Gopinath bari

In Ramnagar road no 4 we have our original house which we call Gopinath bari. Dadubhai bought that before partition and Ninipishi or Leena and Bhai jethun take the possesion as both of them were in India then, Bhai jethun was doing his graduation in commerece in Maharaja Bir Bikram College and Ninipishi was a school teacher. The owner of the house was a shopkeeper and even after selling the house ninipishi had few sleepless night as the shopkeeper used to come drunk and used to ask them to vacate the house.

Later everybody came down to that house from bangladesh and gradually Ninipishi, chottopishi also got married. Misti pishi got married in India itself from their maternal uncles house or rather my thakurma's house of Ramnagar road no 9 long before that .

Gopinath bari always have its own charm. The pond, Gopinath ghor, the open Varanda, the coutyard, the old rooms have there own attachment. I grew up in that house till 4th standard. We had scarecity of rooms, water , proper planning but still most of my sweet memories are centred in that house. I have memories of plucking flowers after getting up early in the morning with baba, the pond, the duck house, the grandfather clock ( that eventually became bad and got replaced with a white Ajanta wall clock even before bhai was born), the store room where thakurma used to store her groceries inside the main Boro ghor(Hall) which was made using a wooden and flowry fabric frame (eventually gifted by chotto pisho) every thing have some memories attached to them. Some special cups which were stored inside thakurma's glass and wooden almirah were kept and used only when my new brother in law or somebody really special used to visit our house. There were special dishes of china clay and glass bowls stored in another glass and wooden showcase in that room itself which were used in special occasions like bhai phota. I still rememeber the semaier payesh and Luchi served in them. Besides those there were books ( most of them were presented during marriages of my dad and uncles), cups, medals and pictures won by any of the Bhattacharjee's. I still remember the old black gown that dadubhai used to wear in court and that was kept in one corner of the almirah wheer all big big copper vessels were kept and used for cooking Khichuri and Payesh during Durga 9basanti) Puja , manasha puja and e.t.c ( which got cut by Rat and I was really disappointed to see that)and his wooden stick ( slightly broken handle) and his 'Hooko' which baba got for him. The Chair where he used to sit was also there kept in the Varanda. When everybody( dadabhai, boneydada, Sona, pupudidi, sumandada) used to come home during summer vacation and there were shortage of chairs in the dining table, those chairs were added up to increase number of sits and we used to fight to sit and have food sitting in dadur chair.

In the main hall and the room where me, my ma ,baba and bhai used to stay was tin roofed and there were fence ceiling. So during afternoon, the sun rays used to come through those small holes and I used to count them lying down with thakurma. I specially miss the wonderful sound that rain used to make while splashing in the 'tin er chal' . We even had a matir chula ( Mud oven) in the kitchen cum dinning room where Ma initially used to cook after marriage. According to thakurma food cooked in a mud oven tastes really nice. Later I have seen only rice being cooked in that and rest every thing used to get cooked in the gas oven.
I used to swing in the front gate of Gopinath's house and used to fantasize. Our room was adjacent to the entrence and so whenever there used to be any sound in the gate I used to look through the window eagerly if any guest had come.

There used to be one garden next to the pond where thakurma used to do gardenning in the evening. Every afternoon I used to lie down beside ma and pretend sleeping and count till the clock strikes four so that I can go for gardening with thakurma. I still remember her 'khupri' and the scpecial 'chaku ' she used to use. There were magic in them. And there were Rajmohan da who used to come once in a while to clean the house and to take out coconut and beatle nuts from the trees.

I also remember Pratimar ma and pratima who used to work in our house. They were there right from the time of Daubhai . Pratima got married and went to Teliamura when I was small . There was a white coloured amall cup with e broken handle in chich she was served tea and a aluminium plate in chich food was served to her. I always used to fantasize having food in those.