Episode 241 : A tale of three cities

For a long time I had bits and pieces of a post in my mind. A post on the three cities in my life, three cities that I returned to for a short holiday after two decades or so a decade or two.

For a long time it lay dormant, till Extempore's ode to Hyderabad spurred me into writing what I half-remember now.

Calcutta (1979-1984).

I left the city in the middle of 1984, a time when the city was being dug up to build the Metro. I left, taking with me memories of rasagullas, Durga puja, Rath yatra, mishti doi, rickshaw-pullers, electricity loadshedding and mosquitoes.

Then Hyderabad beckoned (1984-1986).

In hindsight, it was a place that I took time to get used to. Paradise biryani was the only biryani I ever loved; it always trumped what Mama Hyde made at home. A vague memory of the Charminar and Golkonda. But there was something about the place that always prevented me from liking it. From getting nostalgic about it like how I would when I recalled Calcutta.

Or Delhi (1986-1989).

Edward Hyde's three prodigal years. Football at school and cricket in the neighbourhood. The walks to school wearing woollens in wintry mornings. Hot summers. Tae-kwon-do classes. The markets at Moti Bagh, RK Puram Sec8, Vasant Vihar, Sarojini Nagar and INA Colony, window shopping at Palika Bazaar, the gardens and the parks, Connaught Place and the India Gate. Alu tikki and bhutta. Paneer and tandoori chicken. In Uncle Haas's words, I was "a young sardar in disguise". I hated it when we had to move back to Madras.

That was then.

Calcutta and I met again after two decades. The city hadn't changed much. After visa formalities were over at the American Consulate, I had the evening to myself. A ride in the Metro to the market area, the walk up RB Avenue, calls every two minutes just to update Mama and Papa Hyde... much to their amusement.

'The trams, they are still here!'

'I see the school, it is still there, looks the same!'

'I see the gurudwara... I see the house.'

'I just found the doctor's clinic. It's a store now... and I am standing on the same spot where the fish cart collided into me!!'

It felt like meeting someone you had a crush on as a teenager after many years and finding that she is pretty much the same.

That is Calcutta for me.

I went to Hyderabad twice, once after two decades and again the following year. The town of the 1980s had transformed into a city in the next century. A city I could not recognise. The house wasn't there, the school was replaced by a shopping centre. But Paradise biryani was still wonderful, and the nagging something-is-not-right feeling was still there.

Hyderabad was like the woman you wanted to fall in love with, but couldn't because something about her did not feel right.

I did not expect to return to Delhi for a short holiday in 1995, six years after I left for Madras. The place was changing. I could see in the neighbourhood I grew up in, in the school I studied, in the markets I used the hangout at. I wanted to return. Some time soon, I promised myself.

It was like two lovers having to go separate ways but promising to get back together. Soon.

I went back after 13 years. To a place that I had begun to hear stories about. How lawless it was getting, how rude the people had become. And I wondered how could it be so? My stay in Delhi last year convinced me of one thing- I did not have it in me to want to come back. I consoled myself that I was a South Delhi boy, and that this time I was staying in North Delhi, which is why the city made me uncomfortable.

'I sometimes wonder if I would have grown up to be like them if I had not returned to Madras' I mused.

'It is not the place, it is not the people. It is up to you, you would have changed if you wanted to' she said to me.

Maybe.

It felt like a relationship that went sour. One you are unable to put behind you. One where you want to try again.

Delhi gives warmer vibes in movies than in person. But I get the feeling that if I listen to the soundtrack of Khosla Ka Ghosla, Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye! and Dev.D more often, I may soon be willing to try again.