Memories of Trishul Park

Part III of the short story ‘Sayonara’

Raju and Arin cycled and played all kinds of outdoor games around the dorms or in vast open landscapes and grounds far out in the uncharted backwater of Earth’s orbit, which were freely accessible through the short scenic vistas within the broad Trishul Park’s suburban isolation of the cantonment county. It was their desi little around-the-town Tour de France, or still better, Tour de Alwal.

Driven by curiosity, like young, cycle-riding Marco Polos, Raju and Arin explored as though the unknown ‘Silk Routes’ of the outside world beyond their homely Trishul Park lands, while expecting to discover something beautiful or unusual as they navigated the whole area on their boy’s bicycle, riding slow through the baffling winds of their wonderful Deccan fatherland, which often carried aromas of chameli and jasmine flowers and MS Subbulakshmi’s enchanting morning stotram floating on a dream from a nearby dorm, in the mists of early morning trance.

The largely empty “civil area,” where houses were few and far between, mostly single-storied, rarely double, with a nice little garden as a frontage beauty to the simple house, and neem, papaya, guava, tulsi, or peepul and lime trees had a fundamental overarching presence at the corner side of the amply spaced courtyard. Ordinary lives, lived ordinarily. And it was so meaningful and peaceful to live a small-town life here; ordinariness was a common beauty that every resident cherished every single moment of every single day, beyond the sweep of bling and the fancy of worldly economic desires that had consumed this little town of Alwal forever.

Most homes in the “civil area” looked like peaceful, high-ceilinged farmhouses, with ample space left unused at the rear and around it, creating a tidy, laid-back, natural ambiance that soothes your life with the morning-fresh greenery around the house, until the jasmine blooms in the evening. A family pet dog, usually always a German Shepherd: An Alsatian, residents in Trishul Park society commonly used that term for that kind of dog breed, would hoof around the house courtyard in the late evenings, while during the day it was safely tethered with a metal link and soft collar near the foyer by the front door inside the compound in warm sunlight. Its life was an ordinary dog’s life, joyfully pampered, and a well-cared-for house pet—same as Goldie, the not-so-domesticated, constantly barking dingo Mr. and Mrs. Roy owned back in the early 1980s. Kids used to call out sportively, “Tommy…. Tommy… shoo shoo… shoo…!” whenever they noticed a dog loafing around, wagging its tail in the meadows of Trishul Park. 

Mr. Roy had a characteristic speech pattern of saying, “We’ll see…, we’ll see…” So, “we’ll see” about their house dog, Goldie, in a separate short story, coming up shortly.

--∞--

Garden Talk:
Mr. Dwivedi of 5/8, Trishul Park, used to joke around while he tended to the baby plants and saplings in his nicely grown home garden at the back of his dormitory, where he grew a mango tree at the south-west corner three years ago, “One of these days, I’ll own a black crow and a grey Dove!”

To which Arin finally said, “Why not, Uncle Ji, just make sure you don’t put them in a cage. They’ll be around anyway. Besides, you don’t put a crow in a cage; it brings bad luck.”

Dwivedi ji would state, “You have a point. So I cancelled owning them. Thanks.” 

Arin thought he should have known better, but then realized Dwivedi ji, normally a serious type, was barely funny; however, he tried in deep earnestness, maybe that was more important than attempting a joke. Never mind.

“You’re welcome!” said Arin.

Raju looked at Arin, raised his eyebrows as he remained perfectly still between the neatly tended rows of cauliflowers and tomato plants just in case he didn’t trample them, and widened his eyes for a split second, meaning to say, "What’s going on with Mr. Dwivedi?” and pouting the words…HOW BORING!

Arin just shrugged, and they giggled with glee, enjoying the playful moment. And still couldn’t help giggling at the sight of Mr. Dwivedi, a strict army man and a strict vegetarian, cultivating veggies with fairly good ‘military mechanical engineering’ craftsmanship.

Arin and Raju went home afterwards, as it was lunchtime. They had had enough talking about ‘agriculture’ at Mr. Dwivedi’s well-cared-for backyard garden. While on the way to their dormitory, Arin looked at Raju and grinned, and said, “See you later, alligator!” Raju was not surprised to hear what Arin said, and seeing a chance, he responded in kind, as he would when they jested back at each other, “After a while, crocodile!’ Geee!

--∞--

[An Anecdote: Arin’s strict and traditional school teacher from St. John’s, Savithri ma’am, who taught Hindi, lived in a small house on a lane shaded by a canopy of tall banyan, peepul, coconut, and palm trees, next to a baori (a deep water well) that had been existing there for generations up till the late 1980s.

Sadly, by the time it was late 1990s, the old baori that had once been a drinking water source in the locality, was filled with earth, and a piece of human aberration: an ugly multi-story apartment building was erected in the place, decimating the little patch of paddy farmland that surrounded the baori, habilitating the open space greenland into an economic battlefield of rampant commercial activities of big retail stores, shops, cluttered mudgies (small outlets), parking of polluting vehicles of all kinds, and whatnot, bankrupting the local population with their discount offers, effectively annihilating Mother Nature forever.

Among her former school students, no one knew what Savithri ma’am thought about this new real estate ‘development’ in her residential neighbourhood of just a few small houses, suddenly devoid of its trees and a natural, farmland kind of atmosphere on the land outside, of which she was so well pleased to live on the ground floor of her old cottage. Savithri ma’am might have regarded this towering concrete structure that came up in the late 1990s with nothing but pure contempt.

After her superannuation from St. John's school, she may have given up in unpretending grievance that she’ll have to go about her life in her little house that now came bang under the dark shadow of the massive building which blocked the sunlight forever until the mid-2020s, when she passed away, bearing perhaps no small amount of resentment towards how the way of life has changed in the decades after the peaceful 1980s. She might not have appreciated much anything that came later on in her life at Alwal; she lost her husband decades ago when her cradle-bound firstborn child was very little, and that little brooding, low-lying, ineradicable heartache stowed away somewhere within her heart since many years had kept lingering throughout the remaining years that she lived a lonely life. Savithri ma’am missed her prime years of the 1980s, as did Satish and Arin, her students, their school life.

Arin and Satish still remember her robust command over Hindi literature. But once, when Savithri ma’am asked Arin to read the new lesson, he pronounced the Hindi words which were something like, “Ameriki samvidhan”— “American Constitution.”

She thought Arin was wrongly spelling it. Interrupting him, she said, “It is not Ameriki, as you say,” and began mocking him, saying, “Amerikiii…” “Amerikiii...!” One of the students in the class prompted her, “Ma’am, it's indeed Ameriki written on the page!”

Savithri ma’am fumbled about, checked the text, and became instantly embarrassed that she had unnecessarily mocked her class student. She rectified, saying, “Oh yes. It is Ameriki. It’s a Hindi word, students; I was thinking in English, ‘Amerikan.’”

Looking at Arin, she sounded faintly apologetic, “Go on, read the lesson in full.” Arin never forgot that episode from when he was in the 7th grade at St. John’s. She prided herself on predicting that the coming decade would be “full of death and destruction”— “mrityu aur vinash se bhara hoga.” That’s true. That was precisely the case.

Savithri ma’am had some crow to eat that day.]

--∞--

Back then, there were open spaces everywhere, with no plot markings or boundary walls indicating ownership, and hence, Alwal—a quiet suburb with low-density housing—was known, back in the day, to be a really breezy place you’d be feeling gratified to live in.

Vast open no-man’s land would beckon Raju and Arin, as they cycled around, as if with a heartfelt welcome: “Hey, boys! Come hither and play.” With the continental breeze blowing from the west, the two school-going childhood friends would maintain a steady pedalling pace and coast smoothly about on their all-terrain bikes with the wind blowing into their faces.

Raju and Arin would ride around on scorching summer days as part of their, if you like, “civil area” exploration in their Deccan fatherland, and once, when winding up among the old shady trees that grew in the unrestricted parkland, they would drop off their cycles under one of them temporarily and loiter about the place, while plucking tamarind pods and taking small, careful bites on them. On Sunday afternoons, playing cricket matches with others using a red cork or a yellow tennis ball was a holiday staple.

On other days, they walked the old railway bridge leading to the Sub-Area to proceed to the other side of the desolate C. Barracks station to see how the Major General Commandant’s bungalow actually looked, or cycled through the tree-canopied, leafy green avenues of the peaceful Sub-Area region under the clear blue sky. Spring birds sang songs, butterflies flew about the bougainvillea, rhododendron, and periwinkle flowers that were plentiful in the Trishul Park-bound lands, and a couple of beehives buzzing with bees in the long, tranquil afternoons. Tamarind trees were aplenty, as were peepal, banyan, and yellow flame trees. Arin and Raju would park their cycles under the tree, pluck the ripe black-brown pods from the branches, and eat them; the intensely sweet-and-sour flavour of the Tamarind would make them cringe in an unexpected delight.

Traffic was zero, hardly a bother. The weather was less hot and milder. Winters were colder. Power outages were few and rare in the cantonment county. Roof tops were dotted with TV antennas. Boys played games, mostly cricket and hopscotch. Girls indulged in pretend-play cookery, making doll porridge for their dolls under the cool staircase of the dormitories. Most boys were named Pappu, Raju, or Bipin; girls were named Gudia, Munni, or Bitiya Rani. Wednesdays were for Chitrahaar, and Sundays for the weekly movie on Doordarshan. Other days were for 9 o'clock TV serials. Nobody worried much about anything back in the day in Trishul Park. Being one with nature was everything.

In mid-1988, Arin inherited a deep longing. His boyhood friend, Raju, and his family left Alwal forever on account of his father’s posting, moving to northern India. Decades passed, and Arin never saw them again.

Wonder where all the years went.

(To be continued…)

(End of part III)

By Arindam Moulick

The Melancholy of a Lost Time

Part II of the short story ‘Sayonara’

Time flew. Especially after the senior academic college years of the 1990s, which seemed to rush by like sand through an hourglass.

After the year 2000, Time inspired disbelief among the four friends. It quietly blurred the nineteen-nineties generation into the brand-new millennial decade, which was literally loaded with the onrush of the information technology (IT) revolution that went on to change the world entirely—even the aspects of a decade-old friendship among the four boys who loved hanging out on the rocks at Trishul Park, later at Subranium Strong’s Lake Park dormitory for a year, and then at his Govind Palace Apartment’s low compound wall adjoining the entryway.

As things stood then, and luckily, the four friends became consciously aware that the coming millennial age of “echo boomers” (which included themselves) would soon take over the supply chain, as it were, the IT world had known until then, forcing them to follow through the fright of the curveballs life was certain to throw their way. The old order changeth. They perhaps knew that life would never be the same again thereafter. It’s already changing. This is the final hangout.

That’s how it was back then, and how it is now, and how it will be. It's all in a lifetime.

--∞--

Their “new normal,” metaphorically speaking, came sooner than they had thought, and the final year of the 20th century felt like a turning point: an endpoint in itself, concluding their growing-up years to a fair degree, even as the sweeping currents of possibilities, disruptive changes of InfoTech, the inevitable highs and lows of humanity, in the wonder-filled world had tested their patience. They too weren’t let go for anything they did or didn’t do in their lives. Taking it one day at a time became a pressing priority, however.

For the first time, this little (but all-important) continuity of time had hastened an inevitable truth the universe had long defined, setting a slow (yet steady) realization within their friendship quartet that nothing would be the same as it once was. The 1990s were too far into the past, beyond recovery. Only worth seeking in their memories of those days. From the new millennium onwards, the chronology of their foursome friendship would also change; a strange newness they have to accept. A quiet shift in perspective was also necessary.

--∞--

At that precise juncture, they understood (on a natural gut feeling, one supposes) that time was on their side too, but compelled by its age-old, long-standing, hypertensive urgency after all. Wheeling endlessly in the universe from day to day, year to year, decade to decade. Ultimately, steering headlong into a millennial economic boom following the turn of the century. The 2000s and ever since saw corporate India rushing in.

Be it what it would, the unfamiliarity of their circumstances in the 21st century, each choosing a different career path, had changed the emotional cornerstones in the lives of the four friends from the late 1990s, as all sought to hit their own stride. Getting a job became paramount as they acquired their educational degrees. Even if they weren’t entirely baffled by its meaning or implications, they definitely felt a touch disenchanted since their ‘90s golden age of great music, movies, and television: the humble and simple pleasures that crafted their identity and self-expression had indeed come to a close. Oh hell, such is life, they said to themselves, letting go of the old: those nostalgic embers to burn bright, and moved on. The emotional baggage of the 1990s was weighing heavily on their minds, despite everything. Arin's is the case in point.

Hotfooting forward with relentless, alarming zeal was not a part of their intimate personality; therefore, the new era seemed too indifferent and crude for the four friends of the old days to value, whose deeply nostalgic, analogue roots kept them from enjoying themselves as they had in the past decade, which had been wonderfully meaningful and personal in a way that was nothing but charming. They knew things would never be the same. The arrival of the 2000s felt rather unwelcome. Now, it doesn’t feel like home. The Alwal of yesteryears has disappeared; it feels alien to live here now. No close friends, only soulless acquaintances. This ongoing 21st-century millennium brings only blinding change and cold indifference; the free-range childhood of Generation X would never be able to give much importance.

Time had had its sway, always did, and always will; however, it was not that brisk in its rhythm and flow, it looked like it, back in the day, except now it is insanely ticking forward… as a demon possessed, totally wrung up dry about anything and everything in its realm that one might refrain from making the cardinal mistake of suggesting…Go slow, constantly ticking-time buddy! But only a feeling of the concussive nature of loss that mourned all through Arin’s growing-up years after the ‘90s, as it crept up in one contiguous haptic memory of wonder days past: of the charming old wind-touched and spacious world—which was once deeply rooted in naturalness and was far, far less dramatic in reality than it has now become—had passed us by. That is all that remains, a sweet old memory, as his heart keeps beating for it, recollecting those bygone days in his lonely moments of tranquillity.

Nostalgia for a lost time: Long gone are the glory days of the tight-knit, slow-growth, and politically unsavvy Socialist era of the 80s and 90s. Old wine was sweeter than the new, in a manner of speaking and speaking fairly. When Kolkata was Calcutta, Chennai was Madras, Puducherry was Pondicherry, and Mumbai was Bombay. People were happier with less, despite the many problems the pre-liberalized era had faced before the 1990s. The nineties were definitely exemplary; they offered stability and peace of mind, not much change yet. Then, after the 2000s, all old-school mechanisms fell apart like a cheap Chinese knock-off, discarded and dumped for the new things to come. With the arrival of the era of economic prosperity, the so-called post-liberalized era that brought such, millennial digital natives took over and made everything look spectacular and effortless, pushing the envelope further and further until, of course, AI (Artificial Intelligence, with no actual intelligence) took over: throwing the cat among the pigeons, and how! At least the old-schoolers ate fruits plucked straight from the trees. Like jungle jalebi, tamarind, and jujube berry.

All around: shreds of incandescent nostalgia hung like a pervasive charm of melancholy in Arin’s heart ever since those sweet, leisurely, educational years he still adores so much, almost psychologically living it every day, have begun to ebb away into the faraway furloughs of memory…

(To be continued…)

(End of part II)

By Arindam Moulick

Sayonara

A long story of sorts

In the quiet lap of a middle-class home in Trishul Park, Arin was born and raised. When he was about five or six years of age, he knew how truly extraordinary this residential abode was, where he grew up to adulthood, right up to his college education.

Trishul Park lay in the vicinity of the Sub-Area. This Army-controlled restricted cantonment zone was nestled between the town’s civilian urban locality on the western side, directly across the interstate highway, where, to say the least, it was a genuine blessing because of the naturalness of the well-kept, shipshape military surroundings: the privilege of staying at 6/1, Trishul Park residential premises and a furlong ahead, the great expanse of the Sub-Area.

Even today, Arin’s breath stalls as he recollects the heavenly magnificence of the surrounding lush meadows, clean as a whistle. He still remembers the sprawling grassy knolls in the backwater of the Park: it is where he and his childhood chum discovered Jungle Jalebi way back in the mid-1980s, pristine grey rocks dotted the reddish grounds a little afar from their dormitory, and the Jhula: the children’s park—all of which were part of Arin’s and his dear boyhood friend Rajveer’s joyful havens. During the hot autumnal months, Congress grass—a common weed—would rapidly grow unchecked, while greenish grasshoppers, praying mantises, fluttering, iridescent butterflies, and magical dragonflies hovered over the grass, searching for food and mates.

Sparrows and crows were pretty common during those days in Trishul Park, compared to today’s head-bobbing health hazard that is the omnipresent feral pigeon. Back then, it was quite common to catch chirpy sparrows nesting on balconies—corner preferences were their specialty—while glossy black crows would swoop in and caw outside for lunch nibbles. Not surprisingly, even Koels made their presence felt in the lush green glens of the residential area, while Coppersmith Barbets echoed their fine took...took...took...took notes from the trees along the deserted roads of the Sub-Area. 

A lone Skylark would fly high in the cloudless blue sky, singing for rain.

While in the Sub-Area, sunlight rippled through its tree-lined, winding roads leading up to the little-known Club, the vacant polo ground, the citrus-sweet fragrance lingered in the air of the Krishna Mandir temple gardens, the colonial-era single-story bungalows sat amidst the open parkland of Tamarind, Ashoka, and Gulmohor trees, and the gentle sweep of the valley beyond the Club via the Brigadier’s bungalow revealed the dewy golf courses that looked like verdant green oases, spread out scenically among the ancient trees and scrubs drenched in peaceful morning sunlight. And during the rainy season, the entire landscape would be enveloped in the cool monsoon mist, veiling the bungalows, grounds, and pathways, utterly silent, still as a woodland.

Arin and Rajveer (easily his classic nickname: Raju), his childhood buddy, would go jogging or waltzing through the deserted yet impeccably maintained Army cantonment area, way farther until one hushed roadway wound up at the easternmost fringe of the heather-covered landscape to reach Allenby Lines. There stood the white-washed, rather staid-looking Army bungalow, The Retreat, where it’s speculated that the grumpy old young subaltern Winston Churchill, who became Britain’s prime minister and despised India and Indians, stayed for a while at the end of the 19th century. It is said that the man found his first love here, who, Urg! didn’t care much for him in return. So he, too, was not really rejection-proof! That’s like receiving pre-punishment in advance for calling Mahatma Gandhi as a "half-naked fakir.”

What was still wondrous to Arin was that he always had an uncanny aptitude to reminisce about long-forgotten days. Past experiences that mattered and made him a nostalgically-inclined person—seemingly, the quiet motivating force of those boyhood memories that wouldn’t let go of him; those and many others that his heart possessed. Not even letting a tiny jaded fragment evade his memory-grasp: of the past days coexisting with the present, even as he nostalgically, yet consciously, held them close to his heart, where they accumulated like a snowball of old sacrosanct commemorations, turning them over and over in order to try and make sense of his life story up to now. His mind kept traveling back while laughing off the unpleasant ones and rejoicing in the sweet ones that remained.

(A notion to put forth: What seems to be a therapeutic tool for the elderly, recalling positive life events to help keep them lucid and mentally tidy, he sure liked doing what he, though of young age not yet elderly, did best in his quiet times.) Aside from that, this short/long story of sorts is about four friends whose faces, smiles, voices, and the warmth of their friendship and shared adventures have always been vivid in his mind. When it was time for him to leave his beloved Trishul Park in the mid-nineteen nineties, he wept bitterly, knowing that his childhood and then college eras had finally come to an end. First, it was Arin who shifted to the “civil area”; then, two years later, his close pal Subramanium Strong followed before residing, possibly for a year or so, at one of the Lake Park dormitories, which lay far beyond the dale of the numerous golf ranges of the Sub-Area. Reminiscing has always been Arin’s foremost prerogative.

In those early years, Arin’s neighbourhood buddies were everything wonderful and precious, great and valuable, in this part of small-town India. Peacefully remote, the town was some six and a half to seven kilometres north of the main city centre. But that no longer seems to be the case; it's no longer remotely located, which was once its reprieve from the hard dazzle of the big-town experience. Today, the city razzmatazz is nearer home and in your face, like it or not. Everything is changed beyond recognition. No longer relatable. Alwal and its surrounding vicinities fell to the curse of ‘development.’ As its biryani-scented IT card is issued forth, the city's famed laid-back urbanity has vanished since the late ‘90s, its tech hub taking over everything urbane and natural, empowering us in a weird kind of economic entrapment, promising but more menacing too. Time marches on determinedly, and Alwal too has lost its premium ease of living and its sweet, serene simplicity, just as nature had once ordained it. Everything has been made to fall from grace.

Every friend of his was close to him, with whom he had spent most of his life in and around the amazing valley of Eden, their very own close and intimate commune: Trishul Park, began to drift away, one by one, to far-off distant places somewhere up north in Delhi and Jammu, west in Baroda, north-east in Shillong and Guwahati, and down south in Chennai, Bangalore, and Kochi, never meaning to return. Sayonara, forever. Everybody faded into the coming new millennial age of aspiration and responsibility that the globalized 21st-century world had offered.

Only Satish K. Gupta, alias Demello, remained, for this place, where he and Arin grew up, had become his permanent home—not by birth, but because of his fond childhood memories and all the years spent from kindergarten through high school, all the way to college, and beyond. Where else could he go outside this classic urban-dwelling, albeit non-Tuscan existence, where Subramaniam Strong and Bhale had joined them precisely at that point in life when they all began attending college? Nowhere else in this era-shifting triptych of a place reduced, like any other town or city in our vast country, given over to absolute commercial decadence of endless economic development taking place at a breakneck speed that none of us had surmised, did his happy, largely uneventful life settle and develop domestically as he became a dedicated family man blessed with two yuppie giggling children, a girl and a boy. Eluru, his beloved hometown, had slowly receded into the distant, hazy memory of the simpler times back in the day of the relationships and family identities that mattered more than anything euphemistically called modern, only to be visited, if at all, during vacations or some marriage or housewarming functions. But Satish Gupta, his younger sibling Sailes, and their widowed mother Vijaya Lakshmi had always nursed broken hearts ever since their father passed away here in suburban Alwal when the brothers were little. The house their father built for them and their extended family was the saving grace that kept them going, knowing they had a permanent sanctuary to call home. Life was more or less happy and tidy, but just about when the ‘80s turned into the ‘90s, a fatal rift began to stretch like a rubber band, going back and forth for quite some time unabated, until it snapped back—gaslighting everyone in the family! A villain emerged, and that was none other than their own—“Gumbad Queen,” Chachi (paternal aunt), a char sou bees (420), lady Frankenstein, living in the same house.

Misunderstandings and mutinous mutterings were common. Satish often recounted to Arin, on his bicycle visits, his Chachi’s fine art of grunting like a wild bison! Her everyday evil grunting, too bitchy to handle, was so atrocious that the children would flee from her line of sight to play outdoors, unwilling to return until a little after their usual study hour. This unjustifiable routine on the part of their Chachi 420 invariably tore a rift in their nice little joint family—first among the equals: the adults, and soon enough, the younger ones sensed that something unusually awful was brewing within the household, and that Chachi’s henpecked husband was also hand in glove, in shady collaboration, with his own wife to evict Satish, Sailes and their widowed mother from the house.

With Satish’s father no longer being alive, the once close-knit family split into two halves: one side strong-armed into dark oppression, the other side forceful with a glow of undeserving empowerment, living in two separate portions of the modest one-story house. Two decades later, in the early 2010s, an unsympathetic, bossy, hulk-like Chachi 420 and her suitably henpecked husband upended the apple cart by driving Satish, his sibling, and their mother out of the house. Proper sale deeds and legal rights could have come to their rescue, but there weren’t any to assert their rightful claim on the house Satish’s father had built with his own finances. Petrified of being shouted at, being on the verge of a tumultuous mental collapse, and having no guts to withstand their irascible Chachi’s contentiously filthy language that was employed day-to-day or whenever opportunity for that heartless Chachi arose, they demurred and quietly moved out renting a place in the vicinity of the area where they thought they will have to reside almost all their lives, before putting up a court case, a contentious dispute, for this bossy Chachi and her family to deal with.

Financially, a humongous weight had descended on Satish’s mother’s shoulders; fortunately, she worked in a minor government department, earning a modest salary that she could use to support her family. Missing their former home, they ensured that their rental apartment offered a view of the childhood cottage right opposite, where they grew up: a house built entirely by Satish’s father long ago... but now gone. Destiny was kind to them eventually, but at one point, it seemed as if their future would be at stake, as though it belonged only in the past.

Awakened by the desire to leave the former world a better place than they had lately found it, they lived to tell the tale. Raged against the dying of the light, as somebody has said. Sayonara.

(To be continued…)

(End of Part I)

By Arindam Moulick

Reminiscing with Nostalgia

Final part

The grace and elegance of those beautiful moments, our friendships that have endured, the fragrance of treasured memories of our coming-of-age years, our homes, schools, playgrounds, and all of our childhood adventures, the giggles and laughter, and the faint echoes of timeless Hindi melodies emanating from the audio stall across the Alwal main road will invariably occupy a special place in my yearning heart.

These precious things that, as someone deeply rooted in the past, perhaps may never again come into my life. Alas.

*“Dil dhoondhtaa hai, phir wahi fursat ke raat din …/

Jaadon ki narm dhoop, aur aangan me letkar…/

Aankhon mein bheege bheege se lamhe liye huye …/

Dil dhoondhtaa hai, phir wahi fursat ke raat din…”

Nostalgic memories take me back in time—it is not the ubiquity of technological interconnectedness of today's times that helps ease the elegiac pain of longing, but rather some kind of, dare I mention, spiritual connection with antiquity or times gone by—a step towards the back, rearwards in time, if you will, certainly not an escapist substitute that brings pure happiness to my soul which keeps longing for the olden times to come back. While the temptations of a bunch of techno devices we use today can make your heart grow fonder when you catch a glimpse of old pictures or read about the past days in your palmtop, it is not even considerably solacing, to put it that way, in a world where the future is not only inherently uncertain but does not exist (doomsayers say: the end is near. Really?), the present is a complex perversity already. Therefore, it is only natural that looking back on the past can give us the necessary solace and a solid reason to live on—possibly a far greater sense of purpose in life than what your destiny could offer.

Rather than concerning myself with a utopian futurist techno-fantasy of something that never was, what makes it worth reflecting on is the nostalgia of the late 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s I have in every moment of my life. My long-time dreams are about the past rather than the unpredictable future. I am grateful I have been entrusted with a remarkable legacy of the bygone eras, offering me a classic piece of history that my heart constantly feels affection for. Forsaking the past is unthinkable for this nostalgic soul because it worships it too much to surrender it to insensible oblivion. Looking to the future is difficult if I have not recalled the past in the present time. Looking back gives me pause and adequately prepares me for the future, which is no more uncertain than the present. The past is my saving grace, providing me with the emotional fortitude I need to move forward with my life, one day at a time.

Still, consider that anything good that can brighten your day, whether you want to mine the legacy of the Past or think about the Future, whatever it promises, scientifically or even spiritually, it is up to the individual concerned to learn how to be happy with himself doing his best in the everyday human struggle mixing the mundane with the extraordinary, and the mystical?

Consider drawing valuable lessons from the past and applying those to make the present more manageable. As for the Future, are you still pondering over it? I'm not. Because, as things of the world currently stand, the future will be formidably challenging, even disappointing, and far from green. Environmentally unfriendly, precisely. Though the future cannot be greater than the past, let's hope for a better tomorrow. Hope seems to float.

While I may lose my fictitious 'knighthood' for saying this so bluntly, I believe—regardless of physicists or what other die-hard optimists might wisely say to the direct contrary—the recent past represents a better place to divine ultimate peace than the indifferent and unconcerned present, and though the future—which is still unknown and does not yet exist—will increasingly be one of continual state of flux, with constantly shifting goal posts too, as it were, to strive for as Artificial Intelligence (AI) usurps human intelligence and brings about our impending doom by "allowing robots to think and act like humans."

Oops, there goes my knighthood! He he...

(The End.)

By Arindam Moulick

*“Dil dhoondhtaa hai” - a song from the Hindi film Mausam

Article originally published 0n Medium in Feb. '24

Savouring Nostalgia

Second part

Nostalgia is a mystifying emotional experience, a profound inclination to lose oneself in reflection, rumination, and sometimes even introspective brooding.

It takes me back to times in the past that I have always held close to my heart, never letting go of those long-gone moments I've committed to memory throughout the years of my childhood and adolescence. Selective memory or something else entirely, I don't need to know; it's unimportant. But they have given me the vital emotional energy to try and live a life devoid of disquieting emotions or thoughts, rather something of the great value of sincere facts to go on loving, adoring, and treasuring for a lifetime.

Often, because of my strong urge to go to the place where I ache to go again and again, I like taking a trip down memory lane to the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, bringing up fond remembrances that make my heart sing. I confess I am a nostalgia-prone person. Or better still, nostalgically inclined, easily overcome by nostalgia for beloved old things I miss dearly.

These golden years are especially dear to me, harbouring a special place in my longing heart as they evoke nostalgic memories of a time gone by that I never got over with. Came what may, I persevered through thick and thin, good times and bad, and I will never be able to let go of my special bond with those incredible summers of my life.

So, come hell or high water or caught between a typical rock and a hard place, finding a path forward is well neigh. There will always be a close-knit sense of the good old days, an eternal heartbeat, and a beautiful melody of long ago that fulfils all my days with accustomed pleasure and longing. I've not chosen this path of nostalgia; it just came to me, and that's how I am. The memories of yesteryears serve as fawning inspiration and motivation, an intimate testament to my love of things past and gone long ago, and, shall I say, a continual reminder to face the future.

These formative decades are of great importance to me as they awaken a sense of joy and contentment, so much so that they constitute an essential component of my nostalgic existence—an integral part of my life that I cannot live without while relishing every familiar moment that touches my heart.

Among the most treasured memories in our lives are the fond remembrances of our early childhood friendships. From Poonam's tender moments of closeness to Raju's calm and unwavering friendship, from Ruby's brilliant camaraderie to Sushila's delightful companionship while playing fun games like tikkar billa, langri taang, and eyes-spies, and Meena's sweetly quiet company among us lifelong friends. We lost touch decades ago, but these precious memories have come safely through time as they bind us all, embracing a special place in our hearts.

Nostalgia has moulded my identity and continues gaily to influence my choices and perspectives to the present day. Yes, the music, social identities, and cultural directions of the 1970s, '80s, and '90s have left an indelible mark on me. Reflecting on these decades allows me to bask in the comforting warmth of moments that have defined who I am today and provides a deep sense of comfort and happiness for the beautiful journey I've had thus far.

To a large extent, I consider myself fortunate to be deeply rooted in the yesteryears, as I remain a nostalgically inclined person who feels blessed to possess that, I presume, salubrious subconscious Indian trait still throbbing within my being that loves to mythologize and romanticize through lasting memories and retrospections of the good times that will never come again. This silent brooding, if you will, through this ruminative agency is central to experiencing the ordinary experience of life more contemplatively while looking—with a cautiously optimistic or pessimistic optimist eye—to whatever the future has in its humour.

(To be continued…)

By Arindam Moulick

Article originally published on Medium in Jan. '24.

To read the first part, "In Every Moment of My Life," published in the earlier post, click on the title. The third and final part of the series will be up very soon.