Achaneyanenikkishtam...

Today is achan's third death anniversary . He was too early to die in 2018 ! He was born around Onam time and left us around Vishu ,making sure around both these happy occasions we remember him. From when i remember, he has been a tall, fit 70kg figure spending time in the backyard during the only Sundays he had a day off from work. He had few vices though - first was alcohol was a weakness but never to the extend it interfered with our life and second was spending money. He was very fond of investing in the single house he owned and even before a bonus or extra money would come, he would plan for it. He was by nature a spendthrift and never believed in saving up for my marriage or their retirement or never planned along with amma.

After Hari became sick in 2009 and the umpteen unsuccessful efforts to get him back to normalcy, achan was never his normal self. He was always drenched in a whirlpool of alcohol and his personality underwent a drastic change. He was angry at everything, shouting at amma ,neighbors , boasting unwantedly to even unknown people, getting into wrong deals and company etc. During my days in US from 2013, amma had to suffer it all alone. She didn't have a shoulder to lean nor an ear to pay heed to. Initially Hari made few attempts to tell achan not to drink but his condition only got worse by the day. Even while sitting in "Nandini Fancy Stores" during mornings, achan was drunk. Even though I probably didn't know even 10% of the drama back home, it disturbed to think of him and my family in the midst of all the conveniences the foreign land offered. I have cried loudly and silently ,feeling helpless to improve his situation. I almost lost achan since then.

An M Com degree holder , he was very able and if luck would have favored, he would have reached greater heights in career. Probably that frustration was always with him. Being very good at Maths, he wanted to pursue engineering but the family situation was not very condusive. Listening to his stories of misery and hardship probably was my first spark to try for engineering even though i had no clue what it entails. My focus was always on studies , get decent marks and clear Engineering Entrance on merit.  Achan was always proud of me though he has almost never attended a parent teacher meeting himself or looked at my report cards or my marks. I don't have any memory of him telling me to work harder but his wish was to see both of us peak great heights in education. He never was partial to his son or denied me any freedom being a girl. 

On Saturdays after work, he frequently would get down at Tripunithura main bus stand (instead of Kinar bus stop) , buy milk pedas and walk home in the scorching sun. Until he retired, i don't think he ever took an auto unless we were with him. He has taken us to Children's park a handful of times, to Bimbis for noodles and couple of LTC trips - one to Goa, another to Mookambika and another to Delhi which coincided with my winning National Talent scholarship. He always promised he would educate us both to whatever extend we wanted as he probably thought it is a great enabler for an individual. I almost always remember his words - "kashum panom onnum achanu tharanilla pakshe ningal etratholam padhichalum achan support cheyyum" ..When i was about 8 years , we built our own home and from then the heritage town of Tripunithura became our home. Achan's savings were not and amma's gold was just not enough for the house and he had to take a heavy loan. To add to this, was the burden of sending both of us to private school but he never even once told about it. Such was his confidence in both of us. 

My memories growing up with achan has been only good. From 1988 or so after shifting to "Nandini", he had long working days for nearly 30+ years of work.  Daily morning he would leave the house at 7:30 in the morning and come back by 7:30 pm, often drenching in sweat from the long walks from Railway station or bus stand. I remember panicking and looking impatiently at the clock and outside the gate into the darkness whenever he was late. There were no mobile phones to check on status or get an update of a cancelled train or a missed bus. He was usually never seen at home without shirt and always wore a white banyan. I loved sleeping on his hands just like i do with Sree now but at some point he discouraged me (may be around 10-11 yrs of age). He never smoked or wanted to go be away from us though this cousins were ready to take him there.  He was my protector from amma's wrath. Many days after getting beaten up for some silly disobedience or fighting with Hari, when i sit in pooja room crying, achan would come home from work and immediately relieve me. But he usually never gave us an impression that we had an impatient , short tempered mother.

He disliked when we slept into the mornings, beyond say 8 in the morning, no matter if it was a school day or holiday .He would say very often that students should eat less and sleep less so they can concentrate on studies. I was pretty focussed on academics along with involvement in school activities and cultural events. TV came around the time we were small but color TV and cable was around high school time. Our TV watching was very  limited to chitrahaar, rangoli or surabhi, that too while having dinner or doing other chores, In high school, i started ironing everyone's clothes. Once in college, i stitched my own uniform(was not very good , so didn't try with others) , basically anything that would help reduce the burden from achan's shoulders. 

During initial years of marriage, achan was pretty close to amma's family but after dispute over "Gokulam" which was supposed to be given to amma but sold without informing us, achan turned against his inlaws. Everyone became enemies and that continued until his death. He could never reconcile which meant we had to suffer as well without a relative to visit or come over. Later on, I have heard achan rebuking amma over this issue and how comfortable financially we would have been if they had given that house to us,as promised. Years later, amma slowly started visiting her parents along with us and in high school i have spent few days during vacation staying with them.

He was always apprehensive about our safety. He repeatedly told us not to step outside the house without wearing shoes , precautions to take care while going for any events outside school, not to talk to strangers or accept anything from them etc. Even for a small illness, he was ready to take us to the hospital or watch over us during sleep. 

In 8th standard , when i got the best student of the year award with cash prize of 5000, he took me to Bhima straight after the function and bough a small gold chain , my first ever. After 10th , he left it to my choice what i wanted to do next - join college or continue school. I chose to move to Chinmaya, Vaduthala , which was very far from home. Fees was more and conveyance too but i was too naive to think about those . After a month or two of going in a specially arranged tempo traveller, i started going in private bus. I was determined to study hard and win scholarship to repay the tuition fee and I did that with Mahindra Scholarship.

During 12th,while others did entrance coaching, achan told me to concentrate on boards and not toil with the entrance preparation. When i cracked the entrance with a good rank and could have landed in a Govt engineering College with education almost completely free of cost, achan wanted to keep me as close to home as possible. Model Engineering College was chosen only for that reason though i didn't want him to spend another 1.5 L back in 2000 for my fees when i could easily get into some other govt colleges but stay away from home. I still remember the counselling day when achan was making calculations how to pay the 35K yearly fees. Finally i succumbed thinking i would land up in a job earning 35K and easily pay him back. Because of his protectiveness and proactiveness, i can proudly say I never had any bad experiences in life -sexual harassment, molestation or anything even close.

Towards the end of engineering achan suggested to do M Tech and take up a teaching job. He had heard stories about how taxing IT jobs were and he couldnt stand me take up something like that. But i was keen on working for sometime before going for higher studies. I did CAT entrance coaching at TIME but couldn't get into IIM. After lot of persuasion, achan let me go to Bangalore in Dec 2002 and job hunt. He was apprehensive about my security and bought me a Siemens mobile phone also. I kept trying at so many places big and small, but wasn't getting any job. In parallel he decided to get me married even though he had no savings or any idea how it would happen. Luckily, Infosys offered me a job and in April 2003 around Vishu time,joined for training in Pune. Best days ever except for when Joby didnt clear Compre second time and was sent out ! Later on Mangalore days and then to Bangalore after wedding in 2004.

All through life, he loved Sree like his own son , infact even more than me. Later on when our kids were born, he was the happiest. He would visit us in Bangalore everytime he got a chance, give kids money, bring them toys & play with them. Post retirement, suddenly there was a lot of time in his life ,so he tried for some private jobs. Nothing really stuck and drinking became a daily thing. Hari had landed in a job by then but the real blow for all of us came in the form of Hari's illness in 2009. For an year , we tried all kinds of treatments with the hope he will slowly improve and come back.  But as years passed by, hope started diminishing and achan's depression started taking a toll on him and all of us. We were losing him and no parent can withstand a blow this big. He had big dreams for us and here was the reality ! He started doing things we couldn't relate to , a total alcoholic talking non sense on phone ,etc. In 2013, we moved to US with kids and amma had to face it all. I was becoming restless and didn't know what to do. Perhaps if achan had a brother or a sister who could convince or counsel him, things might have got better. But unfortunately he didn't . For several years, we had to stand this other face of achan until he breathed his last in 2018. It was a trauma for amma more than anyone !

PS :

Acha , Not a single day passes without your memories, without your image coming to my mind. I will always remain your ammini and love you forever ! May you remain happy wherever you are ! You have brought me up with love and imbibed confidence not to fear anything . You were a strong wall , protecting and supporting me and Hari. I want to wipe off the last 10 years of our life and just remember the rest....You had peaceful journey to heaven and am sure you are watching us from there...