Near Death Experience

everyone comes face to face with death , atleast once in their life time.
mine was... when i was in 5th std. i suppose i cud say the same applies to my cousin preeth too...

Different people have different ways of spending holidays. we were always on the outlook for the more outrageous ones.
and one of these escapades nearly brought the curtains down on us.
beaches always hold a fascination for almost everyone and even more so when you are on the younger side.

eventhough i had spent most of my childhood in coastal areas, that doesnt make it any less.
in kannur the beach was just a couple of kms away from the place where we dwelled.

we were in 5th std when we got our first cycles (preeth& me) BSA SLR ,that was the only type available in the market for the childrens section at that time.
i had a blue one and preeth had a red one.. we always preferred the off roads...the beaten tracks, so to speak.

as one side is sea and the other side was too hilly for us to navigate, we invertedly ended up on the beaches more often than not.
we were obviously banned from going to the beaches. they always found it to be too risky for us, especially since both of us didnt know swimming at all but we thought otherwise.

and on one of these trips we ended up on a really deserted stretch of beach. as we didnt kno swimming we never ventured out too deep. we always just ran around the edge, just wetting our feet and trying to splash each other and get drenched in the process.
this time around, while doing so preeth accidently lost his chappal.he came to know about it after some time only. by then it was totally lost. we had no idea where he had lost it.we ran around trying in vain to spot it.

then i came up with this rather stupid idea(back then i considered it on par with sherlock holmes) to throw the other chappal also, so that we can watch where it ends up.....hopefully , it wud float ashore at the same clave.
so he threw it and we waited eagerly with our breaths held...well..... nothing much happened though.....it staright away got washed ashore at the same place where we threw it. we gave it a couple of more tries , but the incompetent chappal was unable to locate its partner:-)

with broken hearts(not cus of loosing the chappals, but at the failure of my idea) we decided to call it quits. as we were turning , preeth suddenly spotted the chappal floating near the edge.

so we ran towards it without thinking much, there was some rocks that ran into the sea, some of them were on the shore and sum trailing on to the water. so we had to run around it, and as we were crossing the rocks, a huge waved suddenly came out of nowhere and swept us off.

it was made worse as our attention was completely diverted looking at the chappal that both of us didnt see it coming.. and there we were...... tumbling and rolling in water, swallowing water mixed with mud.

i was shouting at the top of my voice to help me but ironically he was also doing the same. i could feel the water receding back and it was taking me along with it...i was trying to get up on my feet but i just couldnt balance myself. the sand receding from underneath me made it impossible to have any control on my movements...

the one good thing when u r fighting for ur life is that u dont have time for any negatives thoughts to enter ur mind cus u r always engrossed in staying alive.. so i never gave in..in between when my head wud pop above the water i cud see the shore getting farther and farther . the distance was increasing.

i somehow finally managed to get back on my feet, but the bobbling water was now neck high. and as i was looking frantically for any signs of preeth another wave crashed into the back of my head and i fell face first in to the water. again i was now completely under water, the muddy water made it impossible for me to open my eyes .i was again being dragged back.

suddenly i felt something brush my hands and i grabbed it, it was one of those rocks in the sea. i tried to get a firm grip but it was so damn slippery , with all my might i dragged myself towards it and somehow managed to get a firm holding and then i managed to keep my head above water
and looked for preeth towards the shore, but no one was standing there it was totally deserted there was no sign of him, things were getting really scary. i looked behind me and still i couldnt find any signs of him and then with quivering voice i called out his name, for a sec no reply came and then i heard my name being called and it sounded very near to me, wud u biliv it , he was also clinging on to the same rock on the other side for his dear life. we were saved by the rocks, well atleast for the moment. now came the tough part of getting back on shore.

the water was too deep for us, actually we didnt have much idea how deep the water was there, the land looked too far off...we waited for a while to catch our breath and hoped for the water to recede. but it was not happening, that left us with no choice but to make a dash for it. and we waited for one of the big waves to recede back so that the next wave that comes will be blocked by the receding one.
and it happened just as we wished, one big wave came and was receding and as soon as it crossed us we ran for our dear lives, well u cud say, we somehow managed to bobble our way towards shore keeping our nose above water we were jumping on our toes and wading our way towards shore and then another wave came and hit us , but this time we were prepared, we just went with it and it helped us get to chest high water . from there on it was a mad rush , we both ran for our dear lifes shouting each others name to hurry up and atlast we made it ashore. totally exhausted, we lay there on the beach completely drenched and with mud all over us.

and during all this calamity both his chappal had washed ashore ,i had kept mine on higher grounds.

so we bid goodbye to our beach, we couldnt go in such state to our home, we wud hav had to spent the rest of our holiday under house arrest. so he came up with the idea to clean overselves completely b4 going home, so we went to one of his friends place,bathed then washed our clothes and ironed it dry. first time that i had done either of the last two.
and then we went home..onnum ariyaatha randu paavam poochakuttikale pole veettil keri..
little did they know what had happened, how close they came to loosing their children that day

somehow the event had a lasting impact on me. from that day onwards i never ventured out much into sea, eventhough i do know a little bit of swimming now.
after that day, i hav never gone deeper into sea than up to my waist
well...
other than only once.......