A deviation

I am now going to deviate a little. The last few posts took us chronologically from class 3 to 4 to 5 to 6. Lest things become monotonous, and start feeling as if Wadi was just Saint Ambrose Convent, I will deviate and insert several posts regarding some other aspects of life in Wadi. Wadi as I had said, had four distinct geographical divisions. The Railway Colony, the ACC colony and the Bajaar and the Tanda. The first two areas were house to outsiders, bajaar was house to the indigenous people, and Tanda to the Lambadas. People in this part of Karnataka had a totally different way of speaking Kannada, which the south Karnataka Kannadigas did not even understand. The names here were also totally different from those in South Karnataka. Follow this link for some North Karnataka surnames http://www.ourkarnataka.com/states/nk_familynames.htm. The form of Kannada used here was rough and earthy. It was liberally sprinkled with slang. On buses and trains, it was not uncommon, even for women, to ask people sitting on seats to “move their ass a bit” so that they can accommodate themselves. “Solpa kundi sarsiriyappa. Naavu ondsolpa kundi hachhthivi” was what they said. Like the Jats of Haryana, the northerners are a volatile lot. Most conversation starts with references to the others sister or mother. While visiting people, we would expect to be welcomed with warm words like “Barri nimmavun. Eshtu divasagyada bandu”, and we would reply “Yakri nimmayi? Monne bandinalla? Soole makkalu helilla nimage?” Such usages are so delicate that translating them into English renders them impotent. So I am not even trying. If those of you who read this blog and do not understand these sentences, find authentic north Karnataka people to enlighten you. Such way of talking, made the language more comfortable, unlike the chaste Kannada spoken by the Achars and the Murthys of South Karnataka. These days everyone in India believes that Karnataka is a land of Pubs and discos and software engineers who “live together”, a silicon valley clone of sorts. That’s not the case. It may be true of Bangalore, but Northern Karnataka is a real, earthy, wonderful Indian place even today where real Indians live and die. Thank God, there is nothing Silicon Valleyish about it.

The population was a mixture of Marathis like Kulkarnis and Deshpandes, some Telugus, Muslims, Marwaris, Lingayats, Waddars, Lambadas, scheduled castes and tribes, and other expatriates like us. We knew no difference between each other. Since many did not speak the earthy version of Kannada, we spoke a curious sort of Hindi. It was hardly the Sanskrtised BJP Hindi nor was it the Hindustani variety so favoured by the likes of Khushwant Singh and Kuldeep Nayyar. It wasn’t even the “Bhai ko ek dum ich tapkaneka” variety of Mumbaiyya. It wasn’t the Hyderabadi or the Bangalore variety. I can only call it the Hindi of Gulbarga. It consisted of simple phrases like “Kya be?”, “Kaiku aara?”, “Terku Kaiku” “Merku Hona” etc. For us, the people of Wadi, people who wore lungis and traveled northwards by 10 UP Madras Bombay Mail were Madrasis and those who wore Pyjamas and traveled South by 9 DN Bombay Madras Mail were Seths. We were supreme and were located on the middle of the Earth, where 10 UP crosses 9 DN.

Part 12 of my life in Wadi

Lakshmi Pathy was a popular teacher. It may be remembered that my grandmother Thangi was the aunt of S V Pathy, Lakshmi’s father. Pathy’s mother Naani had passed away. So, had his father. Thangi therefore regarded herself as a guardian and mother figure of Pathy and his family. When my father got into ACC and went to Dwaraka alone on his first posting, it was in Pathy’s house that he stayed initially, because Dwaraka was a strange place for a 17 year old lad from Kerala, and Pathy was already married and settled. Also, when the Pathys were away from Wadi for some reason – I don’t remember why, Lakshmi and Sashi who were in High School in Shahabad, used to stay in our house. Sometime during this period Pathy had some health problem. The incidents following this are rather vague in my mind, and except for a very few people who were concerned, I am not sure many people knew what happened. Having looked after her own self and her fatherless son all her life, Thangi was bold and courageous to the point of being extremely acrid when she wants to. I was not privy to what transpired but for some reason, there was some bitterness between our family and that of Pathy’s. We were not on talking terms for over five years I believe. It was during this period that Lakshmi finished her teacher’s training course and joined St. Ambrose Convent as our class teacher in 6th standard. That was 1975. Unlike untrained teachers and nuns, who used to teach us till then, Lakshmi was young and trained and secular (I mean not a nun), and hence her teaching methods were bold and interesting. We all therefore liked her. After timid Thavaseeli and lethargic Syeris, Lakshmi was fresh and popular and different. Now my relations with her as a cousin, complicated by the bitterness between our families, combined with her capabilities and skills as a teacher was a cocktail that stimulated me. In fact she was one of the first teachers I remember to have shaped my thinking and created an impression that teachers can be interesting.

SACS then had only seven classes and after the next year we were to leave for Shahabad for further education. Our seniors had already taken that path, and the class just senior to us would be doing so soon. We had, what we called Board exams in 7th standard then, which was a big deal. The question papers were set by the Board, in Bangalore (or was it Gulbarga?) and evaluation was also done elsewhere. So there was no question of familiarity between teacher and pupil, influencing evaluation. So we were all afraid of the Boards. As is normal, we the juniors were supposed to give a farewell party to our seniors before the board. This was the first instance when we did it. March 1976. Thirty years ago. I recently read newspaper reports of similar farewell parties in Delhi, where lakhs were spent, and liquor, drugs, cigarettes and even condoms flowing freely in late night orgies. I am not being judgemental – times have changed - but we didn’t do such parties. Under strict supervision of nuns, we wished the seniors well for their forthcoming exams, played some very sober games, gave them gifts, ate small pieces of cakes and sang in groups. Above all we said prayers to Jesus, Mary and Joseph asking for our seniors good performance. I remember a song Lakshmy Pathy composed for this occasion and taught us.

“Hurry Burry dash and Bang, We now introduce our 7th Standard Gang” it went. The song then listed out humorous peculiarities of each of the seventh standard students. Some of those guys were particularly colourless, and I appreciate the work and imagination Lakshmi Pathy must have put into composing the song.

Another reason why I remember the Sixth standard was that, it was then that a new doctor came and joined the ACC Hospital. He was transferred from the ACC factory at Mancherial in Andhra Pradesh. His name was Pudipedda Surya Rao. He had a big family. His parents, wife and 4 children. Now a doctor in the ACC hierarchy is high above a clerk, which my father was. They stayed in SSQ (refer my earlier posts in the blog for what an SSQ is). Also doctors came and went, but except that we went to them for treatment, there was no other connection between us guys and doctors. But what made Dr. Surya Rao particularly interesting to me was, his children or atleast 2 of them. His eldest was P V R Suryanarayana, who was my senior by one year. The next was Janaki, my junior by one year. The next were Bhavani and Arunakanti. The influence Suryanarayana and Janaki had on me directly for the next several years – say a decade- and indirectly, even today deserves several posts. I will be coming back to them time and again in the blog.