Twenty- five Seven

The house at Victoria Road

April 20, 2015

Day Eleven: Size Matters (In Sentences)

Today’s Prompt: Where did you live when you were 12 years old?Which town, city, and country? Was it a house or an apartment? A boarding school or foster home? An airstream or an RV? Who lived there with you?

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Wow! That was quite a call. Having grown up with a father in the Indian Armed Forces, we changed homes almost a dozen times. The last house change was when I got married. I’ve never moved house after that. Moving house was fun though: sometimes we had to change because the job demanded we did so. At other times, we changed because my father got a promotion or was transferred to another place. Luckily we didn’t have too many geographical shifts but I can distinctly remember spending a large amount of my childhood helping my mother pack up the boxes to be carted from one house to another.

When I was twelve, we stayed in a cluster of houses called “Separated Family Quarters”, at the bottom of a road oddly called Victoria Road. The Cantonment part of Pune where the house was situated was full of these British names in those days. At that time, I had no idea why my parents’ civilian friends sniggered when they heard our address, but now as an adult, I can understand why. There was a bunch of six double storeyed buildings of four flats each. The buildings were standard government accommodation meant for officers of a particular rank. In the military rank is all that matters. So these ugly squat buildings with are replicated throughout the length and breadth of the country – uninspiring but practical. Each flat came with standard issue furniture, had ample storage space, an attached garage and an open verandah. This group of semi-detached bungalows was built around an arid field meant for us to play in, but it had more stones than grass and was home to several stray dogs that would bark whenever the trains went past. And since the railway tracks went just past our compound, they barked most of the night. The dogs also enjoyed special residential privileges as they stayed longer than the residents of the flats.

I stayed in one such flat with my younger brother and my mother. We also had a white Pomeranian and a live-in maid who preferred to stay in the flat with us rather than the adjoining accommodation that was provided for her at the back of the house.

Our neighbouring flat was allotted to an officer who was allowed to stay there, to guard the other women who were without their husbands. I don’t think he did such a good job because the lady in the house across from ours had a new lover every night. The family who lived above us had three daughter. They came down to play with use from time to time. The lady who lived on the last flat in our block was crazy. She would call my mom up for a drink every evening while she read out her husband’s latest love letters aloud. She also had a mother-in-law who insisted on going for a traction so that her spine got straightened out.

There was nothing remarkable about that house and would have been yet another in a series of houses that I grew up in except for the fact that our dog died while we were staying there.
Granny’s Adventure on the learning curve

April 20, 2015
Having gone through several avatars in different stages of my life, I am now revelling in the latest phase of being a grandmother. It is strange, but I feel that my grandson and I are on the same learning curve – he on the curve of life learning while I am on the curve of net learning. Computers and the Internet are simply mind-boggling – something that is intangible yet so impactful. Ever since I discovered the joys of the computer, I have been on this journey and over the past two years my incremental learning has been enormous.

Sunday’s BOLTDRIVES activity was one such adventure of learning.
1. The first thing I learnt on this adventure was that I can take risks – great ones at that.
2. There is a whole population of Indians who are willing to take risks and move forward
3. The Internet is not such a bogie as people of my generation tend to think
The Adventure

It all began with an email from Blogadda inviting me to participate in a fun filled activity that involved taking 8 new Bolts for a ride from BKC, Mumbai to Tiger Point Lonavala.

Around twenty bloggers met up at Cafe Infinito at BKC that describes itself as a hip and happening place at 8.00 am on Sunday morning to be briefed on the activity and a quick breakfast. The place was filled with young people and I could see myself and another gent the only two salt and peppered people in the room. With most of the people younger than my children, I was worried how the day would go, but I needn’t have worried because it went off really well.

After the introduction of the teams ( the bloggers were divided into 8 teams with a person from Blogadda as support function), the briefing by the Tata people and the staggered flag off, we switched on our ignitions for the Bolt Drives of our lives.

Our team R4 consisted of a software engineer and a social media consultant both of whom had limited experience of driving in Mumbai. The R4 was the Revetron or petrol variant of the car. Half way through the trip we had to exchange cars to get a taste of the diesel variant.

The first test was the suspension test where we had to drive over speed breakers and join the dots of an outlined BOLT. Even though the suspension was good, this task was really quite impossible and our team managed to finish about 20% of it.

Since I was the eldest member of the team, the only female and also the only one on the team to have experience of Bombay traffic, I volunteered to drive off first at least till the first test. Luckily the car started on the first attempt and as I lifted my foot off the accelerator and see it purr slowly forward, my confidence in myself increased and I made it to the ground where we were to have our first test. It was there that I realised that I could do it and decided to go ahead all the way to Panvel till the first pit stop.

I was simply amazed at myself. This was the first time ever that I’d driven a brand new car, driven on roads that I was unfamiliar with and on the highway which I had only driven on once around ten years ago! As the car throbbed with the EDM music, my co-passenger Ashwini Dodani who was sitting near me tried to figure out the other features of the car- the voice controlled panel through which you could adjust temperature, entertainment features etc. We also received our first phone call from Capt Bolt, our unknown supervisor who kept tabs on our progress.

As my confidence increased so did my speed and I was thrilled with the car’s pick up, stability and general manoeuvrability. After hitting the highway, we moved onto the car’s sport mode and immediately I could feel the pep.

When we reached our first pit stop, I was reluctant to share the driving but of course I could not be a car hog and had to let the other participants have their turn at the wheel. Ashwini drove us upto Lonavala where we stopped for a lunch break at Cafe Triose. Ashwini is not a regular driver but he found the car easy to get used to and we managed without a hitch.

The last stretch was covered by Ankit whose skilful handling of the sharp hair-pin bends belied his confession of being an occasional driver. Once on top of the plateau we had a quick photo session before we made our way back to Mumbai.

Once again, we had a pit stop at the Cafe Coffee Day which turned out to be the most disappointing part of the trip as the coffee was more like flavoured water. But we weren’t complaining really as most of us were still on a high after getting to drive the Bolt.

The verdict

The BOLT is a great car to drive and is what TATA promises: great pick up, good styling, roomy interiors, top of the line entertainment console and efficient air conditioning.

Would I buy it?

I was actually hoping to win the car but having got to drive it, would definitely be looking at buying it. The Revetron which is the petrol variant has the Turbo drive engine that allows it to be driven in three modes – Sport, City and Eco and at a price that you can’t really go wrong with. So as a car for a first-time buyer or a second car for a family who is looking for another vehicle, this is definitely worth looking at.

“A Sunday well spent at #BoltDrives with BOLT from TATA Motors in association with BlogAdda.”
Q is for Quando, Quando, Quando

April 20, 2015

Week four and almost there!

Wow! I simply can’t believe it. I’ve not only managed to sustain this challenge but keep up with my daily life too! I’ve just returned from a hectic Sunday of Blogging activity which involved a drive in Tata’s new car the BOLT which was organised by Blogadda and Tata Motors. But more about that in another post,

Today’s prompt reminded me of a strange song playing in my ear ‘ QUANDO ,QUANDO, QUANDO. Growing up in the 60’s and 70’s this was one of the popular songs that could be heard on Radio Ceylon as it was called back in the day and since morning this earworm has been active in my head.

Do enjoy this version made popular by Englebert Humperdinck whose name was as intriguing as his voice was magical. For many years this song was a great favourite and could be heard belted out in several neighbourhoods and played as a request during request hours on the radio, school fetes, jam sessions and wedding receptions.

Do any of you remember this song? Do people still have song requests dedicated to other listeners on Radio or school fetes these days? Do they have school fetes at all? And do jam sessions still happen?

I really wonder if they do.

And I wonder when will this song stop playing in my ear?

There are over a 1000 bloggers from all over the world participating in this challenge. Do pop in and see what the others are writing. It’s amazing and fascinating to discover how people’s minds work and how the same prompt can inspire different thoughts.