Skip to main content

Book Review: The Last Tonga Ride by Ruskin Bond

The Last Tonga Ride by Ruskin Bond is a short story about his childhood days that he spent with his grandmother in Dehradun of colonial India. The narrator is Bond himself, living with his granny in a big bungalow that has all kinds of trees. His father is posted in Delhi, serving Royal Air Force. He sends Bond gifts and other books since he cannot come to meet him.



Granny often goes to bank and bazaar on a Tonga. She has a fixed Tonga of Bansi. On the other hand, Bansi values her as a special customer and also drives Tonga slowly, unlike other days. One day granny and Bond go to bank on his Tonga. When granny goes inside, they both go to a tea shop and drink lemonade. The bill is paid by Bond, as insisted by Bansi. Bansi is a typical local man. He sings Hindi films’ songs and eats paan regularly and smiles regularly. He promises ride to Bond whenever he crosses his bungalow. He will jingle the bells at the gate and Bond needs to come out. Despite the differences in culture and colour, they become friends.

However, Ayah – Bond’s caretaker doesn’t like Bansi or in fact any of the local persons like Bansi. She says Bond to stay away from that rogue, as per her opinion he drinks alcohol and gambles. One day when Bond climbs the huge banyan tree, he shouts at Bansi down the road. Bansi stops and calls him for a ride but Bond postpones it for Tuesday since that day is Ayah’s off. On Tuesday, Bond and Bansi go on a long Tonga ride. They stop at the stream, cross it, and wash the Tonga. There Bond helps him like a helper.

With time things and situations change, Bond’s father dies of malaria. Granny sells the bungalow to a doctor in neighborhood. Since they cannot carry all luggage; all the costly furniture and other items of class fall in the hands of scrap and junk dealers. They are moving to England, leaving India permanently. The train to Bombay is from Dehradun, and from there they will take a passage to England. Bansi takes them to the station and there ends the last Tonga ride of Bond, as he knows there will be a different life in England.

The theme of separation as per the situations of life is heart-wrenching in this story. The pain of separation from a place and known people is all the more on children. But that is the bitter fact of life. On has to part one day. It is a nice story, highlighting one important aspect of life that is inevitable to most of us.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Poem Summary: Where The Mind Is Without Fear by Rabindranath Tagore

Poem by Rabindranath Tagore: Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high Where knowledge is free Where the world has not been broken up into fragments By narrow domestic walls Where words come out from the depth of truth Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit Where the mind is led forward by thee Into ever-widening thought and action Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake. Short Summary: This poem is written by Rabindranath Tagore during pre-independence days, when India was a colony of the British. The underlying theme of the poem is absolute freedom; the poet wants the citizens of his country to be living in a free state. According to the poem, we see that the poet is expressing his views there should be a country, like where people live without any sort of fear and with pure dignity…they should
67 comments
Read more

Book Review: The Blue Umbrella by Ruskin Bond

Among all Ruskin Bond books, The Blue Umbrella has, so far, gathered immense applaud from readers and critics alike.  This is a short novel, but the kind of moral lessons it teaches to us are simply overwhelming. This is a story of Binya, a poor little girl living with her mother and an elder brother, Bijju, in a small hilly village of Garhwal. One day while herding her two cows back home, she stumbles upon some city people enjoying the picnic in the valley. She is enthralled to see them well-groomed and rich. She craves to be one like them and among many other things of their, a blue frilly umbrella catches her attention. She begins craving for it. On the other hand, the city people get attracted by her innocent beauty and the pendant in her neck. The pendant consists of leopard’s claw – which is considered a mascot widely in the hills. Binya trades her pendant off with the blue umbrella. The blue umbrella is so much beautiful that soon it becomes a topic of conversation fo
63 comments
Read more

Poem Summary: Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Ozymandias is a short poem of fourteen lines written by Percy Bysshe Shelley. The concurrent theme of the poem is that nothing remains intact and same forever in this world. Even the brightest of metal, one day decays with passage of time. The throne name of Egyptian King Ramesses is Ozymandias. It was his dearest desire to preserve himself forever by building a huge statue that he thought would never tumble down. Stanza 1: I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed; Summary: The poet narrates the poem through the eyes of a traveler who seems to have come back from a remote and far-away land, referring to Egypt. The traveler r
23 comments
Read more