Saraca asoca

An Ashoka, Saraca asoca, on Karuna Road is booming. Me stood and watched the moustachioed,
yellowish orange flowers; chatted with it, a one-way affair, felt its oblong, slightly rough leaves; waited. The tree stands near the Mamta Nursing Home, birthing nearly half of Borivili's new generation; every youngster is born here; in Marathi it is called Jasundi. Perhaps, the lone Saraca asoca in the area. There is talk and write these days of bird watching; me am happy; me is now into tree watching, standing before trees, relishing the first spring, brown leaves of a peepal; red flowers of a coral tree; and then on Link Road spotted this tall, old man with a smile crinkling the Gandhian spectacles hanging on to his eyes. He stood before shallow pink flowers of a Spotted Gliricidia; softly pulled out a camera from his canvas bag and took down the tree. The tree has a number as all trees on Link Road. 'These days I click all the trees, match them against google pics and learn a bit about them to become their friends. And anyway, they wont be her for long; like condemned prisoners in jails, they wait with numbers on their trunks, for the earth machines to mow them,' the old man said with laughs intact. Yes, he is being factual. Me has read a Brihan Mumbai Municipal Corporation notice, signed, stuck to a peepal, detailing the number of trees to be hacked and the number to be replanted, which never happens. Borivili (W) is being dug, dug by all, you, me and the world. Electricity and telephone companies, Metro, road contractors have dug up Borivili (W); nothing is left undug; nothing is left to dig; a new money-making game with fresh currency notes. Morning walkers shuffle around speeding cars and bikers; they have no rights except that to be pushed around; have yet to see a car driver or bikers waiting for the old to cross Link Road. On a Sunday morning, Yogi Nagar Road branching off Link Road, is empty as all the car and bike owners are sleeping in or on their vehicles; on this stretch parents love their cars more than their kids. Of many peepals, the dear one stands opposite Dental Hub. This morning, it had golden orioles, coppersmiths, crows.... Rama and me stood, appreciated the gesture ... as birds may not be without trees. Labernums are into yellow flowering.... And then some quiet on a green, wooden bench. When friend Jonty, the labrador, rolled up, climbed on the bench, gave a Sunday licking, lay down .... in a Sunday happiness.