child. But whenever a storm came, the children were always out under the big mango trees and in the orchards nearby, competing to gather mangoes. And when a fierce storm hit at night and we heard mangoes falling on the tin roof, we would all go looking for them.

Those colourful memories seem to have gone, but seeing children makes me want to go back to those days. In the village the scene can still be found. Picking up green mangoes, peeling them, chopping them fine and eating them mixed with chilli and salt: the taste still makes my mouth water.

It was 2009. I went to my maternal uncle's house in the summer holidays in Baishakh. Obayed, Farhad, Miraj and I, four cousins, roamed from one neighbourhood to another with nothing to do but get up to mischief. We woke at cockcrow.

As soon as we were up, all we could think of was raiding the mango orchards. We were afraid that ghosts roamed the orchards during storms, but our hearts would not listen. All four of us ran there and gathered mangoes without fear. We did not spare the jamun, jackfruit and lychee trees either.

When the mango and lychee season ended, we were hooked on colourful jamun. Our only aim was for all of us children to have fun together. There was no pressure of study and no trace of family worries; being happy together was sweet enough.

Even now, when I go to the village and see small children's mischief, I remember those old days. How could I forget them? Even now I feel that when storm and rain come, I should run under the mango tree and gather juicy mangoes, green and ripe.

The writer is a student and media worker.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.