As I flip through the pages of my album,I come across so many photos taken during my Degree days and then decide to blog the crazy teen Degree days. The thought of returning to college for my Degree course,made me adamant to challenge those gang of boys who called me,"Shisu".(Ref:Crazy CollegeTeen Days Part 1) I was now ready to surprise them,with my matching saree and blouse,pottu,earrings and colourful tinkling glass bangles,and though by now I had gained a few inches, I decided to wear heels and fool them. My hair had grown really long, far below my knees. I had transformed myself into a bold young lady who was not afraid of their eve teasing.I was never the shy,coy or giggling kind.Novels like "Mills and Boons," and "Babara Cartland",that were a craze among my peers, didn't romantically intrigue me, as it was just fiction.I enjoyed matter of fact books." One of my favourites was,"Good Earth,"and I loved all the series of P.G Woodhouse,which would send me into peals of laughter.I enjoyed reading magazines like "Illustrated weekly",which was also my grandfather's favourite.I prefered articles and short stories.
Life was meant for good friends and great adventures, and here were we, five friends from Pre Degree who joined the Degree course,as the "Famous Five. " We were all in it together,we didn't mind associating with others and many others would join us in our escapades. Padu, having come from Calcutta, was fashionable with short hair and wore stylish outfits. She stayed in the hostel, and took Arabic as her Second Language.She was well versed in Hindi, so could guide us in the dialogues of the Hindi movies. Sue was just a stone's throw away from the college, dreamy eyed, but a keen observer and good at immitating anyone. She was also a voracious reader and also a source for me to borrow books from. Lat, was the chatter box, in the gang.She had her mother as the head of Physical Department of our college,so we were often afraid to involve her in our feats, but on several occasions she turned out to be the master mind.Although, she was from the English Literature group we came together for French and Second Language English classes .Chuttu was the quiet one, more with us physically than mentally. She was actually the silent partner in our kind of crazy, daring adventures.Then there was me,Prem(my pet name at home)- the bold one.Actually, I was the one who formed the gang, since each one of them was my friend. We were alike in every respect,not crazy romancers and none of us had any boyfriends. As that was taboo among our orthodox families in our generation.We were more the fun loving type,with no cares or worries.Although we fooled around,so much, when it came to studies we excelled. We were the thickest of friends,that I don't remember a day when we fought with each other. Like in the cookie of life,we friends were the chocolate chips.
During those crazy teen years, our heroes were movie stars and we fell in love with them and dreamed about them.To mention a few heroes of our time, were Rajesh Khanna,Amitabh Bachan,Dev Anand and Sashi Kapoor. If any of our friends had a different hero, then there would be verbal wars fought over them. We had a good collection of their pictures,taken from 'Film Fare'and such magazines and even exchanged doubles.
Our favourite heroines were Sharmilla Tagore,Rakhee, Asha Parek, Sadhana,Shabana Azmi and Hema Malini,and we would imitate their hairstyles and follow their dressing sense, especially their style of sarees and blouses.
Our famous meeting place, during lunch recess was under the low lying trees in the campus,with exposed tree roots ,with its branches intertwined and convenient for us to sit or even lie down on (as seen in the pic below)We could see the road near Xanadu clearly, from that point, since it was on a little hill,raised from the road .We jokingly had, nick names, for all the guys who passed by, to go to Government Arts College.
Our Head of the Department, Chandrasekharan Pillai Sir took , took Public Finance, for us.He would come in a black Ambassador,get out of the car and wipe the car with a towel and with that very same towel,he would wipe his face, while we watched from the classroom corridors. We were so sure, that his dark complexion was due to this practice.
Our parents were very strict with us and would not allow us to go for movies, especially Hindi movies.So our only solution was to cut class and go, after lunch for the 1o'clock show and return in time before the evening bell, take our books and head home.
We saw several movies,but the one that is etched in my mind is 'Aradhana',One of our favourites, starring none other than
our heroes, Rajesh Khanna and Sharmila Tagore. There were so many nice songs in it, especially,' 'Mere sapno ki rani kab aayegi tu', 'Khora Kagaz' and to crown it all was 'Roopa Tera Mastana'..which sent romatic thrills and caused butterflies in our stomach.My friend, Sue could immitate Rajesh Khanna's look so well, that she often immitated him and made us relive that moment,sending us into a romantic mode.
One day, as usual, we played truant and went for a movie , leaving our books under our famous tree and returned only to find it missing.We went to the office room to find out if it was among the "lost and found",only to be told we had to go and meet the Head of the Physical Department.We had no other choice,trembling with fear, approached Madam.The look she gave us from above her spectacles really made our hearts skip a beat, but we gathered courage and bluffed her that we had gone to the Ladies hostel to be with Padu as she was not keeping too well. She fell for our story and then beckoned us to take our books and warned us, never to be so careless with our books.Since Lat was her daughter, we could not tell the truth. Later, we f toound a safer haven for our books,in one of the classrooms.
During our first year, the French classes got disrupted,as our teacher got married and left and there was no substitute teacher at college. Our exams were fast approaching, so we had to seek private tuition.Luckily, for me, there was Padmanabhan Sir,close by to my place in Statue.So both Sue, Lat,Chuttu and I joined the morning tuition classes at 8am. I was glad because now, I would have company to go to College in the morning. We enjoyed our French tuitions but had to learn the several verb conjugations and the gendres,because Sir, would often question us.Sir, often called out ,"Grace can you tell me",we all kept quiet as there was no Grace in our class.Then he would turn to me and I would have to remind him umpteen times that I was not Grace.Later I had to just give up.
Our way to college became intriguing, we would come across many University college boys, coming from the opposite direction. There was this particular boy a bit stout and burly, having dark curly hair and a beard,big dreamy eyed looks.His looks actually fell on me but I never dared look back at him because I was afraid of him.But these friends, when they saw him coming with his gang of friends,from afar they would move away, in such a way, that I came close to him as he brushed past me. Sue would often immitate his dreamy eyed look and make fun of me.
One day,while I was returning from college,it was raining ,when I reached a vacant plot,(where Canara bank is situated today,before the Spencer junction ), to cross over,I caught sight of this gang of boys waiting for me.My heart started pounding, for a moment I felt that they would hear it,my knees were trembling,my saree wet with the rain started winding round my legs and prevented me from walking fast. Then they started singing,"
"Rain, rain go away,our little Miss wants to go home."I didn't have the guts to laugh, what a cute thing to say.Was this puppy love? He was the main guitarist of a group and once that group was invited to to perform in our college for the Arts Festival. One of the songs he sang was Muhammed Rafi's,"The she I love is a beautiful beautiful dream come true"....as the song goes..."as black as night is her raven hair" ...so my friends came to the conclusion that he was singing that song to me.That song even today evokes fond memories. We parted ways after college,no flame of love was kindled ,I never saw him after that and recently got to know that he had committed suicide.The reason nobody knows,sad though, it resurrected memories.
Our tuition classes soon had to end as a new teacher was appointed for French.It was young, fair Karunakaran, Sir.He was so shy that he could not face the girls in Women's College,as he would blush with embassment and become pink. He became the heart throb of several girls. Somehow he was fond of me,maybe because I approached him boldly.Our French classes were during the first period. Sue as usual was lazy,so she would inevitably come late to class,either after attendance was taken or only in the second period. We could see her from a distance, from our class room, entering the college gates,swinging her hips and twirling the umbrella,lost in her own dream world, not in the least bothered, that she was late.It was only towards the end of our Second Year, when we applied for our Second Degree exam,that she realised she was short of attendance and wouldn't be able to write the exam.She was in a fix, but being Karunakaran Sir's favourite student,I approached him and asked him to adjust her attendance and he so willingly obliged.She was so grateful to me for saving her from her parents' wrath and being able to write the exam without losing a year.
Once Karunakaran, Sir, was absent for over a week and we came to know that he was sick. So we decided to pay him a courtesy call, during lunch break, as he stayed near the college.When we reached his house and rang the bell, he opened the door and was shocked to see us,he was so embarrassed that he didn't utter a word.At that moment, bold as we were,we felt as if we were intruding on his privacy,so without a word, we just turned back and ran. Only after reaching college, we regained our senses and burst out laughing.Several years later, we learnt that poor Karunakaran,Sir,became mental and was admitted in a mental assylum.That was shocking and sad news for us.
The rowdy tendency, arose in us one day, while we were sitting at the College Open Air Auditorium,Sue pointed out to us a gang of our juniors who were spreading rumours about her elder brother. An instinct of oneness rose in us and we decided to boo them. Another gang also joined us in booing,not exactly knowing the reason, and it turned out to be very loud. This embarrassed those girls.That was the first time in the history of that college that anyone booed and took part in such an act of hooliganism. We were afraid, we would be summoned to the Principal,but luckily we escaped.
We had another hideout when we didn't want to go to class and that was the Women's hostel,right behind the college.We spent so many hours chatting and joking in Padu's room.She would make hot coffee for us and we all loved it.We mingled with the other hosteliers too.For their Hostel Day,they requested me to play the hawain guitar, the song they strangely chose, was none other than,"The she I love is a beautiful beautiful dream come true,"a super hit at that time.
We had this sense of mischief gleaming in our eyes and came up with the oddest things.We decided to take a photograph with the lenghts of our hair.
We even climbed the tree that was next to our French class.
During the final year it was announced that we would be going on a one day excursion to Neyar Dam and Ponmudi.We were so excited that we decided to do away with the boring saree and get into something more comfortable.Padu chose pants and shirt,Sue chose the lungi and top,whereas Lat and myself got into tights and tops.Chuttu remained with her saree.
Several others also joined us in various outfits.
Photo:Another friend of mine, Rema seen with us
Towards the end of our Degree course, one of our classmates, Padmini, announced to the class that the whole class would be given a free treat at her expense.Padmini's father owned the famous"Simla Ice Cream,"on MG Road opposite the General Post Office,the only one of its kind in Trivandrum at that time..Boy! Weren't we excited.We went in our best attire and just couldn't choose from the menu.There were all sorts of cup ice creams and cone ice creams of various flavours. The famous North Indian Rasagoolas, and Rasmalai was also on the menu.It was a real feast for our eyes.We wanted to taste everything,really went beserk.Young as we were, we tried out nearly everything we could lay our hands on and in the end when we reached home felt so sick, that we had to skip our dinner.
Well,as everything must come to an end,our Degree days were over, each one of us went our own separate ways. Some kept in touch,especially the Famous Five,whereas the others just disappeared into oblivion. We did lose touch with each other for a short while as we got busy with our own lives but thanks to technology we have renewed our friendship and keep in touch.Padu,Lat and Chuttu attended my son's wedding reception,it was a reunion after so many years,Sue was unable to attend. These were the best days of our life and the bond of friendship created lasts a life time.
" The great things about getting older is that you don't lose all the other ages, you've been." Madeleine Engel.
The memoir is so elegant, which is not only a reflection of Premla’s College days but also gives us a glimpse of college life for a bunch of close knit female friends in Trivandrum during the 70’s .
ReplyDeleteA tremendous re-telling of days that seemed very special to this fine woman. Her gift of description is phenomenal. She is a first-class blogger.
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