India, Aug. 1 -- What is the image that pops up in your mind's eye when someone mentions the word 'home'? Well, in my case, it is a series of images that flash past, of the various places I have called home in my time.

The first image is of my childhood home in Calcutta (as it was known then) with its sun-dappled verandah on which I spent many blissful afternoons reading my Enid Blytons, and daydreaming of the time I would also get to go to boarding school (Spoiler Alert: That never happened). The next picture to materialise is of my first home in Delhi, a humble barsati in Defence Colony, which was too hot in summer and too cold in the winter - but which I loved anyway, because it was the first space that was mine and mine alone. My tho...