ONE DAY IN THE YEAR.

Just me.

My special birthday is just around the corner and I am so looking forward to it.

As I walk down memory lane, looking back at all those years that have gone by so fast, I look back fondly at many things which remain etched in my memory to this day.

"Walking down memory lane" was a feature page in Filmfare long long ago. If I remember correctly it was written by Sylvia Norris.

In those days there were a few magazines to which one subscribed. Frivolous, fancy free, young girls subscribed to Filmfare, Femina or Eve’s Weekly, bit more serious people subscribed to The Illustrated Weekly of India, Span, and those with a bit more style got Life and Time. In Hindi there was Dharmyug, Madhuri, Sarika, Sarita. There was another periodical which was called Picture Post, this one was not a weekly. Magazines for children were Parag, Nandan and Manoranjan in Hindi. We were not allowed to read comics then, as it was thought that it would spoil our English.

 That reminds me that there was Blitz a weekly in the newspaper format. I had got interested in Blitz  because  the Nanavati case details were given in it. Most probably it was the Parsi connection as R K Karanjia and Nanavati were both Parsis.

We did not have many confectionary brands then. Biscuits were made by Parle and sweets were made by  J. B. Mangharam. I remember Monaco biscuits which are still going strong in the same size and shape and taste and also Glucose biscuits. I was the Monaco biscuit person. The cream filled ones did not find favour with me, I just remember the custard cream ones, then there were biscuits with jam in them, can't really throw light on them as I never ate any of those.

Breakfast in my house was always bread butter, eggs and cheese. We would get  Polson butter,  Kraft cheese in a round tin, then there were Jams and jellies which never interested me, so I don’t remember them or their brands at all. Milk was a complete no- no for me as I detested the taste. To make it palatable I mixed Ovaltine-a chocolate additive to it.

Anyone who lived at that time cannot forget the cute Murphy baby. That chubby little face with ringlets in the hair was an attractive picture. That picture brings back memories of the Murphy radio- a huge radio which occupied pride of place in our drawing room. This radio was brought back by my father from England in 1948, when he returned after acquiring his Engineering degree from there. He grandly took it home to his parents who lived in a remote village named Kurul in  Gadhchiroli district of Maharashtra. There was no electricity connection there so the radio had remained a thing to look at and marvel at. Later when daddy went to work at Hirakud dam project, the radio was finally put to use. It  was  switched on daily at 9 pm sharp for the news read by Melville D’mello, or Lotika Ratnam, Pamela Singh or Surojit Sen. There had to be pin drop silence in the house then. If a child cried he had to be taken out of the room. In the mornings the radio  belted out lovely Hindi songs. I remember old Hindi film songs played from 7.30 to 8 am every morning. The last song was always a K L Sehgal number, which played at 7.55 am.  On the first of every month, "Khush hai zamana aaj pehli tareekh hai" was the first song that one heard. The radio station was Radio Ceylon and one would wait for Wednesday evening to hear Amin Sayani with his velvety voice reaching out to us with 16 paaydaans and songs adorning those paydaans with Binaca Geet Mala. Wednesday evenings from 8 to 9 pm  also demanded pin drop silence.  Binaca Geet Mala memories are of times when I was in school and the transistor had already made its appearance. There was Hamid Sayani who presented English songs. In the classic movie, Reshma our Shera, Waheeda Rehman a village girl calls the transistor,"radio ka baccha".

Vividh Bharati had also started broadcasting songs but we never heard their programmes as they did not play Hindi film songs. Radio Ceylon would come on shortwave, if I rack my brains I will surely recall the bandwidth too.

I was in boarding school from the age of five. There used to be tuck time around 11 am during school recess. I would get 2 Monaco biscuits and one toffee everyday at the same time from the nun in charge of the tuck of boarders. Chocolates were rare, it was only Cadbury’s Milk chocolate then. When my parents visited me from Nagajunasagar dam where daddy was then  posted, they would take me out for the day and I would get egg sandwiches at Green Restaurant at Secunderabad and then a Cadbury chocolate from Prince store at Abid Road Hyderabad.

Visiting the library was a happy time. There was a Maharashtra Mandal library in Hyderabad which my mother would visit and leave me free at the children’s section which had low cupboards full of lovely books with pictures.

We seldom were taken to see movies, yet I do remember that outside the cinema hall would sit a young man with song books which contained the lyrics of the songs of different movies. Everyone bought the books and sang the songs. If I remember correctly they sold for 6 pais each. The decimal system had not started, it was Rupee, Anna and Pai.

When I was small and we were at Hirakud, our bungalow was on the banks of the huge River Mahanadi. There was a flood once and I remember seeing lots of animals floating past our house at great speed in the muddied waters of the river. It was quite a dreadful sight. 

Jawaharlal Nehru the Prime Minister then, visited Hirakud to see the building of one of the new temples of the country. There was no security in those days and as he drove past he flung a garland which landed right on the neck of my small brother Sunil, who was on the shoulder of my father.

Grocery was bought from the neighbourhood provision stores. There were no packaged goods. Everything was bought loose and the shop keeper would measure the item, make a newspaper thonga(cone)fill it up and tie it up with string. No plastic, no paper packages, nothing which could not be recycled. A lot of people kept cows at home for milk, and hens for eggs.

Ladies spent their spare time knitting, embroidering, or stitching, crocheting or tatting. All women were adept at these arts. In school there were extra curricular classes every day, where we learnt gardening, games, Hindi Music, English Music and needlework. These classes were my most favourite classes, and were usually the last class on each day.

Children were encouraged to play outside everyday. Since I was in the hostel, all our activities  were totally regulated. Games, home work class, dinner and then singing. We held hands and moved together singing loudly old favourite English songs. My bonnie lies over the ocean, Oh my darling Clementine, Old Black Joe, and so many more which I am now forgetting.

I must tell you about that big fear which was drilled into our heads. We could never throw salt or waste it because after we died then we would have to pick up all that spilt salt with our eyelids. Don't know what that superstition was all about. As a child I was always afraid of the dark and dreaded the festival of Holi. 

Evenings in dam projects were always spent in the Club. All the parents took their children in prams and while parents played Badminton, children played their own games or slept if they were very tiny. Childhood games of seven tiles, gitte, marbles, four corners, chupan chupai, or sitting in a circle and one child would go around with a hanky singing, "I sent a letter to my father" This was played as "Poshampa, bhai poshampa" in Hindi.

Memories are made of these wonderful times. I, like everyone else, love the day of my birth, and feel so good to have completed another year. I share my birthday with known people, some famous some notorious, but then they all made a difference to the world. The most prominent is Hitler, Ryan O' Neal, Chandrababu Naidu, Babita, Napolean III, Miguel Diaz Canel, President of Cuba, Miranda Kerr, Australian supermodel, and of course yours truly.

What do you know-someday I too may become a person who made  a difference to the world. Till then, I am waiting.

CELEBRATING 2020

MUNICH 

As the year 2020 was approaching, my family spread across three continents got excited about this year which brings in a lot of anniversaries and important landmarks in our lives.

It was decided that we had to go on a family holiday where we would all be together and spend a few days catching up with each other. Planning and visualising the  holidays started in right earnest. It was a very exciting thought, and everyone started coming up with unique ideas to celebrate the events. Many ideas  got thrown into the open cauldron. Hawaii suggested one, a cruise suggested the other, a land holiday suggested someone else. A lot of day dreaming, thinking, discussions on phone, chat, WhatsApp, happened and it was decided that Triloki would plan a cruise trip keeping in mind the holidays of grand children and leave positions of the children  living in two continents. Triloki worked on it and in his inimitable style  threw the entire programme back to the  busy children and asked them to let him know their choice of which cruise best suited them.

The ball kept getting thrown from one continent to another and the decision remained in limbo. As happens in such cases of procrastination, some other greater powerful element took over and nature struck planet earth with the Corona Virus. It suspended all activities and our holiday plans went kaput.

THE CHESIRE CAT AT BEER FESTIVAL

Did I notice someone lurking around with the grin of  a Cheshire cat? No that can't be, it must be my mind playing games with me. After all an idle mind is a devil's work shop!

Well, so that's that for now.

So coming back to the important landmarks of the year. We have our golden wedding anniversary and also a few special birthdays and anniversaries to be celebrated.

We will surely celebrate them, won't let the occasions just go by. Some may be celebrated on line with Zoom or House party. Won’t that be fun? No trouble of cooking, arranging the house, no gifts to be thought of and planned and bought and then wondering if the gift was good enough and liked by the receiver.

MY GRAND CHILDREN

It will be fun to be just together, wish, talk and laugh. It will be a wonderful time of togetherness although we will be far away from each other physically. The time that will be spent together will be beautiful and happy. It will in fact be bliss.

Does nature give us lessons to plan de novo?

Does it say - enjoy being together without any financial constraints, cooking troubles and planning imbroglio?

I have learnt to take life as it comes, to find a beautiful angle, look at the cheerful picture and then enjoy being in that picture frame.  

Life keeps on giving us opportunities to live life, adjust and to accept the good with the bad, the black with the white, the sun rise with the sunset, night with day and so many other ups and downs. 

Finally it is all a matter of choice. One can choose to look at the brighter side of any situation or feel morose focussing on the darker side.

We all have the opportunity to choose carefully all the happiness in the world. It is our own life and we are responsible for it wholly and solely, to make it or mar it. It's all yours-this world, this moment as well as the future, which is not destined to happen, but could be decided by you, by the choices made by you.

Nothing happens just like that, remember their is always a cause and an effect. So Corona or no Corona, celebrations will happen, togetherness will happen because happy moments and memories call for celebrations.

ONCE UPON A TIME

Viva 2020- a wonderful year which is surely going to change the way we look at planet earth and the way we look at humanity. This will be a historical year when the earth decided to put every human being on its surface under house arrest, when earth decided to take a few days off to rejuvenate, when earth told us that nature is supreme and no one will be allowed to harm terra. We are seeing a great transition when exploitation of the earth will give way to restoration of earth. There will be more respect for nature's bounty, flora, fauna, air and water. We humans with our supreme intelligence will ensure a better future for posterity.

A big shout to all the people in my family-

"A very happy 2020- 

May we all have a life full of happiness, good health and cheer.

May we all be there for each other always. 

Bring it on, come on let's party."

Graduation was over and as expected I had topped the University. I was first class first. It sounded so good and I couldn't get over this head in the air feeling. I had achieved something. Let me share with you one extremely stupid thing that I had done once.
My brain cells go dead as soon as  Math is mentioned. I don't know what happens to me, but if you can visualise a rabbit caught infront of a strong light. The little rabbit gets frozen, his eyes are ready to bulge out and he just comes to a standstill. So that is what would happen to me before a math exam. This incident is of school. I was a boarder at Mount Carmel High School at hazaribagh and was taking tuition from our Math Sir, Mr. Rathore. At the tuition class he would blare out my name..Barsa, he would say, open your note book, concentrate, pay attention. In spite of his best effort and my diligence the block head portion of Math would find it very difficult to work out the steps.
So there was this test at Patna for deserving students to be given scholarship. My parents as well as school had high hopes from me so I was taken to Patna by my parents. After I finished my paper and came out my father asked me how I had faired. I told him, " everything was fine but there was one fraction problem that I could not solve."
"Do you remember it? Tell me" said my father.
"If you add  1/2 with 1/2 what will you get?" my response.
That was the day when my father must have given up all hope of my ever solving any mathematical problem.
Well, that was me!
So coming back to me after graduation where I had topped the University, I became a National Scholar getting a princely sum of Rs. 1200 per annum to pursue higher studies. ranchi University was looking forward to this topper joining them, but I had me eyes set on Delhi, so that is where I joined. Delhi University would not admit a student to post graduation studies before the age of 19. I was just 18, so I had to twiddle my thumb for one year before I could seek admission in Delhi University.
I therefore started teaching at a small private school Tagore International School at Lajpat Nagar. It was prep school and mostly little children from the neighbourhood came there. One of the teacher's knew my mother, so that is how I got inducted as a teacher, getting a paltry sum of Rs. 100 per month. I enjoyed myself with the nursery children who were cute and full of energy. there were English speaking classes also held after school got over, so I was asked to teach that too. Reminds me of the TV serial, "Zabaan Sambhal ke". Well my position was not that hilarious as I had mostly Indiann from different places. Women whose husbands wanted them to be able to converse in English  and so on and so forth.
Triloki meanwhile had also found a time pass kind of job in Delhi. He would sometimes meet me before school. Poorly paid creatures that we were , we would walk across the Ring Road into Lajpat Nagar and at a ram shackle tea stall, sit on a wooden bench and drink a cup of hot syrupy cup of tea.
Triloki was working with Marketing Research Corporation of India. Don't know why Mr. D'Costa the owner  wanted fresh Engineering graduates to work for him.

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BLUE, YELLOW AND GREEN.

BLUE, YELLOW, GREEN

Sometimes when the sun doesn’t shine as bright as you wish it did, when the rain drops do not cheer you up, when the first nip in the air heralding winter doesn’t run a shiver down your spine then, undoubtedly you are in the blues. 

It happens to all of us. All creatures big and small,  sharp and dull, pretty and ugly, tall and short, any which way you want to be measured- you are included in this universal law of nature. 

So what does one do when the blues hit you? 

I know, look for a yellow somewhere. Yellow, the colour of sunshine which is bright and warm, the sun flower bending backwards to look at her favourite sun, the colour of daffodils which shoot out of the earth as soon as spring arrives. Yellow is also the colour of sarson, the most romantic farms in rural Punjab are full of sarson,  yellow colour also represents Basant- spring in India. The fifth day of the advent of spring is celebrated in North India, and  almost everyone wears yellow clothes on that day. Do you know why? Because it is the cheapest and easiest dye to colour your clothes with turmeric. 

Turmeric is yellow and is also the harbinger of good health and brings radiance to your face. Every bride as well as bride groom adorns herself /himself with haldi (turmeric) before her wedding. It is considered so auspicious and good that in some states of India brides and bride grooms wear sarees and dhoti dyed yellow with turmeric. In some southern states the mangalsutra is also a  thread dyed with turmeric which the bride always wear. At the entrance of a number of houses in south India turmeric is smeared on the wood panel of the door.

So look for yellow and I can tell you for sure, you are sure to cheer up and forget the blues. 

In case yellow doesn’t cheer you up and takes you away from the blues, never mind, there is still some hope. When you mix blue and yellow together all that you are left with is the colour green. 

GREEN

Can anything beat that wonderful colour which soothes the eyes? Nature has abundantly granted us trees, forests, grass in the colour green. When you look at the bounty of nature you experience peace, tranquility, fresh air, plenty of oxygen and lots of shade under which you can rest awhile. You can play your flute if you are Krishna, or attain enlightenment if you are Gautam, or if you are just a simple human being, you can watch the woodpecker pecking away at the wood,  or look at a squirrel running up and down the tree trunk. You can hear the melodious singing of the cuckoo or hear the cacophony of numerous birds returning home after a days flight.

Green is surely the best colour to be in. Even in modern technology the green  sign says "go". So green is the colour of all seasons and all reasons.

Growth, greenery, green house, green room, green horn, green grocer, green light, evergreen. 

Just felt like writing all that without a reason. 

You didn't like what I wrote? Never mind, at least no one will turn green with envy now.

PENS, PENPALS AND THE MIGHTY SWORD.

The pen as you know was considered mightier than the sword, so my Pilot pen would be used to write interesting letters to Cuckoo. The ball pen had not yet become our instrument for writing, so the handwriting was usually neat and pretty. Did you notice I wrote the pen "was" considered mightier than the sword? Well, times are changing so fast that some proverbs are also becoming obsolete, just as the pen is fast being replaced by typing on the laptop or phone, and will soon be found only with real connoisseurs as collector's items.

Ranchi Women's College true to its name was exclusively an all women Institution where all teachers too were women. We had one "bada babu" who used to sit in the Office and accepted fees and attended to results and such administrative stuff. His name was Satya babu, and I remember that he had six fingers in his left hand. The Durban  too was of course a man. In those days women were supposed to be delicate darlings and one had not even heard of police women leave alone women bouncers. We were very well protected from the outside world and boarders could simply not venture out of the gate, without permission.

CUCKOO

Cuckoo and my innocuous letter writing became quite a ritual where a letter was exchanged every week. Those were the days of innocence and writing letters to a boy too was considered quite a bold step. In our letters no programmes were discussed, no meetings were even thought of. All my close friends would read all these letters.

Prisoners that we were, we boarders were once allowed to go and see a movie,"Milan" starring Sunil Dutt and Nutan.  The songs of the movie were very popular in those days. I mentioned about this programme in my letter to my pen-friend Cuckoo. We were going to the Shrivishnu Talkies off the Main Road of Ranchi and were going to watch the Matinee show. Incidentally Ranchi had three cinema halls that I can recall. Ratan Talkies, Shrivishnu talkies were close to each other and Plaza which screened only English movies was a little away. Cuckoo also decided to watch the movie at the same time. All of us movie goers were herded into the College bus like sheep, a Teacher stood at the door counting loudly as each one of us boarded the bus. Outside the picture hall too we were shepherded out, the teacher once again loudly counted the girls getting out of the bus to make sure that none of  the girls who had climbed onto the bus had vanished into thin air, but had reached the picture hall safe and sound. We were in the Dress Circle and sat down all together in one row. During the interval we were not allowed to go out  at all. The movie got over, the sheep boarded the bus and returned to their pen...errrr hostel, duly counted in. The only satisfaction that Cuckoo, who was in the Balcony and I got was that we watched the same movie at the same time in the same picture hall. Yes, those were the times of the 1960's. As I write this, I feel like a relic from the past...medieval times?

VARSHA, INDU, NILIMA

Cuckoo and I never discussed our holidays or plans for going to Delhi although he also had family in Delhi, so would go home to Delhi during vacations. Sometimes the dates of vacation coincided and sometimes the University would close on one date and the Birla Institute of Technology(BIT) would close on some other date. Once it so happened  that the University closed sine die, a much used term in those days as the Naxalite movement had started in Bihar and due to some problem or riots the University would close "sine die", as students were always involved in these agitations. As the College was to remain closed for an indefinite period of time, a friend Indu Bhardwaj who had to travel upto Allahabad and I left the hostel to catch the Hatia-Patna express en route to Delhi. As we were at the ticket window, who do we see but Cuckoo and another friend also buying tickets but they were headed for Calcutta.  On seeing us, Cuckoo changed his plans and decided to travel to Delhi. We boarded the train in the same compartment and my pen pal Cuckoo and Indu started a virtual match of reciting sher-o-shayari. In this department my knowledge was zilch. The problem was that I never indulged in Hindi or Urdu poetry. I used to like the Dohas which we studied in school and I thought Dohas were the epitome of good taste in the language. Dohas were so meaningful and spoke well about all sorts of values and morals! Sher-o-shayari for me was quite anathema. I thought  that it had no substance except to indulge in romantic and abstract thoughts. 

 In fact, in college we had two compulsory subjects besides the subjects one had opted to study. One was English and the other was Hindi. Those whose mother tongue was not Hindi could opt for Alternative English instead of Hindi. I being a Maharashtrian had the option, so I chose to study Alternative English. This meant that I had to learn simple Hindi and a classic of the English language. The classic was Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, and in Hindi we had a very simple collection of essays about the tiger land of the terai region, most probably it must have been about Jim Corbett and his shikar stories, another one was Essays on Opportunity or Avsar. I was actually quite proficient in Hindi but it sounded good to say that you studied Alternative English, so I availed of this opportunity quite happily.

So while Indu and Cuckoo exchanged shers, I almost fell asleep. Indu got off the train  at Allahabad as she had to go to Katni where her father was posted and Cuckoo and I went onwards to Delhi.The train journey was long, the weather was good as it was monsoon time and Cuckoo and I sat on the steps of the compartment, as it was much cooler and the view was beautiful. Our train traversed across the beautiful Ganga - Jamuna Terai region which is very fertile land. All the fields looked green and fresh as they were filled with paddy and water. 

These were two encounters of a different kind, unplanned and quite romantic by the standards of those days. Those were the days when Hindi cinema would only show the hero and heroine running around trees endlessly. Even the most romantic songs had the extremely handsome, debonair  and suave Dev Anand chasing the moon as well as the heroine in,"Dheere dheere chal chand gagan men", across grassy land. He could even woo Nutan on the stairs of the iconic Qutab Minar singing,"Dil ka bhanwar kare pukar". Yes, you guessed right, I was a huge fan of Dev Anand, and still am,

A year rolled by and the penpals remained penpals, with one slight change. Cuckoo had discovered that a daughter of a Professor of his College and resident of the BIT complex was a student of Ranchi Women's College. So one fine day Cuckoo- whose  first name still evaded me, sent me a letter through her asking if I could meet him at Casanova Restaurant on Main Road Ranchi for a cup of coffee. That was probably asking for the moon as we hostel girls were allowed to go to the market for shopping only on alternative Sunday's and then too four girls had to go together. Two girls would be senior girls and two would be juniors. It had  never been voiced but it implied that we were supposed to keep a watch over each other. We had to make an entry in the Going Out Register giving names of all four girls stating the time that we left the hostel. We would be let out by the durban, and from the gate we would hire two rickshaws and go to Firayalal chowk on the Main Road. Firayalal's was a departmental store and was at one end of the Main Road. We would get off there and complete our shopping and go back to the hostel together,  and mark the time of our return in the register.

Now with this coffee invitation at hand, I was in a fix, but then the adventurous streak came into play, and my room mate and I decided to accept the invitation. As we entered Casanova we noticed that the place was quite  dark, it was not at  all like our familiar Jalajog or Churuwala, the well lit bright and open mithai shops that we had sometimes been to, to buy mithai, mind you-never to eat there. Well, we both diffidently walked in, because this was a big bold step. We were really very scared because if someone had  seen us entering the restaurant, we would be in a soup. Nevertheless, we found Cuckoo sitting there with a friend. Coffee was swiftly ordered, we quickly finished the coffee and  left as soon as we could, there was no question of sharing the bill. That zamana was of chivalry, if you were invited you didn't offer to share the bill. In fact many many moons later, I had visited a restaurant where the lady was handed over a menu without the price list and the gentleman was handed over a menu with the prices marked. Sounds very archaic now, doesn't it? Those were the days!

I was almost like a nun in my habit(s), (pun intended), I did not drink tea, had never tasted coffee and never liked soft drinks. Coca cola in those days was quite a rage and when I had tasted it for the first time I couldn't understand why anyone would want to spend money to drink that horrendous stuff. So now coffee in a dark lit restaurant with the name Casanova was a mighty big step that Miss Varsha Uke had taken. My friends were quite amazed at my big adventure trip, which was discussed in hushed tones, because if the Hostel Superintendent came to know of it, all hell would break loose, and what do you know, I could even be rusticated.That is what we thought then.

We both were brilliant students and in spite of this distraction, Cuckoo managed to come first in his class in Engineering. Now, as letters could also come through a friend and were not censored by the Hostel Superintendent, once when vacations were starting, Cuckoo wrote to me that he was leaving for Delhi on a particular date, so I also decided to travel on the same date. This was the first time that we planned a rendezvous, and what happens next is quite out of the blue as my daddy makes an official visit to Ranchi and escorts me back with him to Delhi, in the first class compartment on the same date. All plans of travelling on the steps of the third class unreserved compartment, gets blown away with the wind and Cuckoo was left wondering why I never turned up at the station on the appointed date.
Do you now realise why communication and  language and the written word is so important? No wonder our ancestors discovered the art of writing, be it with drawings, strokes, hieroglyphic or the symbols of the Indus script which still needs to be deciphered.

PENS. PENPALS AND SOME MORE

 Writing is an important form of expression. Writing systems were created all over the world independent of each other. When exactly did writing start is a matter of serious discussion, which I will not indulge in right now. Suffice to say that as human beings began to live in communities, the need to record and manage information would have been felt. It is said that writing was developed 5000 years ago in Middle East. Around the same time different scripts were invented in India, Egypt, Mesoamerica and China. As writing developed independently in different places they had different rules, different styles and different characters. Writing was primarily a means of recording language, an important tool of communication, maintaining records and expressing oneself. Different types of early writing was cuneiform of the Sumerians, hieroglyphs of the Egyptians, logographs of the Chinese, Indus script of India, and the Maya script of Mesoamerica. ‎

When I was about four years old, I went to school in a place called Hirakud in Odisha. Hirakud was on the banks of the river Mahanadi and a massive dam was being built over it. My father was one of the Engineers building the dam. There was hardly any educational facility in Hirakud, so there I was going to school where I had to write on a takhti- a wooden board on which one had to put some sort of a white paste, dry it and then write with a khadi. When I was five, I insisted and moved over to St. Joseph's Convent School in Cuttack where I was a boarder and started learning to write on paper with a pencil. As time rolled on, from pencil I graduated to writing with a holder. We had to attach a nib to the holder. There would be an ink bottle on every desk and we had to dip the nib in the bottle, take measured amount of ink very carefully, write on the four lined notebook and then use the blotting paper. One had to be very precise in taking the ink otherwise the ink would spread and spoil our beautiful handwriting. In those days a lot of importance was given to write very neatly with perfect strokes. From the nib holder one graduated to a fountain pen. There was a lot of time spent on this humungous task of filling ink in the fountain pen. We used to have pens, which had space for filling the ink with a dropper. One had to keep a rag close at hand and inspite of careful handling and immense concentration, the fingers would always get stained with the Royal Blue ink. In those days, we used to get ink tablets which had to be dissolved in water or then there were  branded inks which were Sulekha and the more expensive Quink. Later on we got self filling fountain pens which did not have to be opened for filling ink. One just dipped the nib in the ink pot,  pulled a small lever and made sure that the ink was filled.

Let's move on in time to about half a century ago, to be very precise 1964, when I joined College. I was an early entrant to college as I was only fourteen years old when I passed out from Mount Carmel High School located at a small little sleepy town called Hazaribagh in Bihar then and Jharkhand now. The town was quite non descript, but its jail had housed Dr. Rajendra Prasad and Jai Prakash Narain during the Quit India Movement of 1942. Rai Bahadur Jadunath Mukhopadhyay a well known Government Pleader was an early settler here and had amongst his guests Rabindranath Tagore and Subhash Chandra Bose. Hazaribagh was a pretty place, had a cool climate and was close to the Hazaribagh National Park  and most importantly for me, had a lot of educational institutions run by Christians, The Mount Carmel High School for Girls, St. Xavier’s School for boys and St. Columba’s College which was coeducational. When I was studying at Hazaribagh my father was working with National Coal Development Corporation(NCDC) and  was posted at Bhurkunda Colliery and later Barkakana, both small little laid back places with negligible educational facilities.  

After school, I moved to Ranchi Women’s College as by now my father had got transferred to Ranchi. Ranchi was a relatively bigger city located at an altitude of 3000 feet so it made its way into the list of hill stations of India, although it figured only towards the end of the list. Ranchi had a couple of co- educational colleges, Ranchi College as well as St. Xavier’s College, but I joined Ranchi Women’s College. To begin with, I was a day scholar in College as we stayed in the Gandhi Nagar Colony of NCDC. I would take the NCDC bus to college. It was a pleasant journey and my school friend Jayashree Nair would hop onto the bus at Jawahar Nagar Colony also of NCDC.

I had taken Science subjects with Biology, as the aim was for me to become a Doctor. After one year of dissecting frogs, when it was time to dissect cockroaches, I discovered that I was not capable of carrying this any further and told my parents that I would like to pursue further studies in humanities. My mother was highly disappointed but tears and reason prevailed and it was agreed upon that I could take Arts for further studies, so it was Political science (Hon's) and Economics as a side subject. By now daddy had got transferred to an extremely backward place in Bastar called Bailadila. The nearest railway station was at Raipur which was about 374 kms away.

More about Bailadila and Bastar later, in some other post.

I was fifteen and pursuing my Arts degree with a lot of comfort and fun. I joined NCC which was an option which was  given to us. It meant daily march past parade practice during lunch time. I used to love it and come summer, rain or winter I was happily practicing and attending sessions and camps of NCC.

As time went by, my father got transferred to Delhi. During holidays I would have to take a train from Ranchi to Delhi. Those were the days of the steam engines and there were very few trains running across the country. Going from Ranchi one had to take the Patna- Hatia Express which had a specific designated compartment  for Delhi. This compartment would be detached from the Patna- Hatia Express at Patna Junction and would get attached to the train going from Patna to Old Delhi Railway station. 

On these journey's I often met a few other students travelling from Ranchi to Delhi, as near Ranchi there was a prestigious Engineering College, BIT Mesra, which had a number of students from Delhi. Holidays normally happened around the same time. We all travelled without reservation as we could not reserve a berth in the compartment.

On one of these journey's, while travelling from Delhi to Ranchi in March of 1966, I met a person who loved to write letters. He asked my name and the college that I studied in and lo and behold one fine day I got an inland letter  from a person who signed his name as  "Cuckoo". It was quite an innocuous letter, yet evoked much excitement and was much discussed by my friends. They goaded me to reply as they saw no harm in writing a letter. Those were the days when making pen pals was quite a rage. One would write to strangers and become pen pals. It was really very innocent and straight forward fun. Often in magazines for youngsters like the Junior Statesman which later became JS, names and addresses of those interested in making pen pals was published.  

Being in a Women's college hostel was quite akin to being in a sort of Concentration camp. There was a strict monitoring of every activity of the residents and letters were totally censored. The Hostel warden read each and every letter that came in. She would not allow letters from any stranger to reach the recipient. The inland letters that we were allowed to write were  posted in a wooden box kept for the purpose outside the Warden's room. The letter had to be kept open so that the warden could read it before closing the flap and sending it to the post office. So, under the hawk eyes of Parvati amma our Warden, this letter came through and I also replied very cautiously.

Thus started a long innings of letter writing. 

The postal department and Indian Railways played a major role in the story of these two characters who wrote and wrote and wrote. Right from 1966 to 1970.

 

1970

MUCH LATER

 Well so the story of writing letters will continue after a brief pause, first let me get some feed back from you. Do you want to know more?

BIRTHDAYS ARE SPECIAL DAYS.

WHEN I TURNED TWO.

It was a hot summer's day when I arrived on terra firma. It was a Thursday, and as per an old children's poem, "Thursday's child has far to go."

In the morning as the clock struck six,  this dark, scrawny screaming infant arrived at Dr. Sita Sen's Nursing Home in Daryaganj, Delhi. My father was delighted to see his first born, and this England returned Engineer who had learnt all about equality, justice, and being fair(not the colour fair) was bewildered when the friends and other relatives around said,"Never mind, Lakshmi has arrived", some others said, "It's alright, you will surely be blessed with a son next time." A lot of commiseratory messages were given, but the one word of "Congratulations" was not forthcoming.

This little girl was named Vidya by Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, my grandfather's very close friend, but my mother decided to call me Varsha.

It was all about education in my house and so I went to the best convent schools close to whichever place my father was posted to. He was an Engineer and in  the developing phase of a new Republic, he was busy building the infrastructure for power and so we were at Hirakud Dam site, Nagarjunasagar dam site,  then Bhurkunda, Barkakana Coal mine areas in Bihar, Bailadila Iron ore project in MP, Panna Diamond Mines in MP, Kiriburu in Orissa. I went to study at Cuttack, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Ranchi and Hazaribagh.

Having grown up in so many different states of the country, I learnt a lot about the food, culture, clothes, style of wearing a saree and ethnicity of various tribals. My education was not only in school but also in the lap of cultural luxury. We lived in absolutely primitive places where fruits, vegetables, shops were scarce, urban life and its styles were missing. I learnt about the Santhals, The Lambadis, the Bhils, Gonds and other Bastar tribals and could understand what diversity was all about. I have to thank my parents for instilling curiosity in my mind and trying their best to teach me everything that they could see and understand. I imbibed a sense of respect for everyone. The fabric of my life is really very rich as what I saw and learnt has remained with me till date. 

I have seen and experienced a Haat at Bailadila. Barter  system was still in use there. I am talking of the year 1966. The tribals knew no clothes, they would cover themselves with lots of necklaces made of beads. At the Haat the tribals brought salt, balls of jaggery covered with red ants, some grain, roots, and potatoes. Country fowl in their beautiful colourful plumes were also bartered. In every haat there has to be some entertainment. What I saw here was  fowl fighting. Little blades were tied on a leg of the fowl and they were let loose to fight against each other. It was quite a ferocious fight and went on till one died. It was a gory sight and I will never forget that scene.

Bastar area was full of beautiful and undiscovered places. Bacheli, Kirindul, Gidham, Dandakaranya were all associated with the Ramayana. The names themselves were fascinating. The closest town to Bailadila where we lived was Jagdalpur. There was a picture hall there, where they waited for us to arrive to start the movie. "Om Jai Jagdish hare" was played at the beginning of a movie.  Much water has flown down all the rivers of the world since then, so suffice to say that all these places are now much-much changed and the tribal culture has now got confined to anthropological museums.

So this dark scrawny girl did well in school and always topped in her class. My father's motto for me had always been,"Nothing less than first class first". It was drilled into my head and without it damaging my persona, I actually succeeded and always came upto my father's expectation.

As a student I hated History as I could never learn dates by heart.  Without dates History often becomes meaningless academically. Later in life I found that History is my most favourite subject and I can go on reading historical stories without a stop. I still cannot remember dates but that does not matter now. 

Life has been interesting, I got married at a fairly young age as I wanted to marry someone I liked. After my children were born, my restless spirit wanted to work and so I got selected as a Probationary Officer of a Bank. To awaken me from euphoria I was given a taste of discrimination. At the Interview I was asked "How will you manage the job with children?" I was also asked how I would manage to stay in different places where I was posted if my husband was not around? In those days no one thought of being politically correct so as to avoid discrimination and to give equal opportunity. I am quite sure no male candidate with a family would have ever been asked this question. Well, life was tough for a woman then, perhaps it is tough even now. 

The job was good, I put in thirty years of service and then took early retirement so that I could do something with my own life while I still could.

Its been good so far, I travelled to my heart's delight. All those wonderful places of Europe, America that I would longingly look at in pictures were within my reach. It does help to have children settled in the UK and USA. 

 As my birthday approaches soon, I sit back and remember some landmark birthdays of mine. Landmark as in memorable ones which left a deep impression on me. The first birthday I remember was my 7th birthday.  I was a boarder at St. Anne’s High School, Secunderabad and my father was posted at Nagarjunasagar which was 90 kms away. My parents arrived at the Boarding house to celebrate my birthday. Mrs. Miller the wife of an American Expert posted at Nagarjunasagar had baked a beautiful cake for me with pink icing decorated with pretty little white pearls. 

SEVEN

After the little party with my friends in the boarding,  I was taken out to a small little shopping arcade near the Green’s Restaurant. There was a little  book shop in the arcade and I was asked to go and pick any book that I wanted as my birthday present. I took my own sweet time and picked up, "My First book of Elves and Fairies". It was hard bound and had colourful pictures. I loved that treasure and still cherish those moments. It will interest you to know that my father loved buying books, but reading them-particularly fiction was a very difficult task for him. "And quiet flows the Don" was a book which he tried hard to read every night before sleeping. Beside his bed there would be a side table on which there was a table lamp, his book and spects. Those objects would remain as it is, till the morning. He never got around to reading it and that had become a sing song recitation to tease him for many years. 

TWNETYONE

Another memorable birthday was when I turned 21. By now I was married and was living in Bangalore. My husband Triloki look me out for dinner, perhaps to Holiday Inn. My dad wrote a very beautiful letter to me. It was hand written. While in School and later College my grudge had always been that my dad would dictate a letter to me which would be typed out by his secretary, and then he would sign it and have it posted to me. Therefore this  hand written letter became a very important memento for me. 

My fiftieth birthday was memorable as it is quite mandatory, after all I was completing half a century on earth. This birthday was however celebrated by me alone while I was posted at Dehradun. My children were abroad and Triloki too happened to be in London on that date.  I ordered a cake, some samosas and some mithai and had a small party in my department. I must have been quite happy as I do not remember being sad or lonely or alone. I only have good memories of that birthday. 

MY GRANDCHILDREN ON MY 60TH.

On my 60th Birthday my children decided to celebrate it together. My mother and I flew to London, where Chaitali, my daughter and her family joined us and all of us flew to Boston where Anurag my son and daughter in law Jharna live. All of us went to the beautiful Lake Winnipesaukee. Anurag had booked a lovely cottage for all of us beside the lake. We spent  a lovely day at the beach enjoying ourselves. It was wonderful as we were all together. 

Now the birthday that is approaching is a beautiful number. The number is "Ulta pulta ek samaan". Go ahead and guess what it is. Being born on Thursday, I know I have far to go(literally) on all my wandering ways, seeing the world, enjoying places, meeting people and learning all about different  cultures.

The gallivanting dark lady moves on looking for new places and new roads to travel on. 

MUMMY- KAMAL UKE, ME, DADDY- N G UKE.

Thank you, thank you everyone in advance and in anticipation of all those birthday greetings that are coming my way. I know you are wishing me, I can feel it in my bones.

ON ALL FOOLS DAY

Flowers are very powerful. They brighten up my mornings with their amazing colours, freshness and beauty. 

I can happily spend my time looking at the beauty of flowers, touch their petals, water the plant or just be by them. 

They bloom, bring joy, cheer and then just as quickly wither away, leaving behind dried petals and seeds. The dried flowers take away the smile from my face as I walk into the garden in the morning and see that yesterdays bloom has already departed.

Just like that time actually has a speed of its own. I am not propounding a theory, philosophy or study, this is just my own experience which makes the words appear on my computer screen. My fingers seem to have a mind of their own, they go on fast on the keyboard without a glance at poor old me who was planning to write something else.

Well, never mind, as long as it is worth your time, and you continue to read, I am happy.

So every morning as I wake up, I think of the glorious day ahead of me which I plan to spend in doing a million things, like clearing away the clutter from my desk, tidy up that almirah which surprisingly has limitless capacity and can accommodate each and everything that I buy impulsively. Nothing gets discarded, nothing gets thrown away.  What if I lose weight and can fit into the clothes that I wore ten years ago. Fashion, did you say? Don't bother, fashion has a way of returning and even if it didn't..I was never a slave to fashion. So that stays, and that stays and yet another one stays.

As the day goes by, I sit down with that ubiquitous cup of tea, which I actually do not enjoy any longer, except that it is a habit which refuses to go. Those beautiful cups bought with a lot of care, give me a lot of cheer even if the tea does not. I love coffee but then I read somewhere that it raises blood pressure and I do not want to go that way, as I am told high BP is a silent killer and I do not want to die unsung and in silence.

I have noticed that with all that immense knowledge floating around on the net, I at least am doomed to die of knowledge overflow. Drink tea, don't drink tea, drink green tea, don't eat fruit with cooked food, don't drink water with food, don't walk after eating, don't take a morning walk early in winter, don't this, don't that and don't everything else.

Once upon a time, long, long ago life was simple. One had to look up Encyclopaedia Brittanica for different answers. The Encyclopaedia  was gargantuan, not easily found and therefore quite unapproachable. Now life is much more complex than a jig saw puzzle, which refuses to get solved, because there are so many possible solutions, and I do not have the capacity to pick up the  correct solution for my problem.

I suddenly look out of the window and notice that the sun has almost gone halfway across the sky and is fast moving on towards the west. My day which had hardly begun is almost over. That desk to clear, that almirah to tidy up, will have to wait for another day.

There is another thought that I have to share with you.  I have found that my opinions, my thoughts, my beliefs have become very outdated, redundant and uncalled for. What I say usually is met with a strong negative response. When this pattern began, I blamed it on the people around me, who I decided were negative, until I discovered that the negative response was coming from different people, at different fora, and on different topics. 

Obviously, I deduced, I have got dated.

So today has been a landmark day in my life, even if it is "All Fools Day" today.

Wisdom has dawned on me and, on this day I begin my journey to discover a monument called Varsha.

Gold and its glitter.

Once upon time there was this rectangular J B Mangharam sweet box with the picture of Ram with a bow and arrow and Sita walking behind him which was my Pandora’s box. I would await its coming out from the almirah and landing on the bed. Then I would stand waiting eagerly for the Pandora’s box to open and show me the glitter, glitter, glitter of gold that lay within. There were beautiful necklaces and bangles and kangans and kadas, earrings and rings. One of the rings held my interest to such an extent that I still remember its design. It was an almond shaped ring with a lotus made on it in Minakari. I was always fascinated by this ring because the name of my mother is Kamal which means Lotus and this ring belonged to her. I always thought how appropriate that ring was.

So the box would open and the treasures would look at my face which I am sure was always filled with awe.

Those were the days when jewellery was kept at home, women wore them and did not hide them away in Bank Lockers. In today’s world all that glitters is indeed not gold. The jewellery shop on display that our brides have become today is like nobody’s business. The art, beauty and charm of adornment seems to have been lost. There is no beauty, no balance and no subtlety in the art of wearing clothes and adorning oneself with its accessories.

Everything seems to be a display.

Weddings have become a commercial venture. The sanctity and solemnity of the occasion seems to have been lost. There was a time long long ago when dowry was considered a bane, a burden, and a lot of social activists took it upon themselves to make sure that parents were not burdened with unnecessary expenditure to be incurred for marrying their daughter off. We had those wonderful years of austerity when at weddings the people could not be too ostentatious. Parents were rid of the burden of spending too much on weddings. One could not invite more than 100 guests at a wedding and no cereal could be served. There was a restriction on the number of dishes that could be served too. All those times seem to have gone very far away into the annals of history.

We are back to vulgar display of wealth and wasteful expenditure on wining and dining and numerous functions. 

A wedding is a personal affair and a social event for family and friends. If only people with immense wealth and influence could understand that they set a bad example for young people of impressionable age then perhaps they would not indulge in so much wasteful expenditure. If the amount of expenditure that the film stars have recently incurred on their weddings was spent for opening a school in a backward village or for supplying water to a village then they would forever earn the gratitude and blessings of the people who benefitted by their gracious act.

In a country where many young children die of malnutrition and many people do not get two square meals in a day, such display of wealth is grotesque. 
Much water has since flown down the Ganga, Volga, Thames and Amu Daria too, and my Pandora’s box too has got lost with time. The contents of the box went into an impersonal Bank locker from where some items would be brought out as and when needed.  The picture on the box of Ram and Sita wandering in the forest now remains locked away in my memory of a time when life was carefree, jewellery was kept at home, worn whenever one wished to and all that glittered was   actually gold.