We have been having a series of discussions at home between me, my wife and sons regarding what I can remember and recount of my memories of my childhood and college life; life in Bangalore during the 70's and other associated things. Yesterday evening my wife while reading the book "Idols" by Sunil Gavaskar asked me if I remember my day at Chepauk in 1975 on Pongal day when G R Viswanath scored that memorable 97* against the mighty West Indies.
Well, it is difficult to acknowledge but the fact is that my memories are limited to only a few events in a particular chain of events. Like if one were to ask me to recount what my memories were of the day when India famously declared war on East Pakistan and the about two weeks' of battle in the Eastern and Western fronts, I would hesitate to say that my memories are of a few random events viz the blackouts and we affixing black paper on windows, the occasional jeep with siren warning us to switch off all lights, the news broadcast over radio that was played over the school playground, and the motorcade near our school welcoming the Army General, Lt. Gen Aurora! Barring that, other memories are probably residing in some dark niche.
The 1975 historic innings of GRV is again of a few random "scenes" and not a sequence of events like a movie. No. And I feel sorry for myself that I am unable to remember various events in my early life. I remember vividly the resounding applause whenever Bedi and later Chandrasekhar stoutly defended a ball or two from the WI pacers thereby giving a few additional deliveries to GRV to score runs. It was a memorable day for me to watch a test match for the very first time courtesy my relative who gifted me the day's pass to watch the match. However, I couldn't remember each and every incident from the day. How sad!
There have been other memorable days in my life - other than the two I have mentioned above. But again, those are only a few random incidents; nothing of any substantive value. Well, the upside here is that my brain is free of any clogs and can keep accumulating more such random memories throughout my lifetime rather than remembering terrabytes of information of a random or memorable day!
Well, it is difficult to acknowledge but the fact is that my memories are limited to only a few events in a particular chain of events. Like if one were to ask me to recount what my memories were of the day when India famously declared war on East Pakistan and the about two weeks' of battle in the Eastern and Western fronts, I would hesitate to say that my memories are of a few random events viz the blackouts and we affixing black paper on windows, the occasional jeep with siren warning us to switch off all lights, the news broadcast over radio that was played over the school playground, and the motorcade near our school welcoming the Army General, Lt. Gen Aurora! Barring that, other memories are probably residing in some dark niche.
The 1975 historic innings of GRV is again of a few random "scenes" and not a sequence of events like a movie. No. And I feel sorry for myself that I am unable to remember various events in my early life. I remember vividly the resounding applause whenever Bedi and later Chandrasekhar stoutly defended a ball or two from the WI pacers thereby giving a few additional deliveries to GRV to score runs. It was a memorable day for me to watch a test match for the very first time courtesy my relative who gifted me the day's pass to watch the match. However, I couldn't remember each and every incident from the day. How sad!
There have been other memorable days in my life - other than the two I have mentioned above. But again, those are only a few random incidents; nothing of any substantive value. Well, the upside here is that my brain is free of any clogs and can keep accumulating more such random memories throughout my lifetime rather than remembering terrabytes of information of a random or memorable day!
