Home and Away in Vizag
My mother would never have chosen the black-and-silver or maroon-and-gold curtains in the two houses that we are looking at — houses I grew up in, where I was once so familiar with every scratch or stain, where I treated the doors as blackboards and scribbled away to glory. These were houses where I lived before adulthood overtook imagination. In the first house, I pretended to be, at different points, an explorer in the rainy Amazon (when my father gave me a new camera), a surgeon (Doctor Barbie!), or a cook concocting delicious teas (Enid Blyton food fantasies). In the second house, where we moved as the spectre of numerous exams hovered over me, I chose the career I never worked towards: a Formula One mechanic.
Now, as I stare at the doors and the windows shut to me, loath to leave, I am almost disconcerted by the knowledge that strangers live in proximity to the pieces of dreams I left behind. What do they know, what have they seen of what I tucked away so carefully? I never went abroad while I lived in these houses, only hoped to see the world, and most of my knowledge of life outside came from Star Movies and literary classics (contemporary writing was still out of reach). The pinnacle of my dreams then was to leave — to hear bagpipes in the Scottish highlands, to live in a high-rise building in New York City, and to picnic in the Alps. Now, coming back with a few dreams realised, others changed beyond recognition, I wanted to shut myself into that bedroom of old, which looked out on the branches of a mango tree, and experience the joys of anticipation again. Say what you will, being very young has its perks, not the least of which is abandon.
Only the previous evening, I had let myself go while G. and I sat on the edge of Kailashagiri, shrugging away the tourists, and watched the sun set in fanfare. The city lights came on slowly, even as the sea, dotted with fishing boats, merged with the horizon, to be later swallowed by the night. The lighthouse atop Dolphin’s Nose sprang into life. Business as usual — change as it should occur, a hotel instead of a home. But didn’t you miss me? Why did you let me go, and why are you so indifferent now?
I realise later that it is not indifference, but the kindness of the city easing me back into its routine, for I have been away for too many years. Even if my visit is only five days long, it is reminding me of favourite foods and temples and streets gently. The roads unwind themselves, buses materialise when we need them, some of the people I once knew are still around and remain friends. Strangers welcome us into their midst.
I am happy and overwhelmed by turns. This trip has come much later than it should have. I wanted to show G. where I spent the larger part of my life before we were married, what made me, why I am the person he knows now. And so, the moment we boarded the train, I transformed into an inexorable tour guide. I showed G. the innumerable stars over Sullurpeta. I woke him at dawn so that he could see the Krishna as we approached Vijayawada, followed by the immense swathes of green stretching all the way to Vizag. As we rumbled over the Godavari, I told him how, on summer vacation trips to Hyderabad, I had seen people lob coins into the river. I showed him the Annavaram temple for the customary distant obeisance. I pointed out Kancharapalem, which G. knew from the eponymous movie. (Side note: we will also remember it now for a co-passenger on the train, a pastor who took advantage of an unscheduled stop there to call up his truant flock and find out why they didn’t attend church the previous week, resulting in some memorable exchanges.)
I show G. around the green steel township where I lived for a very long time. We go to the submarine museum and to RK Beach. We take a bus to Simhachalam to see the ancient temple and for G. to taste the best pulihora there ever was. Pining mingles with closure. Part of me wishes I had never grown up, while another part is excited to share Vizag with G. and have him fall in love with it. We are also creating new memories together — he is treating me to my first experience of Test cricket; in fact, we decided on the trip impulsively around the match on his suggestion, after all previous planning had failed. Vizag reclaims us. After all, curtains are mere trappings. Maybe I never left, and G. has gained a new home.
PS. I’m going to leave you with a piece on Simhachalam I wrote when I was in college. It is flowery and over-the-top at times, but it is from the Vizag years and the only true souvenir I can offer you. Please don’t judge the writer harshly; her older self does it often enough!
PPS. If you’d like to contemplate on Narasimha some more, here are a couple of compositions on the God — one pensive, the other filled with vitality.
Simhachalamuna Velasina Sri Narasimha (composed by Gowri Rammohan (?) and performed by Dr Balamuralikrishna)
Narasimha Agachchha (composed by Muthuswamy Dikshitar and performed by Trichur Brothers)
