Day out at the Numaish

My fellow blogger Vinod says in his latest post: "Only a true Hyderabadi can understand the fuss behind the tamasha that is the Numaish. And only a true Hyderabadi and no one else can come out smiling after spending hours gawking inside the Numaish." That is so absolutely true and I have been a regular visitor to this annual Hyderabadi 'exhibition' ever since I had some money in my pocket and ever since Shruti came into my life...and the early numaish visits were in the nature of being a committed follower and gawker...and of late I have been making small purchases of my own...(great maan!!)...of course, there are no books or pens or music shops there, so for me there is very little choice, unless one wants to buy clothes...and I have bought a hand-sewing machine, which looks like a stapler...a muffler from a Kashmiri stall...very ingenious metal candle stands...and one my favourite stalls is the 'pachak and churan' stall...where you get a variety of tangy preserves which presumably aid in digestion...gooseberry, mango, ginger, tamarind... sometimes as pieces dipped and dried in sugar and spice and sometimes powdered and pelleted...very nice to chew on and do a 'tack' with your tongue and screw your face at the tangy taste...very nice... and of course, Shruti buys a lot of household stuff and something for herself every year...

This time, my parents are here and Shruti was planning to visit with my mother...my mother has visited the numaish previously and has become a great fan...but somehow things didn't work out for Shruti and so, it fell upon me to take my mother and father and to the numaish...

Even if you don't want to buy anything, just going there is bound to bring a smile to your face...that familiar path leading to the gate with snacks stalls on both sides selling fried snacks (god knows fried in what oil)...small hawkers selling unusual toys...and the counter where tickets are sold...and then you enter the gates...and because I am a 'leftist' by orientation, I always turn left...and there would always be a line of endless stalls selling Kashmiri clothes...but this time, they were replaced with Bengali sarees stalls...and then after the Bengali stalls came the Kashmiri stalls...so they were there after all...

What did we buy at the numaish?...I was looking for the 'pachak and churan' stalls... and mother was generally gazing lovingly at the Kashmiri sarees...I bought mother a Kashmiri saree, and bought one for Shruti and one more for mother...ha ha ha...then mother wanted to buy some kitchen items...a large sieve and an oil container...and then I spied a 'p & c' stall...somehow, I didn't like the look of the items kept there and moved away disappointed...and decided the explore the nearby pickles stall...ummmmmm...good only...nice smelling north Indian pickles...I bought three varieties of pickles...stuffed red chillies, green chillies, and big slice raw mango...these are the kind of pickles that Shruti would bring back from Gaya and Patna and thought she'd like them...and after we came home, she just gobbled up one big raw mango slice heavily spiced...I did something right after all...ha ha ha...

We were moving around the central stalls and I saw a stall selling something which I have been hunting around in Hyderabad for months...it was a numismatics and philately stall...wow...I have been looking for an album to store and display my modest coins collection and here they had around 5 kinds of albums (of all things, this was a Hyderabad-based stall and their 'permanent' shop is right there in the vicinity of Secunderabad railway station...what a dud I am!!!) ... this is wonderful...honestly, I never felt so elated in a long long time...I don't know why...after all, it is only a plastic thingy...but these things happen...they were also selling coins, notes, and stamps...but I wanted only the coins album and after inspecting the various models, I bought one which would hold around 300 coins...seeing and buying this instantly gave me a boost...and then we went around hoping to buy a suitable toy for my little one...after visiting a number of toy stalls and debating the pros and cons of various toys, bought a rather tame 'oil tanker' for her...a big one...she is happy, of course...and that is what counts...