A fantastic summer evening

Featured in

  • Published 20150804
  • ISBN: 978-1-922182-90-6
  • Extent: 264 pp
  • Paperback (234 x 153mm), eBook

I WAS THAT age when I was bathing in the season’s first rains without shame or concern for the holes in my underwear. Together with my first cousins V and S, and S’s friend R, I was enjoying a downpour on the front lawn, sliding and muddying the slippery floors of the verandah, not listening to the half-dozen elders living in my mother’s brother’s small house where we spent every summer vacation.

That evening I saw kachindo the first time. V pointed at it and yelled the word in alarm when he saw me squatting next to a chameleon in the bushes. I turned around and noticed the brown, very still, twig, which suddenly produced two round roving eyes. Kachindo! An ancient-looking meditative reptile. A curious little dinosaur camouflaging in the bush, focused on the newly born winged black ants. Our Gujarati name for chameleon stuck with me. An impressive name for an impressive animal that had the ability to simultaneously be in a place and be invisible. I observed it attentively as it charged on an ant, swallowed it and then disappeared.

Already a subscriber? Sign in here

If you are an educator or student wishing to access content for study purposes please contact us at griffithreview@griffith.edu.au

Share article

About the author

Mohit Parikh

Mohit Parikh is author of Manan (HarperCollins, 2014). He was recently awarded a Toto Award for Creative Writing 2015. His works have been published...

More from this edition

Good things come in pairs

MemoirONE OF THE first things you notice at a Chinese wedding reception is the Chinese character for ‘double happiness’. Among the swaths of vermillion...

Back Again

e-bookChain-smoking karang guni guy pushes his bike on the leftmost side, along the double yellow lines as taxis slither past. I admit I missed...

Stay up to date with the latest, news, articles and special offers from Griffith Review.