Harry MacLure
‘I say, pass that thing, men,’ Dexter’s dad said, pointing at the steps leading up to the verandah. He looked like a grease monkey in his loose-fitting, oil-stained shorts and singlet that had surely seen whiter days.
‘Pass what thing, Uncle?’ I asked.
‘His cigs,’ Dexter said; like his dad, he, too, sat on his haunches, helping him wash the finer parts of the bike’s engine with dirty petrol and dirtier cotton waste. His dad’s Triumph 6T Thunderbird stood leaning against the trunk of the guava tree like a defeated prizefighter, a sad sight compared to the full-of-life red and white bougainvillea growing on the trellis that surrounded the railway bungalow on Pilkington Road.
I spotted the pack of Passing Show and a box of Cheeta Fight matches lying on the steps next to a copy of The Sunday Standard. I picked them up and gave them to Uncle Wally. Grumbling about something he couldn’t accomplish with the parts of the engine, he managed to extricate a cigarette with blackened fingers. He lit up and sent a puff of smoke into the air. ‘Those Pudupet buggers, I tell you!’ he muttered, ‘Dodgers!’
At that point of time in my life – the mid-1970s – I was in my teens and Madras was new to me, a Trichinopoly boy. I didn’t know what Uncle Wally meant, so I asked Dexter, my school pal, later, and he explained that a part of Pudupet, an area on the banks of the Cooum, was ‘infested’ with ‘shady’ motor mechanics, second-hand four-wheeler and two-wheeler spare parts shops and ‘auto rogues’.
When my dad retired from the railways as a driver and moved the family from Trichinopoly, a small junction, to Madras, the big, bustling city, everything about it at first intimidated, and later fascinated me. Big buildings, broad roads, horrendous traffic, posh shops, plenty of cinema theatres, the perpetually hurrying multitude and all varieties of human stink. And the Tamil spoken in the city was alien to the ears of an English-speaking Anglo-Indian boy like me who was accustomed to Dravidian decorum in the words and idioms used. Most of the Anglo-Indians of Madras could speak this crude street lingo, a second language to them, probably learnt from the cook, dhobi, milkman, neighbourhood baker, ayahs, vendors and cycle-rickshaw drivers – unlike in Trichinopoly, where they were a little more conscious of the nuances of an ancient tongue.
From Golden Rock Railway School, Trichinopoly, to St. Joseph’s in Vepery, opposite the Veterinary College – I was in that last batch of students who did their eleventh standard, before all schools switched over to the 10+2 system. We lived in a rented place in Otteri then, and I had a few friends in Perambur and in the Ayanavaram Railway Colony, where Dexter and his family lived. His father, Walter P. Harris, was a foreman at the Perambur Loco Works. Uncle Wally was a good-natured man, a great yodeller and a not-too-bad guitarist, famous for his quirk of stripping down and fiddling with his Thunderbird even if it was in perfect running condition. Most Anglo-Indians in the colony would come to him with their motorbike woes and go back smiling – with a complete overhauling done … free of charge.
Madras was full of Anglo-Indians then. The exodus to the UK and Australia was still on, but the community was very much visible in the city – schoolteachers, nurses, secretaries, telephone operators, air hostesses, telegraphists, musicians, sportsmen, army men, policemen and, of course, railwaymen. They loved their jobs and worked hard and sincerely – and this made them stand out from the rest.
Anglo-Indians loved to live where other members of the community lived. The favourite enclaves were Pallavaram, St Thomas Mount, Royapuram, George Town, Park Town (near Central Station), New Town (Periamet), Vepery, Purasawalkam, Ayanavaram, Madhavaram and the well-known hub even to this day – Perambur.
With time, the memory of my life in Trichinopoly began to fade, and Madras took over my sensibilities as I made new friends, visited new places and experienced new ideas. To a large extent, Dexter was my guide and guru. A ‘pucca Madras Anglo’, he showed me the ropes and taught me how to ‘discover’ the city. There were many times when Dexter and I bunked classes from school and made a beeline for Roxy, Casino, Midland, Safire or Blue Diamond to catch the latest Hollywood flick.
I was extremely fond of comics – I still am – but didn’t know where to get them. Dexter, as usual, came to my rescue. He told me about the second-hand bookstalls in Moore Market. I confessed I hadn’t been to the place.
‘What? You haven’t been to Moore Market? Are you an Anglo-Indian or what?’ he said, incredulous.
The following afternoon, Dexter ‘borrowed’ his dad’s bike. His mum, Aunty Doris, a nurse at Stanley Hospital, was on duty. His dad was busy at the workshops, also on duty. ‘Hop on,’ he said. ‘I’m taking you to Moore Market.’
I had my doubts. ‘Are you sure…? You don’t have a licence to ride…’
‘Don’t worry, men,’ he said. ‘You know Uncle James Cunningham? You don’t? He’s a top cop in Madras. One phone call to him and we could wriggle out of any sticky situation.’
I wondered how we’d wriggle out if Dexter’s dad caught us somewhere on the road riding his beloved bike, but hopped on anyway.
Dexter was a good rider. I can still remember the great thrill of riding pillion on a Thunderbird. Two teenage boys dwarfed by the massive throbbing bike, we passed through Kellys, Purasawalkam, past our school in Vepery, then approached Moore Market from behind Ripon Building.
I was impressed with the red sandstone Indo-Saracenic architecture and the easy-to-shop system around a central quadrangle. From London Stores to Chinese shoemakers, one could go round and round from shop to shop without stopping to take a breather. No wonder women loved Moore Market so much. There must have been many a tear shed when it was destroyed by a mysterious fire in 1985.
Dexter gave me the grand tour of the market. He kept the old bookshops for the last. I couldn’t believe my eyes: there were stacks and stacks of all kinds of books, magazines and comics!
Later, I came to know that Anglo-Indians from all over Madras – even from faraway places like Villupuram, Arakkonam, Jolarpet, Bitragunta, Guntakal and other railway towns – came to Moore Market to do their shopping. The well-to-do ones preferred to shop at Spencer’s, Chellarams, and at places where they sold imported goods.
Moore Market became one of my favourite haunts. I used to exchange books and comics regularly at one of the second-hand bookstalls. It was owned by an elderly man who could have easily been mistaken for an uneducated villager, but his knowledge of books and authors was simply amazing. ‘Conan Doyle? You want Sherlock Holmes?’ he’d say in his halting English. ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles? I have it. Enid Blyton? No problem. Which series? Sad Sack comics? Yes, I have.’ And he knew exactly which mountainous pile of books to pull them out of.
I even discovered – with Dexter’s help, of course – the line of beef stalls that were behind the market. This was where most Anglo-Indians caught up with community gossip and exchanged news and views while waiting to buy a pound of round or loin from the butchers who spoke English with an Anglo accent.
Another favourite meeting place as one stepped out of the market was Baanu’s Restaurant, noted for its fried prawns and mutton biryani, not forgetting the terrific dum tea.
Conversations on a Sunday at the restaurant went something like this:
‘The wife’s under the weather. No cooking happening today at home. I’m picking up something for lunch.’
‘You should learn how to cook, men, at least a simple beef vindaloo, pepper water and rice.’
‘I believe that chap Rogers was suspended from work.’
‘Serves that bugger right! He’s a pucca show-off!’
‘Timmy’s daughter and son-in-law pushed off to Australia last week.’
‘Really? Timmy didn’t tell me. Wait, I’ll catch that fellow!’
‘Peggy’s pregnant, eh? That was fast!’
‘Yeah, Jack’s quick on the draw!’
Baanu’s was surely an eavesdropper’s paradise.
Anglo-Indians are one hundred per cent a Christian community. Most of them are passionate about their faith. Apart from spending time for work and play, they also devote a lot of time in prayer at church and at home. All of us grew up on the line ‘the family that prays together stays together’.
Many Anglo-Indian families of Madras in those days faithfully made their annual visits in pilgrimage to the Church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Covelong. This church, blessed by many miracles, is very close to the Taj Fisherman’s Cove on the East Coast Road.
My mum used to tell me that, till the 1950s, the only conveyance from Madras to the church was by small sailboats that plied from Lattice Bridge on the Adyar river, to Covelong. Unlike today, there were no roads then to this church.
Anthony and Beatrice Dubier, my mum’s parents, never failed to make this trip every year with their seven children for the Covelong Church Feast. My mum always remembered the excitement of preparing well in advance for this ten-day stay at the church. They had to pack all the provisions, hurricane lanterns, clothes, portable furniture and even the pet dogs!
My grandparents, Anthony and Beatrice, were professional musicians who had a band that played live for the silent Hollywood movies for the matinée and evening shows at the Elphinstone and Casino cinema theatres. So they brought their violins, banjos and mouth organs along with them and played in the evenings on the beach, entertaining the many Anglo-Indian families who made it for the Feast. Even today, a few Anglo-Indians in Madras continue this tradition of visiting the Covelong Church during the Feast in August, but they do it in a single day.
Anglo-Indians kept neat homes. The ones who lived in bungalows prided themselves in looking after a beautiful garden, and the ones who lived in smaller places had potted plants in their verandahs. Inside, in the hall or living room, there were lace or floral curtains everywhere, well-varnished rosewood furniture, cane sofa and chairs, an easy-chair for the weary body; and then there were carved corner stands, delicate vases or pretty metallic jardinières, lace doilies on small tables, a showcase crammed with glass figurines and bric-a-brac, a bookshelf with the Bible rubbing shoulders with James Hadley Chase and Charles Dickens, and the Sacred Heart picture of Jesus on a wooden or wrought-iron altar if the family was Catholic. In the dining room, there was always a dinner-wagon that displayed fine China, crockery and silver cutlery bought at Poppat Jamal’s or Currimbhoys. And in the bedroom, apart from high teakwood beds, the ladies had their beautifully designed dressing tables – a legacy from the British Raj – to titivate themselves before leaving home. Another permanent fixture in any Anglo-Indian home was the famous meat-safe; made of wood and steel mesh, it held all the food and provisions in the kitchen.
Only in an Anglo-Indian kitchen one would find it quite natural for a son or daughter to suddenly – in a euphoric mood – take up his or her mum for a dance when there was a popular number being played on Radio Ceylon. The Murphy or Usha valve set always sat close at hand on a window sill. I’ve known many who learnt their first steps of the foxtrot, jive or waltz from their mamas in the kitchen!
Madras during Christmas time was the most anticipated season of the year. Every Anglo-Indian was excited no end, and most menfolk in the railway colony were on ‘sick leave’, either decorating their homes and the Christmas tree or helping their wives make kul-kuls, coconut sweets and wine, with good old Jim Reeves, Engelbert Humperdinck and Cliff Richard doing overtime on the gramophones and record players.
Christmas fever spread at breakneck speed in the colony and private homes in Perambur and other Anglo-Indian pockets of the city. The excitement was palpable and the air heady with the aroma of home-made wine, rum-soaked seed-and-plum cake, chocolate fudge and the Anglo-Indian favourite, dhol-dhol, which is a pudding-like sweet made out of black puttu rice flour.
Anglo-Indian youngsters in those days would block both ends of some streets in Royapuram to decorate them and have Christmas street parties with local bands belting out the latest songs practised to perfection. The most anticipated sight on 23 December was ‘The Band Wagon’, which was a decorated bullock cart that came around with a dancing Santa in it distributing gifts, sweets and good cheer.
The children’s Christmas Tree programme, a carol-singing session and fancy dress ball usually took place in the weeks preceding 25 December at the Perambur Railway Institute on Main Street, which is now called Siruvallur Road. Housie evenings and whist drives also took place over the season. These functions were not restricted to only railway families. Anglo-Indians from different walks of life came to the institute and participated in all activities with gusto. Most of these get-togethers were organized by the All-India Anglo-Indian Association that played the important role of keeping the community spirit alive with help from its many branches in the city.
Come Christmas Eve, and everyone would start to get ready for Midnight Mass. Madras, I recall, used to be nice and nippy in December, unlike now, and the good weather lent itself to ‘dolling up’. All churches, Catholic and Protestant, were crowded with Anglo-Indians dressed to kill. The ladies competed to look good with different outfits tailored by their favourite dressmakers – Shanker, Charm, Gani, Finnigan’s and Helen Blanché – who had their shops mainly in Purasawalkam and Egmore.
Christmas Day was normally spent with family and close friends. We did a round of visiting our non-Anglo-Indian friends, too, giving them trays of Christmas goodies, including a bottle of wine each.
Then came the grand festive lunch: invariably, there was buffath (a spicy, gravy-rich dish with fish, duck or pork and vegetables), chicken curry and pillav, and caramel custard or ice-creams from Dasaprakash. Wine or something stronger was also on the table to push up the merriment quotient.
Dinner was early and slanted towards the English side of things – roast pork or beef, salads, grilled duck with sauce, boiled vegetables and sugared bread pudding that dripped with Polson’s Butter. I guess in those days no one even knew the word cholesterol.
Everyone wanted to finish dinner soon so that they could concentrate on getting dressed for the grand Christmas Ball held at the Perambur Railway Institute. Anglo-Indians in St Thomas Mount, Pallavaram and Tambaram, who couldn’t make it to the Ball in Perambur because of the distance, had their own cosy little affairs close to where they lived.
The institute in Perambur took on the smell of a perfume factory and was always jam-packed with young, middle-aged and senior folk. Even children were welcomed. The ladies strutted around on the wooden dance floor in their finest evening gowns, high-heeled shoes and latest hairdos. The men, in their best suits, highly polished shoes and Brylcreemed hair, waited for an opportunity to wish and kiss the girls they fancied. Unlike the Binny’s New Year’s Eve dances at Hawkfield that were conducted in the open, the atmosphere in the institute was intense and intimate.
No one in those days had heard of DJs, and even if someone brought up the idea of playing recorded stuff at a dance, he would have been chased down the road like a mad dog. Since the Christmas ball went on till the wee hours of the morning, there were always two or more bands in attendance to provide music without a break. The MCs who were hired to conduct these dances were stars within the community; invariably, they were tall, nice-looking, had the gift of the gab and a good sense of humour. Married or single, they were a big hit with the ladies.
There was a makeshift bar at the rear of the institute that sold all kinds of drinks, and a snack counter that dished out cutlets, sandwiches and even chapatis and pork vindaloo. A few thrifty housewives brought their own food from home and shared it with family and friends when they felt peckish.
At these dances, there was always an undercurrent of friendly rivalry between Anglo-Indian boys from various localities, especially when it came to the tag dance. It was not uncommon for two hot-headed young men, on account of a pretty girl, settling their differences outside the dance hall while the band played on and people danced away into the night, oblivious to raised voices and fisticuffs.
Today, the Madras skyline and the general lifestyle have changed. The Anglo-Indian community in the city cannot boast of a large presence, and there are very few Anglo-Indians working on the railways. Our youngsters have moved on and into various other professions, including IT jobs, and are doing well for themselves. They are merging into the mainstream and some of them are marrying out of the community, but still bravely holding on to their mixed-blood identity.
The majority of our railway folk of Uncle Wally’s generation has passed on. And so has the gracious way of life and Anglo-Indian bonhomie.
The 500-year-old community is like the memory of a passing show that will inevitably be lost in the mists of time. As Dexter, who is now in Australia, might say, ‘What to do, men? We have to accept our lot … here today, gone tomorrow…’
Even to this day, when I cross the Perambur Loco Works bridge and see a train pass under and hear its pounding beat on the railway lines, I’m transported to a Madras gone by. Sadly, Chennai can never ever bring back the show again.