IT RAINED HEAVILY THAT SUNDAY

Rain rain go away,

Come again another day,

Little Johnny wants to play.

It rained heavily that Sunday. The words of this rhyme echoed in my mind as I waited for the rain to stop. It had started raining early in the morning and then it diminished to a mild dizzle. My friend and I had thought of going out. I was brave enough to go to her place inspite of the bad weather.

Luckily, the rain soon stopped, the sun peeped through the clouds and the water drops glistened in the mild sunshine. Both of us were full of joy and started out.

We reached the main road and waited for an auto to come. Suddenly the sun hid behind a cloud and we glanced with dismay at each other. Just then an auto stopped in front of us and we quickly got inside without much ado. There was no giving a second thought. Once more it began to pour and we were clueless, what to do in case it does not stop. As the auto was open on both sides, showers of water flew in and started to drench us. The rain God is such a spoil sport, I said to myself. The roof of the auto above my head began to drip and I had to adjust myself in a way so I could escape it. The water was flying in from both the sides and we had no way to escape. Especially, I was worried for the girl as I could see her feeling a lot uncomfortable. I felt it was a blunder going out on such a rainy day. Just then the auto driver pulled over and another passenger joined us. She was a lady, bit too fat and her saree totally drenched. My friend was getting sandwitched between both of us while I had nothing to do to bail her out. It was such an uncomfortable situation as all three of us had no place to move. We somehow endured the discomfort till the auto stopped at the exhibition ground. Fortunately, the rain had stopped and we jumped out to get our tickets.

Because of the bad weather there was a short queue at the ticket window and we patiently stood at the end of it. All round the place, there were little muddy patches filled with water. I bought tickets for both of us and then we entered the gate. Just the very next moment, it began to rain once again. I wished I had remembered to bring umbrellas for both of us. We ran towards the very first stall we saw and entered hurriedly without even trying to read the banner to see what was inside. It turned out to be an exhibition of some kind of machinery – something we both were least interested in. However, we had to remain inside to escape the rain. My friend said, if atleast we had got into one of the state emporia, we would have had something to look around, and perhaps, buy. We had to wait for almost an hour untill the rain fizzled out. We walked with the polythene bags which we got from the sales person, which we tore to hold over our heads.

The lady was feeling cold and damp and wanted to have a cup of coffee before going any further. To her bad luck, coffee was no where to be found. We reached a nearby tea stall and she had a steaming cup of tea. She felt quite refreshed as I kept watching her as tea and coffee do not agree with me. Once again the rain began to fall heavily and we had to remain inside the tea stall. We sat on the stools and kept looking at the rain which had now started falling in sheets. As soon as it slowed down, we once again quickly moved towards the Himachal Pradesh emporium. We looked at everything there was to see and my friend bought a couple of scarves. We made our way out apprehensively lest it was still raining. Our fears turned out to be true for it was indeed raining very heavily. Anyway, we made our way through the rain and entered the Orissa emporium. We saw the arts and crafts of our state, the silks and cottons galore and felt that our visit was not completely a waste. As we belong to Orissa, everything inside the stall looked so pleasantly familiar that we did not want to come out. When at last we came out, once more we found it to be raining. Now, I was feeling cold because my clothes were wet and my friend had a running nose. Though I seldom take tea, it was I who wanted to have a cup this time. My friend was happy to have her second cup. So once again, we made our way through the drizzle to the tea stall and had a slice of cake and tea. I looked at my watch and found that it was 4 O’ clock. While taking my friend out,  I had promised her mom that we would be back by that time. We quickly decided to return home, a bit disappointed that we had hardly seen anything of the exhibition.

We swiftly walked through the muddy patches filled with more water this time, to reach the road. Fortunately, we found an auto without any wait. Even though there were already two people inside it, we decided to take it.

We got down at our place feeling quite dejected, tired and a bit sad that the rain kept us from enjoying our day. After all, both of us had a chance to go out together after a long time. The rain had spoilt a day that we both had been looking forward to for a long time. We decided to go out again the next Sunday.

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