Guess who came to the airport to pick me up?

This time I met a dozen of my St. Xavier’s School (SXS) classmates in three different settings. All that within the 2 days that I was in India!! There is an interesting story about how they almost never became my friends to begin with. This involves Father Wautier – the best principal I have ever had in my life, my own dad and my brother.

In 1971 December, SXS had admission test scheduled on one Friday, Saturday and Sunday over a weekend. My father, having figured that all kids will be interviewed first before results would be declared, went to visit his mom in Debipur village on Friday. Came back on Saturday and took me for tests on Sunday. Only to be told that all seats had been filled up.

My dad was terribly crestfallen. It was his dream that I would go to SXS. I do not think he ever forgave himself for that.

I went to Benachity Junior High School (next door to SXS on Mirabai road) instead. Every December thereafter, my dad would take my report card to Fr. Wautier and plead “e bochhoro first hoyecche. ebaar-e niye nin”. (This year too he has stood first – you have to take him now). But Fr. Wautier always sent him back.

Fast forward to 1976 December. My brother now had to go to school. Dad took him to interview in SXS. No points for guessing which day he took him there of the three day options. I remember being in the room with the whole family when Fr. Wautier interviewed my brother. I distinctly remember he asking him to narrate a poem.

For some reason, my brother froze up. Fr. Wautier was incredibly warm and comforting and gave him some encouragement. And like summer tempest came out “Baa Baa Black Sheep” from my brother’s mouth like he was waiting to throw those words up all his life.

On Monday, results were out. My brother was in.

Dec 12, my results came out.

Dec 13, my dad went on his annual pilgrimage to Fr Wautier.

Same old “e bochhoro first hoyecche. ebaar-e niye nin”

Fr. Wautier: “Congratulations, Mr. Roy. But there is no vacancy”.

To hear my dad say it, he pleaded a couple of times. With no result. And then he put down his trump card…

“But his brother got thru this time”

Fr. Wautier was nonplussed. “His brother? What is his name?”

“Chiradeep. Chiradeep Roy.”

Fr. Wautier went to those metal folder racks, fished out some paperwork and asked my dad if that kid whose papers he was holding was my brother.

“Yes, father. They are five years apart”

“Bring Rajib’s report card tomorrow. He will be in our school from January”.

My father, well prepared as he was, promptly fished out my report card from his pocket.

A few signatures and some admission money later, I became part of these guys!!!

Never got a chance to say good bye to my friends in Benachity Junior High School 🙁

Had it not been for my brother…

Abhik had made me promise that the next time I would be in Delhi, I would have to let him know. He would round up our school friends from elementary days and have a gathering. I had about 3 hours between flights to spare. And Abhik came thru with his promise. The last time I had seen Abhik was in 1986 May!

Some of the folks I had last seen even earlier (like Chinmoy). While I am not big into group meetings, the school friends have always been an exception. Perhaps because we have a lot in common – in terms of experiences we went thru together in the early, formative stages of our lives. Each one of them – Kushal, Sushil, Chinmoy, Abhik, Aniruddha, Mithun, Deepak and Jay had to fight a lot of Delhi traffic snarls to get to our meeting spot near the airport. Sanjay was in fact visiting from Bombay and he rearranged his schedule to meet us too!

Those young boys in grey shorts and white shirts have now prospered is so many different ways – from doctors to engineers to managing directors to NGO … you name it… and yet when the folks get together, it is almost like the conversations pick up from where we left off during school. Down to even discussing the crushes from those days!!

The Delhi folks made it very special for me by getting the restaurant to even put in a name plate for me. Those guys really know how to get my ego up.

For all that never-changed-spirits of friendship, everybody agreed on one thing. There is one thing that has changed a lot. And that is me. By general consensus (including my own vote), I was an awkward, thin-as-a-rail nerd toting thick black framed glasses. Nothing really stood out about me other than that I used to get good grades. (Which today I have concluded counts for next to nothing).

Apparently, nobody would have ever predicted the person I am today if they had seen the kid then. Which, upon reflection, could not be truer.

It would be an interesting exercise for me to reflect on whether my traits today are learned traits that I made myself learn or were those traits always there and they just happened to come out as my life context and environments changed around me. As an example, how different would I be today, if I had never come to the USA?

I was fortunate that the group did not deliberate on whether this me is better or that me was better. I was fairly sure that they would demand the old guy back!!

Our houses are antipodal today. I am in Atlanta, Avijit is in Perth. We share the hemispheres neither on the north south divide nor on the east west divide. And yet we used to live stone’s throw away (well maybe a few throws away if you could lay them down longitudinally) and were a constant feature in each other’s houses some forty years back.

We happened to be both in Kokata this week to sell our parents’ houses. He lost his mom literally a few days before I lost mine. And coincidentally, our stay in India overlapped by a few hours this time. We made the most of the opportunity and spent an hour together over breakfast before he had to run to the court and I had to run to the airport.

After quite some time I had two relaxed evenings with my brother’s family. The last eighteen months, the elder nephew was busy with his high school exams and before that of course, there was the Covid thingy.

We focused most of our time on what the nephews like best – eating at different restaurants and of course math puzzles!! They had their first experience of hibachi. I think their stomachs were ready to burst at the end of it. But they enjoyed it thoroughly.

By the way the Victoria Memorial you see in the background – that is actually a wall mural!

One from my own (boys’) school – Kaushik Bose and the other from the rival (girls’) school – Piyali Chatterjee. It was a great “adda” time. Piyali and I took full advantage of Kaushik being a teetotaler and drank for him too!

“Remind me again, how do we know each other?”, I asked.

It is a fairly strange question to ask somebody after inviting him to meet you in your hotel. Well, in June, I had tried to meet him but I could not make time. He had insisted that I make some time for him in my future trips. Since my Durgapur trip got canceled, I took a chance to see if he had time.

I knew that somebody called Tirtha Tanay Mandal often posted comments on my blog. Especially the ones about fountain pens. He had surprised me with his knowledge of pens and had made a few shop suggestions for me to visit in Kolkata.

There was a guy a couple of years younger than me in school with a very similar name. I kind of assumed it was that person.

So when Tirtha walked in with his wife Tanushree, I was taken aback a little at how young they were. (barely reaching 30).

“Well, 6-7 years back, I had come across your blog while Googling something. Ever since then I have read your blog posts every single day.”

Looking at his wife, I asked “Have you folks had lunch?”

“No no sir. He has been crazy to meet you. Let’s just sit down and let him talk,” she said.

We moved to the Resident’s Lounge and asked for some soft drinks and cappuccino. And we started talking…

Forget about my blog – the guy is truly aa very interesting person. I was astounded to find out about one of his passions. He collects different tickets that had been in vogue over the years (literally centuries) for the various modes of transportation in India – bus, train, tram, ferries!!

I was not sure how much variety was there in it.

That is when Tanushree fished out an envelope from her bag. And from that envelope came out four ziplock bags. With some tickets in each one of them. That had been in circulation since the earlier part of twentieth century!!

Some of you who grew up in India when I was growing up might remember the bus tickets that used to be made from computer cards. Do you remember those olden days’ train tickets? You can see them in the picture. Apparently, those are called Edmondson tickets. I looked up in Wikipedia. Apparently that used to be a world wide standard in train tickets originally made in the 1840s by a cabinet maker!!

“So where do you get all these?”

Found out that there are forums, collectors’ websites for exchanges and all that. But Tirtha actually goes all over India to collect these tickets. For example, he waits till the crazy crowd Durga Puja season in Kolkata and then goes to buy metro tickets. Apparently, to manage all the crowds that are not used to automated systems, the metro system switches to the traditional mode of tokens!!

In his turn, he loved that I collect pens, old vinyls, CDs and all that.

“I have never found out what you call the hobby of collecting tickets”, said

By the way, trying Googling that. You will be surprised how many websites there are about people collecting bus tickets, movie tickets and all that.

That was not the end of it. Found out that Tirtha and I went to the same residential school (of course, he went a couple of decades after me). But he had the contacts of my hostel warden – who I had been looking for a long time.

As I started putting the ziplock bags back into the envelope and give it back to Tanushree, he immediately said… “No, no. Those are for you!”

“What? These are part of your collection.”

“That is okay. These are extras. I knew a person like you would value them.”

I was truly touched by the gesture.

To say I had one of the best afternoons of my life and learnt a lot would be an understatement.

We also agreed to start writing letters to each other!!!

Folks familiar with Kolkata will recognize the MAA flyover and Dhapar Math.

Saw this as we were approaching our hotel in Kolkata coming back from Kalyani. Unless my Bengali has gotten really rusty, the ad is exhorting one (presumably lady) to not change husbands but change houses.

Well, that makes no sense. First of all, in most cases, I would assume changing your husband will result in a change in your house. So, one does not need to present the two cases as mutually exclusive.

Second of all, what the heck was that all about again?