My Eighties

Every time I see my niece I end up talking about the 80s to her. It’s usually about music, but it’s the decade of my teens – and the eighties begin with the ending of the "International Year of the Child” – 1979. .

I also remember sitting cross legged on the floor of the kitchen, with my chitappa’s radio playing the “Gopal Palpodi” advertisement, our dinner call at 7:00 pm. Chitappa and Appa were discussing Psycho – which they had both seen. This was unusual, as my father seldom saw any films. It was after much badgering that he had consented to take me to “Superman the Movie”. They were talking about somebody’s eye being very scary – and I understood that it was a film made by somebody who had died that day.

“Geoffrey” – I was either “Geoffrey” after Geoff Boycott – because of the way I played cricket – or “Thenga” for the shape of my head- he warned.  “You should never see that movie. It will scare you into hysterics”. Given that my cowardice was well known within the family - I’m still mocked because I hid under the seat whenever Gabbar Singh appeared in Sholay – and given that this was a movie that scared adults, I thought it was sound advice.

The next day I found out that the person who had died – the director of Psycho, was a somebody I had heard of. After all, I had been heavily into “The Three Investigators” – Jupiter Jones, Peter Crenshaw and Bob Andrews, of Rocky Beach, California. These books were published as “Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators” at that time. Hitchcock was a character in those books – and we knew that he was famous, loved mysteries and was English. Oh and he was fat.

That was back in 1980 – I had just gone to class 6. My sister had just started going to Women’s Christian College. My grandfather had an old ambassador that he swapped for a Fiat 1100 – MSL 7072. We had started writing our notes using fountain pens that year, and felt grown up.

We had this period called General Assembly, GA – once at the end of each week.  It used to be the last period on Thursdays, then changed over to the last period of Fridays.

It was usually fun. We would watch dumb charades, quizzes, speeches, debates and skits. Some of these were very entertaining, others Godawful. There was one particular Wednesday, June 83 – where we had a GA on a Wednesday. Our principal had invited Swami Chinmayananda to address the “children”. Since India was playing England in the Prudential Cup semis at that time, he faced a bunch of impatient students dying to get to their TV sets or the radio. He acknowledged this, and when the teachers welcomed him with a fruit basket, he opened it up and started chucking the fruit at the audience saying that they needed to practice their fielding – this, though it did not go over well with the staff, caught our attention enough to forget about the match for a while. When the lecture ended, I ran to my  cousin’s place – they lived right next to the school. Allan Lamb and Mike Gatting were batting, England three wickets down. I watched until Lamb fell and then cycled home furiously, just in time to see Botham get out. It looked as though India would have a chance to go on to the finals.

And we did. Sandeep Patil and Yashpal Sharma – remember them? They came through. And all we could talk about in the next two days was cricket. And how the fact that we had come through to the finals was just sheer blind luck and of course we wouldn’t win the finals – no one got lucky twice against the West Indies – especially a West Indies team that had Roberts, Holding, Garner and Marshall leading the bowling and Richards, Lloyd, Greenidge, Haynes, Gomes and Dujon in their batting lineup. But still, it was nice to dream and we prayed that India would make a good match out of it and not be bowled out in 10 overs without reaching a triple digit total.

Friday afternoon saw the entire family – barring the mothers around our TV. We watched Srikkanth’s innings with our hearts in our mouths, cheering as he hit a six and cringing immediately after as he missed and edged his way to a patchy 38. Through most of the Indian innings, it looked as though it was a question of how much humiliation the Windies would heap on us. A total of 184 to get in 60 overs was pitiful enough, but when it was against the strongest batting lineup in the world – the only variable was the number of  overs would they take to win.

I remember sitting in the hall after dinner, watching the first over. It felt like watching an execution. Then Sandhu bowled Greenidge out, shouldering arms to one that came back in. Still, it just meant a 9 wicket victory for the men in the maroon caps. The next few overs confirmed this, as Haynes and Richards seemed to settle in. After a point, I decided I did not want to watch and went to bed.

I was woken up by my sister, telling me that the West Indies were 7 down for 120. I didn’t dare to believe her, but I went up to the TV where the family was watching in rapt silence. There were no comments, no discussions – no fundae or predictions. Just a silent group of people devouring the TV.

Marshall and Roberts fell. The sounds of cheering swept through the streets. There was a brief period of quiet as Joel Garner and Michael Holding hung on, but we knew that the unthinkable was going to happen.

And it did, when Holding missed a delivery from Amarnath and was adjudged LBW. It was Deepavali in June.

Kapils Devils. Mohinder Amarnath. Kirmani’s Nataraja shot.  An Indian world cup win. The perfect year.

Cricket was possibly the only thing I watched on TV in those days. Doordarshan specialized in gray studies of hopeless misery – the occasional Tamil play and the weekly half hour of film music providing relief from the regular stream of programmes for farmers and adult education shows – perasiriar Ma Nannan, anyone?

This was changing now. In 1984, Hum Log started, followed by Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi, a show that was popular even in Hindiphobic Madras. Shafi Inamdar and Swaroop Sampath appeared in every home. Khandaan, the desi version of Dynasty, started around this time.  The Pathak sisters appeared in a sitcom called Idhar Udhar – or was it Paying Guest?  House husbands were on display with Jayant Kripalani and Archana Puran Singh in Mr & Mrs.

DD also started playing the occasional English serial – usually Britcoms. Notable ones were “Father, Dear Father”, “The Goodies”, “Yes Minister”, “Wodehouse Playhouse” and “Are you being served”, the serial that introduced OTT camp gaydom to India.

The movies were ruled by Rajni and Kamal in Madras and by Amitabh in the North.  Madras in the 1980s meant that you knew the lyrics to “My name is Billa”, Rajni’s breakthrough hero role.

Tiger Mask and Flares

You watched Kamalahasan and Sridevi star as a Tambram couple in Meendum Kokila, a Retard, his twin and their lover in Kalyanaraman, as a vigilante and his girl in Guru, as a Dying man and his lover in “Vaazhvey Maayam”, a mentally ill girl and her caretaker in “Moondram Pirai” and many others. Kamal also had his first Hindi film megahit “Ek Duuje Ke Liye”. His next movie in Tamil “Sakalakalavallavan” had him sing, modestly “Ek Duje Ke Liye, Aendi nee paakirey?…Naalthorum thaan Aal Maruvane, Naan thaan Sakalakalavallavan” (“Why do you watch “EkDuuje Ke Liye, girl…I change personalities all day, I am the master of all arts”).

Caalage Teenage Penngal

I would go to my aunt’s house in summer weekends. They were never well off, but they looked after me and fussed over me like I was a VIP whenever I came over.  The whole street was full of  guys in their early 20s – just out of college and into their first jobs. Every evening was a party – there would be badminton games, kite flying, carroms and chess games, long discussions about movies and girls – it was like living in a youth club or something.

I adored my cousins, especially the eldest. He was infinitely patient , and genuinely liked me. He would take me out to the Duraiswami road subway everyday at 2:00 pm to see the Vaigai Express because I was train mad.  He would take me to my first Bond file (The Spy Who Loved Me) and pass his passion for the series on. He would take me to watch “The 36th Chamber of Shaolin”, one of the longest running foreign language films in Chennai – it ran for over a year in the Safire theatre complex.

There were rules – theatres like Casino, Devi, Satyam and once in a while Pilot would play English films. Blue Diamond, on the top floor of the Safire complex played continuous shows from 9 am. If you had 20 rupees, you could stay in an air conditioned hall  all day.

Another place that was excellent for escaping the Madras sun was the British council. Open from 11:00 am to 6:00 pm, Tuesdays to Sunday, it was everything a guy who liked to read wanted. The air conditioning was powerful, conversations muted, the sofas comfortable and books and magazines plentiful.  I used to hang out  in the Encyclopedia section with Halliwell’s Film Guide (5th Edition) a paper and pencil, making a list of movies that I would see when I was older.

You could also see some excellent documentaries – David Attenborough’s The Living Planet was always in demand.

Once in a while, I would visit the American Center. It was nowhere near as good as the British Council. Library membership was free, and they had good titles, but with pages torn or scribbled over.   But they had a collection of Bosley Crowther’s movie reviews, which made was great way to pass the time.

Of course, the heat did not feel as bad as it does today. Whether that’s because of nostalgia or because there were more trees and less concrete in the city at that time, I don’t know. But come on, summer hols meant you were out of the house all day, playing cricket in the open area where the Nungambakkam Tennis Stadium now stands or table tennis in what is now the corporation office.