Temples of knowledge ! - The “City Central Library

The name ‘City Central Library’ - ‘ನಗರ ಕೇಂದ್ರ ಗ್ರಂಥಾಲಯ’ in Kannada - always strikes a chord in me. The day before yesterday I saw the board at the BDA commercial complex at Banashankari and went inside. There were about a dozen people reading something or the other. The shelves contained lots of government publications, many literary works stocked out of compulsion, plenty of dog eared old books but also quite a few books which I wanted to read ! I made enquiries regarding obtaining a membership and was asked to get a copy of the ADHAR card and few copies of my Photographs. 

I went there yesterday morning carrying the required stuff and was asked to write my name, address and phone number on a form. I did that, paid a refundable deposit of Rs 200, and came out carrying four books which I had spotted the previous evening ! The official who was in charge was extremely cordial and the entire process took about 15 minutes. I was very pleasantly surprised at the ease with which I could obtain a membership and my liking of CCLs went up by a notch ! 

  

The department of libraries introduced ‘City Central library’ to Bengaluru around 1970. The first library was at KH road (Double Road), near my house and my mother was one of the first few members. All my family members have been very enthusiastic users of the library. My father was a permanent fixture there on Sundays and we have seen him spend the entire day there, forgetting food and drink! Before the City Central Library came into existence, he was a weekly visitor to the Public Library in Cubbon park, Bengaluru. 

During one of my browsing sessions through the shelves of the library, I found a copy of the kannada translation of “The Farmer boy” by Laura Ingalls Wilder. That was a time when I was a daily visitor to the library. A period of six months after my 12th standard and before the start of our course in Dental College. I stood in the narrow passage between the shelves engrossed in the book and later shifted to a more comfortable position in the reference section. I remember taking the book in my hand around 10am in the morning and I came out around half past one, after finishing the book !  I became an immediate fan of the author and I might have read all her books at least half a dozen times. 

During the next week, I borrowed one book each day - Little house in the big woods, Little house on the Prairie, On the shores of Silver lake - to name a few,  and finished the series in a week. Subsequently my brother and sister also turned out to be Laura fans and between us we have all her books - both the original english editions and kannada translations - in our possession. It is through her books that I first heard the names Wisconsin, Minnesota, Tennessee, Prairies, Great lakes etc etc. These books are in circulation between us even today !

Laura Ingalls wrote the very popular ‘little house series’ (A popular TV serial too) based on her family’s travel westwards during the 1800s in the US. Laura’s family was one of the pioneer agriculturists who moved continuously looking for better pastures during the eighteenth century. With some curiosity, I looked for her books in the Public Library at Canton, MI, USA and was disappointed when I did not find even one of them! I enquired with the librarian and was told to look in the children’s section. 

So, one senior citizen went to the children’s section at the Canton City Library, was very glad to find all the books of one of his favourite authors and happier to find one which he had not read before !  I later visited city libraries in Dearborn, Plymouth, Novi, Northville, Wayne and so on and loved the libraries in the US. I was extremely impressed by the unhindered access to all facilities available in the libraries and the comfortable seating. I loved the  large print editions of the popular books for senior citizens. These library visits have been a high point in my trip to the US. 

Now, armed with my membership card of the CCL Bengaluru I plan to check all libraries around (there are three CCl branches in a radius of 2 kms from my house - they now have about 30 central libraries and 550 branches in the state) and hope to be able to access the digital library too. To start with, the three books shown above - DVG’s ‘Smriti ChitragaLu’, and a book on Pu Ti Na, will keep me busy for the next two weeks or more !  

A short dream and a cherished friendship

This morning my brother called me and asked “have you heard from GR recently ?”  I said “no, it has been nearly a year since I received his mail. Why did you ask ?”. He said that he was trying to contact GR. E-mails sent to his known mail Ids had not received any response and there was no phone number to call. Since my brother was expected to be in the US in November, He was trying to get in touch with GR, who lives in Colorado, in the hope of meeting him. 

Now, a little bit about this GR. He is my childhood friend. Three years older than me. When I first met him I was in second standard and he was in fifth. We walked to school together everyday. A distance of about three kilometers. And I am sure this is what put a firm foundation for our friendship. He completed his Phd in Artificial Intelligence and left for the US for a postdoctoral. I completed my BDS and left for Goa around the same time. And I can confidently say that there has not been a single day in the intervening twenty years, but for the time he was in IIT Madras, that we have not met !  And whenever we met, ‘time stood still’ as the saying goes. We never met for a few minutes, at least an hour always !

He was ‘my friend’ but equally friendly with my brother and sister. He is known to everyone who knew me in my childhood. I do not intend to bore all my friends by writing about our friendship which I cherish. I am sure all of us have one or two such relations in life which transcend all known relations !

As my usual practice is these days, I lied down for a short nap after lunch. And I dreamt. I had parked my scooter by the side of the road and was checking something around its wheel. I felt someone come and stand next to me and on lifting my head saw GR standing there. We did not speak. I got up, took the scooter off the stand and started. He sat on the pillion. After a very short while, he said “there are police ahead”. Indeed there were police ahead and checking. I replied “don't bother. We have everything”. Then he said “No helmet!” I stopped abruptly turned the scooter around, parked it by the road side and turned towards GR to say “We will have to go and get helmets”, and I woke up. 

I last met GR during his short visit to India six years back. The earlier meeting was in 2010 when I had visited the US. He received me in Denver and I stayed with him for two days. He had recently built his house and when I stepped in he said “ ನೀನು ನನ್ನ ಮನೇಗೆ ಬಂದ್ಯಲ್ಲೋ ! ನಾನು ಮನೆ ಕಟ್ಟಿದ್ದಕ್ಕೂ ಸಾರ್ಥಕವಾಯ್ತು ಬಿಡು !” ( Oh, you did come to my house ! It is certainly worth building it ) I was so touched with that exclamation, that I have tears in my eyes even as I type this !

How I wish that I meet him out of the blue sometime again, just like the way I met him in my dream this afternoon. 

National High School - Revisited

 National High School - Revisited 

I happened to be in the vicinity of National High School this morning and went into the building on an impulse. I have moved around the building hundreds of times even after I left Bengaluru but never went in even once. Today’s was a revisit after nearly half a century. It was a nostalgic visit. As I stood in the quadrangle of the NHS, I could almost hear HSM (our head master) clearing his throat prior to his customary post prayer sermon from the stage ! 

It is unfortunate that the beautiful edifice with the clock tower is blocked by a very run of the mill new building but most of the interiors are as they were. The space at the back of the quadrangle where we used to eat our afternoon lunch is covered and utilised for some purpose, the library has come to the ground floor, the audio visual room is converted into a class room, and new toilet blocks are built. One of the class rooms overlooking the college auditorium is in a dilapidated condition and shut down. The cycle park has become an additional building and the school is now Co-ed making me wish I was born decades later !! 

The college section has not changed much except for an entrance opening onto the Pampa MahaKavi road at the place where the Principal’s office used to be and there are additional floors built. An attempt has been made to make the auditorium walls soundproof and they now look as if cardboard has been pasted onto the walls.

I was walking around the school premises aimlessly, lost in memories when a lady who was sweeping the corridor addressed me “ಓಲ್ಡ್ ಸ್ಟೂಡೆಂಟಾ ಸಾರ್?”.(are you an old student?) I nodded my head. “ಚನ್ನಾಗಿ ನೋಡ್ಕೊಂಡ್ ಹೋಗಿ ನಿಮ್ ಸ್ಕೂಲ್ನ”, ( Take a good look at your old school) she continued with her work and I came out of my school. I am sure that she has seen many visitors like me !

I took some pictures and they are here. The ones with a dash of colour are the college open air stage, auditorium and new opening. The bright classroom at the end of the corridor (seen in one of the pictures) was our 8th E section. I will end with an anecdote connected with the room.  

It was 1969 in the era of running commentaries of test matches. India was playing against Australia at Kanpur and it was the test debut of G R Vishwanath, a boy from Basavanagudi where our school was located. He was from a very humble background and a student of Fort high school which is about a kilometer from NHS. There might have been a few from our school who knew him personally. Even though most of the minds that morning were in Kanpur, we had no access to commentary and only had to listen to the description of the coast of South America from our geography teacher SN. Half the class was half dozing. 

Suddenly and unusually, the intercom speaker which had been fitted in every classroom sprang to life and crackled. Our attention was drawn to the speaker and our headmaster was speaking. He informed us that GRV was batting and has reached the nineties and said that it was a wonderful performance. He requested the teachers to suspend the teaching activity and said that the running commentary would be brought to all classrooms through the intercom till GRV completed his century ! 

And that, GRV did with a flourishing square cut to the boundary, which later came to be known as his trademark stroke. The school premises erupted in a joyous applause and the moment remained etched in my mind forever.