21. Arunachala Anna was the first one to be with my parents, then came Mani Anna and much much later, Akka’s youngest brother, Kishta Anna too had come to be with us at Bombay, chasing his luck and fortunes. Dorai Anna, one more brother of Akka, too had come to Bombay, – but that was just for site seeing. His only daughter, known as ML was a baby of three months then, was a delight to play with, to us, all brothers and sisters. One day Dorai Anna and his wife Sundari manni had left behind their baby at home under Akka’s care and gone to a cinema, in a very famous Cinema Theatre – Maratha Mandir and the cinema they went to was Navrang. Who you think was their escort? Me! Of all people! Because in those days, I neither knew Hindi nor the east or west of Bombay. Thank God none of us got lost and all came home in time and intact.
22. Akka’s one more brother Checha Anna was the one left out who did not come and stay with us at any place. But may be to compensate that, his daughter Rama was with us for one vacation and his son Murali was with us at Nagpur for quite long. He studies in Lakshminarayana Institute of Technology and was a gold medal winner too.
23. Athimber always wanted that we should enjoy good movies. I do not know whether he went out with Akka for any cinema or not. But he had taken us for good films – mostly English. He was very fond of Laurel Hardy movies and Charlie Chaplin movies. I still remember those films – though Laurel Hardy Charlie Chaplin films were comic ones, some others were classics like “Limelight”. The Hunchback of Notridam and Tale of Two Cities were also nothing short of classicals. Our outings were not confined to cinemas only. During our vacations, he had taken us out to Vihar Lake – a place far away from our Ghatkopar – not by distance, but due to circuitous approach roads. I wish and hope the lake, with all its serene beauties is still alive along with the Board claiming “Beware of Crocodiles”. His preferred choice was always the Aquarium rather than the Kamala Nehru Park on Malabar Hills or the Victoria Gardens at Byculla.
24. On one occasion when he had taken us to Victoria Gardens, the Byculla zoo, Mallika somehow got mixed up in the crowd and was lost. A passerby noticing a crying girl took her to the Auditorium Stage and the announcer announced loudly about her presence there. He announced-“ The small girl here, says her name is Pappi and mother’s name she says Akka and father’s name Athimber . The parents please come and collect your ward”. So we got back Mallika. Later we came to know from her that she followed a lady in green sari assuming her to be Akka. Athimber might have scolded Akka on that day or not, but as my memory goes he never scolded any of us. The brunt could always be on Akka. But such incidents never deterred him from taking us out on further outings.
25. In those days, come Jauary 25 and 26. Bombay wore a new look every year. Truck loads of people and their bizarre pipe horns and their deafening sounds (of music!) vehicles moving on snail pace, pavements on both sides filled with people, vendors…. Entire stretch as far as eyes could see all filled to the core with heads and heads… as though the entire population of Bombay has been let out onto the streets…. Yes. All Government Buildings would be lit up with decorative lights and serial bulbs. Each one decked up more artistically than the other. Awesome! Really it was worth watching. In one particular year, when he could not take us out, Babu was asked to escort. He with his leadership qualities would exert pressure on us to follow him very strictly lest he would be questioned. I wonder the practice of lighting the government buildings is still in vogue! So what! Those grandeurs of yester years have been dimmed by the present day celebrations. The present generation may not be missing anything. Celebrations of Ganesh Chaturthi and Dandiya Raas have come up in a big way in all nooks and corners and are here to stay for many more years.
26. While many parents would flatly refuse, Athimber never said “No” to us when it was a school excursion. It was totally a different issue that we never ventured to ask him for such luxuries. Nevertheless, I had the privilege of going on such an excursion to Borivili National Park. I do not remember the experiences of Babu Gita Mallika or Ramesh about their school excursions. But I know for certain that when an excursion was arranged by our colony, both mine and Babu’s names were right royally included. We had gone to Elephanta caves with our colonial brothers. Much to the contrary belief that Athimber was very skeptical on spending, he did his best for the comfort of his children. He might have forgone his own comforts and luxuries but accommodated ours.
27. People may ask “What is there in the name, A rose by any name smells all the same”. But in our customs, a lot more goes into the naming ceremony of a baby boy or girl. Only difference is that the name that was given at the time of naming ceremony with all rituals and fan-fares, is somehow lost somewhere down the years and a new name gets stuck to the person. The same thing happened in our family also for my brothers and sisters. After coming to Bombay, it was time for Babu to be put in proper school. Though he was called Babu at home, his name as per naming ceremony was Kumaraswamy, the name that my mother’s grandfather had. As per usage and customs, names of elderly persons who passed away are chosen for naming the new born baby and hence this name stuck to Babu. He was taken to a Hindi school near Uday Talkies in Ghatkopar itself, as my parents were not willing to send to him to a far off school at Matunga. Bharathi had taken him to the Hindi school. When the Headmaster asked Babu for his name, he rightly said Babu, and then immediarely corrected it to Kumaraswamy. According to Headmaster, Babu could not be considered as a personal name and Kumar sounded an incomplete one. So he asked what Kumar which Kumar – Dilipkumar Pradeepkumar Rajkumar Ravikumar – which one. Babu not knowing what to say simply said “yes”and Bharathi also agreed and so from that day onwards, a new name had stuck to him and he is known to all, till date by this name only. A boy who was born at Thondaiyaarpettai of Madras and well “christened”as Kumaraswamy, lost his original name and came to be known as Ravikumar Iyer.
28. Gita born at Mylapore was rightly given the name of Kalpagam, the presiding deity of Mylapore, but was never called by that name. As for Mallika, her original name was Seethalakshmi, the name of my father’s mother who passed away a year before. Like Gita, even Mallika was never called by her original name. When she got admitted in Municipal School in Tamil Medium at Matunga, the teacher or the clerk who was looking after admission matters could not take Pappi as a name for a school student. He had altered her name to Mallika and Athimber also agreed. Similarly, Ramesh whose name as per naming ceremony was Swaminathan, the name of my paternal grandfather, was changed to Ramesh at the time of his first admission in a Peda School. Play School, Nursery, LKG UKG etc. were not known in those days – not even kindergarten. But Peda School was exactly a Play school where Gita, Mallika and Ramesh were going to. Any computer savvy may be well aware of “drag and drop”, but Bharathi without any such background knowledge was good at it. She did the “drag and drop” for the trio. Sometimes Akka did it. Thus all who had been ceremoniously named with traditional names had been renamed in modern names by some persons unconnected with our family. The point to note here is that they all had earned ‘a name for themselves’ on that day itself and again they have “earned a name” now for themselves by their own exemplary efforts.
29. As long as my father was at Bombay, he worked at far off places only – Kandivili , Ambarnath etc. Early in the morning he would leave when most of us were asleep and would return late at night by which time we would have gone to bed. Sundays were his special days. He would ceremoniously take elaborate oil bath and we were also given oilbaths, a trend which is missing in our present day life.
30. On many occasions my sisters and brothers would sleep on the log of wood in front of the house and it was Babu’s favourite past time to frighten Gita at bedtime, by showing and describing the passing clouds in the sky, as some scary creatures. Very often they changed shapes to the advantage of Babu and he would conveniently ride on his fantacies. Poor girl, timid and scared, would rush to others for comfort. All these were narrated by Babu himself later when I joined them. I have noticed a peculiar trait in Babu – whomsoever he ragged or teased, would initially run away from him but was still clinging to him only. Be it Gita or some years later, Chandru or even much later Harish, our youngest nephew, who came to be with Akka and Athimber. Similar traits were found to be equally strong in Ramesh, but his equations were first with Sowmya, our niece through Bharathi, and later it became much stronger with Harish. Akka literally had a very tough time in separating them and more so when she was “holy untouchable”.
31. Athimber never confined himself to mere putting the children at school. He would not only get their school books, but would also wrap up them up neatly and stick labels too. Unlike these days where the parents have to go to school to get books and notebooks readily wrapped up with school’s name duly printed on them, in those days only the list will be given by the school and the parents had to go to shops and buy the stock. Luckily, second hand books were also sold in the same shops. In Bombay he could not pay much attention to our needs because of his office at far off places. In 1957, my base shifted from Mylapore to Bombay and I was admitted into S.I.E.S.High school. I had earlier studied in Tamil Medium only and now my entire courses were through English medium, which I could not cope up. Every word in all the text books was totally unknown, big and new to me. When I asked Athimber to teach me, he simply got me a LIFCO dictionary. He asked me to write down unknown and unfamiliar words in a separate note book and then refer to the Dictionary and write down the meaning. It turned out to be virtually writing the whole book. But that also helped me to pick up the subject.
32. In a few years of Athimber’s transfer to Bombay, Bharathi got married and went off to Vellore. Generally, the marriage takes place in girl’s place, but in her case it was at Vellore – the boy’s place. In the hustle and bustle of travelling with too many people and with too many luggages, one suit case containing choicest clothes, well embroidered designer dresses and a few embroidered sarees got lost. Whether it was left behind in the train itself, or at the railway platform or at the tonga stand nobody knew. Only when we wanted to wear one of those beautiful outfits, we realized that it was lost forever. Needless to say, despite the loss, the marriage went off very well. Only Akka could not console herself as the dresses were made exclusively for the occasion and with precise exquisite artistic work.
33. At Vellore, Athimber’s cousin brother Ananthan, was living, who later became very close to our family. They were then living at Vasanthapuram in Vellore. In the later years, they too moved over to Madras. Just like Athimber, his cousin brother too was a man of few words but equally kind and generous. Apart from this Ananthan Uncle there were some more cousins – brothers and sisters, but we had very less acquaintance with them or their family members. Athimber had one elder sister and one younger sister, but their families too were confined to themselves. Only Athimber used to go and meet them occasionally. He had one younger brother who passed away at a young age. The irony was that he was a very good swimmer, but got drowned in Adyar River.
34. Reverting back to our family, Athimber never lost his patience when it came to polishing his children’s shoes. Even when we all had grown up, he continued to take care of our belongings like keeping our cycles shining and pumped with air, and our cheppals, sandals canvas and leather shoes duly polished and kept them spick and span. Though many fathers may be taking care of all these tiny odd little things, his attention was something special. Later in our life, when we were required to attend to our children’s odd little things in the same manner, we realized his importance.
35. His hand writing was forever a matter of high appreciation. In those days post cards were the most common means of communication and the post cards he wrote to us always drew the attention of even strangers and we received the compliments which should rightly go to him. Whenever he wrote and whatever he wrote, be it just the address portion in the inland letters or on the covers, it always caught the attention of the readers. As his sons and daughters, though we may now be proud of our legible handwriting, none of us have the beautiful handwriting which he possessed.
36. Many in our family were born on special days, that is, on the festival day itself or very close to some major festivals. Come Diwali, it is birthday of not only Akka, even her granddaughter Sowmya’s too. She also will be remembered. A cousin of mine, Akka’s favourite niece, Susheela too has her birthday around that time. Sowmya was born at Ghatkopar Bombay, at a hospital in Rajawadi area in Ghatkopar and due to strict observations of taking baths after a visit to hospital, Babu or I would only carry meals / milk etc. to the hospital. Akka would finish of her turn in the early morning – before her bath. The unique feature of Sowmya’s birth was that my maternal grandmother too had come to Bombay – just to guide Akka in handling a tiny baby. But the major point to note was four generations were under one roof at the same time. Sowmya, her mother Bharathi, her mother Akka and her mother Gowri paatti. I do not remember whether my mother’s grandmother- Thulasi Paatti was alive at that time – or else it would have been further more unique of having five generations living at the same time. Though Sowmya cannot confirm that because of her, birth, the uniqueness of five generations alive, hale and hearty at the same period, Bharathi had vouched that she made it possible for the fifth generation to be in the palms of – no no in the lap of the first generation. Thulasi paatti was lucky to have her fifth generation child smiling on her lap. Both Bharathi and all those who escorted her to make this happen have to be congrajulated. In those days taking photos were not common. Why so much! It was simply believed that by taking out photos, the life of the one who got photographed got reduced. Due to such beliefs, the rarest of rare moments in life are greatly missed.
37. Somewhat similar thing of “multiple generations under one roof” had happened at a much later date to my maternal grandfather – he was lucky to witness three generations grow under his hereditiory, sharing the same “Kaushi Gotram”. This unique feature happened when my cousin Dhandu became father of a baby boy. The child named Krushnakumar, his father Dhandu, his father Mani Anna and his father Venkatasesha Iyer – all under one broad umbrella of Kausika Gothram! Really a great fortune! and that called for a grand celebration and it was duly performed also, with all rituals attributed to the occasion.
38. While in Bombay Babu showed unique traits of being attracted to street jugglers and snake charmers. Wherever and whenever they were at performance, Babu was sure to be there squatting in the front row – least bothered about the world around him or how others at home would be worrying about his long spell of absence. I could imagine the tension that would have prevailed at home on such occasions. Both Akka and Athimber would worry a lot. Akka used to miss Bharathi on such occasions because, once Bharathi had run frantically in search of him and found him in the crowd and brought him back home. The cinema title “Naache Naagin Baaje Been” became popular at a much later time – but before then “Naache Naagin Jidhar and Bhaage Babu Udhar” was a common feature in our house.
39. That was one reason Akka had dared not sent him to English Medium schools at Matunga / King Circle. Such places could be reached only on taking a rail route. But he had come up of age and so along with Gita, he was sent to S.I.E.S.High School – standing for South Indian Education Society’s Higher Secondary School. Later even I had joined the same school. My stint at my Gurukulam at Mylapore also ended abruptly, as I was keen to join my parents. My youngest brother Ramesh too was admitted into the same school. Only Mallika was left out. She continued in the same Municipality School with Tamil Medium.
40. Earlier, Akka had to train all three children – Babu Gita and Mallika – to read and write Tamil for which she would hand over a Tamil Magazine Ananda Vikadan and demand a page from the magazine to be written. It was a tough job for Akka to get things done – especially with Babu. Whether he wrote Tamil text or not, he drew pictures as was appearing in the magazine- particularly a character called “Raayar” in a continued story and that was of a school teacher who in his school days was a notorious student and was now troubled by his notorious students. Though I was not there with them in those days I learnt all these from them later on. In keeping with the trend, at a much later period, as per Akka’s instructions, my daughters both Anu and Aruna were also made to write one page from Tamil Magazine, same Ananda Vikadan and Aruna too like Babu, started drawing sketches from the Magazine. She became famous for her sketches on the character “AmmaaKannu”.
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