“Let us go to Kollengode!” – this is what is trending in social media nowadays and this is what got triggered, out-of-blue, among the friends as we were attending a marriage function near Palakkad. “It is just a 30 min drive, let us go!” and we all are set. Social media is bustling with Kollengode reels since it got listed in the best 10 villages of India! Now trippers, vloggers and many obsessed with social media are crowding to this tiny hamlet to make their own reels or in their attempt to go back in time and live their nostalgia.
Soon after our presence was recorded at the function which was followed by a heavy lunch, we started to Kollengode. Through the reels and vlogs most of us were already familiar with this place even without visiting it once. Our first destination was definitely to have a good solid tea to refresh and awaken our nerves. Before 2 pm, we were at the tea shop of Chellan Chettan, familiar now to all who follow Kollengode vlogs and reels! We did not expect to get tea at that time. But not only did we have very good tea, we also had freshly fried snacks as well. The road splits into two from there one taking to Chinganchira Nature Temple and another taking us to Paddy Storage Room. We visited both the places and on our return visited Seetharkund waterfalls as well. All pleasant, green rich locations. But do the vlogs and reels really convey the reality? This is a very deliberate question which we all should ask in black and white to ourselves before blindly going after social media.
Let us start with Kollengode listed among the 10 most beautiful villages in India. Did we ask who selected it? Did we ask on what criteria it got selected? The answer is most of us do not know. We just heard it in the media or in the vlogs and we simply got convinced it is one of the most beautiful. It is surprising how easily the people of this educated state can also be deluded into believing what the vloggers, reelers or the media wants them to believe! The fact is this list of beautiful villages is neither from any authorized agency nor from any govt. department. It is just from a twitter handle (Colours of Bharat) who suggested it, probably from their explorations or their study and we readily took it to another level.
So does it mean Kollengode is not that great a place to visit? This is a subjective question. It depends on various factors – your expectation, your locality, the season, the day you visit etc. For eg. If you are 1-2 hour drive from Kollengode it is worth visiting it on a pleasant day (with light rains) and preferably on a weekday. It is a good place to visit in case you are travelling to any nearby place there, such as to Thrissur or Palakkad and you have some catch up idle time. Now, if you have to drive four or more hours just to be at this place and that too on a weekend or holiday it is a big No! Even on summer days probably this place may not be the way you expect it to be. And it is again a No to all who already have high expectations about this simple village watching all those beautified reels.
Why is it so subjective? It is after all a beautiful village nevertheless. Isn’t it? Okay – here it is – Kollengode has paddy fields which you can see in several other places in Kerala and you may easily choose one such place which is close to you. Yes, Kollengode has a beautiful backdrop of mountains and a waterfall nearby, making it subjective. But decide it objectively. Then there are many who are coming here to have tea from a nostalgic gracefully underdeveloped hut – hmm, I would like to say, you are sliced by social media – come out of it and reinvent yourself. All these hang-outs here are nowadays crowded by those who are sucked in by social media. Their commutes have already spoiled this beautiful village, the empty bottles, the plastic wastes, their SUV grinded roads – may it be Nature Temple or Seetharkund waterfall all are amply polluted already. Even the outer space is now filled with thrash sent by man, then how can we expect this earth to be clean! Human beings are the most hygienic polluters of this Universe!
But isn’t it at least helping the villagers to get some extra bucks? Ha, the most destructive question. Kollengode is already turning into a classic example of how the mindset of an uncomplicated, innocent simple village gets destroyed by the lure for money. If you observe the villagers now, they are already competing among themselves for those extra bucks thrown to them by these commuters. There are new tea stalls sprouting around, there are competing parking areas, there are new constructions in progress and definitely there will be more hangouts, more resorts and more concrete structures around ending up in destroying whatever was expected out of this humble village.
So what is in a nutshell to summarize? In simple one line - Let us not contribute to anything that leads to the destruction of the original definition and intention of this village. If that means traveling responsibly, so it be or if that means not even visiting it, so it be too!
Preserving this pristine village and its unpolluted souls is much more important than these insatiable cravings emerging from the over polluted, superficial, fabricated and cosmeticized social media!
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