My Dear champakkulam

Champakulam is the place where I spent most of my childhood. It was my mother's house and we lived there for many years.

Champakkulam is in Aleppy district. It is A beautiful place, full of palm trees, rivers and paddy fields. The river Pampa flows through the village, splitting it into two. currently it is connected, by road to aleppy and kottayam.

The Champakkulam in my memory is a small village. It didn't have any roads. So the only way to connect to the main land was by boat. Also people used "vallams"( boats without an engine) to travel from place to place through the canals and paddy fields.(When paddy is not cultivated, paddy fields become filled with water)I still remember when I, then a boy of 11 years, fell unconscious due to some reason, I was "hurried to a hospital" in a vallam. When i reached the hospital after one hour, I myself regained consciousness.

We had two schools, St. Mary's High school and St. Thomas U.P. School, hardly half a kilometer from my house. Still we used vallams to travel to the school.

We had a temple nearby, The small Ganapathy temple, which we consider as our own ganapthy. We would go there and pray to him for anything and everything.
Also we had our family temple, pulikkakvu, nearly two kilometer's from our house. we used to go there once in a while, Also by a "valavarayan" vallam, which is a medium sized vallam, with a tent like covering so that the sun and rain will not affect the travellers. Families had different types of vallams, starting with the tiny kochuvallam, to the large kettuvallams. Also we used to visit the kallampally krishna temple, which is also nearby.

Champakulam have a great church, Called Champakkulam valia pally, which is centuries old. Also there are some smaller churches.

THe most important festival of our land is "Champakkulam boat race", which is conducted every year. We used to assemble in the banks of the river and watch the spectacular race.

Champakkulam had two hospitals, one a private mission hospital run by dedicated sisters,and another a government hospital. Due to the healthy nature of my family members, and me we had an account book in the hospital. In case of an emergency, the patient may be taken in a boat to the Alappuzha medical college.

Champakulam had one small printing press, a small cinema hall and one barbershop.

For the people of Champakkulam, the worst enemy was the flood that came regularly and destroyed everything. River Pampa will bless the village for weeks when there will be water everywhere. We enjoyed the rain and floods because we could convert large copper vessels used for boiling paddy into vallams and travel through the landscapes under water.

Now Champakkulam has changed much. Road facility is there, the theater has vanished, and people can go to nearby towns in buses and cars for purchase. The old schools have also been upgraded. So it a small town now, but it has still not lost its village charms.