ME

By Sulabha Naik

Me is written by SULABHA NAIK.It comes under Memoir category.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Blue Rose Publishers
• Release date: Nov 6, 2023
• ISBN: 9798890089298

Book preview

Chapter 1

Childhood

The eagle flying high up in the skies stirs my soul.... as a very young girl I was always overawed by the power of the bird........ fearless, powerful and exclusive...... exactly the way I wanted to be when I grew up into a woman.... wings unfurled, unfettered sweeping into the wide expanse of the skies!

Be fearless, compassionate, generous, ambitious and sincere in Life. Never waste your precious tears on undeserving people, whether family, relatives or friends said my father (Appa in Marathi) in a father-daughter conversation as I stepped into my teens full of effervescent youth and enthusiasm keen to step out into the world to explore this mysterious and charming realm of mystery.

It was a soggy wet morning at 8.20 a.m. on 16th of July as the heavens poured in great sheets of water drowning the historical city of the Peshwas, Pune, a defining moment, when a bawling baby girl was entering the world, Me!

It was Circa 1948!

Author Sulabha Naik as an 8 month old baby.

The monsoon grey clouds had gathered and the winds picked up speed as the heavens opened up, the frogs croaked in the puddles outside the Maternity hospital on Deccan Gymkhana in the heart of the city with blue-grey dragon-flies droning noisily over the slush and mud under a sullen cloak of fading light settling on the city environs, wet and gloomy.

On a late afternoon when I was just four days old I was bundled into a warm flannel blanket sleeping blissfully in my mother’s arms as she, my father and grandmother travelled in a tonga, a horse-carriage very popular in those days for ferrying passengers to and fro. Clip-clopping sedately down the famous Fergusson College road aflame with thick Gulmohar trees, the street carpeted with flaming red and gold flowers limp with water dripping in deep runnels the horse-carriage (tonga) ferrying us finally pulled up at my grandparents’ house just a few metres from the Maternity Home on Deccan Gymkhana in Pune.

My grandparent’s bungalow built in the 1930’s by my maternal grandfather, an eminent civil engineer Mr. Mahadev Shankar Vartak stood imposingly in the cusp of undulating hills and verdant green spaces, a serene oasis teeming with flora fauna and birds of every feather and hue, flanked by the legendary Fergusson College on one side and on the other the imposing black stone structure of the Ranade Institute.

Only a handful of rickshaws, buses, horse-drawn carriages and cycles punctuated the quiet neighbourhood and at night the petals of Life folded into sleep till the feisty colours of dawn ushered in the sun early morning.

Layered like an imposing Fort my grandparent’s 3 storied high black stone bungalow nestled in a veritable garden blooming with Champa flowers, fruit trees burgeoning with Chikku, mango, guavas and luscious Amla (gooseberries) enveloped in a tiara of thick entwining branches.

Mornings and evenings the birds trilled in gay abandon in heavenly arias as jasmine perfumed breezes swept through the house leaving tendrils of freshness in its wake. The smells and scents of my grandparent’s bungalow enveloped my childhood on our Annual Summer holidays in Pune snug in its creamy soothing layers of contentment and bliss.

Arriving at Shivaji Nagar station by the Deccan Queen passing through the dark endless tunnels from Mumbai en route from Kolkata to Pune and stopping at Karjat station my dad would hop off the train to buy the smoky fried batata vadas and the honey sweet deep purplish small rounded luscious Karvandas (blackberries) bursting with ripened juice of a thousand summers!

On one such memorable train journey my father had got down on the platform to get the Batata vada and Karvandas wrapped in a green leafy pouch, I stuck my head out shouting for him to return panicking that he would be left behind on station platform as the train, the majestic Deccan Queen had started moving slowly....luckily my dad returned and seeing my head stuck in the window bars both he and a co-passenger expertly twisted it free! Phew! That was a close call all because of the impetuosity of a youngster!

Clip-clopping down to my granny’s house was fun in the horse drawn Tonga with our luggage....4 bedrolls, 3 suitcases and the copper water vessel called Lota to keep the drinking water cool. Tumbling out of the Tonga, my brother and I would rush to hug our granny Uma Ajji, 2 Mamis, 2 Mamas and 2 Aunts! What a homecoming......laughter spilling in barrels of mirth and meeting up with our cousins, some younger, some older like prisms of the rainbow melting into the mists of Time!

My granny (gramps) all of four feet and few inches, a petite, fragile old lady yet formidable in her nine yards white sari, her ice-cold blue-green eyes sent shivers down our spine when she scolded us for scampering up trees or played hide and seek on the third-floor terrace running up and down the regal marble staircase in gay and careless abandonment!

Strict yet as soft as a marshmallow she ruled our little hearts and we all, the rogue gang ran errands for her to bring her betel-nut box which was a strict no-no for her grandchildren to eat, but we did manage to smuggle a pinch...also fetching her spectacles, her Puja Book, sacred scriptures to read and the hymns to be sung by us the young brigade in the evening after the oil-lamp was lit in the Puja room. Dinner was served in the big kitchen with my Mami ladling steaming hot food into our thalis (steel plates) as we squatted on the small wooden seats called Paats cross-legged eating with relish!

Author as a young 8 year old girl

I loved sitting on my granny’s cosy lap while she oiled my hair and braided them into two long plaits tied up in white ribbons. Off you go she would sigh and shoo me off but not without a hug!

In the mornings an oil bath was in order as we would line up in front of the bathroom (five, six- and seven-year olds) while the water warmed up in the brass contraption called a Bumba used for heating water with cow dung cakes and small wooden chunks thrown in to build a roaring fire. At times a bitter spoonful of castor-oil mixed in tea would be poured down our unwilling throats as a means of cleaning our stomachs! Yuck....that oily taste still lingers on in my mouth!

Bumba at my grandparents house was used as a water heater for our baths.

The fragrance of scented soap, oil and smoke wafted in the house long after we had our oil baths. Our Puja room was a small one with the deities bathed and fresh with offerings of (jaggery) gur and coconut, heaps of prayers and all of us joining in the Aarti (chanting mantras and lighting of lamp) and blowing the sacred conch shell.

The elders in the family laughed at our antics but sometimes we ended up in the dog house for being annoyingly mischievous. Days just blurred into tiny fragments of memory as our holidays ended and we said our goodbyes with a heavy heart and promised to meet soon again. Those days in the 50’s and early 60’s we had no mobiles and no Internet....only studies and play......it was a very secure, happy and loving world full of humaneness and warmth.

Hopping across to pray at the Lord Ganapati, Goddess Laxmi and Lord Vithoba-Rakhumai temples in the heart of the city with our mother, my brother and I loved eating the prasad holy offerings and sitting inside a sugar-cane vendor’s tarpaulin covered shop feasting on the fresh green sugar cane juice being crushed into a glass jug, honey-green golden liquid intoxicating in its fragrance as we waited impatiently to drink it from our glasses, the crushed ginger and lemon frothing in the foam. Alka the cinema theatre was our favourite place to watch movies like Limbu Timbu wearing red plastic spectacles watching the antics of all the animated characters on the big screen quite akin to today’s 3D spectacular movies.

From Pune to Ratnagiri (Konkan) travelling to my dad’s small village hamlet Ayani was full of excitement and adventure.....firstly sitting in the brick red and parrot green square nosed State Transport bus from Pune through the beauteous hill-station of Mahabaleshwar, down the Ghats into the valley to the Ayani Mete bus stop where we climbed out of the bus, dusty and tired yet full of excitement for the 4 km bullock cart journey through rice fields on both sides and a kuccha (dirt) road in between.

Nostalgia swamps my mind as I shrink into that childhood world of a youngster on holiday in this rustic place, called Home away from Home. Bhagu Mama, my father’s trusted Man Friday, weather beaten face like polished dark mahogany would lift us my brother and me in his sturdy arms and twirl us in sheer joy!

We eagerly looked forward to the rocky ride in the bullock cart with the