You probably have heard me saying this often before – I am always struck by the difference in the attitude of people as they age between India and US. While generalization of any sort is fraught with danger – and I have certainly seen a few strong exceptions – but by and large, I tend to believe the following: compared to the country I live in (US), folks in the country where I was born and visit often (India), people, as they age tend to have a far less physically active life. And also seem to complain more. I would certainly put my parents in that category. But as I said, I run into exceptions too. I get inspired by those exceptions and that is why I write about them.

Such an encounter happened yesterday. I had a few hours left before I had to say bye to my parents and leave for the airport. I was aware that a gentleman that I wanted to meet for some time was going to be in Kalyani (small town where my parents live now) on that day. He is the father of a friend of mine in Atlanta – Nachiketa. I figured it would be good to go and say Hi to him. I was sure he would be thrilled to know that I live in the same place as his son does and we can talk about a few things. Also, my elder daughter and his youngest granddaughter are very close friends.

Before long, my brother and I were knocking on the door of what seemed to be the right address. There was no response. I pushed the door and it opened. I raised my voice to ask if anybody was inside. Soon, a very elderly gentleman came out. I introduced myself as his son’s friend from Atlanta and that I live in Kalyani too. Now, the last part was not correct at all but I was afraid that he would jump to all sorts of wrong conclusions when somebody comes unexpectedly from Atlanta saying that he knows his son. Eventually I corrected myself and let him know that my parents live in Kalyani but I personally have never done so.

In any case, I had bargained for half an hour of pleasantries – after all he was 86 years old and take leave of him. Turned out it went for over an hour and if I did not have a flight to catch, I could have sat for another hour. What had my jaw drop is that this gentleman – as I said 86 years old – takes the 5 o’clock local train every Sunday from Kolkata (where he lives) and comes to Kalyani where he has a house. He spends the day there and then next day goes to another town and teaches Post Graduate students in a college there. At 86 years old!! He travels in local trains (only people from Kolkata area will know what it is like to travel in crowded local trains)!! And teaches in a college!! I found out that he also spends Tuesdays and Fridays working at the National Library in Kolkata.

The Sundays that he spends in Kalyani – he tends to his large garden. He took us around his garden – with all sorts of flower plants, fruit trees and the like. It was an extensive set up he had. I asked him where did he get all this energy. He looked at me for some time and asked “What else would you expect one to do?”. That was the best answer ever. I was not sure I had an answer.

We went back inside from his garden for a cup of tea. He regaled me and my brother with stories of undivided India from the early twentieth century. (He was born in Bangladesh but moved to India). He had more stories about freedom fighters from those days than I had ever heard before. My brother and I had an absolutely fantastic time! Both of us agreed to meet him again – either in Kolkata or in Kalyani.

But to me he is the same old Atish Sarkar that I went to first grade with.
Woke up on Saturday morning in Durgapur with the exciting prospect that I would be able to see another first grade friend of mine – the twenty sixth one that I have dug up so far, if you are keeping count – after a very long time. We got separated after 1976 and that was almost forty years back. Not sure how, but a few years back, I was able to get his phone number and I was startled to find out that he remembered me immediately. I had made a promise to visit him some time in Raniganj. And Saturday was the day.

While it is never too late to meet your old friends, in one aspect I was too late. His dad passed away long time back. I owed him a lot of things but there was one I have been ever indebted to him. It was a seemingly innocuous act of getting me an application form from Narendrapur Ramakrishna Mission school and encouraging me to sit for the entrance test. My dad and I were already set on me going to a different school where I had a guaranteed admission. I did give the entrance exam in this other school and I did get in. And against my dad’s wishes then (there is a rather juicy story behind this one – but I will leave it for later), I went to this school. And to this day, my dad and I agree that was the best decision for me. It opened up a lot of future opportunities for me.

Unfortunately for me though, I never got a chance to say Thanks to his dad. I did narrate that story to his mom and expressed my gratitude for uncle’s encouragement. I was lucky that his mom was there that day. She was visiting him and I did not expect to see her at all. It was absolutely wonderful to sit with her and talk about some of the incidents from forty years back.

One of the amusing story was a routine Atish and I had every “tiffin” period – which was basically the recess time when we had our snacks and kicked around some “kodomphool” pretending them to be soccer balls. I had this blue “tiffin” box and my mom would give me bread, banana and a boiled egg every day. He had a silver colored one and I do not recollect what all he brought – but he sure always had a “lobongolotika” (which is one of the best sweets you could find in Bengal). He loved eggs and I loved lobongolotikas. So, the first act during every “tiffin” period would be to exchange those two items. Much later in life, I realized how that must have reinforced the wrong message to both our moms seeing we had finished up all our food in the box 🙂 We had a great laugh sitting at his house and ruminating over such small incidents in front of three generations of women in his life – his mom, his wife and his daughter!!

Before long, I realized that one morning was going to be too little to go thru all our stories. He needed to get back to work. We promised to sit together as five people again and finish up the rest of the stories some day soon!