by Chandramohan Nair
I alighted at Chennai Central and received a familiar welcome – the moist warmth of the coastal air accompanied by the faint reek from the nearby canal. My suitcase was too heavy for me to lug around and after some half-hearted haggling with a wizened-faced porter, I hurried behind him, picking my way through a platform strewn with goods to be loaded.
I was in Chennai after many years to attend a function. I had an old association with the city dating back to the seventies when, fresh out of college, I was a frequent visitor. Although I had made several subsequent trips and even had a stint of work in the city, the memories of those first visits remained in my subconscious as reference points.
The station was crowded and noisy with advertisements blaring out of a variety of display systems. The glitzy food court in the main hall bore little resemblance to the breezy and spacious railway restaurant on the first floor where I used to have a filling thali meal while reading a magazine or a paperback. The station looked cleaner and there was much more helpful signage, but to me it seemed like a conservative old friend suddenly trying to look trendy and in vogue.
Stepping out through the south exit, I remembered the Old Moore Market which used to be a distinctive feature of the station. I would often pick up some light reading for my return journey from the book-stalls that lined the front of the market. A reservation complex and a parking lot, filled chock-a-block with cars and producing a numbing cacophony of horns and engines, now stood in its place.
It was a relief to escape the sweltering weather and the throng and get into a cab. Sitting in air-conditioned comfort with the heat, the din and the smells cut off, I was able to look at the city more benignly. The skyline had not changed dramatically, many of the old buildings and landmarks still remained and the arterial roads were in good condition. But the maddening density of vehicles on the road meant that traffic moved at a snail’s pace and it took more than an hour to cover the ten kilometres to my cousin’s apartment. The inner roads leading to the neighbourhood bore the tell-tale signs of unplanned and rapid growth – double-parked cars that ate up most of the pot-holed roads, garbage piled up at various street corners, the conspicuous lack of greenery all around and the virtual non-existence of sidewalks. I sensed that Chennai, after holding out the longest amongst the metros, was now at risk of joining the ranks of our dysfunctional cities.
Still, sitting on the balcony of my cousin’s fifth-floor apartment after a sumptuous meal, with the sea breeze gently whistling in my ears, I could be pardoned for thinking that I was back in the Madras of yore.
The city then had a friendly and unhurried air about it which was charming and put one immediately at ease. Most of my initial visits were for writing tests or giving interviews. In those days many companies didn’t feel the need to have a centre in Kerala, and Madras used to be the favoured venue. The first few visits were more like going on an adventure – travelling and staying alone, fending for all your needs on a tight budget, having no contact with the family for three to four days with only the telegram available to you as a means of urgent communication.
There was the choice of two train routes to reach Madras. You could travel on the Kollam-Chennai Egmore Mail on the metre gauge or take the Madras Mail on the broad gauge line. If the first route provided enchanting views of the backwaters of Kerala, the second offered fabulous vistas while traversing the ghat section between Punalur and Sengottai in addition to the thrill of seeing some turn of the twentieth-century architectural marvels – the thirteen arch Kannara bridge and the Kottavasal tunnel linking Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
If I took the Egmore route I would stay at one of the lodges on Kenneth Lane, a quiet and narrow street south of the station. For the princely sum of ten rupees a day you could get a decent room with an attached washroom. Nothing fancy but great value for money – a clean bed, a table and chair, a modest cupboard and drinking water stored in an earthen pot. A cheerful and uniformed room boy would be at your beck and call throughout the day to fetch coffee or tiffin. The morning news update would be through a copy of The Hindu kept at the reception.
My preparation for the test or interview would have little to do with academics and was usually restricted to locating the venue on my trusted city map and then figuring out how close I could get to the venue by bus.
Sauntering down Mount Road and spending time at Higginbothams was a favoured pastime that was both light on the pocket and stimulating to the mind. I would also try to take in a movie during most trips. Visiting a theatre with more than a single screen was a novelty for me and I was overawed by the three multiplexes – Devi, Sathyam and Safire, with the first two being almost spanking new. Blue Diamond in Safire, whose back-to-back shows between 1 pm and 1.30 am still evoked wonder, was also a great place to seek refuge from the summer heat. I remember watching Kokila, featuring Kamal Haasan in the Emerald hall of Safire and the Sanjeev Kumar and Sharmila Tagore-starrer Mausam in the Devi complex. Safire did not survive beyond the early nineties while Devi and Sathyam are still around and competing with the numerous multiplexes that have come up in recent times.
As far as eating out was concerned in those days, I was more circumspect having endured the miserable experience of a stomach upset during a visit. Freshly prepared vegetarian food was the preferred choice although it was impossible to make out whether a chutney or curry was fresh or not. Water was the bigger problem and finally you placed your trust in the hotel, your stomach and the strip of Imodium that was always kept in your hip pocket. Once in a while, I would give into temptation and venture into the Buhari Hotel on Mount Road for their mouth-watering biryani. This was the time when the Bruce Lee craze was still raging in India and if I remember right, the famous “hall of mirrors” backdrop had been enthusiastically recreated on one side of the lobby at the Buhari. It was rather disconcerting, though, to see multiple images of yourself when you ambled out with your stomach full.
There was one constant across all my visits which was also connected to my boyhood days in Quilon when we used to listen to Tamil movie songs on the radio. Almost every night, regardless of where I stayed in Madras, the strains of some of the captivating Tamil hits of the sixties would drift in through my window from some unknown FM radio in the vicinity. It was a delight to listen to old favourites such as the romantic Naan Paarthathile, the pathos-laden Paalum Pazhamum Kaigalil Endhi and the delightful Andru Vanthathum Ithe Nila and to note that these songs had retained their appeal through the years.
The function I had come to attend was a wedding reception being hosted at a hotel in the heart of the city. For many guests such occasions were an opportunity not just to convey their blessings but also to catch up with friends and relations. The sprawl of the city and the traffic congestion had made regular social visits too much of an inconvenience. As we drove to the hotel through the evening rush-hour traffic, the pretty glass-fronted facades and glowing sign-boards of the big brands appeared in stark contrast to the weary faces of office-goers wending their way home. The venue itself was teeming with people but I could spend time with some of my old friends before joining the serpentine queue of well-wishers for the few seconds of pleasantries on the dais followed by the mandatory photo shoot.
Mission accomplished, I realised that, in striking contrast to my initial visits, I had spent little or no time out in the streets. Of course, I no longer had the energy and enthusiasm of youth, but the reality was that the city, apart from having become a pedestrian’s nightmare, had also changed in character – from being cheerful and laidback to now acting harried and edgy, which made the prospect of a leisurely stroll both unappealing as well as perilous. For those who could afford it, life in Chennai, as in other big cities, now seemed confined to the sanctuaries of homes, vehicles, malls and places of work.
Early next morning, I took a cab back to the Central station. The city was still waking up, the traffic thin and the air cool. We passed the beautiful Kapaleeswarar temple and saw devotees hurrying past the temple tank for their morning darshan. Speeding through the old Cathedral road we soon hit upon the Marina. The long expanse of light-brown sand with the azure sea on one side and the stately buildings lining it on the other side always put me in a serene mood. It appeared as though the endearing Madras of my youth had reappeared briefly to give me a fond farewell. I left the city feeling thankful but wondered whether on my next visit, I would catch such fleeting glimpses of the charming city that Madras used to be.
Picture by https://www.flickr.com/photos/draconianrain
