I am The Great Collector. Don’t ask me what of? Well… it is a huge variety of objects, curios, artefacts – both Indian and foreign, Ganesha images of any material, elephants of varied dimension made of wood or stone, well padded diaries, and a hundred other items of interest. I shed tears when I heard the famous “Moore Market”, stone’s throw from Madras Central Station was destroyed by fire. Till date, it has not been reckoned whether it was a natural disaster, or engineered with diabolical motives by vested interests. I can of course boast that the Rs 2/- per day allowance my father gave me, helped me build a personal library of several hundred books which I acquired from select booksellers of erstwhile Moore Market. Ask me about any leading authors’ works, and chances are I have it in my library.

Three of us friends pooled our resources to see movies – almost always English movies. And if you asked me about the actors, actresses and the titles of those movies, my answers would possibly astound film critics with the statistics I could provide. Minerva of Broadway, Casino, Elphinstone, Roxy, and Globe were the most frequented theatres of my time in Chennai. You may wonder how a student could enjoy 250-300 classic films of Hollywood and British origin, when he is seldom free. Yes, my engineering workshop classes came in very handy, with the co-operation and assistance of the duty master and foreman. We in turn, took good care of his frugal demands and kept him in good humor. I have in my possession, a whole set of photo albums of celebrated stars of the silver screen. Occasionally, even today, I pick up some of these albums, and get engrossed admiring the facial expressions of immortal souls that graced those movies of high drama and performance. I fondly reminisce the days of Paul Muni, Leslie Howard, Charles Boyer, Gary Cooper, Charlie Chaplin, Eddy Cantor, Clark Gable, Walter Pidgeon, Ronald Coleman, Douglas Fairbanks, Gregory Peck, Sir Lawrence Olivier, Paul Robson, and Humphrey Bogart, to name a few; the list of course is never ending. Similarly, a whole battalion of heroines including Greta Garbo, Vivien Leigh, Norma Shearer, Bette Davis, Catherine Hepburn, Ingrid Bergman can never be forgotten. Gone With The Wind, with two intermissions, is in my mind’s eye, where Clark Gable, Vivien Leigh, Leslie Howard, and Olivia De Havilland played stellar roles. What a movie it was, what acting, and what settings! Great indeed were the moments we friends spent enjoying such movies. It was capable of lifting us to a different and higher plane of introspection. Believe me, I do not decry Indian movies; I respect some of them approaching the standard of foreign films, but the numbers were deplorably low and were no match to what Hollywood counterparts could offer. More on the subject of films would be penned in this narration later on. How much of my writings would invoke interest is to be left safely to the readers’ judgment. 

The conveyance we used to reach the entertainment centers were partially availing of suburban electric train service to the nearest point followed by what we used to call “Natraja service” aka trekking. Mind you, hungry as we all would be, we had reserve funds for a cup of hot tea during intervals. On the way back home, we never denied ourselves refreshments in the form of a plain dosa and half a cup of enervating coffee at Udipi Café at the round-thana on Mount Road. You have to believe me when I say that you could satisfy your appetite for 2 ½ annas (15 paise by today’s measure) for what we term as tiffin (and a whole sumptuous meal cost only six annas, ie, thirty six paise).  Where am I? No day dreaming… I am right here in Madras of the late ‘30s and ‘40s.

Around September ’47, I bade adieu to Madras by boarding the Howrah Mail destined to Calcutta, seeking greener pastures. Job-hunting is a chapter in one’s history, with its own ups and downs. Well, that chapter has to wait. 

For the present, I have to cover a chapter reserved for relatives, made up of periappa, chittappa, periamma, chitti, mama, mami and their offsprings. What a crowd they all go to constitute, scattered as they were, all over within the Madras Presidency and beyond. We had some who had crossed the seas and become fabulously rich. 

My father gave us comforts that today’s money could not buy. For a medical doctor in yonder Burma, to take care of me and my seven siblings, and fund his dependent relatives in India, it was not much effort, as his salary and perks were adequate enough. He enjoyed a furlough to visit India once in two years. All these were possible as the purchasing power of the rupee during my father’s professional days was significantly higher than what it is today. A whole set of relatives had visited Burma as father’s guests and my dad had met the entire expenses. Deck passengers on steamships had to pay a paltry eighteen rupees to travel two days from Madras to Rangoon; so cheap it was that I remember having traveled from Madras to Tiruchy on a two-rupee rail ticket. Nowadays, beggars refuse small denomination as alms, as cost of living has spiraled upwards.

Lifestyles are changing, and the nation’s economy is still beset with problems aplenty. The disparity between haves and have-nots today looks unbridgeable, and this aspect deserves corrective methods by the powers that are ruling the roost. Power breeds corruption, and ultimately power verily assumes self-destructive behavior patterns.

To travel almost thirty-six hours in a train that shifts your body from Madras to Calcutta with a valid Rs 18/- ticket is unbelievable today, considering the distance. My highly qualified teachers, with salaries around Rs 100/- a month lived comfortably without incurring debts, and could support their families of six or more persons. Their extra income at best came through tuitions. They were free from bribery and nepotism. They were dedicated practitioners, promoting education of a high standard. My class teacher, Sreeman Srinivasacharyar who lived to hit a century, passed away recently; I was one of his favorites. His nephew, a qualified chartered accountant, Sreeman Velukudi Krishnan has taken to religious discourses, enriching our lives with sublime thoughts. Today, Velukudi is a much sought out person for upanyasams. I was blessed to have class and school mates like Late General Sundarji, Chartered Accountant Late N C Krishnan, well known public figure Yagya Raman of Krishna Gana Sabha fame, and good many who later climbed the ladder to reach dizzy heights in their respective professional career. “Sada”, ie me, is still a multi-faceted character, who moved amongst the brightest and dullest class-fellows. It was the dullest in the class who happened to be talented soccer, hockey, and basketball players. I learnt a lot from the many Dorais, Vincents, Bhaskarans, Babus, and Nainis, who helped me sharpen my skills and raise my playing standards. I was in touch with this lot for many years; I may not be wrong with my conjecture that 90% of my contemporaries have departed from their earthly abode. I am hell bent in following my class teacher, Late Srinivasacharya, by surmounting the hundred-year hurdle. God, in all HIS mercy, should grant me a century of living under the benign sun; dreams are sometimes realized.

I will now touch another most favorite pastime of mine - sharing and listening to music. Music has the power to cure your ailing body and depressed mind. Music, I assert is divine, is a great leveler, and helps you maintain your equilibrium. You might be surprised to hear that there was music reverberating within the four walls of our home at all times. The sound vibrations drew me closer and closer to music and occasionally indulged me to sing all by myself. I am not a mean performer of vocal Carnatic music, and of some catchy light music sung by the likes of MS, MKT, DD, DKP, NCV, and TRM. They popularized music to a level where even hand-rickshaw pullers used to freely sing those songs, as well as the original singers. Music has magnetic powers and to the exception of Aurangazeb the despot, the melody that music unfolds mesmerizes the entire humanity. I was witness to the advent of audio technology – the gramophone, and later, the radio. Out of sheer curiosity, we used to peep into the gramophone to check if there was a real human being, invisible to our eyes, “singing”. We elementary school kids could never fathom the intricacies of science and technology; we had to believe our elders.

Our elders used to advise us to be cautious while meandering out, drumming into our ears that ghosts were prowling around tamarind trees. We never cultivated the power of questioning our elders. We never had an identity of our own. We were hero worshippers, and fanatic followers of certain dogmas, and of of dos and don’ts. 

When I was three years old, I was told that I evinced a keen interest in music. My elder siblings had music classes at home. The music teacher with his tuft, known as “Kudumi”, took centre-stage in the main hall, using the harmonium as a shruti; sitting a few yards away in one corner, I used to hear the fine tuned voice of the teacher offering melodious music. My sisters would follow the teacher, and would shout their hearts out, almost unbearably. Later on, my sisters, through voice culture, developed a considerable music repertoire. During the Navarathri season, i.e., dolls display, named as “Navarathri Golu”, my sisters were much sought after for their music renderings. So started my entry into the music world as an audience, to hear the great masters in both vocal and instrumental. The list of musicians I heard would go to make a long list. Each one of them had the “gurukulavaasam”, learning music from the vidwans. The gurus taught their disciples for a very short while in the evenings, and fully engaged them for the rest of the day to do domestic work - washing, cleaning, cattle-feeding, running around fetching vegetables and provisions, etc. It was non-stop, hectic work, demanded by the vidwans’ wives. The shisyas eventually, free from the gurus’, followed in the footsteps of their gurus, taking in disciples, and got them to do the same errands they had been carrying out earlier. Quite literally, most of the shisyas were self-taught to become famous singers.