Amritsar Blessing for class 12

On Sunday 4 November, 2012 students of class 12 assembled at School at 6 in the morning, for Amritsar. This trip was extremely special since we were going to seek a blessing. Besides it was our last trip as a class. Naturally we were sentimental as was visible from the mixed faces of the students, their parents and teachers.

We said our byes to our parents and settled into the buses to head for the New Delhi Railway Station at around 6:40 am. We boarded the train at around 7:30. The teachers handed us our seat numbers and we all sat down. Finally we were on our way, excited and eager.

The train ride was enjoyable and ended before we knew it. We played card games, dumb-charades, listened to music, chatted and of course, we ate! We had tea and breakfast on the train and even that was fun, all because we were on a train with our friends!

We reached Amritsar at 1:30 pm and headed to our buses. Amritsar was everything we thought it would be-old, historic and full of traffic! Some of the buildings looked as old as from Partition built with a distinctive type of thin brick. The walls were covered with graffiti in Gurmukhi and with election posters and advertisements. We also saw 2 humungous gates, the Hathi Gate and the Gandhi Gate.

Our first stop was the Durgiana Temple, which was a complex of temples. From here we headed for our much awaited lunch at a restaurant called Narulas (yes you read it right, it was Narulas!) We quickly ordered our food, ate and were in the buses, heading for Jallianwala Bagh by 3:45 pm.

At the Jallianwala Bagh we felt moved by the walls punctured by the bullets of General Dyer's men, the memorial in the middle of the park and the infamous well where at least 120 people had jumped to death. Hundreds of innocent people had died here, old and young, men and women, unable to escape as the only exit had been bolt by the adversary.

There were visitors of all ages in the park. Children were playing and the elders taking a stroll. Several foreigners too walked around to absorb the poignant past. Life -sized wire-grass figures had been placed in the park; of those entrapped and pleading, confronted by those of the advancing soldiers readying their triggers. The remembrance was duly reinforced, for us visitors. We felt filled with patriotism as, what we had heard and read about in the past suddenly came very close. We felt we too 'belonged' to this history. The site and it's city no longer seemed strange.

From here we could sight the dome of the Golden Temple and we walked over. It would be our final stop. We entered barefoot, our heads covered. The Temple looked ethereal in the evening as it shone through the dark and in the still water which cradles it. The Ardas was being chanted in the background and we all bowed in it's direction. We bought prashad and proceeded to the shrine for our blessing.

We joined in the langar and thereafter headed back to our buses almost in hesitation. We felt strangely drawn to the sanctity and the tranquility and felt determined to return regardless where our, journeys direct us in the future.

We boarded our train for Delhi and quickly settled in. Some of us chose to sleep while others chose to keep awake and chat. At around 8:30 pm we reached Delhi, got in our buses and reached school by 9. Our parents eagerly received us as we returned.