Playing marbles and flying kites were my favourite games as an adolescent. There were a few popular games with marbles called Gotilata - a small depression in the ground was made, from there, should hit the opponents marble with middle or forefinger stretched, Mumbai, Kanche, were other versions of the games played. The marbles were made up of glass or in Hindi glass is called Kanch, so the marbles game in Hindi called Kanche. The smaller than average size marbles are called Putni and big marbles are called Pedda-gotilu.

As a kid playing marbles, like a squatted monkey and jumping around was a good exercise for body and mind. Connected to the earth by feet and hands was also a good thing as it improved the immunity system.

In the basti, it was common to see some youth playing Marbles by betting. They used to play marbles by drawing a square on the soil against the wall. The wall due to the repeated hitting by the marbles had holes formed.

I used to store my marbles on the sajja that is a shelf made outside of our house. Others cannot climb this sajja as it was challenging to reach, so my marbles were safe there. At first one needs to climb the parapet wall and with the support of projected bricks should climb to the top of the sajja.

I liked flying kites especially during the Sankranthi festival, which falls on 14th of January every year. I made my own kites which were trendy but flew very well. My experiments of flying kites, probably motivated me to learn flying drones at a later stage in life. I sometimes say my life is like a kite, flying high with a thread. The thread was my source to remain in a place and focus on interesting aspects and fly high. When released, stuck somewhere again and focused on interesting things and flew high and so on. I am like a flying kite with complete freedom not tagged to a single source for ever.