“ Roomani is the word that comes to the mind…for us Indians, rains are akin to a sense of fulfilment… as if we all together have been yearning for something and the wait is finally over.”įor long-time buddies and homemakers Sharmila and Chitra, rain is an adventure. Nandini Rao, artistic director of Yours Truly, a Bengaluru-based playback theatre company, agrees. His travelogue tells us with wry humour why monsoons are such an integral part of our collective consciousness. In more modern times, this love of rain was what prompted British author Alexander Frater to pen his iconic book Chasing the Monsoon where he literally did that - he witnessed firsthand the monsoon bursting upon Kerala and slowly journeying up to Delhi, Kolkata, Cherrapunji and finally on to Bangladesh and wrote about it like a true romantic adventurer. This was true of Kalidasa as well who arguably wrote the most hyperbolic tribute to those carriers of rain in his epic work Meghadootam where a lovelorn couple enlists the help of a wayward cloud to communicate their feelings. (You will not, for instance, see many go gaga over how sunny or wintry it is). Of all the seasons, it is monsoon that evokes a range of emotions within us. Just serene,” he says.įor most of us, rain is a recurring, living, breathing character in our lives. “When I watch rains, I am still neither excited nor unhappy. Though there must exist people like Mrityunjay Sawant, a digital content specialist, who says it is only rains that completely calm him down. Sheela Vasanth, an educator, says rains brings out all her ice-cream cravings! “When it rains I am more like a child than my children - I rush out to eat ice-cream and get drenched,” she says.Įvidently, there are not many centrists when it comes to rain. “I love everything about it - the soaking-playing-drenching, the rainy day songs, the coffee and bhajjis - no umbrella needed!” she says. Later when I ask her, she coolly tells me I gave her permission the other day when it was raining!” laughs Chaya. So, when I am watching rains, she ensures I say yes to things I normally wouldn’t.

“My daughter knows how happy rains make me. She says the very thought of rain makes her delirious. On the other end of the rainbow is Chaya Dwarkanath, a ‘Bengaluru hudugi’ who has now settled in California. So she adds that when it rains, she would like to snuggle with someone and watch it from the comfort of her home, without getting wet.

This sunshine soul has a strong suspicion (and not without reason) that she may be in the minority after all, it is not quite the done thing to decry rains. They make me feel sad, locked up and constrained,” declares Ramya Shashibhushan, a homemaker-entrepreneur. “I don’t like the rains and I absolutely detest getting wet when it is pouring. And the battle lines seem to be clearly drawn. It is a truth universally acknowledged that there are two kinds of people in this world - those who love rains and those who don’t.

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