Monsoons - Magic or Mayhem?

 

This post is my humble attempt at making sense of the mayhem unleashed by the monsoons this year. Incredible amount of water has rained from the skies, especially over the Indian subcontinent. So much that Delhi has surpassed its annual average with 4 months to spare, which is a rare achievement given the drought-like conditions that prevail every other year. 

Dark rain-laden clouds that brought a lot of precipitation 

And it is an El Nino year, that is touted as a phenomenon where the warming of the Pacific leads to hotter temperatures throughout the year.  The part that is conveniently ignored is its impact on the rains. Because hotter does not mean drier...

Cute snails in our local park

El Nino years have always had significantly more severe rainfall and cyclones, leading to waterlogging, floods, and typhoons in many places, and resulting in massive losses of life and livelihood. Yet we prefer to be tone deaf when it comes to a climate change conversation. Till we end up with something catastrophic like what happened in Nepal. I believe glacial melting would also be higher in the El Nino years but no warnings are ever issued. 

My only wish is to live in a world where technology is used more to benefit mankind - with accurate predictions, timely warnings, and faster disaster response being the benchmark. Unfortunately the world we are currently inhabiting seems to treat humans as entirely dispensable.

I love the magic of the monsoons, as you can see from the pictures in this post. But I am seriously worried about the mayhem it is causing in our part of the world.

Mid-year Update

 

A little over a year in our home city, and life has been a mixed bag. We survived an intense summer, struggling with niggling health issues. 

But thankfully, most of my plants are thriving despite the soaring temperatures. Especially the old and sturdy ones - like umbrella palm, hibiscus, Swiss cheese plant, and jasmine. Though I did lose some pothos and chrysanthemums in the horrendous summer heat. Made up by planting some chillies and bitter gourd in containers, hoping to recreate my passion of growing our own food. However, the paucity of space is a big challenge here.

Meanwhile, there has been incessant rain this year, and subsequent waterlogging over most of Delhi-NCR. After years I am seeing parks full of water, and can hear the frogs croaking through the night without worrying about finding one or two inside my home. We  can finally enjoy the rains again! 

As the skies darken at midday with rain- laden clouds, it feels like living in a rainforest, as the son rightly said. Thankful for the choices made and the decisions taken last year.

The iconic Charbagh as seen from the Lucknow metro 

We also made a couple of weekend trips over the last two months. I felt they were easier to do from Delhi somehow, perhaps because of lesser travel time and better connection. 

Inside Keoladeo in Bharatpur 

Hoping the remaining months of the year go by well. Fingers crossed! 

Chorchori Chronicles

Traditionally the Bengali staple mixed veg preparation called chorchori is supposed to have potatoes and spinach along with any three seasonal vegetables. As my mother taught me, there are five main players, hence the alternate name paanch-mishuli. So in winters, veggies like radish and cauliflower routinely make it to the chorchori mix, while in summers one finds bitter gourds, brinjals and pumpkins getting added.

Now here I was cooking chorchori in the rains, so the essential spinach was missing. It is anyway advisable not to consume these greens during monsoon as they spoil faster and host a few creepy crawlies. So I decided to try leaves from my moringa tree instead. Totally not kosher, as any Bengali mashima would tell you! 

Moringa tree in the backyard 

But while being experimental I discovered that the moringa leaves added an interesting nutty flavour to the chorchori. Also since they grow high above the ground unlike spinach, their leaves do not get spoilt by the rain. And, their health benefits are many. 

A closer view of our moringa forest

Moringa is a hardy tree, pretty resistant to the vagaries of the weather. Then why not give a modern twist to the traditional chorchori and enjoy it every season. If the spinach is unable to pull through our current climate change, an alternative is on hand already.

Frangipani Fiesta

When we moved house four-and-a-half years back, I had to leave behind a few pots due to paucity of space. The yellow frangipani was one of them. 

The old yellow frangipanis

A cutting of the same I planted on ground in our new abode did not take well to the new soil and developed fungi, spoiling soon after.

The large fungi at the base of the yellow frangipani 

To make up for the loss, the hubby planted a stem of white frangipani taken from the neighbour's garden. 

The white frangipani 

A year later I got another cutting of a red frangipani from a cousin. This year they both flowered well, thanks to the abundant rains.

The red frangipani 

In case you are wondering why I'm inclined to call the good old Champa as the frangipani, well I admit I find this name rather exotic. This plant that adds a touch of regality to the garden comes in many colours, is native to south-east Asia, and is also called the plumeria. But the best part - it is hardy and easy to transplant. 

Monsoon Diary

 

This year the monsoon has been kind to us. Keeping it cool and pleasant without drowning us out. So here's a visual diary of the season which is otherwise so welcome for the relief and renewal that it brings.

As the plants heaved a sigh of relief after battling the unbearable summer heat, one could see the garden looking visibly happy, and producing both flowers and vegetables. 

However a squall brought down the Gulmohar tree beside our house, damaging a car in the neighbourhood. And I promptly put up a piece of the lopped off trunk in the front garden. Had been meaning to add a tree trunk for a long time.... finally managed.

As the skies turned gray, the bright rain liles and portulacas provided perfect contrast by making the garden vibrant with their colours. Little pops of happiness!

Even though we diligently water our plants through summer, it is always amazing how a few drops of rain makes everything flower in such abundance. Our portulacas have been a source of joy, much like the beautiful skies above.

And flying the tricolour at our home to mark 75 years of India's independence added to our monsoon fun.

Hope the rains will remain enjoyable henceforth, and leave us with some good memories of this season.

Encounters With A Bull Frog

 

After an exceptionally hot and parched summer that lasted longer than usual, one had expected to see a dwindling amphibian population. But at the first signs of rain, out came this bull frog from a storm water drain.

When it first made an appearance, we thought it would find a home amidst the numerous pots and dense bushes like most of its tribe did. But this guy had other plans... Instead of hiding from us humans, he proceeded to jump right in our faces, eliciting shocked screams and some heightened cardiac activity from me. Not just once, but repeatedly over a couple of days. 

Before long he took over the front garden, swiftly moving from one end to the other with his characteristic quick and long jumps. And then he would sit staring at us with his beady black eyes, almost accusing us of trespassing his territory and disturbing his peace. He made himself comfortable in my containers, lounging in them as though he was sitting in a bathtub!

Till one morning the boys decided to reclaim the front yard, and gave the fellow a little poke in his hind side. While the first couple of pokes were met with some disdain as the bullfrog scuttled about the garden, a third push became the last straw. The fellow jumped his way straight out of the garden and the main gate, determined to find a new abode. Even as we watched half-amused, he crossed the lane and disappeared down another drain. Bye-bye, bullfrog.... till we meet again.

The Mango Tree Saga

The mango tree has always been an integral part of our love for this house. The first time we stepped in to see the house with our agent, the mango tree caught my eye. Green and lush, it gave the backyard a focal point and much-needed character. That it also produced fruits was not of much importance. What mattered was the perfect canopy it provided, given our location in the sunny tropics. 

After we had officially bought the property and repairs had commenced, the agent got the mango tree chopped a bit to give it a definitive shape. I remember it looked shorn when we moved in, and I missed its shady canopy. 

But in the next couple of years, the mango tree became lush again, and its canopy expansive. The shade it provided was so inviting that we spent many an afternoon working on our creative projects in its cool embrace. 

Situated right outside our bedroom, it was also a favourite with the birds, as their noisy chirrups woke us every morning. As we lay in bed on hot and endless summer days, looking at the lush leaves outside made us feel as if we were lying right under the mango tree. 

Just after moving in, we had an amusing episode with a bunch of local kittens who scrambled up the mango tree in a bid to escape us. You can read more about that here. For the first couple of years, the tree did not bear too many fruits. I made chutneys from the handful we got, happy to have gotten any produce at all. But last year the bees were plentiful and the tree filled up with flowers.

Soon there were fruits showing up aplenty in all the branches, filling our hearts with joy. Just the sight of them dangling cheerily, never mind the strong gusts of summer loo, gave us a lesson or two in resilience. 

And this was when the Delta strain of coronavirus was wreaking havoc everywhere. While we also lost loved ones, this tree and its bountiful fruits gave us hope. Hope that life always renews itself.

In June we harvested a huge crop of sweet, juicy mangoes that we distributed to family and neighbours as well. Basketfuls of the king of fruits right in our backyard was such an indescribable blessing!

Then in July that year, the rains came in torrents, filling up the roads and open stretches, and with water entering our houses. Even after the rains subsided, the ground remained wet and humid for weeks. That is when the termites came, making the mango tree trunk their home and eating away its roots. They ravaged the mango tree from its very core, despite all our efforts to fight them. And slowly the tree dried up, its leaves turning a sickly brown. 

We waited till spring, hoping against hope that something may sprout again. But when nothing showed up, finally last month, about a fortnight after we completed three years in this house, we had to let the tree go...

The backyard looks barren now, and we feel exposed and open to the prying eyes of neighbours. It has been heartbreaking losing the mango tree; it truly feels like losing a family member all over again. Such was the benign motherly presence of our beloved mango tree! 

A saga that ended much too soon...

Autumnal Garden Wonders

 

After a substantial and longer-than-usual spell of monsoon last year, the garden was going wild, with each plant showing extraordinary growth. Meanwhile, the absence of gardeners ('maalis') due to the waxing-waning pandemic didn't make things any easier. 

All the trees in the front yard had grown tall and excessively bushy. Baba's attendant Ramu was already helping with chopping the lawn grass and had no time to give to the trees. That is when the hubby decided to take matters into his own hands, and brought home a couple of fresh blades to saw the trees.

One fine November morning, hubby finally got to chopping the red hibiscus tree. It had been flowering through October, and so was one of the last trees remaining uncut. After pruning a few branches, as we were putting together the wood in manageable piles, we noticed the bright green Jewel Beetle sitting on the main trunk of the hibiscus tree.

Jewel Beetle

Such a gloriously pretty colour it was! Though I recalled seeing one in bright ultramarine blue too, many years back. The next round of pruning revealed something even more extraordinary - a snake skin lay entangled in one of the topmost branches of the hibiscus.

Snake skin entangled in chopped hibiscus branches

As we all watched in awe, we realized we shared our habitat with a slithery creature. In fact, we had found one sunning itself on our porch on a cold morning. Maybe the same fellow had shed its skin on the hibiscus.

Snakeskin held by Miss P

Gingerly extracting the delicate snakeskin from the tree branches, we examined the patterns on it before putting it away in a box. A gift to treasure from the garden!

Surviving A Flash Flood

The Flood

After an unusually cool summer this year, the second half of June and early July turned out to be incredibly hot and humid. The rains usually arrive by June-end but this year the heat was relentless. Till suddenly in mid-July the skies opened up, and how.

On the morning of 19 July, we woke up to swirling waters outside our doors. The lightning and thunder had started the previous night, and it started pouring by 4am. But since it was dark outside, one didn't realise the quantity of rain that was falling. By 7am the water started entering our house - from under the doors, and from all the piping outlets. The rain fell incessantly, sometimes heavy followed by light spells. 

We rushed to remove whatever little we could from the watery onslaught - groceries in cartons, cane furniture, cartons full of books and stationery, floor mats and rugs. Bewildered by the ankle-deep water all over the house, we just sat pondering what hit us. Nobody wanted breakfast even; the worry had killed our appetite. As did the dysfunctional toilets.

Thankfully the authorities had the good sense to switch off the power otherwise electrocutions would have been imminent. The RWA managed to get a pump running by the afternoon that ensured that water levels receded somewhat by the evening. 

Endless rounds of pushing out the water from our rooms using wipers resulted in backaches. Cooked food available in the fridge was a big saving grace. 

The rain stopped by the evening. Electricity was restored around 9pm after the authorities checked each junction to rule out the possibility of short circuits.

The Aftermath

Dampness

Most of the water was gone by the next day after many rounds of thorough cleaning. But one bedroom had a faulty floor levelling, and the accumulated water just stayed put in the corners and middle for a couple of days.

Smell

Floodwaters carry a typical odour, something we discovered when the smell of dampness lingered for days. This despite our trying all forms of ventilation and perfumery to give our olfactory senses some relief.

Spoilage

Stored pulses that had been timely pulled out of harm's way still developed a lot of infestation. Even after the skies had cleared and the sun was out.

Termites

Possibly the worst outcome of the flash flood was a termite attack, both on our mango tree and in the kitchen. The tree is eventually dying, with very little chance of a revival despite our best efforts at containing the termites. Meanwhile, an entire cupboard of the kitchen had to be cleaned out, and yet the termites seem to be spreading to adjoining cupboards.

Climate change is real, and right here! Even our own homes are no longer a safe haven. Time to clean up our act or get swept away...

The Kitchen Corner

Last year around this time I decided to set up a workspace for myself. For that, I required the garden table to be placed in my bedroom. So I decided to shift all the green goodies on it to a new place to free up the said table. The corner outside the kitchen window was most appropriate since a fabricated structure was already in place.

I found a stone slab of approximately matching dimensions and placed it on the fabricated iron cage. Then I arranged my plants, the log of wood and the old letter box on it.... and voila! there was some more green added to the backyard.

Over a period of time, I moved around some of the things to give the place a fresh look. These small planters also substituted to add the touch of green to my bathroom.

The old letter box cleverly hides some leftover painting materials like sandpaper and brushes. And the flowers bring in the much-needed occasional bursts of colour.

Monsoon Memories

Sharing some snapshots of our monsoon days. The rains came towards the end of July, bringing a long spell of unbearable heat and humidity to an end.

Beautiful skies lit up our evenings.

Frangipani Skies

While new blooms in the garden brightened our mornings.

Ruellia

Trumpet Vine

Milk and Honey Crinum Lilies

An unprecedented locust attack was quite an experience.... seemed straight out of a movie, as if apocalypse was at hand.

The downsides: waterlogged streets, the cockroach downpour from the drains, and the day-night electricity outages. 

Struggling For The Basics

 

Every coin has two sides. All this while we mostly came up heads. But the last couple of months have only thrown up tails. 

When we bought the house, the colony was in the middle of a changeover - from the hands of a struggling private company to the established government agency. Everyone was happy at the change and looking forward to better times. But good times vanished even before they could get here!

Let me list down the trouble areas for better understanding:

Roads

Were in extremely bad shape, with potholes so large that many neighbours admitted to substantial damage to their cars. 

Though repairs, carpeting and even recarpeting were carried out, they created newer issues. Manhole areas were left undone, leaving deep yawning holes where many tripped and hurt themselves. And the smoother roads led to over-speeding.

Water Supply

Was fairly regular but water quality was not good as it was muddy. Tanks and filters required regular cleaning.

Supply frequency reduced considerably, water pressure became an issue and the quality further worsened. There were days of no-show, as a result the overhead tanks became near-empty many times. The accumulated slush at the bottom of the tank got into pipelines and the filter, choking the entire system. 

Electricity

Was always a problem in this colony. Ten years back we suffered; our inverter and other appliances went kaput. 

Nothing has changed; rather the situation has gotten worse. After going through a 10-hour outage from 4PM to 2AM we thought we had seen it all. But the worst was an 18-hour outage that lasted from 11PM to 5PM of the next evening. After that they claimed to have changed transformers, cables and suppliers. But the power interruptions continued on a daily basis.

Sewage

The entire city is together on this one. The millenial city has no sewage disposal lines, and whatever is there for namesake does not work.

Waterlogging for days during heavy rains, with water even entering houses seems to be the norm here. Vehicles start malfunctioning as they are parked in water for days and their parts get rusted. There is backflow into the houses from the sewer, with slush and cockroaches getting deposited in our yards.

Garbage Collection

Has been a problem area off and on. 

Contractors were changed but that did not seem to help as garbage was not collected for days on end. And yet, they were prompt in collecting payments. Rainy days are again no-garbage-pick days.

All in all, the ground realities have been exposed within 1.5 years. Now only time and tide will tell what the future holds...

Then & Now: Front Garden

Next in the 'Then & Now' series are shots from the front garden. 

Now

One of the first things that caught my eye when we came around house-hunting was the possibilities that this lovely patch of green opened up. We had a few trees to start with - papaya, curry leaf, and hibiscus. We added more right after moving in - harsingar/shiuli, togor or wax flower, champa, moringa, tecoma, and a sago palm that we rescued.

Though our gardener propped a brinjal bush at a totally inappropriate location, I'm not complaining because the plant gives good produce. But I did insist on clearing out the patio edging and planting season flowers instead. Also, the unusually dry desert-like climate makes it the right environment for lilies. Have planted quite a few; hope they flower well.

Then

Decidedly unplanned and unkempt, with just about anything growing anywhere, it certainly looked like a gardener's worst nightmare in a lot of ways. 

The lack of fencing meant the street dogs could saunter in whenever they pleased. And those clothes drying on the railings.... Eewwww!!! Still I had the courage to take a chance... and with help from the better half managed to turn the place around within an year.

Soothing September

As the scorching summer gave way to some refreshing rains, we witnessed and experienced these rejuvenating moments...

A verdant green lawn that looked so welcoming.

Flowers blooming about our feet.

Butterflies flitting around in delight.

While peacocks called, playing hide-and-seek.

So grateful for the last couple of months that gave us such awesome memories to keep...

The Log of Wood

Sometimes the smallest things hold the strongest connections, just like this log of wood in my garden.

So this piece comes from a huge peepul tree that grew right outside our windows.... in our previous apartment. The peepul gave us many interesting experiences - from watching the antics of mynahs, parakeets and barbets, to seeing the eagle family's annual expansion, tracking the visits of the migratory rosy starlings, to getting awed by the bees and how beautifully they formed their hive. We got a ringside view of all these and more.

One monsoon when the peepul grew rapidly, spreading it's branches into people's homes, it was decided to prune it down. And that is when I opted to keep one of its branches as a keepsake in my garden. My mom thought I was a nut to be doing that but now every time I look at the log, it reminds me of so many stories! When we recently moved houses, I chose to carry the peepul log into my new setting.

Weather-beaten and gnarled, now the peepul log rests on the blue garden table under the mango tree, holding some of my green treasures. Every monsoon it duly rewards us with a toadstool or two! And makes the perfect backdrop in all our garden photos.

Aah, the joy of giving in to our crazy desires sometimes! And valuing those little things that money cannot buy...