2 C, Roja Nagar ( 22 Years @ 2 C ) - Part- 2

   Started visiting  MMCH ( Maruthi Medical Centre and Hospital ) -  as ENT consultant from February 2002 onwards.  Since there was no Audiographer but the Audiometer ( audiometry machine) was there, I started doing audiograms also along with  ENT consultation. Till then, I was doing surgeries along with treating people as outpatients. Many caesarian sections in VMK hospital (a private hospital) and a lot many ENT surgeries while studying post graduation in Madras Medical College. So, doing audiogram, studying the graph, determining the type of hearing loss were a change for me along with my regular professional work. Visiting Subha Hospital also.

    I bought a scooter- Kinetic Style after started going to MMCH. This one is my second two- wheeler. My learning cycle was of a different kind - since growing up in Nilgiris, we did not learn cycling and that was not necessary also. Walking was enjoyable and I had seen no cycles, except the baby cycle having three wheels. After my first child was born, I had a servant named Chandra. She would come for the work every day in her cycle. She taught me to ride. 

   Coming back to the Kinetic Style- this one had a stepney tyre at the back, like a hair bun . The body is silver grey in colour and would look a little fatty. I had this vehicle for more than ten years, and one time we had to change the body. Then we sold it and bought a violet colour bodied Scooty pep. This is small and handy but lacks the majestic look and stability of Kinetic style ( Kinetic style appadiye nikkum -அப்படியே நிக்கும்) . I took my children to Sandhai (weekly market) , bought bangles, to musicals shop, to a pharma company ( Themis) lady doctors' lunch party - all by the Kinetic Style. Once I took both of them to V O C park in the evening in K Style, which is very much cherishable. That was the only triple ride I rode and that too turning around the round about near the bus stand and all. 

             As mentioned previously, the front separate room- the clinic was arranged with necessary furniture and instruments for an outpatient clinic and for doing minor procedures . Also a shelf of medicines for dispensing. I also stuck some nice posters on the walls and the house clinic is memorable for all of us. Not only for our family including our sister, but also for my past patients and area people, the clinic was a memorable one. This I came to know because of their conversations.

                                      

     As the time went by, as the college lecturer work of my husband, as the domestic chores and as my professional work were going on, my babies were growing. For the first two academic years after we shifted to Erode, from 2002 to 2004, they studied in SVN. Then we shifted the elder one from SVN  to BVB and the younger one from SVN to Kalaimagal Kalvi nilayam and then to BVB (Bharathi Vidya bhavan ). And the schooling went smoothly. I made them cool, never scolded them, always remained affectionate, gave importance to their feelings and requirements. I could never be a typical socially projected mother material, which  (the mother material ) was never liked by the children. My mother was also not the typical socially projected mother material and because of that we had free hand and came up in life. In fact my mother had open views to new ideas and developments. 

                                                                                         

                      My children did their studies and also participated in extra curricular activities like singing, dancing, oration etc. And, we bought many books for them, including some second hand books from town hall, Coimbatore. And I used to read and tell the story. Once I read a book, few pages at a time , told the story with some important dialogues, then again read some pages and told the story and repeating.  One incidence I want  to mention here is about a fearsome situation in which my second daughter remembered a character named Norena Devan in a story written by James Hadley Chase, and smoothly escaped from there. And I felt, it is better to share some gruesome things with children to keep them get alerted in certain situations.

    One cherishable memory was a family tour to  Nelliampathy, a hilly area in Kerala State . I wrote about this tour in my post Travelling to Nilgiris - Part 2, in which I mentioned about the female instinct. That tour like any other group tour, was filled with travelling, eating , playing and  chatting. We had few competitive games , children's dances, musical chair and  campfire at night.                                                   

   Again to Erode - being with the children in the evenings and nights were quality time. I would receive both the children coming in the school van , give them something to eat and then only go for my evening OP. There would be some snacks to eat. Also, curd rice (cooked rice mixed with curd ).  Since the children would come home after hot afternoons in school and stuffy van,  they like the  curd rice nicely crushed with hands ( Norungap pesanja thayir sadham in Tamil ). More than that, they would be hungry.

        Side story- I remember occasions when my mom gave me food mixed by her hand. When thinking about them I am able to recollect the scenes and tastes. Those occasions happened while we were in Coonoor. See, the pathway of writing about Erode house is now leading me to Coonoor house, where we grew up as school children, just the same way as my children grew up in Erode house.  38, Harewood, Coonoor-2, 643102 is the address of our house in Coonoor, which is engraved in mind.  And my adjacent house Senthilamma used to sing a song to her baby daughter, the meaning of which is, the baby beats her hands in a rhythm of thaththangi, thaththangi... ... and eats curd rice.  ( " Thaththangi thaththangi thattuvaalaam ; thayirum saadham thimbaalaam " ).

     We took our children to movies. Mostly we go for evening shows , and rarely night shows when I had to be in my clinic during evening time . One movie we went during our initial days ( year 2002 ) was  ' Gemini ', enacted by a Tamil language hero Vikram and heroine Kiran. I think that, that movie was played in  a theatre named Lakshmi theatre in a place called Agraharam in Erode and the theatre was not a hi-fi one, but the movie was enjoyed  in full. So many movies we went, sometimes discussing about the movie while travelling in the car back home. And the heroes changed from MGR, Sivaji along with my parents and Kamal, Rajini along with my husband to Vijay, Ajith along with either or both of my children. 

      And the new year evenings and nights used to be special, along with festivals Ramzan and Bakrid. We used to remain awake till 12 midnight on 31st December. Would watch Tv screen showing the time tickling to 00.00 the next year, the colours crackling when the new year is born and watching the song " Wish you happy new year.... Ilamai idho idho, Inimai idho idho... ", the Tamil hero Kamal's song played invariably  every year. Once we roamed out in Erode town , saw it was crowded, could not sit and eat ,we bought chicken etc, brought home, sat at the backyard of our house ,enjoyed and ate. 

     Initially we had many plant pots and mud area in our portico for gardening. In that there were many types of crotons and other plants. Then we grew many rose plants. There are three posts depicting the  gardening done at Erode house titled  ' செடி, கொடி,மரம் வளர்த்த கதை - பாகம் 1 ' , ' மரமல்லிகை  மரம் ', and ' செடி கொடி மரம்  ....-3  (Gardening history continuation)', and please read those if you are interested.  Watering the plants gave us a chilling experience. The word chilling does not denote anything negative, as in case of bone chilling and something like that. It actually has the literal meaning of chilling of the extremities, namely the hand and feet and sometimes water splashes either intentionally or non intentionally on the body. Also the water somewhat cools the surrounding air space also. Especially in Erode, the hot climatic area, thus playing in water is joyfully chilling. There was a guava tree, and the leaves of it were falling and my elder daughter used to broom it regularly for some period of time. My younger daughter kept a beautiful plastic red rose in a pot plant in first floor and one neighbour who used to go walking in front of our house thought it to be a real rose and asked so.

      Once, before we had much flowers in plants , on my husbands birthday, my younger daughter ran fast to a house which is in the cross street after a turning, known as  'JE ' house, because  the house- owner was a junior engineer in Electricity board. Then she ran back home bringing with her a bunch of  small small flowers and made a cone like shape with paper, kept the flowers in that cone and presented that to my husband. I was touched by her gesture.