May God forgive our wicked souls! 😉

Applying at Loyola, ‘Madras’ | & ‘Newspaper’ Memories

Wednesday, 5th June 1996

[This day, 28 years ago, from my personal diary entry!]

#memoriesfromdiaries

#newspaper

Well, my tryst with the Indian Express dates back to a few decades ago!

[Yes! Up until 1999, it was known as Indian Express across India. But from 13th August 1999, the northern editions retained the Indian Express tag, while the southern editions started sporting the new moniker – The New Indian Express!]

This past diary entry that dates back to 28 years ago in time, is the real prompt for jogging my memory bigtime, and helping me recall some of those nostalgic days when the newspaper was our daily delight!

We used to have those monthly subscriptions for the Indian Express and The Hindu that came with an added delivery charge of Re.1/- per month.

First thing in the morning, there would be a real big sibling-fight for the day’s newspaper, almost every other day - Noted down faithfully in the second part of this diary entry! (My sister fought with me!) 😊

And since May & June were holiday times, Amma had prepared her trademark yummy biryani for us at home today, for the second consecutive day.

This was also the time when we all were busy applying to colleges in ‘Madras’.

Thilakaramanujan (Thilak) my classmate and bestest friend, had brought along an application form from Loyola College, Madras, (yes, back then it was Madras, and only from 17th July 1996 it became Chennai!) for both of us.

Since ‘deadline day’ was drawing near, he had resorted to ‘signing’ on behalf of his parents in the application form. I should confess that I too played my part in encouraging him to ‘sign’ thus! May God forgive our wicked souls! 😉

Back then, we had to get our mark sheets attested, and tag them along with the application form, and so later in the day, I went to see our Chartered Accountant Mr. Anandan to attest all my original certificates, before applying to Colleges.

Interestingly, an added contender for the newspaper of the day, was a young professor named Mani, (dad’s colleague in College), who happened to be our neighbour, as well!

You see, the newspaper man used to keep the day’s newspaper wedged to the grill bar of the main gate, and then giving a quick ‘cling cling’ bell from off his Atlas bicycle, he used to dart across with such nuanced alacrity to the adjacent localities!

Prof. Mani hence, made it a point to quietly hover around the main gate for that precious little ‘some time’, and quickly grabbed the morning newspaper, the moment it was wedged, and then, gently turning towards me gave off that added gladded glee! 😊

‘In five minutes I shall give it to you, Rufus’, he used to assure me, pacifying my frayed spirits!

I quite didn’t mind even if it was fifteen or fifty minutes.

But what bothered me the most was that, he used to chaotically flip through the broadsheet, and then, removing the pages from its neat arrangement, he used to file them up in separate sections and parts and fold them with such crumples and wrinkles all over! ☹

This is something that really daunts and dampens my spirits you see! 

As for me, the newspaper should, by all means, be read in the exact order in which it is arranged when it is birthed from off press.

This has always been one of my innate idiosyncrasies as regards handling a book or a newspaper, all of the time!

Yes! I really don’t like it when a person flips through a book or a newspaper, in haste, leaving behind trails and trails of crumples, creases and crinkles on them in the process.

It’s like - you enter a beautiful garden, and then leave behind a trail of damage, devastation and destruction behind while exiting it!

So yes! I do judge a book – not by its cover!

But by its owner! 😊