We built our own house in Chennai, on the East Coast Road (on the way to Pondicherry) near a village called Uthandi. The house is situated in one of the lanes heading towards the sea, still an unpaved road. Only a few houses are around, it’s still a quiet, uninhabited neighbourhood.
The design of the house was inspired by an architect friend V, whose team later helped in the execution of this dream house. With my close supervision (and I’s occasional, timely engineering inputs) we completed the house in eighteen months.
The house was built within a thicket of Casuarina trees. Though we’d encouraged these trees to grow for years, and tried to still maintain them, many had to be cut down from time to time to make room for other fruit varieties to grow. A huge one was felled only last year to make room for a swimming pool. The lemon tree gave us the most beautiful lemons almost all year-round. It was a true pleasure sharing this yield of the land with friends. Despite being a seaside plot the coconut palms somehow did not do well, probably due to incompatibility with the casuarinas!
An expanse of a huge Yellow flame tree covered most of the garden, providing lots of shade. The canary-yellow flowers of this tree present a breath-taking view in summer. While still fresh, they fall on the ground, forming a radiant carpet of bright gold on the green ‘shade’ grass.
The greenery around attracted many birds. Kingfishers, Hoopoes, Bulbuls, Drongos, Tree Pies, Mynas, Koels, Crow Pheasants , Doves and Green Bee Eaters were frequent visitors, though aside from these regulars there were others, including the Babblers and Crows (scavenging around and often fighting, creating a real racket among themselves). On 2 rare occasions A and I also sighted a Golden Oriole!
The house gets its character (and charm) from the various roofs covered with terracotta Kerala tiles, which are moss-resistant and heat-reflective, suited for the hot and humid climate of Chennai. The beams, rafters and pillars which form the skeleton for the roofs in the verandah are made of Padak wood, which is locally available and the best all-round option after teak. This wood is red in colour, and we therefore painted it dark green … to contrast with the terracotta tiles and the red ceramic flooring (as viewable in the photographs). The walls of the house are white, but adorned with a deep yellow in places, again to complement the other colours.
The two verandahs running along the living area of the house converge into a bigger verandah space. This extention of the house became our most favourite haunt … we had our morning cups of tea or coffee here, reflected or listened to music, spent time with the dogs, entertained friends and family here, and this was the place from where we watched all the winged friends that visited. In the silence of the night, sitting here we could often also hear the sea in the distance.
To the east of the house is the sea, the Bay of Bengal … a glimpse of which one can get from our terrace. Though the casuarina grove on one side and the new lot of houses on the other allowed only a glimpse of it, the good news was that these acted as natural filters to the corrosive sea-breeze, thus reducing deterioration to our home appliances!
The beach is actually a 5-minute walk from the house. Many of our evening walks were along this beach, and fishing boats, nets, fish drying on the sand were common sights ... but sometimes the plastic and lack of cleanliness was a put-off, and worse, the sight of villagers squatting along the water-line relieving themselves would take all the fun out of it. Anyway, the moods of the waves and the sea breeze … helped you forget all these sights.
We lived in this house for nearly 5 years, with short trips to Chennai in the last 2 years as by then we’d started a home in Dubai, then regretfully deciding to lease it out last year. But we’d spent Quality time there with the family, it was a major milestone in our lives, a really wonderful phase and we all miss it a lot.
I must say it was the most fulfilling experience of my life so far. Usually one would hear the elders say it’s a job organising a wedding or building a house. It’s true, one can only know what it takes by experiencing it.
This was not just a house with walls and beams but our home made of love and dreams.
