A home is just bricks and mortar, nothing more, nothing less. Bit by bit it gains a soul, indecipherable to the 5 senses. When I was a kid, the homes we stayed in weren't too big. But they always seemed enough. Summers meant a 3 hour train ride to Mysore with a helping of maddur vada on the way. From then on, maddur vadas transport me to a time when life was shorn of its complexities. And no other place makes them like how they do in maddur - oily, soggy and with a rider for a cholesterol check. The home in Mysore has since been sold but the memories are still vivid. The maroon tiles, granddad in the portico, a dog that went by the name Julie and the scent of Mysore rasam that emerged from the kitchen. They're all gone now, the home, the dog, my grandparents. The only link between me and those halcyon years is the maddur vada. And every time I greedily sink my teeth into one, for those few moments, it is home. In the course of a life, we switch homes. Moving h...