Dr. Showkeen Bilal Gul Faculty Member, Department of Education, South Campus, University of Kashmir

1. Rainy Day Picnic: A Unique Experience of Enjoyment and
Expenditure
By:
Dr. Showkeen Bilal Gul
Faculty Member, Department of Education, South Campus, University of Kashmir
Part I
It was 4th June 2015, the day we decided to have picnic from South Campus,
Kashmir University to Pelhgam (land of heavens on earth). The day before picnic
all the students were eager and busy in preparations, it was same as I was feeling
and doing my school and college days during picnics. On the day of picnic when at
morning I woke up, it was a cold, breezy and cloudy day; the weather pinches me a
little as it was a day we decided to have a picnic. After that I did phones calls to
my colleagues to enquire about the programme of picnic and I came to know that
all students were ready to have a picnic on rainy day. Our journey to picnic starts
from women’s college Anantanag, we all get on to the university bus and seated
comfortably. When I looked towards my students, there was a mixed type of
feelings; on their beautiful and innocent faces I noticed the feelings of sadness
because of rain fall. But some students were also excited to have first experience of
picnic on a rainy day. In this way we started our journey towards pelhgam, on the
way students started having little fun, singing songs, making and passing joking
and also dedicated songs to teachers. So it was 11:30 when we reached at pelhgam
bus stand and we decided to have tea in order to refresh our body and mood.
Having a small budget we decided to search a cheap hotel, after 10 minutes
enquiry about rate of tea. My colleagues informed me that here one cup of tea
having rate of Rs 40, after a while we became successful in managing a cheap
hotel to take tea. When we started to having tea in hotel, I observed some students
were feeling uncomfortable because our hotel was not so much hygienic. My
senior fellow motivated them by jokes and experience, after a little they all started
enjoying sips of tea with kashmiri rooti. After all tea was very delicious like the
famous tea of Chungi of Aligarh Muslim University. after taking tea, we decided to
visit Baitawb Valley, it was 12:30 we reached there, when we get off from the bus
rain was pouring down continuously. The gigantic threes round the hills of
pelhgam were looking charming and the smell was so pleasing that I kept on
breathing for quite some time. The students were exited they started approaching
towards Baitawb Valley, reached at gate they came to know that there is entry fee
of 100 per student. What happened inside the valley read part II.

2. Part II will be uploaded soon