A student's winning podcast looks back to a way of life she never knew

"Avani Yaltho's podcast, The Things We Buried, begins with the trill of a wooden flute. The haunting sound propels the listener on a trip into the past, set in motion by her first line: "My grandmother says mango trees used to belong to everyone." Her narrative takes listeners to the villages of Kerala, a state at the southern tip of India, where Avani's grandparents grew up. Her story explores the things that have disappeared over decades of urbanization and globalization in India."

"Avani describes communities full of colorful houses with doors wide open to the world. Groups of children would run to the mango tree in town and wait for the wind to shake the fruit loose. "No fences, no ownership just laughter, sticky fingers and the simple joy of being together," she says in her podcast. "That was Kerala." Her descriptive prose at times feels like something out of a storybook, and she uses family interviews to weave a cohesive narrative."

"[Now,] if you go to most of the towns or villages, you'll find an elderly couple living there alone," Avani's grandfather, Jacob George, says in the podcast. "The youngsters are nowhere to be found. The kids are leaving. They don't want to stay in India." Saira George, Avani's mom, jumps in to add: "It's more like they were leaving for better opportunities their education, jobs abroad."

The podcast opens with the trill of a wooden flute and the line 'My grandmother says mango trees used to belong to everyone.' The narrative moves to villages in Kerala where mango trees and open-door communities once fostered shared play and communal ownership. Children gathered under mango trees, enjoying laughter and sticky fingers. Over decades of urbanization and globalization, younger generations migrated for education and jobs abroad, leaving elderly couples behind. Family interviews recount these shifts and evoke the sensory past. A judge praised the work as a moving exploration of loss and commended the host's skill in guiding family conversations.

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