Music cassettes and two-in-ones
Phones that didn’t ring for months
Phantom & Bahadur, Diana & Bela
Fun fairs & circus, disco & mela
Family doctors who made home visits
Silent comedians who kept us in splits
Neighbourhood tailor & buying cut piece
Only a few hundreds for school fees
Annual visits to ‘native place’
No Byju’s Classes, Kota or PACE
‘My colony-vs-your colony’ matches
Action in the gullies, passion in The Ashes
Buying ice-cream sticks from a pushcart
Teenage crushes, till dads did us part
Playing hide & seek, rummy & bluff
Blowing away the worries, few paise a puff
Home kitchens dishing out fresh meals
No Dominos, KFC or McDeals
Mum’s cooking in love & pure ghee
Worth a thousand ‘likes’, not calorie
The first refrigerators were a rage
Some were Allwyn some Godrej
Binary choices, no Flipkart or mall
No full page ads, no promises tall
Chasing your dreams, no matter what
No fear of trolls or getting caught
Bombay ka ‘bhai’, Madras ka ‘anna’
Both crying in bed for Vasu & Sapna
Rare outings to eat ‘thali meals‘
Premier Padmini, your biggest set of wheels
Holding hands, walking to school
‘Kaali Peeli’ an exception, BEST – the rule
Watching Sunday ‘blockbuster’ on DD
Enjoying ‘Talkies’, no Dolby or 3D
Charming newsreaders, no Arnab or Prannoy
Salma (Sultan) & Komal (GB Singh) – so demure, so coy 😉
Soulful melodies, not files in megabytes
‘Eastmancolor’ after silent black & whites
Srikkanth’s sixers peeling off the Pakis’ colour
Skylab crashing on Bombay and all that horror
Jaimala & Akashwani, no Red FM
The odd Walkman, few could afford ‘em
Campa Cola, Gold Spot & Dukes lemonade
Rasna & matka paani, who needs Gatorade
Noisy alarm clocks with no snooze
Good clean fun, no ciggies no booze
Fountain pens, Nataraj pencil & Chelpark ink
Waterbury’s Red Label – if you must drink!
Days were bright, nights were starry
No flights to catch, no PPTs to carry
Slow n noisy fans, growing up ‘non-AC’
How we needed one, but it never came easy
Then came Moore’s law, internet & twitter
Hours on phone & laptop we chose to fritter
Don’t get me wrong, I like my devices
But how I miss the younger me, the older vices!
Oh! It’s a new year, let’s not fret over what’s past!
Spread a little cheer; slow down you’re going too fast
May your ship of dreams never run aground
Love people & use devices, no other way around
********************
©KP Sanjeev Kumar, 2016. All rights reserved. All pictures scanned from personal collection or Wikimedia commons.
Nice kp. Good remembrance of childhood times. Thanks
Thank you so much 🙂
FANTASTIC Kaypius – always a pleasure to read your blog
Thank you, Sir 🙂
Great. .kp….. those days Were unique
Sure they were 🙂
You are a wonderful writer with a great flair for the written word. I have always enjoyed reading all your works. Love… an ardent admirer
Thank you, o’ anonymous! i know not who you are, so putting Phantom’s Devil on your trail 😉
Thanks for taking me down the memory lane…
Life is nothing but good old memories.Wonderful penned down almost all the good things we enjoyed…
Pleasure reading KPS…
Thanks
Many thanks sir & happy Diwali 🙂
Good one Sir ! Time n thing’s have changed. Earlier we had a simple and quality time.
Now we have WhatsApp & migraines 😉
You know that when your mom’s been telling you to read the new article on the kps blog for the past few days, something gold awaits you.
Love the flair of writing, sir. 😉
Lookin out for the next one!
Very many thanks, vanshi! Mom’s always right… that’s a dad speaking 🙂
Awesome write up
..very nostalgic ..cudnt stop smiling as i was reading thru…walked down the memory lane of my school days.. beautifully penned each n every minute details…so much of home work u do…amazinnnnng….loved reading…ATB n heartiest congrats