We chose the tour of Temple Towns of Tamil Nadu, which included Pondicherry too. That was because of my intimate connection with the city - I had spent three years there when my father was posted as the Director, Public Works Department. We used to live in the government quarters, just above the PWD Office building Travaux Publics - on the first floor. My engagement was held in that residence, so it held nostalgic memories for both of us.
Much before the tour, I had checked up the place - I mean Travaux Publics - on Google - the photo looked great - the gate looked the same as before - looking majestic and fresh!
Soon after we checked in at Hotel Atithi at 7 pm, my husband and I decided to visit the place. I must have looked like an excited little girl as we were exiting the hotel. We had no clue whether to go left or right. We asked the security guard about the distance and location of the PWD office. He said we could take an auto and be there in ten minutes.
We hailed an auto, seated ourselves and asked him to take us to Travaux Publics. He charged us Rs 100 for the short distance of less than three kms - we were in no mood to argue and we didn't let that dampen our enthusiasm.
We stood at the tall gate with freshly painted doors and gazed at the imposing building beyond. It was 7.30 pm, but the office had not closed down. A few persons were seen there.
We gazed up at the first floor. We could see a light there. We were hoping that the present Director of PWD must be staying there; perhaps we could pay a quick visit and look around the place. My heart started beating fast.
Looking at us staring at the building, the security guard politely inquired what we wanted. I excitedly told him that I used to live upstairs once upon a time - 50 years ago to be precise, when my father Mr. N.D. Rajan was Director, PWD. We told him that we wished to visit the house upstairs and wanted to know who was living there. He said it was occupied by an ex Minister of Puducherry but he was out of town, visiting his family in his home town Mahe. I was crestfallen - my hopes of going around the house to refresh my memories were crashed.
In fact, we saw a separate gate leading upstairs to the house - it wasn't there then; it was new. We used to use the same gate as that of the office. We double checked that separate gate - it was locked, so no chance of visiting 'our' house.
Meanwhile the guard went in and came back after a few minutes after checking out my father's name on the board. He respectfully told us that we could come to the office and see the board listing out all the Directors.
We walked in and saw the huge board; the security guard pointed to the first name. I told him that was not my father. Scrolling down further, I saw my father's name in the sixth spot and told him that was my father.
When we were clicking photos, he obliged us by taking our photos in front of the board. Everyone around, though total strangers, looked at us with respect in their eyes and it made us feel good.
As we came out, the guard clicked a picture of both of us and then gave us privacy.
We started taking photos of the first floor of the building from every angle. It was dark, but I managed a few pics.
First, the mango tree - it used to supply us with loads of delicious mangoes (lal bagh / sendoora variety). The mangoes would be plucked when ready and brought home. It was my mother's job (assisted by our Man Friday) to spread hay on the huge pooja room and place the mangoes there to ripen. My mother enjoyed choosing half a dozen ready mangoes for each day. I still remember all of us seated around her, as she'd neatly peel each one and cut equal sized pieces and make five equal portions. This would be repeated with each mango. Everyone would get to taste equal number of pieces of each mango! The seeds also would be equally shared to relish the flesh. I was so glad to see the tree still alive and well.
I could see that particular room beyond the tree on the left side. What was new? I could see an A/C, which we could see connected from its balcony.
Behind this room was our drawing room - my most pleasant memories of that room are about the 'girl-seeing' incident, when my would-be husband had come over with his parents, and we got engaged the same day. I did not get a view of this room.
Then there was the long verandah / corridor, with large windows, right above the center of the office downstairs. We had a long swing, where all five of our family could squeeze in to be seated. What's special about the house is the height of the ceiling.
Beyond that was our dining room, where we had a big dining table, which would double up as table tennis table, where I would agree to play with my champion brother - on the condition that he would not slam shots / aces.
Behind that was the extra large kitchen and adjoining pantry, which had their own share of stories ....
On the right side, we could see the balcony of what used to be our bedroom - my sister's and mine, I remembered how at bedtime, we'd be discussing the stories and scenes of the movie we had recently watched, only to be ticked off by our parents in the adjoining room, their bedroom.
Their bedroom had a balcony too, which faced the road. There was a small tea stall there, which would cater to the office staff too. It was called 'Janaky Tea Stall' - incidentally, Janaky was my mother's name. The tea stall would play film songs in the mornings and evenings.
When I came out to see the tea stall, I saw no sign of it. Nothing along the neat wall of the building on the opposite side of the road. I asked the guards there about 'Janaky Tea Stall', and they said it had been shut down some years ago.
I remembered the numerous movies we had seen in Pondy - I remembered the many modest movie theaters of those times - all lined up on the same road - Newtone, Ratna, Raman, Raja, Kandan, and Ajanta. I ventured to ask the guard about the theaters and he started telling us which ones were still there and which ones had turned into malls / hotels. I told him we were put up at Hotel Atithi. To our surprise, he informed us that it used to be Ajanta theater. Oh wow! I remembered watching so many Tamil movies, including - 'Avalukkendroru manam', 'Engirundo Vandaal' 'Raja', even the ancient 'Ambikapathi' (re-run) ....
The beach is located pretty close to the house, but dad would choose to drive us all to the beach on some late evenings. It was not for a walk (those days we had not heard of 'walking for health'). We'd sit there and enjoy the breeze for half an hour and drive back home.
In this context, I remember my father proudly taking us to a famous French restaurant (forgot the name) on the beach front. We kids were overawed by the ambiance. Dad ordered fruit salad for all of us. We were waiting impatiently for it to arrive. Arrive it did, and as soon as the waiter left, we dug our spoon into the attractive cup and eagerly put in the first morsel in our mouth. Dad was excitedly watching our expression. What did he get to see? No, not cheerful smiles and sparkling eyes, but twitched lips and sour expressions. Why? The fruit salad tasted different - it was sour, in fact. We whispered among ourselves that they would have added curd (yogurt) in it - probably by mistake. None of us took in a second spoon. I don't know why, but we didn't make an issue of it with the management but just paid the exorbitant bill and walked out, vowing never to set foot anywhere near the precincts. Looking back, I think they must have added sour cream to the fruit salad.
We were happy to spend some wonderful moments reliving the wonderful memories associated with the house. We then took leave of the security guards, gave one more longing look at 'our' house of yore and took an autorikshaw back to the hotel - this time we were charged a reasonable 50 Rs.
That was the best one hour of the entire tour for me. I could not help remembering our visit to my father's sprawling government quarters 'Haddo Villa', when we went on a group tour of Andamans in January 2016. It is now Tribal research Center. We were also fortunate to visit in January 2015, my maternal grandfather's official residence in Cochin, where I was born. It is now Maritime Heritage Museum. Some connection - eh?
We enjoyed the sumptuous spread for dinner and retired to bed, ready to dream about my good old Pondy days....
No comments:
Post a Comment