Unwinding on the Jayanti Janata Express, all the three of us obviously for three different reasons; Amma overjoyed at the thought of meeting her kith and kin at the affectionate Maratha Mandir(my beloved maternal uncle’s domain at amchi Mumbai), my brother, God knows for what and I am still in the process of deciphering his thoughts and myself, on a post annual exam traumatic stress buster in the exclusive company of the aristocratic near to one’s heart cousins!
Dad was only too glad to see the trio off for a good one and half month of freedom dedicating the non nagging time to the annual accounts closing ceremony of the office and trying out the different countries and continents on his rotis, relishing and savouring his accomplishments and Colombus like conquests!
The two and half day trip on the AC coupe was a breeze with a multitude of kids emulating spiderman, (the talk of the town in the early eighties with the animated show spiderman, spiderman, your friendly neighbourhood spiderman…)the swinging skills did beat the master webber in his own den! The other recreations including eating stuffed home made puris, playing cards, and of course sibling rivalries! Amma, in her true inimitable style made friends by the dozen and succeeded in shrinking the globe by establishing a relationship network, somewhere, the Palakkad Tambram would pull a string and strike a chord!
The coterie would be there in full strength at the VT station to give a rousing welcome (akin to our medal winners and almost on the verge of podium finishers from the Olympics) to the southies (afterall amma was the only one uprooted from the western world!). Mama, that is my uncle fondly showed off his flashing red new Maruti 800 into which all of us were squeezed and the drive to Cheddanagar was filled with fun, frolic and fervour.
The Chitrahaar on the B&W Weston brought the entire household to the carpet area along with all the chota and bada Muralis, karthiks and Subasris of the twin Ganga Jamuna enclave, jostling for space in earnest anticipation of the then super hits of Jackie dada from Hero…ding dong..oh baby sing a song and pyar karne waale kabhi darte nahin..and the teenage trimurtis (you will get to know shortly who they are) were lost in the platonic love of the 6 footer hulk next door…
The adorable grandparents, the north and south poles of a magnet, diametrically different but hit off as a pair, were a pleasing entity that added vibrancy and sparkle to the house. The typical quintessential Thatha and Paati who charmed their way into the hearts of the young and the old alike with their demeanour and attitude! The latter, as a resolute, firebrand and vociferous lady bestowed with the superior powers to admonish the former, a good humoured thick skinned man, who was absolutely insensitive to her taunts and tamashas!
The rotund, cherubic Mami, my aunt was a picture of grace and patience tolerating the adolescent teenage trio comprising of her daughter Radhika, her niece Savita and myself and the preteen pranksters, again a terrible trio of son Rajiv, nephew Rajesh and my bro Shankar(to balance the equation). She skilfully managed the accommodation in a Bombay flat and the cuisine, whipping out favourites from the kitchen with the support of her sisters in law and granny!
Grandparents along with mama and mami stayed in the ground floor of Ganga and my mom’s elder sister and family stayed in the third floor, this arrangement gave us the comfort of owning the entire apartment and alternating our boarding and lodging facility savouring the hospitality and we edged out the Marati manoos sandwiched in the second floor! They were like refugees in their own kingdom. My uncle along with mama had the incredible habit of giving nick names to all and sundry which were outright funny and humorous. Absence and distance can indeed make the hearts grow fonder and Mama pampered his pet sister with goodies and she had the first say to choose colour of the saris, I must hastily admit that he gifted all his three sisters and the nephews and nieces without any bias! I remember fondly a fluorescent green pleated skirt that he bought for me from Nepal!
He took all of us, packed like sardines to Juhu and Chowpathy, Borivili national park, gateway of India, Elephanta caves, Siddhivinayak temple, Haji Ali, the planetarium and to a host of delightful places and these picnics are etched in my brain as beautiful memories and the piece de resistance was the Bombay Bhel and ice dunked in cola (kala khatta)The foodies that we all were, we never gave a miss to the exotic restaurants, an extended table ,with the magnanimous mama heading it and footing the mammoth bill for the mouth watering thaalis with umpteen desserts and ice creams!
Radhika, Savita and myself explored all the shopping avenues especially linking road, we left no stone unturned in the search for the latest and trendy outfits with matching accessories to boot; these were promptly showed off to my buddies back home. We used to take a taxi home(taxis were damn cheap in those days) after the hectic shopping accentuated by hard bargaining and parleying.
I can never forget the Grammy nights telecast live on television and we used to sit up ogling at the galaxy of stars and watch thriller MJ, Whitney Houston, Cindy Lauper, Madonna, Abba and BoneyM time and again…I relive those priceless and precious moments by tuning into Retro hour on FM radio even today!
There was this Agarwal stores nearby and the entire jingbang walked in the hot sun after a game of cricket and hide and seek to get the famous sip up, the ice candy in different flavours sealed in a polythene pouch. We never missed out on the A1 samosas and the vada pavs that was and still is a rage, a delicacy of Bombay and Mumbai…
Amma’ eldest sister and family stayed a little far away in Sion and the meetings with the elder cousins are coming alive like flash backs for they are filled with fond and affectionate memories – reflections of the glorious past!
In the meanwhile, amma would slowly slink away to her bosom childhood friends’ house – Rajam and Baby with whom she would reminisce her glorious SIES days and the umpteen cinema shows at Maratha Mandir.
During the fag end of our vacation, appa would join us at Bombay and that brought about more pandemonium. The boisterous gang led by dad and his counterparts playing games of cards, cracking sardarji jokes and the quiz sessions literally brought the house down. On one such occasion, the havoc wrecked by “alla ponakka gang” (roughly translated as ‘how about otherwise’) resulted in the milkman’s repeated knocks and ringing of bells falling on deaf ears, the outcome – no milk supplied and when Grandma came back from the temple to find the milk bag empty, she gave a mouthful to appa for the uproarious behaviour and the since deaf ears resonated in the sonorous tunes of Aunt Agatha!
I still see the tears in my Thatha and pati’s eyes when we bid goodbye after the long camp, all of us yearning for the next annual entertainment at Maratha Mandir, the temple of love and affection.
These pleasant remembrances of the Bombay talkies make my heart pine at a excruciating time when our grandparents and one of my uncle and aunt have departed and the cousins have drifted apart physically and mentally. I dedicate this post to my maternal family for the nostalgic times at Bombay and for inculcating the value of relationship built on the foundation of love and affection!
Fond remembrances!
My own grandmother and had seldom set her foot out of the temple town she lived in. Once, when visiting relatives in aamchi Mumbai, she was all excited about a suggested visit to Maratha Mandir. Imagine her reaching there, only to discover what it really turned out to be. Such perfidy!
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Ha ha..thanks for the lovely anecdote..names are misleading aren’t they and thanks once again for gracing my blog.
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hey sunita…a beautiful trip down the memory lane…cheers
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Thanks Hari..and probably you could find some familiar names there:)
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yes, i noticed!!!
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and the last para..hope that has some effect and brings back all the lost relationship!
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oh, it will happen for sure!!
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Thanks for the optimism
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that is my forte…hahah
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Great:)
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Haha
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Suni simply super.surprising how you could recollect all the events.well done 😊.you missed patti’s big aavoo enacted by your brother when our taxi left cheddanagar towards railway station.Anyways indeed very touching.what is your next one
Eagerly awaiting.with good wishes.ammai
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There were so many memories all holed up and they had to be unleashed and I sure missed on many..but all of them are ingrained and etched never to be erased! You are the source and inspiration for all of these and glad that you are becoming part of the journey here too!:)
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Fine recollection of the good old days. Why did you leave out Paati’s apprehension and anxiety about my water usage ?
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Oh yes..missed out on that..and so many of them..thanks appa for liking this and for the reminders!
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Nostalgic….. Bombay, chitahaar, Sion, boneyM……. walk down the memory lane.😊😊
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Absolutely..no part of Bombay was left unexplored!
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very nice…..
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Thanks Sudhir
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😃😃😃
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Those sound happy memories, but it is sad when the older generation pass away and the younger one drift apart. Much the same thing has happened in my family too, I regret to say. Incidentally, I was intrigued by the name Elephanta Caves, so I Googled them. They look very interesting. 🙂
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I think we are losing out on the family system and the visits to grandparents’ homes these days…very much unlike Enid Blyton:)
You seem to visit India through our posts..Elephanta (rhyming with fanta) is attractive
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I’m afraid you may be right. 😦
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Enjoyable read! I love the way you describe how your dad would spend his time in your absence..so witty. But lovely to go back to the days of summer vacation where we just tagged along with parents/mom to relatives’ without any expectations. So unlike today’s times:)
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Yes Rashmi..the innocent and naive kids that we were!
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Beautiful piece Sunita!…You’ve in such a lovely way described such precious memories!
The part about your dad’s map like rotis cracked me up! And your Thatha & Paati sound absolutely adorable 🙂
Enjoyed reading this a lot:)
This read brought back a lot of memories for me too,,,
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Thanks DD..:)glad that it resonated with the never to be forgotten vacations with grandparents.
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Fond memories…. it’s great that you recollect them with such details. Felt nostalgic! 😉
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Thanks Indrajit ji..
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Wow, I must say that you have a great memory. You were able to collect all those events. It was written very well. Thank you for sharing Sunita.
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Thanks Lai..we can never let go of such fond memories ..
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Lovely post! It’s always a pleasure to read memoirs, more so when loaded with fun and large number of family members… Thanks for sharing.
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Thanks Rajeev..glad that you liked the walk down memory lane:)
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Love your posts ! Such fond memories 🙂 Nostalgic !!
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Thanks Nischita..very much obliged for the praises
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Wow!!!
Such a beautifully written piece and indeed it is nostalgic and I am sure everybody of us would relate to the incidences and the memory of yesteryear’s which was so special…we didn’t have the Multiplexes and we didn’t have the mobiles and we didn’t have the Internet, still we all loved the life and cherished every moment of gathering and get together of family members…indeed visiting to a relative place and that too from a town to a city was a big thing then and of course it was all weather train that took us such far of places and the time in the train for days was picnic by itself and we all have gone through those wonderful moments and we feel how we could do so much and how so much of time was at our disposal.
TV was the ultimate source of entertainment in home and Chitrahaar remained the ionic slot for the Wednesday evening at 8 PM…we didn’t have all these junk food nor we had the spread of the packed food in kiran shops unlike the packed packets in today;s retail shops…life was simple and life was fun and life was around family and friends…
I love the way you have presented your wonderful memories with such finer details and with such finesses it has touched and moved me…I was nostalgic while reading the post, I have gone through the very journey of memory.
😀
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I am very much obliged to you Nihar for the gracious comments and absolutely delighted that this article resonates well with your childhood days. As you rightly said, those days were simple without the complexities of technology and their banes and probably that is ONE big reason for social gatherings with relatives and friends. Now we have a plethora of options and indeed spoilt for choices but left wondering what to do and what to see!
A walk down memory lane is indeed thrilling and happy that I could take readers like yourself on that journey.
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How can it not be resonating with readers like me, when you have poured your heart out and written with such deep thoughts and beautiful emotions which you had stored in your memory bank for years and have en-cashed in such wonderful way and at very appropriate time. After all we all are so much busy and have been lost in the wilderness of cacophony and gizmos of digital life we don’t have time for ourselves and we are confused and bordering becoming crazy in our life and living…those good old days and those time when we had enough time to pause and reflect is gone with the wind today…
Just loved it and thanks so much for sharing…
😀
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Appreciate the encomiums showered on ordinary mortals like myself, I feel humbled and honoured at this meteor shower of praises. I truly believe that irrespective of the advancement of time, we need to stand still and reflect on the past as hindsight may be good teachers apart from being good remembrances.
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My pleasure and it was indeed such a lovely post and you have beautifully demonstrated the essence of reflection in life…yes, it acts as a teacher not just remians as a remembrances.
😀
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Thanks nihar and have a lovely day
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😀
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An enjoyable read in your inimitable and racy style bringing out memories of childhood days of vacation at grandparents place.Those were the days when simple pleasures, that were always inexpensive like eating at roadside shops,watching TV at home,playing with cousins at home,brought us great thrills and immense satisfaction..Life was simple,uncomplicated and innocent with contentment.A good post with which everyone could relate to.
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You made my day with the generous dose of appreciations for fond memories and remembrances that were as you so rightly put it “uncomplicated” and “simple”!
KP sir, I elated at the thought that these simple pleasures can give us the same sense of joy and pleasure to all of us!
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this was a fun read! walk down memory lanes are always lovely esp when someone describes it as nicely as you did in this post. It was so LIVELY
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Glad that you also embarked with me on this fond walk down memory lane and enjoyed the valuable company of friends and relatives, Thanks Sujatha for the appreciations!
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It’s a joyful read to know about your beautiful memories. We all have such fond rememberance of our childhood and they give us a good enough reason to smile just like you must have. 🙂
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Glad that I gave my valuable readers reasons to smile and be cheerful thinking about the good old days!:)
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A wonderful trip down the memory lane. It made me a bit of nostalgic as well, remembering my cousins with whom I shared such intense relations and numerous secrets. Really we have drifted apart, physically and mentally, but somewhere the chord remains, in the deep heart’s core. And, reading your post, the chord did chime.
Well, one thing, my rotis, if they were preserved, could be published as a new roti Atlas!! 😀 😀
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Yes, Maniparna, it is this chord like the umbilical one that keeps the relationship going..so glad that this revereberated with you in every sense of the underlying theme and brought back rich memories.
Ha ha..so you are an expert in roti making! And I am keen to know the new land masses discovered!
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😀 😀 …
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Those days are indeed the golden days for every soul… sometimes making you wish you could revisit childhood once again. Nice post!
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Thanks so much Leena for the appreciation and lending your lovely thoughts on this one.
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Colourful memories and nostalgic moments come alive in this post. The excitement of watching Chitrahar, sitting huddled in front of a BW TV is something that the present generation of kids will not know. Thankfully they can still enjoy kala khatta and Vada pav. 🙂
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I am obliged to the appreciation and the fondness that you have shown on this post of remembrances Somali…our generation was of course different free of gadgets and gizmos
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Very detailed interesting Post. Memories of Childhood. Since I am a Mumbai Girl, for me, Memories was getting on the train and going to Bangalore to my Grand-parents house for 1 and half month vacation.
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Glad that this post resonated well with you and thanks so much for your wonderful thoughts on this one.
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Muaah!!!!!!!!!
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Hello, I’m Cattie. I have read your post and posted a Comment. But the comment in not featuring here. Please check your spam box and see if my comment is there.
Cattie
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Thanks so much Cattie…yes your comment was in spam and I have recovered it.
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