Last week my mother-in-law and I went for an impromptu "picnic". This wasn't a British picnic, we didn't bring sandwiches, find a patch of grass, sit down on a blanket and drink lemonade. This was a Nagpurian picnic, which I have come to realise is a little trip out of the city. I am always ready for a chance to get out of the city so we travelled about 40 km to a temple dedicated to Lord Ganesh (Ganpati Baba), Adasa.
Asada was absolutely beautiful with its peaceful incense infused atmosphere. As the sun started to dip below the horizon, standing outside the mountainside temple we could see for miles, a huge blanket of rural Maharashtra under an orange and pink sky.
To our surprise, our impromptu picnic to a Lord Ganesh temple coincided with a festival celebrating the God himself, so the temple was full of worshippers. Don't you just love coincidences like that? Most of the women were dressed in a style associated with North India, their pallu (loose end of the saree) pulled over their heads and heavy jewellery balancing on their brow. I absolutely love this style and it's so different from the way Maharashtrian women dress so we guessed this festival must originate from the North.
A girl caught my eye, she looked about the same age as my youngest sister, Sophie. She had large, dark almond shaped eyes and round cheeks, I smiled at how adorable she was, my smile faded I realised something was different. She was wearing a navy blue embellished saree, the pleats were neat and the pallu perfectly placed over her head, but she was shuffling uncomfortably towards the temple. It was so strange to see a young girl, who looked to me between twelve and fourteen years old, wearing a saree.
The idol inside this temple was the biggest I've ever seen, the priest had to climb the twelve foot tall statue of the elephant headed God to place the garlands across his neck. This idol of Lord Ganesh had been created from a huge piece of carved rock painted bright orange, it was a spectacular sight.
As we left the temple and made our way back to the car, the girl with the almond eyes caught my eye again. I noticed she was trailing behind an elderly couple and a tall man with deep acne scars, her almond eyes to the ground, trying not to trip over the neat pleats she had been dressed in. Then I noticed the small mangalsutra around her neck and the faded mehendi on her hands. My heart dropped to the pit of my stomach and my mother-in-law looked at me, also noticing the mangalsutra, as shocked as I was.
That night I could not get that innocent face out of my mind, I still can't. Yes, she may have looked much younger than she is but I cannot forget the way she was struggling to walk in her saree and those child like almond eyes.