a 25th birthday with a twist

after spotting and hugging my parents at the airport in Coimbatore, I also met n hugged my grand-mother, Inna...we made our way to the car...there was Ramasamy, our driver since I was in 1st standard...20 years...he retired in the middle, then came back and ever since then seems to ageing in reverse...my mother puts it down to a diet of vethla paake and beedi...

Inna, Amma and I squeeze into the backseat...our collective shoulders are too broad, so I move my torso forward...Amma repeats the case for a new car...cheerfully now, not exasperatedly like before...soon, we reach the city and I'm greeted by the sight of a tree-less Avanashi Road...the trees were removed to make the road wider...development has its costs...we pass Stanes, my school for 14 years and source of more than half my friends, all my best friends and at least 75% of my best memories...also venue of my most daring deed...the Diwali bomb

up Anna-flyover and down again...rush hour traffic has passed, but the roads are still busy...mad honking but not angry honking...just honking by habit and to make their presence felt...reflecting a honking culture...lorries, buses, vans, cars, auto-rickshaws, motorcycles, bicycles and pedestrians vying for space generally ignoring rules of the road but relying on common sense to get them through...I spot a road-side stall selling tender-coconut water and make a mental note to visit it sometime...we reach the tranquility of Saibaba Colony, make the final left turn and reach the house...

the house looks the same as always...white gate...the coconut tree at the back...I enter the gate and immediately notice that the lawn on the grass has changed...for the better...the blue easy-chair has replaced the cane chair that Thatha used to sit on, waiting for my sister and I to return from school...a new servant comes out...that's 3 consecutive years that I've come back to a new servant...walk into the house, past the hall into my room...check if my chocolate-wrapper collection is intact...it is...all 346 different wrapper-types...the room looks the same, the bed is neatly laid in preparation for my arrival...but for some reason, the room feels too small for me...could it be that I feel metaphorically that I've outgrown it and that's accidentally translating into my physical perception of its size ? or is it that it really is tiny and I just hadn't noticed...

go upstairs and feel the same way...the Christmas decorations are still out...things are much less tidy than my house at 100 Addington Road, Reading....but oh, so much more homely...I go down and Appa and Amma sing me 'Happy Birthday' and cut the cake...as renditions of birthday songs go, this must have been one of the worst...its important to have perspective...

go up to the bedroom, Appa on one bed, me face-down on the other with Amma beside me massaging my back...we settle into relaxed, natural, free-flowing conversation...Inna comes back and its time for lunch...we go downstairs...

sambhar, rice, chicken and potato and chutney...just the memory of it is making my mouth water now...'delicious' doesn't seem an adequate word...maybe heavenly or divine....so filled with taste...I stop talking and concentrate on relishing every mouthful...it isn't difficult...the conversation is lively...social roles well-defined...Amma talks the most but not domineeringly, Inna next, Appa and myself least...but everyone has their say...Appa and I eat the most and finish eating first, Inna next and then Amma...

I get a phone-call...Danie...wishing me happy-birthday...ask him how Chennai is and when he's coming down...he isn't coming down, so we decide to meet in Chennai...next, Vicky calls...asks me if I've been knighted by Queen Elizabeth...I clarify that I havn't but was invited to a dinner at the House of Commons...I congratulate on the high-salaried managerial job he's just landed and notice the tone of measured satisfaction in his voice...we have an interesting conversation about how the marketing strategies that he uses might be improved by a knowledge of how the brain works, which is what I do...we ask each other about any marriage plans and are both relieved to discover no impending plans on either side...he has to go and will call tomorrow...Mukund calls...I clarify that I didn't meet Queen Elizabeth at Buckingham Palace, but was only invited to dinner at the House of Commons, by a meer MP...feel quite gratified that my friends should actually think it possible for me to meet the Queen

I go up and sleep to the sound of gentle Christian music...wake up to the bites of mosquitoes...its 6 pm...Johnny calls...we talk what we always have talked about since I got to know him in 8th standard...girls...which one is recently married, who is about to get married and who isn't yet married...he's going to Bangalore tomorrow, so we decide to meet when he gets back...hangs up...Suna Aunty calls and wishes me Happy B'day all the way from New Zealand...Poornima,my cousin sister also wishes me and talks non-stop for half an hour about her recent holiday, her impending transition to high-school, her love for animals and ambitions to become a vet...also tells me about animals she's nursed...sounds quite impressed when I tell her I'm tranining to be a neuro-scientist...how nice it is to be doing something so impressive :) ...everyone thinks its difficult, but its no more difficult than any other branch of science...should I feel guilty about slightly undeserved respect ?

HONK-HONK, HONK-HONK-HONK !....my gang's honking code...they're arrived outside ! I look outside to see Shiban's lean frame and bald head...go out to see Mukund and Shiban...hugs...man-hugs...cursory hugs with minimal physical contact and tonnes of awkwardness, but hugs nevertheless...we settle into easy banter that is the product of 3 people knowing each other for 20 years...Adarsh joins us and joins the banter...they're going for a movie in half-hour and want me to come...I havn't yet eaten dinner...I go and eat while they wait...dosas and sambhar...

get into Shiban's car and we race off...Shiban likes cars and drives like a mad-man, but with control...the music in the car is loud and stimulating...speed definitely thrills...we reach the theatre and buy tickets...the theatre is a ramshackle dump...no place to park, one super-expensive food stall and a run-down building...but its not decrepit...despite its minimalist nature, there's something clean and fresh about it...inexplicably, it is dirty but the dirt feels like one of the cleaner forms of dirt...maybe I'm just psycho

we enter the theatre hall and find our way to the seats...hard as stone...notice some school juniors of ours behind us...people are talking loudly waiting for the movie to start...we settle into our chairs and put our feet up...what the theatre lacks in convenience, it makes up for with the easy atmosphere...you don't feel like you have to behave in a place that is so patently less good than you deserve...the movie starts...

I discover its a Hindi movie...so, don't understand a word...about half-way, Shiban explains that its about an amateur actor trying to break into Bollywood...he asks me if I'm enjoying it...I explain that I don't understand it but am enjoying the other aspects of the experience...he turns away puzzled...Shiban is especially non-judgmental and I'm grateful for it...the movie finishes...we exit...

after the post-movie chat, we get into our cars and head back...Shiban suggests we go jogging tomorrow morning at 6 am...its about 1 am now...I volunteer to wake us all by phone-calls...I reach home, go upstairs, set two alarms and go to bed, resolving to wake up at 5:45 am in the morning...