This year our Tamil New Year started in my in-laws
place - Nagerkoil. Before going into those details, let me tell about my encounters with this city. Nagerkoil is a
small(but growing) city in the southmost part of Tamil
Nadu, just above Kanniyakumari(19 kilometers from Kanniyakumari). I have first heard the name of this
city during my childhood from our Shanmugam Mama, my Dad's friend. Mams's native was Nagercoil. Whenever Mama visits our home, we hear the word "Nagerkoil" atleast 10 times.
Way back in 2003, I was travelling by train to
Trivandrum, for joining in my first company. I was sleeping in the side-lower
birth. Around 1:30 in the night, when the train was passing across
Nagerkoil Junction. I was disturbed from my sleep by people
getting ready to get down at Nagerkoil and at that time I peeped out of
the window. I saw a couple of big white colored fans rotating.
Actually they were power generating windmills. At that time (and even
now) I had a special interest over the city, as it
was my friend's native and I kept awake and kept gazing out through the window till the
train crossed Nagerkoil.
While returning from Trivandrum - this time by bus - it was
raining heavily. I kept looking through the window
when the bus was crossing Nagerkoil. While at Trivandrum, I liked the
city felt that I should settle down in such a small,
calm and beautiful city. Nagerkoil was also close to that - a small
& calm city. But nowadays its gradually changing.
Now, lets come back to our Tamil New Year
celebrations. The specialty of Tamil New Year in Nagerkoil
is - "Kai-Neettam"(in Tamil this means "extending the hand"), a custom in while elders give money to the younger generations
and bless them. So, a nice custom... We get blessings & money too. On April
14th, as usual I woke up around 9:00 AM, when my Sister-in-law gave
"Kai-Neettam" to my little friends and blessed them. Then my Parents-in-law gave "Kai-Neettams" to all of us. And the "Kai-Neettams"
continued. Around the same time I started getting New Year wishes over phone from parents and sisters. Thus we got a considerable amount in hand and I thought why
dont such a function come every month :-).
Then we all got ready and went to the nearby
Krishnankoil Temple. I was surprised to find that my friend had never
been there. It was a nice temple. We prayed to God peacefully. These days our Deepu
kutty starts praying by folding his hands whenever
he sees God.
Overall it was a happy day and we all had a good time.
