The Golden Heart Forever

My Ajja and Myself

Sometimes we never realize what awakens memories, what can trigger things in your heart and what can make tears roll down your eyes. What happened to me can be explained with these sentences. Life rolls on always and as everyone knows people live and die. But no matter what we do and even try to do, nothing prepares us when we actually face such a situation. That loss is always a loss and no one else will take up that void.  

Ajja was that to me. Even today, a mango, a Mitsubishi Lancer, a sprinkler, a jackfruit, a calm evening or even the tune of the morning news in BBC channel can wake the past and before I know it, my dam’s burst of my eyes. 

Life is equally funny too. The mango reminds me of the day when my uncle was admitted in the hospital and both my mother and grandmother were off to the hospital to take care of him. So I became the impromptu chef in the house for ajja. After he inevitably praised my lunch and had it, (I never came to know how actually it really was) we both went to the stash of mangoes which my grandmother had kept and sat down with them. Ajja started cutting off the skin and I started cutting it into pieces. Seriously, at the end of it we really count on the number of mangoes we gulped down. The only registered fact was that my grandmother almost had a mini heart attack after she came back with my uncle.

The Mitsubishi Lancer is a story on its own. The love for that car, the fun loving car washing part or even the each time when he came to pick me and my mother from the railway station. The best part of it is when I got to fight for the front seat when coming from the railway station to ajja’s house. My mother always lost and I always ended up getting the front seat! The most memorable time with that vehicle was when I got to drive ajja around in that car. I got that opportunity only once and cherish it till today as a very priceless memory.

The small sprinkler sitting in the areca nut and coconut farms too have their fair share. I stayed with my grandparents during my 1st and 2nd PUC (11th and 12th standard). I shared few works of the farm that time which included giving ajja company during the time of changing sprinklers day or night. The times when we had to change at 2 am were the best because I got woken up from deep slumber and pushed to do it. Along with Ajja was a very caring dog which used wait near the next sprinkler so that I did not have to fumble my way around. The day time when I did change them, invariably would end up drenched by it (by choice and not by chance!) no matter how or when Ajja started the motor.   

It used to be a habit when all cousins got together for our summer vacations, every single one of us get out playing in the evenings. This meant that children and adults got down competing in lagori, koko or cricket. When cricket was the game of choice, Ajja always got batting. He swung his bat to any ball and managed at least a four with each hit. And yes, he always was on the kids’ team, which means we won. After his session, he would sit in his chair and encourage us to play well. It ended with some hot bhajji or chakuli of grand mom’s specials. The calm evenings were filled with fun, screaming and laughter. 

If the evenings were filled with rain and I happened to be walking back from the bus stop to ajja’s home when coming back from school, I would hold the umbrella till the point just before where Ajja would see me coming on the road. Then, I would fold the umbrella and tuck it in so that I would get completely wet and stand in front of him. He would be waiting to scold me and after that round of scolding, he would say, “Go have a bath in hot water, grandma has kept it ready for you. Go now before I scold you more.” But the funny fact was that his scolding would actually be a mild reprimand.

The day with ajja would start with the watching of BBC news at 7.30 sharp. Even today, I remember starting my holidays getting up to this tune of this news. Then I would go down and sit with him to watch it.  Any major news would become a discussion between us that instant. I definitely cannot forget the part when some politician would talk in Hindi and Ajja would always say, “Ambi ambi hotha hai.” (Ambi means cow dung in kannada). I never understood why he used to do that. After that small programme, I was off to brushing and he in time for his breakfast.

As I knew Tamil fluently, Ajja and I shared a love for black and white Tamil movies. He could tell any story of almost any old film and along with it another story would unravel on how he went to watch that movie in the talkies way back when he was studying in Madras (Chennai). The planning, saving and escaping from home to watch the late night matinee shows with friends or cousins. When we were watching on the television, except my mother all the others would irritate us to change the channel but that would never materialize. 

The thing I always and still aspire from him is the fact that he carried a heart that harbored no malice or jealousy to anybody else. He would constantly tell me that everyone is good and he faithfully followed that in his life. He was a human who spoke his heart out and forgave in an instant. He gave love freely without even asking and was one who made people like him even if they didn’t want to. He lived a life he loved the most with kids, grand children, pets, farms and fields.