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Tell it to the Birds!
Nov4, 1988
The two-man demolition squad arrived early that wet Sunday morning, even before the serial 'Ramayan'. Without much ado, the team cheerfully set about its task of dismembering a huge gulmohar tree. One worker scaled a slippery leafless branch and began hacking at it with demoniacal intent, while the other, puffing away on a bidi, started tugging at the rope tied to the trembling, ill-fated branch. Soon the branch came down with a deafening crash making the apartment dwellers scurry to their windows to witness the sad spectacle of a giant being razed to the ground.
The other spectacle on the telly had an epic battle being waged amidst thunder and lightning. As the drama electrified the skies on the small screen, from across the flat could be seen more branches' coming off the tree and hurtling down with a roar, to bounce and rest on the concrete driveway. By evening, the two men had done a neat job of piling sections of log ready to be carted away. Not even a stump was left behind on the ground to remind anyone that a forty-year-old tree had once stood there and given joy and happiness to so many.
For not too long ago, the gulmohar tree was a marvelous, vibrant specimen, a delight to the eye. A rounded crown with a velvety spread of lime-green and deep green leaves, and in season, with a sprinkling of red-yellow flowers. Around April-May, it would become a symphony in scarlet, "the flame-of-the forest" in all its glory.
Four summers ago, enterprising children had erected three swings on a branch and the cheery sounds of merry-making and laughter could be heard all day. The bigger kids would be found climbing its strong and steady brandies, making the squirrels scamper to higher levels. For one girl a hollow in a branch served as a nook for a good read. Enid Blyton was giving way to Nancy Drew. Under the branches, little kids played.
On the spongy floor of fallen leaves and flowers, little girls in colourful dresses shrieked in delight and jumped up and down playing hopscotch. In the evenings, the toddlers emerged from the flats and found independence under a blue sky. In their push-carts and tricycles with red plastic seats and horns, they raced around the tree.
At another level, at tree-top, the place was a virtual menagerie with dozens of birds of different colours resting on it. The sound and movement and happy chatter made for a welcome diversion from the continuous hum and din of the buses and trucks and other vehicular traffic outside the apartment building.
Now all this has changed. The tree is no more. A huge hoarding has taken its place. It has a message in bold letters: ‘Ours is a beautiful city. Let's keep it that way!’
The Golden Threshold
May 07, 1988
It happened more than 30 years ago. On the way back from the school sports, I got lost. I was then 9, and had ambled into an unfamiliar part of town , It was the first time I was on St.Mark’s Road, alone. It was getting dark and a light drizzle fell and I took helter under a rain-tree.That was when I noticed it. It was a case of love at first sight.
The golden threshold stood in front of me, a two–storey building, grey and white, and stucco-finished. From the white wrought-iron grill, a small gravel driveway let to the house. There was lawn, a small pond in the centre. Red flowers and crotons and ferns were all about. The house had several indoor plants hanging from shiny brass holders.
Inside, illuminated globes hung from the ceiling. Sounds of little girls playing and laughing could be heard. It was also the first time I heard the magic of “Espana” on the keyboard. The music, the greenery and atmosphere made me momentarily forget that I was lost and that my immediate task was to get back home soon.
Then, as I grew up, through school and college, that Iberian architecture continued to capture my imagination. Across the road, I have stopped several times, first on my bicycle and later, on a motor-bike, and gazed on the loveliness across, much like an incurable romantic. I have even taken a double–decker from Shivajinagar just to pass the building and get a fresh perspective and to drink in its heady beauty. All through college, I viewed it- in the early morning sun, at a high noon, in the quiet of mid-afternoon, at dusk late in the evening. All return trips home invariably took me down the section containing the Threshold.
Still later, as I progressively got involved in the sometimes tooth and claw life of the corporate world, here and outside the city, the vision of the dentist’s abode in Bangalore would often appear, making me nostalgic for home and the quieter life.
I remember once, on a cold rainy evening, with Glenfidich clutched in hand, I sat in front of a blazing fireplace, leisurely describing Bangalore to a 70 year old English-woman in Brussels. The lady seemed most interested and amused at the very thought of so many churches of different denominations being to her how this came about.And the talk moved to the British army, the Cantonment and Victorian bungalows. Before I knew it, I was again describing Dr.Camilio Miranda’s villa. Shortly thereafter the lady said, You must love that building of yours very much, I wish I could see it with you some day.
That day was not to be. For when I was back in Bangalore, some years later I received the news of Mrs. Harold’s death. About the same time, after several valiant efforts to stop it, came the news of the demolition. Immediately I was there outside taking pictures and drinking in whatever was left.
The garden has gone to seed. The branches of the huge rain-tree outside were chopped. The place was desolate. An eerie feeling, of losing someone close, came over me. Later, when an uneasy calm returned, it occurred to me. Sunny gracious living in Bangalore must inexorably move to make place for crass vertical habitations that usher in perpetual twilight at the grass-less ground level. And elegant structures such as the Golden Threshold must yield to the mad scramble skywards of steel and concrete, to a building, in this instance, brazenly named ‘the House of Lords’.
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