Back on the road: Tha Madras!
After packing my backpack for the trip to Madras, a pang of anxiety & excitement hit me when I locked my apartment door and stepped out.
Madras, you hear a lot about this city in movies, especially in Tamil movies. The plot always revolves around Madras — I never knew why. Maybe to cut down the product cost. That’s how I know about Madras — through movies as a kid.
The first time I almost visited Madras was during my school days — I went to National Cadet Corps (NCC) camp in Chengalpattu, a stone’s throw away from Madras as per realtors and engineering colleges (It takes a good two hours ride to reach Madras from Chengalpattu). I didn’t explore Madras much then.
After that, I visited Madras twice to give CAT: I failed pathetically on the first attempt, and I scored 97 percentile on the second attempt and received calls from almost all IIMs, except Ahmedabad and Bangalore. Eventually, I screwed all the interviews because my communication was pathetic then (I’m from a tier 3 city who relied on novels and self-help grammar books to learn English. My conversational English was terrific. Scratch that. I mean terrible).
Eventually, I got into an IIM — Micro achievement in life.
I digressed a lot.
Where was I about Madras?
The flight to Madras from Bombay was two hours. Somehow I was always scared of flights: minor turbulence gives me major adrenalin rush to flight or fight.
19E.
That was my seat number. As usual, someone else was occupying my seat when I reached my seat. The person who was sitting in my seat said his seat was 19D, and he exchanged it with the lady who was sitting in 19E. I panicked. Have I boarded the wrong flight? Then I double-checked my seat number, the date and flight name. Everything was right. Madam’s seat number was 18E, and she was wrongly sitting in 19E before I came, and intelligently swapped the wrong seat with 19D.
Bloody confusion.
Meeting Parthasarathy & Parthasarathy:
I started playing NFS on my iPad (of course it was on Airplane mode) before the flight took off.
I comfortably settled in my seat on the flight: I sat in 19D because I didn’t feel like sitting in the middle seat, and asked the 19D guy to stay in 19E itself. Then, I mentally started ticking the go-to places: The Armenian Church, Government Museum, and Parthasarathy Temple.
I am in no way religious. But I do visit Parthasarathy Temple whenever I come here. It’s a 1500-year-old Lord Vishnu Temple. Here, Vishnu is in the avatar of Parthasarathy (Parthasarathy in Sanskrit means the one who rides the chariot. And, this avatar is the version of Vishnu that you see in Mahabharata, where he is the charioteer for Arjuna!).
My favourite writer, Mr Sujatha (Mr is not a typo!), often wrote about this temple. He was very religious and worked as an engineer at Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) — and used to write short sci-fi stories and dialogues in movies.
Let’s go back to the flight.
A few minutes later, after giving the regular instructions, the air hostesses started distributing the dinner to the folks who had already pre-ordered their dinner.
The Airhostess came near my seat and asked me, “Mr Parthasarathy, What would you like to have for Dinner?”
Was she talking to me? Yes, she was.
I got perplexed.
This time 19D clarified. 19D said that he was Parthasarathy and would like to have Upma for dinner.
Parthasarathy has always been with you: what you seek is seeking you.
The City of a bygone era:
Let me tell you what I like about Madras: It’s 400 years old. Founded in 1639. (My math is weak.) The only reminder of its long history is the colonial buildings that have survived time and ended up in our chronology alive.
The Government Museum in Egmore is one such place.
The next morning, after having breakfast with my friend at A2B (Adyar Ananda Bhavan), I took the metro to Egmore to visit the Government Museum.
The museum looked like a palace. The place was meant for recreational activities for the British, originally.
The Building was built by the British & briefly owned by an Armenian Merchant and again sold back to the British — It is a red-stoned building with beautiful arches and domes (I should have chosen Architecture over Electronics & Communication in Engineering. What a waste of 4 years of my life!).
The museum is closed on Fridays was the reply I received at the ticket counter.
Zahir!
Not knowing what to do next — when the sun was almost at its zenith — I strolled around the museum. I could see a bunch of folks sitting and preparing for exams under shades of trees.
I was carrying, Zahir, a novel by Paulo Coelho. A novel about obsession. I sat down under a tree and read a few pages. That’s when I noticed that I was sitting in front of Connemara Public Library (founded in 1896 by then Madras Governor, Lord Connemara), one of the biggest libraries in the city. I’ve always wanted to visit this library — but never knew where it was located, and it was located within the campus of the very museum that I was in.
I wanted to explore the library. Before I went in, I had to surrender my belongings outside with the security guard.
I always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library wrote Jorge Luis Borges. I agree with him.
Once I got inside, I could see so many people sitting and reading. Happy to see so many folks in the library.
I assigned myself the task of finding ‘Zahir’ in the library, the book that I left it outside with the security guard. I looked for the book floor by floor.
It took me some time to understand how the books were sorted. It was based on the first three letters of the second name of the authors!
I found the section with COE — and in that section, I did find the books of Paulo Coelho. But, Zahir was not there. This has become a recurring event in my life — losing something in one place, looking for it everywhere else.
Breezy weather:
Around 1 pm, I decided not to roam anywhere outside because the sun was getting closer and hotter. Even though it was hot, you would never sweat; the moment you sweat, it’d get vaporised in the heat.
What’s the point of fighting with nature?
So, I decided to watch a movie. I went to the Sathyam theatre. The weather inside the theatre was cool, breezy but the film was horrible (It was Little Mermaid if that matters). I became more tolerant of the humid sun and stepped out of the theatre during the interval.
The Armenian Church:
The Armenians came to India during the 16th century when Akbar ruled most of India. He let Armenians settle, and trade spice and silk in India.
The Armenians thrived and built churches in Delhi, Bombay, Kolkata and Madras. The church in Madras was built in 1712 AD. It was a small, unique church surrounded by frangipani trees. The good thing about the church was that it was still in good shape, and condition.
I swear to God:
Every time I visit Madras, they make me regret why I went there: so much swearing. North folks, you be happy that you don’t understand Tamil, and they don’t speak Hindi! Ignorance is bliss, sometimes.
Everyone seems to be rude to everyone else, why? Due to horrid weather? But, this harshness had come down slightly after covid compared to the pre-covid days. Minor improvement.
Loss of Inheritance:
The advent of Ola and Uber had humbled the auto drivers, a bit. If not for these riding apps, the auto drivers would ask you to share a part of your inheritance for taking you from Egmore to Triplicane, a distance of 3 Km.
Madras Cafe & Bhuhari Briyani:
The trip to Madras will be incomplete without a good filter coffee and biryani.
I hunted so many restaurants for good biryani — Anjappar at Central Station, Samco at Alwarpet — but the quality and taste had dwindled after covid.
Is it because I lost the sense of taste or the cook lost the sense of cooking? God knows.
Eventually, I found a decent biryani at Bhuhari on Mount Road.
Finally, about Marina Beach: Do keep it clean, and don’t drink and break the beer bottles on the beach. Modi Ji should start his cleanliness campaign from this beach.