The Bridge Across Forever

We were on our maiden trip to Orissa. I wasn't sure for how long I was asleep. But this is what i saw when I woke up.

Image of the bridge that runs over 'Mahanadi' near Cuttack.

The weird thing about our trip was that there didn't seem to be many hotels or restaurants WITH restrooms on the Cuttack- Chilka lake road. I think I had begun to hallucinate about signboards. Iam - here. Whatever I had imagined it to be, the lake had definitely turned out to be much much much more soothing. Notice the faint row of hills just over the horizon of the Chilka lake? The locals were waiting for a boat to take them to the Durga Devi temple in the island near by. As the legend goes, a young bride was on her way to her husband's house (with her entourage) on a boat when a storm broke out in the lake. When the storm subsided, all were present in the boat except for the young bride. It is believed that the 'Durga Devi' had taken her. I had decided that Goddesses who were fond swallowing young brides can't be that good after all. It didn't take us too long to reach the island with the 'Durga Devi' temple. I quickly announced that I was in no mood to say hello to the Goddess. But while waiting for my folks to return, I couldn't help but notice that the mouth of the horse-statue-god had an uncanny resemblence to the woman who was standing near by. I wonder why we Indians feel the need to yell on top of our voices all the time ! (I do it all the time, but just can't help it :/ ) I'd like to call our captain Mr. Rajnikanth. Isn't he cool? With the glasses et all? (Avoid the second officer, who is shamelessly trying to devour all the attention which was originally bestowed upon Mr. R) At some point, the gang had come to a conclusion that sitting on a boat+looking out into the blue equates to uber cool bollywood. I did the worst I could ;0D We were told that we will need to wade through some ankle deep water to reach our vehicle. But I was already wishing we could have stayed longer in the boat. There was this dog who kept following my mother and aunty. He was very polite. Always waiting in the background.. This one was just like the lake - calm, peaceful, yet very much alive. I wish we didn't have to go back..